Chapter 8 - FOUR THOUSAND DEGREES
The high-pitched hum of electronic timers echoed from the four corners of the room.
Small red digital displays attached to the steel support pillars began counting down.
89... 88... 87...
The room was already rapidly warming up.
The smell of magnesium and sulfur filled the air.
Thermite burns hot enough to melt solid steel and reduce human bone to dust in seconds.
Sofia collapsed against a metal shelf, her eyes wide with total despair.
"He's going to burn us alive," Sofia whimpered, her hands covering her face.
"He really doesn't care about me at all."
"I told you," Elena said calmly, dropping her rifle and examining the steel walls.
"Now stop wallowing and look for the ventilation duct."
"It's no use!" Sofia screamed, breaking down.
"The walls are solid steel! We're trapped!"
75... 74... 73...
Elena ignored the crying girl and walked straight to the back corner of the room.
She pointed her flashlight at the heavy metal fire extinguisher mounted on the wall.
She didn't unhook the extinguisher.
She pulled the entire mounting bracket toward herself with all her strength.
CLICK.
A mechanical latch released behind the wall.
A small, hidden chute used for disposing of classified documents opened up near the floor.
It was barely two feet wide, dropping straight into the pitch-black darkness below.
"Get in," Elena ordered, turning to Sofia.
"That's a trash chute!" Sofia panicked, looking down the dark hole.
"Where does it go?!"
"It goes to the sub-basement drainage system," Elena said, pulling Sofia up by her arm.
"It's either down the chute or turn into ash in sixty seconds."
"Choose right now!"
45... 44... 43...
The red digital timers began to beep rapidly.
The first thermite charge ignited with a blinding white flash and a terrifying WOOSH!
Sparks erupted from the corner pillar, liquid white-hot metal dripping onto the floor.
The heat slammed into their faces like a physical wall.
Sofia shrieked in terror and threw herself headfirst into the small chute.
She slid down into the darkness, her screams fading down the pipe.
Elena took one last look at the Winterfall file in her hand.
She folded it tightly and slipped it inside her sports bra.
The second thermite charge detonated, filling the room with blinding light and suffocating smoke.
20... 19... 18...
Elena jumped into the chute just as the entire ceiling began to melt into a rain of liquid iron.
She slid down the steep metal pipe at violent speeds.
Friction burned through her torn clothes as she twisted and turned through the dark pipes.
After five seconds of freefall, she slammed violently into deep, freezing water.
SPLASH!
She surfaced, coughing and gasping for air.
The sub-basement sewer canal was dark, wet, and smelled of stagnant water.
A few feet away, Sofia was splashing wildly, drowning in four feet of murky water.
Elena swam over, grabbed Sofia by her wet blonde hair, and pulled her toward the concrete ledge.
They hauled themselves onto the slippery concrete, both covered in black mud and sewage.
Above them, deep inside the building, a massive explosion shook the foundation.
BOOM!
Dust and small rocks rained down from the concrete ceiling of the sewer.
The archive room had been completely incinerated.
To Arthur Sterling and the board of directors, Elena Vance and Sofia Sterling were officially dead.
Elena sat on the wet concrete, wiping dirty water from her face.
She looked at her hand.
The fake pink diamond was gone, lost somewhere in the trash chute.
She looked at Sofia, who was lying on her back, staring at the ceiling with empty, lifeless eyes.
"He killed me..." Sofia whispered endlessly to herself.
"My own father just burned me alive..."
Elena leaned over, her face inches from Sofia’s wet, pale cheek.
"He tried to kill you," Elena corrected her, her voice smooth and cold.
"Which means you are now a ghost."
"And ghosts... can exact absolute revenge."
Elena stood up in the dark sewer, pointing her flashlight down the long, echoing tunnel.
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"Get up, Sofia," Elena commanded.
"We have a empire to reclaim."
