Story code: ST-001737
Part 2: The Metric of a Heartbeat
Marcus stepped directly into Eli’s path, his glossy dress shoes squeaking sharply on the polished linoleum. He didn’t look up from his clipboard. “Eli. Do you want to explain why the primary dispensing zone is completely unstaffed during a peak volume window?”
Eli didn’t look at the clipboard, nor did he look at Marcus’s perfectly knotted tie. His eyes darted frantically past the district manager’s shoulder, tracing a direct sightline through the store’s automatic sliding glass doors and out into the blistering asphalt parking lot.
Abernathy’s faded brown Buick sat parked in the second row, baking in the relentless afternoon sun. The brake lights weren’t on. The exhaust pipe wasn’t smoking. Abernathy was just sitting behind the wheel, a dark silhouette against the glaring windshield, staring straight ahead.
“I need to get out there,” Eli said, his voice tight and breathless. He sidestepped toward the employee exit, but Marcus mirrored the movement with practiced authority, effectively boxing Eli against the heavy metal security door he had just been locked out of.
“You need to be behind the glass,” Marcus corrected, finally looking up. He tapped his silver pen against a fresh compliance printout. “The automated system shows a manual override attempt at Register Two. Then the security perimeter registers a door breach. If a state board inspector walks in right now and sees you outside the box, we’re looking at a ten-thousand-dollar fine and your license on a platter.”
“A patient is having a crisis,” Eli said, his heart hammering a frantic rhythm against his ribs. He gripped the heavy manual override keys attached to his breakaway lanyard. The jagged brass edges bit into his palm, sharp and grounding. “He was just at my counter.”
Out in the sweltering lot, the silhouette inside the Buick moved. Through the heat distortion radiating off the blacktop, Eli watched the old man lean sideways, reaching awkwardly over the passenger seat toward the glove compartment. It wasn’t the frantic, pained writhing Abernathy had displayed at the counter five minutes ago. It was the same slow, terrifyingly deliberate motion he had shown when pocketing the empty amber bottle.
Abernathy sat back up. The glaring sunlight caught the dull, heavy gleam of dark gunmetal in his right hand.
Eli’s stomach bottomed out. The cold dread in his gut rapidly crystallized into sheer, freezing panic. Abernathy hadn’t accepted the pain. He hadn’t found a sudden well of inner strength. He had simply chosen the only permanent method left to turn the agony off.
“Move,” Eli said, shoving his open hand against Marcus’s shoulder.
Marcus stumbled back a half-step, his eyes widening in genuine shock before his expression rapidly hardened into corporate fury. “Excuse me? You do not touch me. You do not leave the secure perimeter.”
“He’s got a gun in the lot!” Eli shouted, pointing a trembling finger through the front glass.
Marcus didn’t even turn his head to look. “Store security handles the lot. You handle the pills. That is the protocol. Now swipe your badge and get back inside that box, or your employment is terminated. Right here. Right now.”
Eli patted his smock instinctively. His stomach dropped even further, hitting the floor. His employee badge-the magnetic proximity card required to unlock the heavy metal security door he had just let swing shut-was sitting on the keyboard next to his blinking monitor. He was completely locked out of his own pharmacy.
“My badge is inside,” Eli breathed, the panic rising to his throat.
“Unbelievable,” Marcus scoffed, a sneer curling his lip. He unclipped his own red-lanyard master keycard from his belt. “This is going directly into your file, Eli. I am initiating a full audit of your station the moment this shift ends.”
Eli looked desperately back at the parking lot. Abernathy was resting the barrel of the heavy revolver against his own chest, right over his heart. He was adjusting his grip with that same terrifying, mechanical detachment. The old man wasn’t rushing. He was preparing.
If Eli ran outside right now, he would never make it across the sprawling asphalt lot in time. Even if he did, sprinting and shouting at a man who had already made peace with pulling the trigger would only rush the inevitable. Startling Abernathy would guarantee the gun went off. The only thing that could stop the old man was the one thing he had begged for. The medication. The physical guarantee that the agony would end without him having to end his own life to stop it.
Eli needed the reserve stock from the manager’s safe. He needed the physical pills in his hands to show Abernathy through the car window.
Marcus swiped his master card against the wall reader. The heavy magnetic lock on the pharmacy door disengaged with a loud, metallic clack. Marcus pulled the door open and gestured inside with his pen. “Get in there. And consider yourself on administrative suspension.”
Eli didn’t hesitate. He lunged back into the enclosed pharmacy stall, ignoring the line of confused, angry customers who were now knocking aggressively on the thick glass partition, demanding service. He bypassed his register entirely, dropping hard to his knees in front of the heavy steel manager’s safe tucked securely beneath the bottom dispensing shelf.
He jammed his manual override key into the primary slot and twisted it with all his strength. It turned with a heavy, satisfying clunk.
But the thick steel door didn’t budge.
Eli stared at the small digital keypad mounted flush beside the keyhole. The red LCD display blinked steadily, waiting for the six-digit authorization code. The administrative code that corporate headquarters changed every single Monday morning. The code that only the district manager possessed.
“What are you doing?” Marcus demanded, stepping into the pharmacy box and letting the security door click shut and lock behind him. The district manager stared down at Eli, his face flushing a dark, angry red. “Get away from the reserve safe. Now.”
“I need the code,” Eli said, his voice trembling as he looked up from the floor. “I have to pull an emergency override for Abernathy. I have to show him the bottle.”
“Absolutely not,” Marcus said, his voice dropping into a dangerous, quiet register. “That inventory is locked by the algorithm. You failed the dispensing threshold. Pulling those narcotics now is a federal felony, Eli. I will call the police myself.”
Eli looked at the aggressively blinking keypad. He looked back up at the front windows, where Abernathy was slowly, methodically thumbing back the hammer of the revolver.
The thick security glass separated Eli from the desperate old man. The heavy steel of the safe separated him from the medication. And standing between him and the keypad was a manager who cared infinitely more about a spreadsheet metric than a human heartbeat.