Make the call

There’s no time to wait around and cover your ass.

You hurry out of your room and head downstairs, where you pick up the phone.

“911 emergency,” a woman responds.

“Hi. I need to report a missing person,” you say.

“That’s not an emergency, Ma’am. You’ll need to come in tomorrow morning.”

“I’m afraid she’s in trouble. I know where she was last,” you say quickly. “And who she was with. I’m asking for an officer to check on her.”

You wait for a reply. And keep waiting. After a moment you look at the phone, puzzled. Did she hang up on you? You hang up and dial again. Nothing.

They didn’t hang up on you; the line’s dead.

You worriedly put down the phone, turning at the sound of a creak from the house.

You have a bad feeling about this, and you haven’t forgotten that open window. That by itself would be one thing, but you don’t like the dead phone line. There’s no storm or anything going on tonight.

A sudden bang makes you jump. It came from the kitchen. You hurry that way, ducking through the hallway and walking into a cold gust of wind.

The back door is open, banging against the wall.

You hurry up and catch it, then close it, finding the lock broken. Well, that solves that mystery. You shut it and hook the chain, turning around to scan the kitchen with your eyes.

There’s definitely an intruder. Whoever they are, they have guts to come after you on your home turf.

A knife is missing from the block on the counter. That noise was loud, but not loud enough that the others would have heard it upstairs. You can’t call for help with the phone dead.

You take a deep breath and swallow your panic. A leader can’t fall to pieces at a time like this. You have to act.

Find the girls and get them out?

Or hunt the intruder?