Chapter 10 - Breathless Retribution
"One," Logan whispered.
Matthias was dialing a satellite phone near the vault keypad. Fiona was still babbling on the floor, pleading with him to hurry.
"Two."
I kicked off my heels, planting my bare feet on the cold concrete to gain traction, clutching the pre-loaded syringe in my right hand.
"Three!"
Logan slammed his elbow through the glass of the Halon station and pulled the red lever down with a violent metallic screech.
Instant chaos.
High-pitched klaxons shrieked across the ceiling. Heavy magnetic fire doors slammed shut down the hallway, sealing the vault chamber off from the rest of the mansion. White, suffocating gas hissed violently from high-pressure nozzles in the ceiling, instantly displacing the oxygen in the corridor.
Viktor shouted, choking on his own breath, reaching blindly for his weapon.
*Crack! Crack!*
Logan fired two precise shots through the fog. Viktor dropped like a sack of stones against the steel door, his weapon skittering across the floor.
Fiona curled into a ball, gasping for air as the oxygen dropped to zero.
Matthias spun around, coughing violently, his face turning purple as he scrambled blindly toward the escape hatch on the north wall.
I didn't run. I moved with calculated precision, holding my breath, stepping over Viktor's bleeding form, and caught Matthias by the collar of his bespoke Italian coat.
He turned, terror wildly flashing in his bloodshot eyes as he saw me through the white cloud of Halon gas. He raised a fist, ready to strike my stomach, ready to murder our unborn child with his bare hands.
"Serena—" he wheezed, starved of air.
I ducked beneath his wild swing, hooked my foot behind his ankle, and slammed him flat against the concrete floor.
Before he could push himself up, I drove my knee hard into the small of his back, pinning him down, and plunged the three-inch needle directly through his trouser leg into his femoral muscle.
I slammed the plunger home.
Matthias gasped, his eyes bulging as the paralytic hit his bloodstream.
"What... what did you... do?" he croaked, his jaw instantly going slack, his fingers locking into rigid claws against the stone.
I leaned down until my lips were right against his ear, breathing the thin, filtered air from the small emergency pocket-mask I had pulled over my mouth.
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"Collateral losses within acceptable parameters, Matthias," I whispered. "You're going to lie right here, completely awake, completely paralyzed, while the world watches you burn."
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