Chapter 3 - The Basement Extraction
Floor 42 was a labyrinth of towering server racks. The blinking blue and green LEDs of the data center provided the only illumination in the suffocating darkness. The air was frigid, kept at a constant temperature to prevent the servers from overheating.
Maria Santos pushed her cleaning cart nervously down aisle seven. The sudden power outage had terrified her. The elevators weren't working, and her radio to the custodial manager was emitting nothing but static. She just wanted to finish her shift, find Leo, and go home.
A shadow moved at the end of the aisle.
"Hello?" Maria called out, her voice echoing off the metal racks. "Is someone there? The power went out."
Footsteps approached. Slow. Measured.
A man stepped into the faint glow of a server rack. He wore a charcoal suit. His blonde hair was slicked back. In his right hand, he held a sleek, black pistol with a silencer attached to the barrel.
Maria froze, her mop slipping from her hands and clattering to the floor.
"Mrs. Santos," the man said. His voice was smooth, devoid of any accent or emotion. "You brought your son to work today. Where is he?"
"I... I don't know," Maria stammered, backing away. "He's upstairs. Please, I don't have any money."
"I don't want your money," the blonde man said, raising the weapon. "I want to know who he talked to. Call him on your phone. Tell him to come down here."
"No," Maria said, her maternal instinct violently overriding her terror. She grabbed a heavy bottle of industrial floor cleaner from her cart. "Stay away from my son!"
The assassin sighed, stepping forward. "Wrong answer."
Before the man could pull the trigger, a dark shape dropped from the ventilation ducts above.
Vance Keller landed silently behind the assassin. In one fluid motion, Vance clamped a hand over the man's mouth and drove a combat knife toward his kidney. But the blonde man was impossibly fast. He twisted, catching Vance's wrist, and drove an elbow backward into Vance's ribs.
The two men collided against the server racks. Sparks showered down as metal dented under their combined weight.
Maria screamed.
"Run!" Vance roared, grappling with the assassin. "Go to stairwell A! Go up!"
Maria didn't hesitate. She abandoned her cart and sprinted toward the glowing red EXIT sign.
The blonde man tried to raise his pistol to shoot her, but Vance slammed his forearm against the assassin's wrist, knocking the gun to the floor. It slid under a server rack.
"You're good," the blonde man grunted, throwing a devastating left hook that clipped Vance's jaw. "Private military? Blackwater?"
Vance spat blood onto the polished floor, settling into a fighting stance. "Sterling Corporate. You messed with the wrong billionaire."
The two men clashed again, a brutal, silent exchange of martial arts in the freezing dark of the data center. The blonde man was ruthless, aiming for joint breaks and lethal strikes, but Vance was an immovable object. Vance managed to land a staggering blow to the assassin's throat, forcing the man to stumble backward.
Realizing he was losing the hand-to-hand advantage, the blonde man kicked the cleaning cart toward Vance, pulled a flashbang grenade from his jacket, and dropped it.
Vance shielded his eyes just as the grenade detonated, filling the aisle with blinding light and deafening sound.
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When the smoke cleared, the assassin was gone.
Vance keyed his earpiece, his ears ringing heavily. "Arthur. The hitter is highly trained. Ex-military or syndicate. He lost his primary weapon, but he's ascending. He's coming for the penthouse."
