Gallery of the Dead

One Hundred and Three

That morning, due to a broken-down truck by exit road number four, it took Tyler Weaver exactly twenty-eight minutes and thirty-one seconds to drive the nine miles between his house and his work place. That was about twelve minutes more than usual. Parking the car took him another forty-eight seconds. The walk between the staff parking lot and the staff door were responsible for another thirty-three seconds. Security check, clocking in, dumping his bag in his locker and a quick trip to the bathroom added another eight minutes and forty-nine seconds to his time. Grabbing a quick coffee at the staff room and the final walk down the corridor that led to the control room took another one minute and twenty-seven seconds — which meant that in total it took Federal Detention Center infirmary control-room guard Tyler Weaver exactly forty minutes and eight seconds to go from his door all the way to the worst day of his life.

Guard Weaver felt his heart go from resting to tachycardia as he got near the west wing control room — the infirmary’s maximum-security wing. The square control room with large bullet-proof glass windows was never, ever left unattended, having always a minimum of two officers inside it at any time of day or night, but from halfway down the corridor Guard Weaver could see no one, which was worrying fact number one. Worrying fact number two was that the control room’s assault-proof door was wide open and unattended; but the most disturbing fact of all was the large blood smear that Guard Weaver could see against the inside of the control room’s bullet-proof glass.

‘No, no, no...’ His voice got louder as he went from walking to the fastest sprint he’d ever done. With each step, the large ball of keys that hung from his belt bounced loudly against his right thigh.

Guard Weaver reached the control-room door in two seconds and nightmare became reality.

On the floor inside the control room, Guards Vargas and Bates lay in one massive pool of blood, both of their throats slit.

‘Jesus Christ!’

Guard Weaver had to step over Vargas’s body to reach the blood-splattered cell monitors. Only one maximum-security prisoner was supposed to be in the ward that day. Guard Weaver checked the monitor broadcasting the images from infirmary cell one.

Empty.

Lying in another pool of blood inside the cell was another body, who had been stripped naked. Guard Weaver immediately recognized the body he could see on the monitor as belonging to Guard Torres.

He felt his airways constrict. Breathing became a struggle.

‘Shit, shit, shit.’

Though he knew it was way too late, the first thing Guard Weaver did was raise the alarm, then with trembling fingers he called the FBI Academy in Quantico.