Chapter 4 - THE FORTY-TWO SCREAMSThe heavy metal click of Commander Reyes's holster releasing sent a shiver through the silent ICU ward. The four federal marshals advanced in unison, their combat boots thudding against the linoleum like a death march.
Dr. Esteban Rojas instinctively stepped forward to shield Mariana, raising his hands defensively. "Are you out of your minds? This is an active intensive care unit! You pull a weapon in here and you compromise sterile protocol, let alone federal law!"
"Step aside, Doctor, or you'll be charged as an accomplice to treason," Reyes growled, his hand gripping the black polymer grip of his pistol. He didn't blink as he stared down Mariana. "Don Leonardo doesn't care about protocols. And by sunrise, neither will anyone else."
Mariana didn't move an inch. Her posture remained rigid, her eyes locked onto Reyes with a terrifying, calm intensity. With her left hand hidden inside the pocket of her white lab coat, her thumb hovered over a physical panic switch—a hardwired emergency broadcast toggle that bypassed all internal IT firewalls and streamed encrypted files directly to three independent international news networks and the Mexican Supreme Court's internal transparency portal.
"Go ahead, Víctor," Mariana whispered, her voice carrying a chilling edge. "Press your luck. But before your men put the cuffs on me, you might want to ask yourself why the hospital's central server just received a secondary data burst from Valentina's cloud account."
Reyes stopped dead in his tracks. His eyes narrowed. "What are you talking about?"
"The phone you recovered downstairs was just a decoy," Mariana lied smoothly, maintaining an unwavering facade. "Valentina knew her father searched her belongings. The real archive—all forty-two high-definition video recordings detailing the Arriaga family's operations, the financial kickbacks, and the night her biological mother disappeared—is currently uploading to a decentralized offshore ledger. The moment my heart rate stops or my passcode isn't re-verified within five minutes, the dead-man's switch triggers."
For three agonizing seconds, the only sound in the room was the rhythmic, mechanical beep-beep of Valentina's heart monitor.
Reyes stared at her, trying to read any micro-expression of panic, any flicker of doubt. But Mariana had spent years navigating the cutthroat politics of Mexico City's elite medical establishment; her poker face was forged in steel.
Slowly, almost imperceptibly, Reyes raised his hand, signaling his men to hold their position.
"You're bluffing," Reyes muttered, though a bead of sweat rolled down his temple. "A thirteen-year-old girl doesn't have the technical capacity to set up a decentralized dead-man's switch."
"No, she didn't," Mariana replied coldly. "But her mother was a brilliant software engineer before Don Leonardo forced her out of the picture. And before she died, she taught her daughter one very important rule: Never trust an Arriaga."
Before Reyes could formulate a response, a shrill, piercing alarm wailed from the nurse's station outside the ICU doors.
Warning: Main Server Firewall Breach. Unauthorized Access Detected from IP Subnet: Ministry of Justice.
Esteban gasped, spinning around toward the central monitors. "Mariana! They're not trying to take her out anymore—they're trying to wipe the medical database remotely! They're overriding the local servers from an outside terminal!"
"They're trying to destroy the evidence digitally!" Mariana realized with horror.
Reyes smirked, his confidence instantly rushing back. "Looks like your bluff just got called, Doctor. The Ministry's cyber division doesn't need physical custody anymore. They can wipe the girl's entire medical history and your precious 'evidence' with a single keystroke from downtown."
"Not if we cut the main power grid manually," Mariana said.
Before Reyes could process her intent, Mariana spun around, slammed her fist into the emergency red circuit breaker box mounted on the wall, and threw the heavy industrial lever downward with all her might.
THUD.
The entire intensive care unit plunged into pitch blackness.
Emergency backup generators kicked in a second later, bathing the room in a dull, eerie crimson glow. All digital network terminals flickered, sparked, and instantly went dead as the local firewall disconnected from the external web.
"What the hell did you just do?!" Reyes shouted, drawing his firearm fully as his men scrambled in the red gloom. "You just severed the life-support telemetry!"
"No, I didn't," Mariana shouted back, her voice cutting through the chaos. "The life support runs on isolated battery backups! But the external server connection is severed! The data is trapped inside our local hard drives, locked behind physical encryption keys that require a human fingerprint to open!"
Reyes lunged forward, grabbing Mariana by the lapel of her lab coat and slamming her against the wall. "You insane bitch! You've just triggered a federal alert across the entire district!"
Suddenly, the heavy glass doors of the ICU slid open again, but this time it wasn't federal marshals who poured in.
It was a squad of armed Internal Affairs investigators, led by Judge Elena Morales—a woman known across Mexico as incorruptible, fierce, and entirely outside the pocket of the Arriaga family.
"Drop your weapon, Commander Reyes!" Judge Morales commanded, her voice ringing with absolute authority as three armed federal anti-corruption agents leveled their rifles directly at Reyes and his men.
Reyes froze, his hand still gripping Mariana's collar. He slowly turned his head to see Judge Morales walking forward, holding a high-security judicial tablet displaying a live warrant signed by the Supreme Court President himself.
"Commander Víctor Reyes," Judge Morales recited coldly, "you are hereby placed under arrest for high treason, obstruction of justice, and conspiracy to commit digital tampering on behalf of Don Leonardo Arriaga."
Reyes slowly released Mariana, his hands trembling as he raised them into the air. "You're making a massive mistake, Judge. The Arriaga family owns—"
"The Arriaga family used to own this city," Judge Morales interrupted sharply, nodding to her agents as they swarmed Reyes and slapped heavy steel cuffs onto his wrists. "Not anymore."
As Reyes was dragged away screaming curses into the dim crimson light, Judge Morales stepped up to Mariana, who was catching her breath, smoothing down her lab coat.
"Dr. Salcedo," Judge Morales said, her expression softening into one of deep respect. "We received the emergency data burst just in time. The Supreme Court now has all forty-two video recordings."
Mariana let out a long, shuddering breath, the adrenaline finally beginning to fade from her veins. She looked over at Valentina's bed, where the young girl's heart monitor continued its steady, rhythmic pulse.
"And Don Leonardo?" Mariana asked quietly.
Judge Morales pulled a fresh arrest warrant from her leather briefcase and held it up for Mariana to see.
"A raid is happening at the Arriaga estate right now," Judge Morales said grimly. "By morning, the entire empire falls. But Dr. Salcedo... there was one video in that archive—the very last one, number forty-two—that revealed something even we didn't expect."
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Mariana's heart skipped a beat. "What was it?"
Judge Morales looked down at the tablet screen, her face pale. "It wasn't just about domestic abuse. It was a confession... about what really happened to Valentina's biological mother two years ago."
