Chapter 8 - Five Minutes of Air“Cover your mouth.”
Lily pulled her shirt over her nose.
“What is that?”
“I don’t know.”
“That is not reassuring.”
“I’m trying not to lie to you anymore.”
“Maybe start tomorrow.”
Despite everything, I smiled.
The countdown showed 04:31.
The gas appeared faintly white beneath the red emergency lights.
I scanned the room.
Server enclosure.
Console.
Cooling ducts.
Maintenance access.
Every secure data facility had redundant ventilation because servers generated heat.
If one system was injecting suppressant gas—or something worse—another might lead outside the sealed chamber.
I climbed onto the console.
“What are you doing?”
“Finding air.”
I ripped open the nearest ceiling grille.
Cool airflow.
Wrong direction.
The vent was pushing gas toward us.
I searched the opposite wall.
A low return vent sat near the floor.
I kicked its grille.
Nothing.
Again.
Metal bent.
Lily joined me.
Together we pulled it free.
Behind it was a duct barely wide enough for one person.
“Get in.”
She stared.
“No.”
“Lily.”
“You first.”
“Not happening.”
“You always do this!”
“This is not the moment.”
“It is exactly the moment! You disappear, you lie, you decide everything alone, then show up and expect me to obey because you’re protecting me.”
The countdown reached 03:42.
“We can have family therapy after we survive.”
“Promise?”
“Yes.”
“Fine.”
She crawled into the duct.
I followed.
The metal passage was tight.
Gas drifted behind us.
Lily moved quickly until the duct angled upward.
Then she stopped.
“What?”
“Fan.”
I heard it.
A powerful ventilation fan spun ahead.
We couldn’t pass through.
I reached through darkness.
The fan housing had an emergency shutoff box.
Locked.
Of course.
I pulled Holloway’s small surgical scissors from my pocket.
He had accidentally—or perhaps deliberately—left them attached to my bandage kit.
I jammed them into the latch.
Twisted.
The box opened.
Three switches.
No labels visible.
I picked the largest.
The fan stopped.
“Go.”
We crawled through.
Behind us came a heavy metallic bang.
Then another.
Mercer was trying to breach the blast door.
Good.
He wanted the archive badly enough to come inside.
Let him.
The duct ended at another grille.
Lily kicked it out.
We dropped into a maintenance tunnel.
The air was clean.
I sucked in a breath.
Lily lay on the floor laughing hysterically.
“We just crawled through an air vent.”
“Yes.”
“This is insane.”
“Yes.”
“My sister is a secret commando nurse.”
“No.”
“You had a code name.”
“Please stop.”
“Nightingale.”
“Lily.”
“Nightingale!”
I covered her mouth.
She laughed into my palm.
For ten seconds, we were sisters again.
Not hostage and rescuer.
Not survivor and secret.
Just Mara and Lily.
Then gunfire echoed through the bunker.
Federal teams had arrived.
I pulled Lily up.
“Stay behind me.”
We moved toward the sound.
The maintenance tunnel ended beside the outer communications room.
I cracked the door.
Mercer’s remaining man lay wounded near the stairs.
Another was surrendering.
Real tactical officers shouted commands from above.
Mercer was nowhere visible.
Then a pistol pressed against the back of my head.
“Don’t.”
My entire body went still.
Mercer.
Lily turned.
He aimed another weapon at her.
“You are incredibly difficult to kill.”
I looked at him.
His face was streaked with blood.
“How did you get behind us?”
“Bunker has more than one route.”
He motioned us toward another tunnel.
“Move.”
Outside, agents shouted.
Mercer fired toward them.
We ran.
The tunnel sloped downward.
Water dripped from overhead.
I realized where we were heading.
The harbor.
An old emergency submarine loading exit.
Mercer had planned an escape.
We emerged onto a narrow concrete dock beneath Pier Seventeen.
A small black boat waited.
Engine running.
One pilot sat aboard.
Mercer pushed Lily toward it.
“Get in.”
She stumbled.
I followed.
Then a voice came through the tunnel.
“Mara!”
Agent Sloan.
Mercer fired twice.
Sloan ducked behind concrete.
