Chapter 5 - The Sister's Betrayal
"Ashley, what are you doing?" I screamed, my voice barely cutting through the ringing in my ears.
Ashley’s hands were shaking violently, but her grip on the heavy pistol remained terrifyingly firm.
She wasn't aiming at the mercenaries storming through the front doors; she was aiming directly at Emma.
"She brought this to our family, Emily!" Ashley cried out, tears streaming down her dust-covered face.
"Mom is dead because of her, and now we are going to die too!"
Emma slowly turned around, her expression hardening into a mask of pure, calculated indifference.
She didn't raise her own weapon, knowing that any sudden movement would cause the panicked woman to pull the trigger.
"Shoot me, and you'll be dead before my body hits the floor," Emma warned coldly, gesturing toward the advancing mercenaries in the lobby.
"They don't care who pulled the trigger, they only care that there are two faces that look exactly like mine."
Ashley sobbed, the heavy reality of Emma's words finally penetrating her frantic state of mind.
"I just wanted a normal life," Ashley whispered, her arm slowly lowering as the adrenaline faded into exhaustion.
Suddenly, a barrage of suppressed gunfire erupted from the hallway, shattering the glass partitions of the nearby offices.
The mercenaries had heard the explosion and were closing in rapidly.
Emma didn't hesitate for another second.
She grabbed Ashley by the collar of her jacket and hauled her violently through the jagged hole in the concrete wall.
I caught Ashley as she stumbled into the dark subway tunnel, pulling her away from the crumbling debris.
Emma dove through the opening just as a hail of bullets chewed away the edges of the concrete where she had been standing.
"Move!" Emma commanded, clicking a tactical flashlight onto her pistol and illuminating the damp, trash-strewn tracks.
We sprinted blindly into the darkness of the subterranean tunnel, the distant rumble of an approaching train vibrating through the soles of my shoes.
"They will follow us," I yelled over the echoing noise, struggling to keep pace with my highly trained twin.
"Let them," Emma replied grimly, pulling a small remote detonator from her pocket.
She pressed the button without looking back.
A secondary, massive explosion rocked the tunnel behind us, collapsing the breached bank wall and completely sealing the entrance with tons of impassable rubble.
The shockwave knocked us off our feet, sending us sprawling onto the cold, grease-stained gravel of the tracks.
I coughed up a lungful of dust, my ears ringing so loudly I could barely hear the approaching train.
Emma scrambled to her feet, shining her flashlight down the tracks.
"We have to get off the main line, a train is coming in less than two minutes," she warned, grabbing my arm and pulling me up.
We hurried along the narrow maintenance walkway, searching for a service door or a ventilation shaft to escape the deadly tracks.
Ashley was limping heavily, her designer heels completely ruined, complaining loudly about her twisted ankle.
"Shut up and walk, or I will leave you down here to get run over," Emma snapped, showing zero tolerance for Ashley's weakness.
I grabbed Ashley's other arm, helping her limp faster as the blinding headlights of the subway train rounded the curve ahead.
"There!" Emma shouted, pointing her light at a heavy, rusted metal grate set into the tunnel wall.
She kicked the grate with her combat boots, the rusted hinges groaning but refusing to break.
The train was bearing down on us, the deafening screech of metal on metal filling the tunnel with terrifying intensity.
I grabbed a heavy piece of loose rebar from the tracks and jammed it behind the grate, using all my strength to pry it open.
With a final, desperate heave, the grate snapped off, revealing a narrow, pitch-black maintenance shaft.
We dove into the hole just as the massive train roared past, the violent rush of air nearly sucking us back onto the tracks.
We lay in the dark, suffocating shaft, gasping for air and listening to the rhythmic clacking of the train cars passing by.
When the train finally faded into the distance, Emma clicked her flashlight back on, illuminating the small, brick-lined space.
"Where does this lead?" I asked, wiping the grime and sweat from my face.
Emma pulled a digital mapping device from her vest, studying the glowing green screen carefully.
"It leads to an old, abandoned Prohibition-era smuggling tunnel," Emma answered, her brow furrowing in confusion.
"But according to this map, the tunnel doesn't lead to the surface."
I looked at my sister, feeling a sudden wave of dread wash over me.
"Then where does it lead?" I asked softly.
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Emma looked up from the screen, her eyes filled with a terrifying realization.
"It leads directly underneath the headquarters of the very people trying to kill us."
