Chapter 5 - The Price of Treason
The sniper above didn't fire immediately. A voice drifted down through the damp gloom of the aqueduct—smooth, cultured, and sickeningly familiar.
“Step away from him, Nurse Miller. Your child’s prospective donor is already waiting in room 402. Don't spoil her chances by playing the martyr for a dying dog.”
Nora stared up into the shadows where the catwalk hung above the drainage tunnel. Standing under the maintenance lights was Dr. Mercer, wearing a pristine trench coat over his tailored suit, flanked by two heavily armed mercenaries.
“You,” Nora said, her voice shaking with pure fury. “You told me this was a private grant. You took Mia’s marrow samples.”
“Mia’s marrow was never the objective, Nora,” Mercer smiled coldly, leaning against the iron railing. “Her rare HLA typing matched Roman’s nephew, who died three years ago. But her blood work provided the exact cryptographic marker Roman used to lock his personal accounts under family trust laws. Petrov needed the biological key. You were simply the delivery system.”
Roman didn't flinch beneath the red laser dot still hovering on Nora’s chest. Slowly, without taking his eyes off Mercer, he shifted his body, placing his broad shoulder directly in the path of the beam, shielding her completely.
“You always were a sloppy surgeon, Mercer,” Roman called up, his voice echoing along the wet concrete arches. “You thought my family trust was keyed to marrow? You were reading fifteen-year-old medical logs.”
“It’s enough to initiate the asset seizure,” Mercer countered, raising a hand to signal the mercenaries. “Petrov has the banks on the line right now. All he needs is confirmation that you took your last breath in this shaft.”
“Marco,” Roman muttered beneath his breath, barely moving his lips. “The storm drain bypass behind them. Two rounds.”
A deafening crack split the cavernous tunnel. Marco hadn't aimed for the men; he fired directly into the rusted hydraulic valve of the main drainage reservoir above the catwalk. A torrential wall of pressurized river water erupted from the corroded pipe, obliterating the catwalk and sweeping the two mercenaries into the raging cistern below.
May you like
Mercer screamed as the iron walkway buckled beneath him. He scrambled toward the exit ladder, dropping the encrypted data pad onto the concrete below.
Roman seized Nora’s hand, pulling her toward the drainage tunnel escape hatch as tons of water began cascading into the shaft. “Run!”
