"Top Floor Rules"
They took the stairs because elevators are for sane nights.
Eleanor hustled after Tyson with a towel over one arm and a stitch blooming under her ribs. Terry (the large Volkov) leaned a forearm on her shoulder for leverage as they climbed—an indignity he apologized for twice between gasps—while Josh (the thin Volkov) limped a step ahead, one hand clamped to the spot where Tyson's short uppercut had taught him about ribs.
"Six flights," Josh wheezed. "We got this."
"We do not 'got' anything," Eleanor said, posh and breathless. "We are simply… arriving."
Above them, Tyson's bare feet slap–slap–slapped a metronome of purpose. He hit the roof door first, rattled the bar, and read the sign—ROOF ACCESS—ALARM WILL SOUND—LOCKED—as if it were a personal insult.
"Trap," he muttered. "I feel it."
He listened, head cocked, eyes bright with private thunder. Then he jogged down one flight to the topmost patient floor—nightside offices, chemo daybeds dark, a small cluster of single rooms, the admin lounge. The domain of the petite terror the staff called, with equal parts affection and dread, Chloe.
Top Floor / Chloe's watch
Eleanor arrived one heartbeat behind Tyson, towel ready, Terry heaving, Josh pale and heroic. The corridor here was too clean for the hour—waxed bright, hand‑sanitizer dispensers gleaming, clipboard cubbies squared off like parade ranks.
Chloe stepped out of the charge desk before anyone else could speak. Tonight her hair was braided in a tight, no‑nonsense plait that made the nurses on lower floors joke "Elsa's on duty"; at five feet, half her authority came from how little she cared about being small. Garden Grove kid, nail‑salon childhood, Shotokan since middle school; green belt in fact, black belt in rumor; the night shift's "line in the sand."
She planted herself in the middle of the hall—white shoes shoulder‑width, hands on hips—and addressed a half‑naked heavyweight like he was a toddler running with scissors.
"No running in the hall," she said crisply. "Stop right there."
Tyson did stop—more at the audacity than the command. For a breath his eyes softened in surprise; then he clocked the towel in Eleanor's hands, the two guards at her flanks, the red EXIT behind Chloe like a dare.
From behind Eleanor, Josh raised a hand in warning. "Watch out—he's—uh—intense."
Terry patted his own chest, mortified but present. "Also," he said to the carpet, "I think the stairs fixed my… earlier problem."
Chloe didn't blink. "Mr. Tyson," she said, voice like a snapped chalk line, "turn around. Hands where I can see them. Sit on the floor. Now."
Tyson lifted a palm and made a solemn little wave at her face—Jedi‑style. "There's no need for security," he intoned. "The person you lookin' for ain't here."
Eleanor could feel the failure radiate off the hand gesture like heat.
"Fantastic," Chloe said. "Mind tricks. New one." She took a step closer. "Last warning."
"I ssense a trap," Tyson said, squinting at her like a prophet who'd seen this scene before. "You can't deceive me, little kk— karate queen."
"If it helps," Chloe said, "I'm a nurse."
She slid one foot forward and chambered a front kick (textbook mae‑geri), heel to Tyson's midline.
It landed. On anyone else it might have been decisive. On Tyson it was like flicking a refrigerator. He rocked a half‑inch and stared at her as if she'd just tapped a giant.
Chloe, refusing the lesson, pivoted through a spinning hook kick she was still learning and missed the timing by a hair. Her heel kissed empty air; physics demanded a tax; she windmilled once, twice and sat down on the waxed floor with a gasp and a squeak of rubber soles.
For one suspended beat, everyone had the same thought: That was supposed to be cooler.
Tyson's mouth twitched into a wild, disappointed smile. "Do as you please," he said, breath half laughter, half sermon. "Break yourselves on my body. You can't stop the chosen one with weak tactics."
Eleanor, because decency is a reflex, used the moment to throw the towel. It draped Tyson like a crooked toga—helpful for exactly three steps before it slithered to his hips and began arguing with gravity.
Josh darted forward to Chloe, hand out. "Don't be embarrassed," he said, reverent and earnest. "You did great."
She took the hand, popped to her feet, and was instantly six inches shorter than him and ten times scarier. "Baton," she said. "Both of you. Distance only. No head or neck. He's a neuro‑obs, not a piñata."
"Copy," Josh said, fumbling out an expandable baton with the solemnity of a knight drawing a very modest sword.
Terry extended his own with a shink that made him look briefly, gloriously competent. "Policy grip," he said, to no one, then to everyone. "I know policy."
Tyson glanced past them, toward a cluster of night staff peeking from doorways, phones unconsciously halfway up before guilt lowered them. He cocked his head to the thrum of helicopters, to the mosquito whine of a drone at a window.
"Demons," he murmured, pleased. "They came early."
"News crews," Eleanor said, already moving to flank behind Terry—because she was brave, not stupid. "Not demons."
Chloe slid in beside Josh, bedpan now in her off‑hand like an aluminum shield. "Funnel him," she said, quick. "Don't chase—make him choose a side. If he grabs, peel the thumb, step off line. Eyes on the hands."
Tyson took one deliberate step toward them and the whole group shifted without thinking—two batons tracking, two nurses ghosting behind their meat shields, the towel giving up and falling to the floor like a white flag with timing issues.
Chloe set her weight and tried again with words. "Mr. Tyson, sit down. We're not your enemy."
He grinned—feral, charismatic, frighteningly alive. "Eeveryone's my enemy," he said softly. "Till they kneel."
He slid left. The little team slid with him. A couple in a doorway gasped at the famous profile, at the famous butt, at the unreality of a legend barefoot in their corridor. Tyson looked past all of it to the stairwell at the opposite end, chose it like destiny, and broke into a run.
"Move!" Chloe barked, and the unit moved—Josh long‑striding after him, baton ready; Terry chugging, heroic and pink; Eleanor right behind, one hand pinching her nose (the memory of stairwell air still unkind), the other gathering a fresh sheet off a passing cart because someone had to defend decency; Chloe a little arrow of fury and competence, bedpan half‑raised like a saint's icon.
At the bend, Tyson took the corner on a barefoot slap‑slap, wires and towel‑tag streaming. He didn't look back.
"Hands, not heroics!" Chloe called as they turned after him. "And if anyone farts again, I'm writing you up for chemical warfare."
"Yes, ma'am," Terry said on reflex.
They pounded into the next stretch of hallway—the legend ahead, the little phalanx behind, the night staff leaning out with mouths open—and the scene ended on motion: the hospital's top floor, awakened and watching, as a naked messiah sprinted toward the next bad idea and four tired mortals, somehow, kept up.