Chapter 2 - The Severed Feed
The metallic static of the walkie-talkie hissed aggressively in the tense silence of Room 4B.
"Repeat, Frank? Did you say lockdown?" the dispatcher's voice crackled through the small speaker, laced with confusion and static interference.
"I said lock this entire facility down immediately!" Frank barked back, his thumb jammed hard against the transmission button. His large frame blocked Evan from view, shielding the boy as his heavy tool belt jingled with every sharp movement. "Cut the main power grid to the west wing right now. We have an unauthorized, active wiretap tapped directly into the classroom monitoring system."
Mrs. Gable stood frozen near her desk, staring down at the spilled coffee mixing with the dust at her feet. The stern, unyielding authority she usually projected had completely vanished, replaced by a hollow, trembling disbelief.
"A wiretap?" she whispered, her voice barely audible over the hum of the overhead fluorescent lights. "Frank, who would do something like that? This is a public elementary school. We have strict privacy protocols."
Frank didn't answer her immediately. He knelt back down, tracing the severed black cables with fingers that moved with practiced precision. The wires didn't connect to the school's internal network hub. Instead, they fed directly into a specialized, encrypted transmitter tucked away behind the wall paneling—a military-grade relay unit that shouldn't have existed in a municipal building.
Evan clutched the edges of his gray and black hoodie, his knuckles turning white. "I told you someone was watching us," the boy whimpered, his eyes fixed on the small, dark lens of the smoke detector mounted high in the corner of the ceiling. "During math class, the red light on the smoke detector blinked twice. Like it was taking a picture."
Frank shot a sharp, protective glance toward Evan. "You did good noticing that, kid," he said softly, his tone softening just a fraction before hardening back into professional resolve. He pulled a pair of heavy wire cutters from his tool belt and clamped them around the thickest bundle of coaxial cables. With a sharp squeeze, copper strands snapped, and a shower of tiny electrical sparks illuminated the dusty floor.
The overhead lights flickered violently once, twice, and then plunged the classroom into an eerie semi-darkness, illuminated only by the pale afternoon light filtering through the tall windows.
Outside in the hallway, the distant, frantic chime of the automated security alarms began to wail, signaling that Frank's lockdown command had finally gone live through the building's central mainframe.
"Stay right here, both of you," Frank ordered, standing up to his full, imposing height. He unclipped a heavy steel-handled flashlight from his belt, holding it like a club. "Do not open this door for anyone until I give you the code phrase."
"What code phrase?" Mrs. Gable asked, her hand trembling as she finally stepped back from the mess on the floor.
"The rusted anchor," Frank replied, his eyes locked on the frosted glass window of the classroom door.
May you like
As he spoke, a heavy, deliberate pair of footsteps echoed from the hallway outside, stopping directly in front of Room 4B.
---
