Chapter 44 - The Geneva Transmission
Richter staggered to his feet, ripping the bloody crowbar from his shoulder with a guttural growl. Blood soaked down his tactical vest, his face twisted in psychopathic fury. He drew a serrated combat blade from his chest sheath, stepping toward Valentina as she struggled to push herself up from the floor.
"You're a nuisance, girl," Richter spat, raising the blade. "A gutter rat Arthur brought home to play house."
A loud, sharp crack echoed through the bunker.
Richter froze.
A red blooming crater appeared in the center of his throat. He dropped the knife, his hands flying to his neck as his knees hit the concrete.
Behind him stood Vance, his sidearm smoking, leaning heavily against the master terminal with blood running freely from his side. Vance didn't say a word. He pulled the trigger a second time, putting a round cleanly through Richter's temple.
The heavy commander collapsed forward, lifeless.
The bunker went eerily quiet, save for the rhythmic, mechanical hum of the diesel turbine below.
Suddenly, the main display terminal hissed to life.
The amber text vanished, replaced by an ultra-secure, encrypted satellite video feed. The high-resolution display illuminated the blood-spattered bunker in stark, clinical light.
Sitting behind a pristine glass desk in a high-rise office overlooking the moonlit waters of Lake Geneva was Victoria Pendelton.
She looked seventy, but her skin was tight, her silver hair pulled into an immaculate, aristocratic chignon. She wore a tailored charcoal suit, her cold blue eyes assessing the corpses on the bunker floor with the detached curiosity of an entomologist studying dead insects.
*"Impressive, Vance,"* Victoria said, her voice smooth, crystalline, chillingly unaffected. *"I see your tactical training hasn't completely decayed after all these years in hiding."*
Vance dragged himself over to the terminal, coughing up a spatter of crimson, his hand braced against the edge of the glass. "It’s over, Victoria. Richter is dead. Your strike team is wiped out."
Victoria offered a thin, pitying smile.
*"Richter was a contractor, Vance. Disposable. Just like Celeste. Just like my pathetic son, Arthur. Did you really believe Celeste came up with the koi pond plan on her own?"*
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Valentina rose from the floor, wiping the blood from her lip, her eyes locking onto the screen with pure hatred. "You told her to do it."
Victoria turned her icy gaze to Valentina. *"Celeste was weak. Greed makes people predictable. I merely let it slip to her that Owen’s trust was conditional upon his absolute physical resilience. I knew her jealousy would do the rest. The boy had to face mortal terror to trigger the epigenetic bond of Aegis-Seven. The koi pond was merely the incubator."*
