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“Officer Mallory... say something. Nod if you can hear me. Blink if you can...”

‘Hector...’

“Is he...? He’s not... You--you’d know, right?”

‘He’s not dead yet,’ said Garovel. ‘But he’s probably not going to make it.’

“You can’t... do anything? Nothing...?”

‘I’m sorry.’

Hector closed his eyes and sighed. “I failed to save him...?”

‘We failed, Hector.’ The sirens were loud enough to fill the room. ‘And if you don’t run right now, our failures will only increase.’

He ran. Out the back, through the rear yard, and over the fence. He cut between houses to avoid the street.

‘You should take your shirt off.’

He stopped behind the corner of a stuccoed house. He looked down at his shirt, riddled with bullet holes and soaked in blood. “This is...” He sighed. “This is going to become a thing, isn’t it...?”

‘Probably.’

“B-but... uh... I’m not sure... a black guy running shirtless through this neighborhood will, uh... go over so well...”

‘Better than a black guy running through the neighborhood covered in blood. From a crime scene, might I add.’

“But I... I don’t know if... uh...”

‘This is not the time to be shy, Hector.’

“You say that like it’s supposed to make a difference...”

‘Take off the damn shirt!’

He pulled it off. And as he looked at the wet cloth, he realized his hands were trembling. Arms, too, even all the way into his chest. It was faint, hardly even noticeable unless he was standing still, but there it was.

‘Ah. Your body’s gone into shock. I tried to suppress the effects, but this is to be expected.’

“What...? Why am I in shock...?”