Release(82)

She was beginning to think that no one might ever come back into her room ever again.

It was at that point that the door finally opened, and a nurse entered, carrying another paper cup with pills.

Ariana scrambled to her feet, seizing the chair by its legs. She leapt on the nurse and brought the chair crashing down on the woman’s head.

The nurse made a strangled cry of surprise.

Ariana lifted the chair and slammed it into the nurse again.

The woman stopped making noise. She was unconscious. She lay flat faced on the floor, the pills rolling around from the spilled paper cup.

Ariana didn’t waste any time. She hurriedly stripped the nurse out of her uniform and pulled off her own gown. She dressed herself in the nurse’s uniform and draped the gown over the woman’s unclothed body.

The nurse’s uniform was too big for Ariana. She did her best to cinch it at the waist. She didn’t have a mirror in her room, so she couldn’t look at herself to see what the effect was. It would have to do.

Ariana picked up the paper cup and scooped the pills off the floor and back inside it. She used the key in the nurse’s pocket to open the door to her room. Then she strode into the hallway, her head high.

Her heart thudded against her ribs as she walked. Stare forward, she told herself. Act like you’re supposed to be here.

She didn’t catch the eyes of anyone else in the hallway, but she didn’t hide her head either. She moved as if she belonged in the baggy nurse’s uniform, as if she was hurrying to complete important business. Near as she could tell, no one gave her a second glance.

The hallway outside her room was nondescript. Gray, with a few benches outside of rooms with locked doors. Ariana walked by all of them as if she’d seen them hundreds of times and pushed through a swinging door at the end of the hallway.

She paused for a second as she emerged into an open area. There was a nurse’s station to her right, and she could see a woman huddling over the screens, not paying attention to her. Ahead of her, another hallway, making a T with the one she’d just exited. Which way to go? She couldn’t stand here thinking about it for too long. So, she picked the left hand one, away from the nurse’s station, and she started to walk again.

“Hey,” called a woman’s voice from behind her.

Ariana ignored it. She kept walking.

“You with the pills,” said the voice. “Are you deaf?”

There was no one else in the hallway. Ariana quickly debated. If she didn’t respond, that would be suspicious. If she spoke, the woman might figure out what was going on. Biting her lip, she turned. “Me?”

“Yes, you. Do you see anyone else around?” The woman who spoke was another nurse, tall, with broad shoulders and dark hair. The nurse was holding up a syringe, flicking the tip of the needle. She was alone in the nursing station except for a hospital guard who stood boredly at the corner.

“Do you need something?” Ariana’s eyes darted from the syringe to the blaster on the hip of the guard.

“Dr. Trint asked for this in Exam Room Seven.” The nurse held up the syringe. “Since you’re headed that way anyhow, can you take it?”

Ariana strode back to the nursing station with quick steps. “Sure.”

The nurse was eyeing her uniform. “Do you usually work on this floor?”

Ariana yanked the syringe out of the woman’s hand and plunged into the neck of the guard.

The nurse gasped. “What are you—”

The guard gurgled and fell to the ground. Ariana knelt to get his blaster, switched it on and pointed it at the nurse. “Shut up.” Her hands were shaking.

The nurse had gone pale. “You’re a patient, aren’t you? I recognize you. That duke’s daughter, the one who was kidnapped.”

“Shut up,” said Ariana, gesturing with the blaster. The shaking in her hands lessened a little bit as if she drew strength from the way she ordered the woman around.

The nurse bobbed her head.

Ariana looked around. There was no one else close by, but someone could round a corner or come through a door at any second. She shoved the blaster in the nurse’s face. “What’s the quickest way out of here?”

“I...” The nurse was shaking now.

Ariana didn’t have time for this. She pulled the woman out from behind the nurse’s station and jammed the blaster into her back. “You can show me then. Lead me out of here, avoid any places where I might see someone who’ll stop me, and if we run into guards or anything like that, I shoot you. Got it?”

The nurse whimpered, but she started walking.

It turned out to be easy. There was a set of stair at the end of the hallway. They took them all the way to the basement. The nurse led her to a back door, apparently used by the staff. Once outside on a back street, Ariana set the blaster to stun and shot the nurse. She shoved her inside and darted down the street.