The Blackout List

From below came the cry of a child and the squeal of a wheelchair wheel scraping too fast across tile. Lin realized, with a sick kind of clarity, that this was not a routine emergency. It was a rehearsal for the moment when every “normal” system would start melting at once. The power room door opened on a hard smell of scorch. Inside, one row of indicator lights was dead. The main cable housing had bulged like the skin of a burned snake. Marcus crouched and swept a flashlight over it, then swore. “Someone touched this.” “Who?” “No idea.” Lin stood in the doorway with the hospital cooling behind him and the cut wires in front of him.