Chapter 74 - The Cold Truth of the Bloodline
I crouched behind the steel mesh railing of the catwalk, pulling Lily down beside me into the shadows cast by an overhead air duct.
"Stay here," I whispered, my lips brushing her ear. "Do not move an inch."
"Mom, you can't fight two men with guns," Lily whispered back, her voice urgent.
"I don't have to fight them," I said, my eyes scanning the layout of the substation beneath us.
Above the white trailer ran an intricate network of industrial piping: high-pressure hydraulic lines feeding the funicular lift mechanisms, and beside them, marked with bright red stencils, the *HALON FIRE SUPPRESSION SYSTEM* manifold designed to choke out electrical fires in the transformer bank.
Directly above the guards' heads sat the manual discharge lever for the secondary Halon canister.
If I could reach the release valve without being spotted, the sudden explosion of non-toxic inert gas would create a blinding white fog and a deafening roar, disorienting the guards long enough for me to reach the trailer door.
"Lily," I said, handing her Arthur’s flashlight. "If that gas goes off, it will be completely white down there. Count to five, then shine this light directly at the main breaker box near the stairs. They’ll think someone is flanking from the north."
"A diversion," she said, nodding solemnly.
"A diversion. Be careful, my clever girl."
I slipped off my heavy boots, moving only in my thick woolen socks to silence my footsteps on the diamond-plated steel catwalk. The metal was freezing, searing through the knit fabric like dry ice, but I ignored the pain, keeping low, creeping along the outer railing where the shadows were deepest.
Below me, Evelyn’s voice suddenly cut through the drone of the transformers, amplified by the natural acoustics of the cavern.
"I don't care about the board in Geneva!" she was screaming into her satellite phone, her voice echoing off the rock. "The core terminal is in a hardware fault! Arthur must have had a dead-man trip wired into the bus. You told me the override key was on the silver drive!"
She paused, listening, pacing violently back and forth past Julian, who raised his bruised head, watching her with dull, defiant eyes.
"No!" Evelyn snapped into the phone. "Arthur didn't give it to Claire! Claire doesn't know anything! She’s spent eight years scrubbing floors and clipping coupons! She’s an idiot who thinks the world runs on honesty and forgiveness!"
She kicked the leg of Julian’s chair, sending him crashing onto his side against the tile floor. Julian let out a stifled grunt of pain, but refused to cry out.
"Listen to me," Evelyn snarled into the receiver. "Track the summit MAC address. If anyone attempts an external relay from the upper observatory, fry the lines. I am going back up to the core myself to strip the circuit by hand."
She slammed the phone shut and tucked it into her coat. She turned to the two guards standing outside the open door of the trailer.
"Kovacs. Take the service lift up to the main chamber. If Claire is still breathing, put a bullet in her spine and bring the girl to me. The girl has the locket. The old man wouldn't have trusted Claire with the analog cipher—he always knew she was too weak to carry it."
My blood ran cold. She knew about the locket. Arthur hadn't hidden it from her as well as he thought.
"And him?" the guard named Kovacs asked, gesturing with his chin toward Julian, who lay bound on the floor.
Evelyn didn't even look back. "Once we have the girl, put him down the elevator shaft. We don't leave loose ends."
She turned back into the trailer. The two guards adjusted their rifles and began walking toward the industrial lift cage at the end of the catwalk.
*08:40.*
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Time was up. If they took that lift, they would run directly into Lily on the upper tier.
I stood upright on the catwalk, threw my entire body weight against the heavy red emergency Halon lever, and pulled downward with all the strength left in my aching arms.
