I hit the button on the side of my walkie-talkie headset. “The lobby is secure. How’s it going, Zoe?”
Her voice crackles through the speaker. “Don’t. Even. Ask.”
“What, you’re not having fun in there?” Trent asks.
“Very funny,” she says.
Chris looks like he’s staring at the floor, but he must be doing something on his flexi. “Like Lynne said, I can’t open the lab from here, but I’m disabling all cameras in the building and cutting the alarms so they can’t alert the police or fire department. I’ll need, like, two minutes.”
“Not a problem,” Trent says.
The seconds crawl by as we wait. Every muscle in my body is tense, waiting for another threat. Trent’s disappeared into the smoke. Chris sits behind the front desk, his eyes unfocused.
I hear a soft footstep behind me and spin around. Something hits my arm and my entire body jerks and spasms like I’ve been electrocuted. Sharp pain shocks through me and then I’m on the ground, looking up at a guard with one of those electrified batons. Karma’s come to bite me in the ass.
The guard kicks me in the side and I scream. Or I try to, but no sound comes out. My body won’t work. I can’t move my arms or my legs. I gulp down air, panic rising in my chest. I have to get up. I have to fight.
A figure moves in the smoke, silent as a shadow, creeping up behind the guard. Trent bashes the guard in the back of the head with his flashlight, but it’s not enough to knock him out. They fight, their figures hazy, while the numbness in my body fades enough for me to move again.
With a shaking hand, I grab the plastic bag in my pocket and pull out another of the chloroform rags. With my other hand, I try to push myself to my feet. One of my legs works, but the left one still feels like it’s asleep, all painful tingles and weakness. I lunge at the guard as I topple over, pulling him down with me. We hit the floor hard, and I jab my elbow onto his chest, then press the cloth against his mouth. Trent helps me hold the guard down until he collapses.
I drop the rag and fall back on the cool floor, struggling to catch my breath. Tremors of pain echo through my chest where the guard kicked me. I shake my leg out, trying to get some feeling back into it.
“You okay?” Trent asks, helping me up.
Each inhalation feels like someone’s poking my lungs with a butter knife. My ankle hurts too; I probably twisted it when I took the guard down. But I just say, “Yeah. Thanks for the help.”
“Hey, I owed you one.”
We drag the unconscious guard through the dissipating smoke to the front desk to stash his body with the other two. Each movement sends hot flashes of pain through me, and I have to lean on the desk for a moment until they pass.
“We’re done here,” Chris says into his headset. “You in position, Zoe?”
“Yep, I’m over the lab now.”
“All right, we’re heading back up.”
We get back in the elevator and exit on the sixth floor. I limp a step behind Trent and Chris, cursing my throbbing ankle and ribs. I do not have time to be injured right now.
We stop to get Adam from his office, and as soon as he sees me clutching my side, he rushes over. “Are you hurt? What happened?”
I shrug. “Got in a fight with a guard. I’m okay.”
Adam gives me a wary look like he’s going to argue, but Chris speaks into his headset. “We’re ready, Zoe.”
“Okay, lighting it up now,” she says.
We move down the hall to the lab and wait in front of the door. I lean against the wall to ease the pressure on my ankle and toss the bag of chloroform rags to Chris. There are only two left, but we shouldn’t need more than one.
Zoe’s voice crackles in our headsets. “Fire in the hole.”
She’s got one of the smoke bombs Adam made and should be setting it off in the air duct above the lab. Once the smoke enters the room, the guard will think there’s a fire, hit the alarm (which Chris cut off), and run out—giving us the perfect moment to douse him with chloroform and then sneak in.
We gather around the door, listening, but I don’t hear anything. No smoke creeps out from under the door. Did she actually set it off? Maybe the smoke bomb isn’t strong enough, or the guard doesn’t think it’s a big enough threat to leave.