You're nothing but a pathetic fraud who ran from the medical corps, Chloe screamed, grabbing my collar and ripping my shirt open in front of eighty high-society donors at the seaside benefit in N...
The digital records from Boston Mercy Hospital’s archive wing were now under federal lock-down, accessible only by Admiral Bowen’s team. I sat in his temporary command center, a repurposed conference room in the naval yard, watching a data analyst scroll through endless files. The air conditioning hummed, but the tension in the room was palpable.
“We’ve hit a snag, Leo,” Admiral Bowen said, his voice grave. He gestured to the screen.
The data analyst brought up a specific file: my admission records from five years ago. Most of the critical documents were there: my initial intake form, the vague “exploratory procedure” notes, even records of the heavy sedatives I’d been given. But one crucial document was missing.
“The original parental consent form,” Bowen explained, his finger pointing to a blank space on the digital ledger. “Signed by your father, Richard Kincaid.”
My stomach dropped. That was the linchpin. The legal authorization for anything they did to me. Without it, the entire illegal operation would unravel.
“It should be here,” I said, leaning closer to the screen. “It has to be.”
“It was originally digitized,” the analyst clarified, “but then, a specific entry was made. Marked as ‘converted to physical-only hard copy, removed from central server for archival purposes.’”
A cold dread spread through me. That wasn’t an archiving procedure; it was a deliberate act of sabotage. A way to make sure the digital trail was clean while the physical evidence disappeared.
“Who authorized that conversion?” I asked, my voice tight.
The analyst tapped a few keys. “The log shows it was approved by a senior hospital administrator, under advisement from Maritime Health’s legal counsel. The physical copy was then marked for transfer to the subterranean paper archive.”
The subterranean paper archive. I knew about it. A forgotten network of concrete tunnels and vaults beneath the hospital, rarely accessed. A perfect place to bury something forever.
“The audit is scheduled to commence at 0700 tomorrow,” Admiral Bowen said, checking his watch. “They’re running out of time.”
Just then, my phone buzzed with a message from an anonymous source – a former classmate loyal to Chloe who was now having second thoughts. It was a cryptic text: “Chloe in basement. Shredding. Tonight.”
A severe summer thunderstorm was rolling in, the sky outside turning an ominous bruised purple. I looked at Admiral Bowen. “Chloe knows. She’s trying to destroy it.”
“The hospital security is on high alert due to the audit,” Bowen warned. “And a storm like this often triggers rolling blackouts.”
But I knew what I had to do. Chloe, the architect of my public humiliation, the keeper of my father’s ultimate betrayal, was going to destroy the last piece of tangible proof of my innocence. The original parental consent form. And she was doing it tonight, in the darkest, most isolated part of the hospital. I had to get there before her, before the storm, before it was all gone forever.
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