Chapter 5:Is Anyone There?
401 Words
Andrew was wrapping the last strip of surgical tape around his forearm when he heard it.
A faint, stuttering crackle from his hip.
He froze, then reached down slowly and unclipped his radio. The device was scuffed badly along one side — he hadn't noticed until now — likely damaged in whatever had put him on that alley floor. The screen was cracked, a hairline fracture spider-webbing from the top left corner down through the channel display. He tapped it once and the static sharpened briefly, like a signal straining against distance and interference.
Then a voice broke through the white noise.
"— hello? Hello, is anyone receiving? This is Officer Mia Reyes, badge 2-2-7, broadcasting from the fourth precinct dispatch. If anyone is out there, please respond. I repeat — is anyone there?"
The voice was young and measured, but Andrew had spent enough years on the force reading people through their voices alone. Underneath the professionalism was something pulled very tight. Fear doing its best impression of composure.
He pressed the transmit button immediately.
"This is Officer Andrew Callahan, badge 1-1-4. I'm reading you. Go ahead."
Static.
He released and pressed again. "Reyes, this is Callahan. Do you copy?"
Nothing but the hiss of dead air returning his words to him.
He looked down at the radio and his stomach dropped. The transmit button depressed without resistance, sinking too easily into the casing with a hollow, mechanical click that produced no tone, no beep, no confirmation light. He pressed it repeatedly, each time meeting the same hollow nothingness.
The mic was dead. Receiver still partially functional, transmitter completely gone.
"Damn it." He said it quietly, through his teeth, the words landing hard in the empty pharmacy.
Mia's voice returned through the crackle, repeating the same broadcast on what sounded like a loop, cycling every thirty seconds or so with minor variations — as though she was sitting somewhere, alone, sending the same message out into the dark and waiting for something to come back.
"— if there are any officers operational in the city grid, please respond. Situation is critical. I am at —"
The signal dissolved into static before the location came through.
Andrew stared at the broken radio in his palm.
She was out there somewhere. Alive, broadcasting, and completely unaware that the only person who'd heard her couldn't say a single word back.
- Writer
