One Life ✓

Chapter 27: The Countdown Shift

A/N: Today's a dual chapter day! The last one was short so here's a treat!
Shannon—San Antonio Memorial Hospital, San Antonio, TX

Few Days Later

Mollie hangs up the ER hotline phone. "All right, guys. Today's brief is that there's an incoming flight to San Antonio from Paris, France, and they have some crisis going on up there. We'll have to see, they may have patients for us."

Grace taps at her Mac from behind reception, where she now works for a good part of the day. Her unreal speed has started to slink away, replaced with a weird urge to eat ice cream and broccoli together. She gets easily distracted on cases, which is actually pretty funny, and one more patient file would likely drive her batty.

She scrolls through the news. "Nothing new here. No details on what's going on. The pilot isn't responding. They might actually put the city on terror watch."

"Terror watch? Oh my God." Bri looks terrified. Clearly this didn't happen in Oklahoma.

"Update us if anything happens, okay?" TC nods at Mollie and Grace.

"I'm calling in to airport security every five minutes," responds Grace. "That and I'm surfing public records, flight tracking, San Antonio news, national news, world news, anything I can get. I have nothing on the possible situation."

"So, Tee, you and I are on field, if we have to go," Drew concludes.

"Don't die, na?" Grace raises an eyebrow at Tee. "You have that habit of yours. The jackass effect. Impress the women by one-upping the men."

"The jackass effect," I snort. "Hey, who's gonna Snap that?"

TC grins, then peers at me. "Shannon? We'll have to take you, if anything."

"Wait, me?" I know I look taken aback, because I am. "I'm not a war dog, you know."

"Well," Drew lowers his voice, "the remaining war dog is too busy eating, sleeping on the job, and walking around the hospital in slo-mo for the next five months."

"All right," I agree. "Just don't make me jump from heights or anything. Those aren't good news."

Grace's laptop pings. She scrambles to lean across to the desk to check it. Cue two minutes of trying to surmount her bump to scooch the chair.

"All right," she finally says. "You guys are going to be going with a select Army para team to retrieve any wounded. But they only want military personnel."

"Why?" I'm confused.

"You can consider our airport the front lines." Grace looks up at us nervously. "There's been a revolt on the plane. No rhyme or reason, but as far as I know...it's a terrorist hijacking."

Drew—San Antonio International Airport, San Antonio, TX

I shrug on my bulletproof vest over familiar fatigues. TC is beside me, loading up the guns.

"Back in Afghanistan, huh?" I buckle the vest.

"Yeah, man. Terrorists, hijacking. All in a day's work." Tee hands me an extra clip and fixes the earpiece that will keep us in contact with SAM.

"How is the baby doing?" I ask, the thought making me smile.

"Good, everything's normal. Well, the OB says it's actually great. Grace told me that they can hear me now. I sit down every day before work and talk, just talk to our boy. It's kind of silly, but I just want him to know me." He grins sheepishly. "But the food...we go shopping for groceries every few days. Grace depletes our stuff so fast it's scary. I'm pretty sure it's the soldier in her."