Chapter 26 TIME OF DEATH 5:00 PM!
The rapid footsteps of nurses echoed down the hospital corridor as stretchers rolled past...The family groaning, blood staining white sheets, oxygen masks placed on everyone's face.
“Emergency patient one: deep puncture wound to the ribs, lacerations to the forehead, multiple glass shards embedded throughout the body. Name—Jolie.” The announcement cut through the air.
Beside her, another gurney rushed forward. Emily.
Her neck was twisted at an unnatural angle, her hands deeply cut, shards of glass glinting under her skin. Her pulse was weak, barely there.
HOURS EARLIER
The family car had caught fire after being pulled from the bridge wreck. The ambulance had not arrived alone.....firefighters had too. Two men dove into the freezing water, racing toward the sinking vehicle.
The car was heavy—metal and flame sinking fast. Jolie’s body floated motionless, bubbles escaping from her lips as water filled her lungs. Emily, barely conscious, was trapped but alive. She clawed desperately at Jolie’s seatbelt, fighting to free her.
“Come on! Come on!” she cried, her voice muffled underwater.
The metal pipe jammed through Jolie’s ribs was impossible to remove. Emily screamed in frustration, blood seeping from her own wounds.
One firefighter reached them, dragging Emily upward as she thrashed to stay with Jolie. Her hands slipped away as she was pulled to the surface.
“Let me go! She’s still down there!” she choked, before her body went limp. She fainted the moment she reached the shore. The firefighter carried her back to the ambulance
“She’s critical, pulse fading!” a paramedic shouted, pressing an oxygen mask over her bloodied mouth. “Load her in, now!”
Moments later, another firefighter emerged, Jolie in his arms. The metal rod was still impaled through her ribs, part of the car seat still attached. It couldn’t be removed. Not yet. Removing it would kill her instantly.
“Gracious Almighty,” the paramedic breathed, pressing trembling fingers to her neck. “Her pulse is faint, barely there. Move! Now!”
They stabilized what little they could, packing towels and thick gauze beneath her abdomen to slow the bleeding as the ambulance tore toward the hospital, sirens wailing.
Police sealed the crash site, yellow tape slicing the night.
END OF FLASHBACK
Inside the operating room, chaos ruled.
“Scalpel,” Dr. Ethan ordered. His gloved hands moved fast but precise, sweat trickling down his temple beneath the surgical light. The air reeked of disinfectant and blood.
He worked on Jolie, shards of glass glinting beneath the harsh light. One by one, he pulled them out—nineteen... twenty. His tray clinked with each bloody fragment.
“Forceps,” he said. They were handed to him instantly.
He cut carefully along her ribs, his eyes narrowing. The embedded metal pipe pressed dangerously close to her lung.
“One wrong move, and we lose her,” he muttered.
“Fluid,” he said next, and a nurse brought a straw to his lips so he could sip water without breaking concentration.
He exhaled sharply and began to work again, steady hands despite the tremor of exhaustion.
Meanwhile, in the adjoining room....Emily’s surgery.
“Heart rate dropping...pulse, faint—blood pressure collapsing!” a nurse shouted.
“Clamp the artery!” the lead doctor commanded. Blood spurted across his gloves as he worked swiftly, his tone calm but clipped. The nurse inserted sterile pads deep into the wound to slow the bleeding. Emily’s mouth parted slightly.....blood slipped past her lips.
“Heart level lower: forty-five!”
“Keep her stable!”
The surgeon’s voice grew urgent as Emily’s body jerked violently against the table.
“Defibrillator—now!”
ZAP!
Her body arched. The monitor blared....flatline flickers.
“Charge to 200, again!”
ZAP!
Still dropping. “Heart rate twenty-two!”
Back in Jolie’s operating room, Dr. Ethan’s eyes darted to the monitor as her pulse plunged. The instant the metal rod was lifted out...blood sprayed in a violent arc, splattering his face shield.
“Doctor, she’s bleeding out!” a nurse screamed.
“Pressure here! Suction, now!” he shouted, voice sharp. He grabbed a hemostat, clamping the artery near her lung as the nurse vacuumed the pooling blood. The suction roared, the air thick with iron and panic.
“Get me gauze—no, more than that! Pack it....deeper!”
The team scrambled. A nurse pressed down, but her gloves slipped in the flood of red.
“Her heart’s slowing: thirty-eight!”
“Don’t let her flatline!” Ethan barked, sweat dripping from his jaw. He reached for the surgical needle, sewing fast, desperate. Every second mattered.
The monitor wailed.
“Epinephrine!”
A syringe was pressed into his palm, he jabbed it straight into Jolie’s chest.
“Come on, Jolie… breathe,” he whispered under his mask.
Beep... beep.....The rhythm stuttered, faint, then flatlined.
“Charging, 300! Clear!”
ZAP!
The shock hit her body, no response.
“Again! 350!”
ZAP!
Still nothing. The monitor screamed an unbroken tone.
Dr. Ethan froze, his gloved hand trembling over her chest. His eyes burned behind the mask. Around him, the nurses’ faces fell.
The room went silent, except for the shrill, endless beep.
He pulled off his gloves slowly, voice hollow.
“Time of death… 5:00 p.m.”
UNDERGROUND
Erica’s hand reached for the phone that had been buzzing nonstop. She rubbed her tired eyes and picked up the call, her eyelids fluttering open and shut with each slow blink.
“Hello,” she answered, her voice hoarse and heavy with exhaustion.
“An accident occurred… five are in the hospital wing, and two didn’t make it.”
The phone slipped from her hand. A cold wave of shock rushed through her veins, freezing her in place.
Her throat tightened as she whispered, almost to herself, “Jolie… Emily…”