Chapter 7 - The Vault
The toxic green gas rapidly filled the sterile air of the vault, burning my throat and stinging my eyes.
"Cover your mouth!" I yelled to Sarah, ripping off my suit jacket and pressing the fabric against my face.
We had less than three minutes before the lethal neurotoxin caused permanent, irreversible cardiac arrest.
Sarah rushed toward the heavy titanium door, desperately searching the digital keypad for a manual override sequence.
"He completely fried the internal circuitry from the outside," she coughed, her eyes watering profusely.
I frantically scanned the massive room, my highly trained mind searching for any structural weakness.
I noticed a heavy, reinforced steel access panel mounted high on the wall near the ventilation shaft.
It was the maintenance hatch used for the bank's complex pneumatic tube delivery system.
"Boost me up!" I shouted, grabbing a heavy gold bar from a nearby pallet to use as a makeshift hammer.
Sarah locked her hands together, creating a sturdy step for my heavy tactical boots.
I launched myself upward, violently smashing the gold bar against the reinforced hinges of the steel panel.
Sparks flew aggressively as the metal bent and warped under my desperate, adrenaline-fueled strikes.
The hinges finally snapped with a loud crack, exposing a dark, narrow pneumatic tube leading straight up.
I pulled Sarah up behind me, shoving her into the tight space just as the green gas entirely consumed the floor.
We crawled vertically through the dark, suffocating tunnel, our lungs burning with intense agony.
We eventually reached a heavy service grate that opened into the bank's busy executive lobby.
I kicked the grate open, and we tumbled out onto the polished marble floor, gasping desperately for clean air.
Terrified bank patrons screamed and scattered as we scrambled to our feet, covered in soot and sweat.
We sprinted out the front doors of the bank, hijacking a running taxi cab waiting at the curb.
"Drive to the airport, now!" I roared at the panicked driver, tossing a stack of euros onto the dashboard.
We boarded our private jet and flew directly back to the city, preparing for the final, deadly confrontation.
When we landed, I plugged the tracking virus into my encrypted laptop to pinpoint Elias's exact location.
The digital map loaded quickly, displaying a blinking red dot near the city's abandoned industrial sector.
But as I zoomed in on the coordinates, a sickening wave of absolute dread washed over me.
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The tracker was not broadcasting from Elias's hidden base.
It was broadcasting directly from the basement of my own suburban home.
