Chapter 6: The Clovers Lab

"What is it, Henry? is it safe to get in?" she whispers, as she takes the spray can out from her backpack.

"Jesus…" the boy whispers back.

"This is the place. She’s in there. She… she’s busy. We’d have to rush her."

The boy peers around for a door in, and wonders how hard it would be to smash the glass in a lab like this. It was probably designed against that very occurrence.

"If we are quick, we can get her. She’s big!"

From what Henry can see, the door appears to be on the other wall of the room, around the bend in the corridor. It's a glass door and it's currently closed, though it's impossible to tell for him whether it's locked or not.

"We have the spray cans, right? ... maybe if we rush her, we can go for her eyes first? She'd be big and blind..." she whispers to the others.

She then casts a glance from the direction they came from. "That woman back there. Do we want to do something about her too? Not too hot at the idea of having her behind our back."

"I have rope," Mikael suggests. "She probably wont like me tieing her up though."

"Let's get inside of there quick." Sabine suggests. "If these windows are glass we can knock them out with crowbars and bats. If not, we can use hair spray blow torches to heat up the plexi, make it brittle, and then knock it out with bats and crowbars. If the door proves too resistant, I'll shoot out the lock."

"Our objectives: Save the kids and not let this monster escape."

"You got it, Sabine," Mikael says, "let's all just watch each other's backs. We've got this. " He removed the crowbar from his backpack and nods to indicate he was ready to press forward.

"Right! After me. Quick."

Henry, stooped, scurries under the window, and around to the door. He sits beside it, hunched down and looks back at the others.

"Ready? Let’s stop this!"

He stands, and using the small space the corridor provided, barges the door.

Stina rushes in after Henry and takes in the sight of the machinery.
Holy shit... This is more complex than I thought... COME ON, COME ON!

Her mind thinking fast, her eyes following cables and wires, trying to figure out a way to put it out of use.
Ignoring the tattooed woman, she runs behind some consoles and starts tampering...

She curses as one of the metal coverings behind the machine cuts deep into the palm of her hand, causing a gash that immediately starts bleeding liberally... She perseveres despite that.

Focus, goddammit! she thinks, ignoring the pain in her hand and trying to force the back panel of the machine open. You cannot let those trapped kids down now!

Just then, the recurring memory of her failure pervades her mind - a film clip she has played a million times over in her head. A younger Stina riding her bike at high speed, upset for a stupid discussion with Mum. She had let her rage do the driving, over to Anna's house to let some steam off... but her cat... you didn't react in time, you clumsy idiot... your reflexes were shit. TOO SLOW, STINA...

She sees the scooter tyre over the white fur, feels the bump - hears the crunch of broken bones.

The metal cuts deeper into her hand, she groans in pain. She tries to tap into her burning rage, surging within her like a red tide Can you react now, or will you let people down again? CAN YOU, YOU USELESS PIECE OF SHIT??

The panel gives way and opens, exposing the wires inside - Stina sighs in relief, dives in and starts disconnecting with bleeding hands.

Mikael runs up to the machine near Stina. He looks into her eyes and nods. "Let's do this together. You keep working the system while I dig in and see if I can't find a way to navigate through the shut-off procedure while getting the kids out safely."

He looks around for some sort of system manual, but seeing nothing, begins routinely studying the controls and studies it as swiftly as he can. As he does, he finds that he is beginning to understand not only what the controls must do, but what order they are meant to be operated, based on how the machine is designed.

A small voice in his mind nags at him, telling him maybe things are better this way. Dad's not in prison now, we might have another chance. He pushes past the thought - even if there was a chance with this new reality that things might be different, he would always know they weren't right. He is determined to get these kids out safely.

He tells Stina which levers to reset and then which to pull, what buttons to press, and in what order. At the end is a big red shut-down button behind a thick plexi-glass shield, screwed to the machine. He whips out his swiss army knife and uses the screwdriver tool to pry the shield free. It slips as he puts his weight behind it and it stabs painfully into the meat on the palm of his hand. He yelps in pain as blood runs from the wound, but he sets the tool back and manages to remove the shield after several more moments before smashing down on the button with a bloody hand.

Sabine rushes into the torture room the second Henry bashes in the door. She keeps low and blindsides Dr. Sundgren, as the evil woman is threatening the boy locked separately in the side room, with a gun.

'Come on Sabine. Don't let these kids down. Don't let them die by the hands of this maniac. You have to stop her from shooting someone. Don't let these kids die on your watch. You are here for them when you couldn't be for Mom an Dad. Stop this killer...'

She brings the bat down across the tattooed arm holding the gun and hears bones breaking. As the woman screams, she keeps swinging..and swinging...and swinging...

Mikael steps forward, closer to the bat-wielding Sabine. "Sabine," he says, then louder, "Sabine!" He places a hand on her shoulder, "Sabine, stop. I still have that rope - let's tie her up and figure out the best way to do this. Regardless, I don't think we should let her walk away from this. Not like Jarnek and Dr. Liv. I'm tired of seeing the bad people walk away like they did nothing wrong." He looks to Henry and Stina. "They can't keep getting away with this shit. First, lets get the kids out of this machine."