Chapter 4 - Smoke and Iron
The crack of a high-caliber sniper rifle echoed across the warehouse before Viktor could react. Marcus leaped from the catwalk, his heavy body slamming into Viktor and knocking him hard against a stack of shipping pallets. The bullet shattered the concrete where Viktor had stood a fraction of a second earlier, sending stone chips flying like shrapnel.
""Ambush!"" Marcus roared, returning fire toward the rusted crane tower overlooking the pier.
Alexei seized the moment. Scrambling on hands and knees, he threw himself over the edge of the dock and plunged into the churning black water below. Viktor rolled onto his knees, ignoring the pain shooting through his shoulder, and fired three rounds into the water where his foster brother had disappeared, but the river swept the traitor away into the gloom.
Gunfire erupted from all sides of the dock. A black convoy of unmarked utility trucks smashed through the perimeter fence, disgorging masked mercenaries armed with military-grade assault rifles. This was no disorganized hit; it was an organized eradication team meant to mop up whatever survived the hospital attack.
""Boss, we have to fall back! The docks are compromised!"" Marcus yelled, dragging Viktor behind a steel shipping container as automatic fire ripped through the metal skin above their heads.
Viktor’s eyes blazed with a manic, icy fury. He swapped magazines with practiced muscle memory. ""They didn't just come for me. If they knew I was coming here, they knew I left the hospital.""
Marcus’s radio crackled through the static and deafening roar of gunfire. The frantic voice of the lieutenant left at the ICU came through: ""Commander! We’ve got breach teams in the south stairwell! They’re using tear gas! They’re after the girl!""
The blood in Viktor’s veins turned to liquid nitrogen. They weren't trying to assassinate him here—they had used Alexei as bait to pull Viktor and his best operators away from Elena and his mother.
""Kill them all,"" Viktor commanded, his voice dropping into a register of primal brutality. ""Take their vehicles. We’re going back.""
Viktor broke from cover, firing with terrifying precision. Each round from his pistol dropped a mercenary in the rain. Marcus and the remaining men advanced like a scythe through wheat, brutal and uncompromising. Within three minutes, the dock was silent save for the groans of the dying and the steady hiss of rain on burning tires.
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Viktor climbed into the driver's seat of an intercepted armored SUV, slamming the door. His phone vibrated against his ribs. A text message appeared from an unknown encrypted number:
Her heart started again. Let's see if she survives the night shift.
