Denton screamed at the top of his lungs as both his hands went up to his throbbing head. He curled up in a fetal position and grit his teeth as he rolled back and forth on the floor, stars dancing across his field of vision. He closed his eyes tight and concentrated on his breathing while his head pulsated with pain.
"Denton, are you alright? What happened?" Tanner asked in his ear, an unusual concern in his voice.
"My head," Denton grunted.
"Your head? What about your head?"
"There was someone in here, in the last bedroom," Denton said and forced the words through his teeth. "He tripped me, I hit my head." Denton touched the bump that was forming on his forehead and felt something wet. He looked at his fingers and saw a red smear. Blood.
"What? Who was it?"
"I have no idea. And yeah, my head is killing me, thanks for asking. And I'm bleeding, I think."
There was a temporary moment of silence during which Tanner felt extremely bad. Denton took advantage of the quiet and struggled to his feet and stumbled out of the bedroom. He wiped his hands on his pants, and he stumbled towards the door, unsteadily, one hand rubbing the bump on his forehead. "Do you have eyes on him?" he asked Tanner.
"On who? Oh, the guy in the bedroom? Hang on, checking the cameras."
Denton made it out of the apartment and dashed towards the lobby area by the elevator. He emerged from the corridor and immediately saw the officer that had been guarding the door on the floor, groaning on the floor.
"Tanner? Where is he? He knocked out the door security."
"I don't see him. The cameras on that floor are down. The elevators are not moving though so I don't think he went that way."
Denton knelt down to check on the guard. He looked up when he heard a door slammed shut.
"He took the stairs," he shouted to Tanner and ran towards the stairwell. "I'm going after him."
"Good, good. Just be careful. I don't have any live feeds from the stairwell, except at the ground level. The door to the lobby and the emergency exit to the street."
Denton yanked open the door to the stairs and ran over to the railing. He bent over in an attempt to steal a glance at the source of the steps, but all he heard were the echoes of his assailant running down the stairs. With a grunt he started down the stairwell, his body protesting as he took the stairs three steps at a time. The descent was quick, and he continued past the eighteenth and seventeenth floors, glancing over the railing every few steps. On the sixteenth floor he stopped, his hand on the railing, doubled over. His body ached, his lungs burned, and legs once again felt wobbly. He didn't have to look down the stairs to know he couldn't catch him.
"Any sign of him? Do you see him?" he shouted to Tanner between breaths.
"I told you, I don't have any live cams in the stairwell, I can't see him."
Denton hesitated for a moment. His body screamed at him, protesting the mere possibility of any further descent down the stairs. He made a snap decision and ran through the door, into the lobby of the sixteenth floor and over to the elevator. "Come on, come on," he whispered as he jabbed the button for the elevator. "Tanner, I'm taking the elevator down."
"The elevator? Why would you do that? You'll lose track of him."
"I will anyway. There's no way I'm going to make it down the stairs in time and catch him. Remember, I just got out of the hospital. I'll be dead before I get to the bottom. What's your view of the lobby and outside the building?"
"Cameras cover all sides of the building as well as the lobby. I can't miss him."
"You better not. I'm going down." Denton said and stepped into the elevator as the door opened to the sound of a small chime. He tapped the button for the lobby multiple times and waited impatiently while the elevator delivered him to the bottom floor. He squeezed through the doors as they opened and hurried towards the lobby. His eyes darted left and right across the open space, but there was no sign of him.
"You got him?" he said as he positioned himself behind a pillar, just next to the front doors.
"Nothing yet."
"Ok, keep your eyes peeled. We can't lose him."
"Got it."
Denton leaned against the pillar and drew a few deep breaths. Then he waited. Whoever had been in the apartment had to pass either through the lobby or the emergency exit at the bottom of the stairs. Entering any other floor would lead him further into the building and not out. He'd be trapped. The two exits were the only two options, and he covered the front one. Tanner had the other one covered with his cameras. Then it dawned on him. Tanner was covering the other exit, but he wasn't physically there. He wouldn't be able to do anything to stop him.
"Tanner, we need to lock the building down," he suddenly said as he left his hiding place and ran towards the security room.
"Wait, what?"
"I can't cover both exits myself. I've got a 50/50 chance he'll come my way. If he tries to get out through the emergency exit, you won't be able to follow him."
"I'll be able to track him, guide you to him," Tanner protested.
"Yeah, but for how long?" Denton said as he burst through the door to the monitoring room of the building security. A security officer seated in front of a bank of monitors looked up, with big eyes, his wide-open mouth full of food. He scrambled to his feet, his one hand stretched out with a fork pointed towards Denton, the other on his firearm on his hip.
"Hey hey hey, who are you? Whadda you want?" he shouted as he waved his fork at Denton.
Denton flashed his credentials. "I need you to lock the building down. It's a matter of national security."
The guard raised an eyebrow as he examined Denton's credentials. He slowly lowered his fork. "National security, huh?"
"Yes. There's a fugitive in the building. You need to lock it down before he gets out."
The guard glanced at Denton for a few moments and then picked up the phone. "Yeah, it's me," he said to the person on the other end. "Condition Zero. Lock down the building. Nobody leaves."
Immediately, red lights started to flash outside the security room. Denton nodded his thanks to the guard and ran back into the lobby. He could hear the clicks as the doors locked and shut everyone inside. A soothing voice announced over the building PA system that the building was in lockdown mode and that all residents were advised to stay indoors for their own safety until further notice. The guard at the front desk nodded at Denton. "That should do it."
"Yes, thank you. Do not open it up until I authorize it."
"Roger that. Now what?"
"Now we catch him."
Denton walked away from the security guard. "Tanner, I need you to get the rapid response team over here. I have a feeling he's hiding in the building, and in my condition, there's no way I'll find him."
"Got it."
Five minutes later, multiple rapid response vehicles arrived in front of the building. Denton knew from his training that there would be others deployed around the building. The security guard let them in through the front door and then locked it again. The sergeant walked up to Denton.
"Rawlings, sir. I understand you have a fugitive in the building."
"Yes. He took a couple of us out before he disappeared from a suspected crime scene on the nineteenth floor. As best I can tell, he ran down the stairs but seems to have disappeared. I need the whole building searched. We have to find him."
"Roger that." The sergeant turned to his men, and moments later, they fanned out to search the building floor by floor, apartment by apartment.
Denton collapsed on a couch in the lobby, his body grateful to be off of his feet. "Tanner, anything?"
"Nothing. Whoever was in that apartment did not exit the building."
"So he's somewhere between here and the nineteenth floor."
"Yep, that's likely. The sergeant and his team will find him."
"So we wait," Denton said, sighed and made himself comfortable for what he knew would be a long wait.
~~~
Well, what do you think? Who's the assailant? Is he still in the building? What does he want? As always, if you like this chapter, hit that star and leave a comment, let me know what you think.