Chapter 187: The Runaway Madwoman

2022-05-20

“Don’t fool around, this is not the time!” The head nurse glanced around but got no response. Everyone finally realized just how serious things were. Aside from the security guards and us, if anyone else could hit the alarm now, it’d be those psychiatric patients locked in their small rooms.

The head nurse let out a startled cry. “Did someone escape?”

Just then, we heard a security guard shout from downstairs. “Something’s wrong! Quick, someone help! Someone’s escaped!”

The shout came from below. We raced downstairs and found that the iron door to a room on the second floor was wide open. My mind spun. Wasn’t this the room where the woman who always faced the wall was kept? But now she was gone—no sign of her anywhere.

Sweat poured down the head nurse’s face as she shouted into her walkie-talkie, then rushed into the room. Sure enough, it was completely empty.

“How did she get out?” The head nurse turned to us. “All the doors are locked from the outside. Unless someone opened it from out here, there’s no way to get out. Only the old man’s room can be locked from the inside. The rest can’t.”

I frowned, picking up on her implication. So I said, “You mean someone among us opened the door?”

The head nurse barked into her walkie-talkie. “Attention! Everyone, listen up! An Area A female psychiatric patient has escaped. I repeat, an Area A female patient is missing. We haven’t confirmed her appearance or ID yet, but Area A patients are highly aggressive. Let me say it again—an Area A patient is loose!”

She glared at us. “You lot better not make things worse. Just stay out of the way and I’ll be grateful. If this doesn’t get solved, my year-end bonus is toast.”

She yanked her electric baton from her belt and called to her team. “Come with me, let’s go after her. That woman can’t have gone far.”

Watching her rush off, I suddenly remembered seeing that woman lying stiffly on her bed when we first arrived—it struck me as suspicious even then. Now, there really was something off. But how was her disappearance tied to us? Was it connected to our case?

Gazing at the open door and the empty room, I stepped inside.

Standing at the doorway, I took a careful look around. The room was tiny—just a bed, nothing else. The bed itself was welded together from a single sheet of iron, so there was no way anyone could use it for anything—no way to make a weapon or pick a lock.

On the wall, I spotted some faint marks—hundreds of thin, vertical scratches clustered by the bed, looking fresh and newly carved. I took a closer look at the latch from the doorway.

“Flashlight,” I said to Gu Chen.

Gu Chen handed me a flashlight. I shined it into the latch and saw some bright new scratches inside. A picture flashed in my mind—this kind of latch could be easy to open. I’d just need fishing line and a small round stone.

But before getting in here, everyone’s things were thoroughly checked.

I closed my eyes, picturing how it might have been smuggled in. In Area A, even utensils were made soft to prevent patients from using them as weapons. So how did she sneak anything through the search?

We’d tie fishing line to a small stone, wrap it in a wad of rice, and swallow it. Tie one end of the fishing line to a tooth, and carry the whole setup inside. Later, with your back turned, dig the stone back out. Now you’ve got a tool to open the door.

Swing the stone through the bars of the window so it catches on the iron door. Then, thread the line through the outermost bar, and tug. That would slowly pull open the latch. More likely, the person swallowed a small magnet, using it to ease up the latch until the door opened.

But opening the door would get caught on camera. Suddenly, it all made sense—the scratches on the wall were to track time. This room, unlike the old man’s with a little window, had no windows, not even a light. Locked in the dark, with no clue about day or night or the seasons, these patients had no sense of time at all.

Notches on the wall—maybe a way to keep time. Judging by their length, I guessed each one stood for a second. Each row held thirty marks, a hundred rows made one block, and there were three such blocks—a whopping nine thousand marks in this small area.

Nine thousand seconds, that’s about a hundred fifty minutes, or two and a half hours.

So for two and a half hours, the woman did nothing else—no interruptions, just carving nine thousand marks to measure time. But why count the seconds? I had a guess. From the moment she entered till she escaped—she was counting down.

What was she trying to do?

I said, “Let’s go. Team Leader Shao is still outside—let’s find out what happened.”

Downstairs, the place was empty except for the security guard at the door.

I walked over. “Where is everyone?”

The guard answered, “Nobody’s left. They all ran out.”

I glanced at the TV monitor—pitch-black. “What happened?”

The guard shook his head. “I’ve got no idea. Just now, the screen suddenly went dark, and I don’t know why. Some people went out to check the lines. I stayed here with your Team Leader Shao. Then I saw someone dash out—he tried to stop her but couldn’t.”

He told us what happened. “Two people chased after her, but I don’t know where they went. The ones checking the lines came back and said someone cut the wires. Then the alarm started blaring, and everyone rushed in. Not long after, another group ran out. Now it’s just me here.”

He gestured as he spoke, but his story only left me more confused.

I tried to piece together what happened with the security guard while thinking over the situation. I couldn’t shake the feeling that there was a deeper reason behind the woman’s escape. She must’ve had a purpose for being here. Otherwise, she couldn’t have gotten her hands on the magnet and fishing line. Someone must have helped her.

Just what was she planning?

“Let’s go,” I told the others. “See what’s happening outside. You, stay here.”

The security guard nodded.

When we stepped out of Area A, nearly all the security guards were gone—they must have gone after the madwoman. I frowned. Realistically, getting out of Area A should be almost impossible. How did she manage to run out in broad daylight and not get caught?

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Unless someone on the inside helped her—or there’s a secret passage.

After a while, a big crowd shuffled back inside—headed by the head nurse. Several guards were dragging a wild-looking woman in Area A’s uniform. It seemed they’d caught her after all. Even as they held her, she kept struggling frantically.

Watching her, I felt something off—this woman didn’t feel like the calm, cold figure I’d seen before. She was much too agitated.

I hurried over. “You caught her?”

The head nurse nodded, glanced at Team Leader Shao, and said, “Yeah, Team Leader Shao caught her. No idea how she got out.”

I pressed, “What happened with the cameras?”

The head nurse said, “Someone cut the wires outside. No clue who.”

“Show me,” I said.

The head nurse pointed to a guard. “You take them. I’ll put the woman back.”

With that, a guard led us out.

Like I’d heard, this was an old psychiatric ward. The wiring ran outside the building. The guard showed us—the main power line had been snipped, so the TVs had no power and could no longer show the feeds.

I glanced around—no patrol posts nearby. Which meant, if someone wanted to cut the power, it would have been easy.

“You think someone could escape from Area A?” I asked the guard.

He shook his head. “Area A might be old, but it’s solid. The walls are thick, and there’s no way the patients can break out. There’s also an electric fence. If anyone touches it, they’ll be shocked unconscious and trigger the alarm. Even if she left her cell, there’s no chance she’d make it out of Area A. So relax—the head nurse just loves to freak out.”

But something was wrong. Judging by all the careful planning, there’s no way someone clever enough to sneak in a magnet would rush her escape. If she knew how to hide things, she must’ve thought about how to get past Area A’s defenses.

Suddenly, a vivid scene played out in my mind!