“Mercer!” she shouted. “You’re surrounded!”
He laughed.
“By people who don’t know half the names on that archive.”
“You’re done.”
“People have told me that for twenty years.”
He shoved Lily aboard.
Then he turned toward me.
For the first time, I saw uncertainty.
He knew the fragment was gone.
He knew federal teams had captured Vale.
His network was collapsing.
All he had left was escape.
“You come with me.”
“Why?”
“Insurance.”
“No.”
He aimed at Lily.
“Yes.”
I stepped onto the boat.
Mercer followed.
The pilot accelerated.
Gunfire cracked behind us.
Agents couldn’t risk shooting because of Lily and me.
The boat shot into Baltimore Harbor.
Wind hit my face.
Mercer forced us toward the rear deck.
“You ruined everything.”
I looked at the skyline.
“No. You did that eight years ago.”
“You think releasing those files fixes anything?”
“No.”
“Then why?”
“Because names matter.”
He frowned.
“The eleven people you killed had names.”
“So does everyone who dies in war.”
“They had families.”
“So do enemy combatants.”
“You still don’t understand.”
“I understand better than you.”
Mercer’s expression hardened.
“You were good once.”
“I’m better now.”
He laughed.
“As a nurse?”
“Yes.”
“You were wasted in that hospital.”
I looked at Lily.
Then back at him.
“You saw people as assets, liabilities, targets, leverage. I spent eight years learning to see them as people again.”
“That makes you weak.”
“No. It reminded me what strength was for.”
The boat made a hard turn.
Lily lost balance and fell against Mercer.
I saw her hand move.
Fast.
She pulled the spare magazine from his belt and threw it overboard.
Mercer spun.
“You little—”
I hit him.
We collided against the railing.
His pistol went off.
The pilot shouted.
Mercer punched my injured arm.
Pain shot through me.
I nearly lost my grip.
He shoved me backward.
“You should have died in that valley!”
He raised the weapon.
Then Lily picked up a red emergency flare launcher from beneath the seat.
She pointed it at him.
“Leave my sister alone.”
Everyone froze.
Mercer stared.
“That’s not a toy.”
“I figured that out from the word emergency.”
“Lily,” I said carefully.
Her hands were shaking.
Exactly like mine.
Mercer smiled.
“You won’t fire.”
Lily looked at me.
I knew that expression.
Fear.
Not weakness.
Information.
“Put the gun down,” I told Mercer.
He moved the pistol toward Lily.
She fired.
The flare struck the deck beside his boots.
Mercer jerked backward.
His foot slipped on the wet edge.
He grabbed the railing.
For one second he hung over black water.
I could have stepped on his hand.
Could have ended eight years of nightmares.
He looked up at me.
Maybe he expected revenge.
Instead, I grabbed his wrist.
Mercer stared.
“Why?”
“Because I’m a nurse.”
I pulled.
With Lily’s help, we dragged him back onto the deck.
He immediately reached for his weapon.
Then a shot cracked from somewhere behind us.
The pistol flew from his hand.
Another boat roared alongside.
Federal maritime agents.
Sloan stood at the bow.
“Try it again,” she yelled, “and the next one isn’t going into your gun.”
Mercer finally stopped.
Agents boarded.
They forced him to the deck and cuffed him.
Lily threw her arms around me.
I held her tightly.
The sunrise was beginning to color the harbor.
I thought it was over.
Then Sloan’s phone rang.
She answered.
Her expression changed.
“What?”
She looked at me.
“When?”
Silence.
Then she lowered the phone.
“Mara.”
“What happened?”
“The evidence fragment never reached headquarters.”
My stomach sank.
“The convoy transporting it was intercepted.”
“By whom?”
“We don’t know.”
“What about the archive?”
“Without that key, they can’t decrypt all of it.”
Mercer laughed from the deck.
Sloan kicked the pistol farther away from him.
He looked at me.
“You thought I was the end of it?”
I stared at him.
“There’s someone else.”
His smile widened.
“Vale was never the top.”
Lily tightened her arms around me.
May you like
Mercer whispered:
“Black Lantern is still alive.”
