Chapter 9 - THE GIRL WHO RAN BACK INTO THE DARK
Ramon didn't remember moving.
One second he stood in the clearing.
The next he was at the hatch.
Esteban raised his pistol.
Gabriel tackled him.
The shot went wild.
“Go!” Gabriel shouted.
Ramon went underground.
Behind him came the sounds of fighting.
He didn't look back.
The concrete stairwell shook.
Dust fell from the ceiling.
Red emergency lights flashed.
“Lucia!”
No answer.
He reached the lower corridor.
Smoke drifted beneath the ceiling.
Sprinklers had activated.
A computerized countdown echoed through the halls.
FACILITY PURGE IN THREE MINUTES.
Ramon's chest tightened.
“Lucia!”
A distant cry answered.
“Here!”
He ran toward it.
Found a locked door.
“Lucia?”
“Ramon!”
He fired the lock twice and kicked.
The door opened.
Lucia stood inside with three other children.
Two boys.
One girl.
All younger than twelve.
Ramon stared.
Lucia was crying.
“I heard Gabriel say there were kids.”
“How did you get here?”
“I hid in the other car.”
Ramon wanted to be furious.
Later.
If they had a later.
“Everyone come with me.”
One boy shook his head.
“My sister.”
“Where?”
“Other room.”
The countdown continued.
TWO MINUTES, THIRTY SECONDS.
Ramon checked the corridor.
“Which room?”
The boy pointed.
Ramon ran.
He opened another locked chamber.
Five children.
Then another.
Four.
By the time he returned, thirteen terrified children were gathered behind him.
Too many.
Not enough time.
“Hold hands.”
They moved toward the stairs.
The floor shook again.
A section of ceiling collapsed ahead.
Lucia screamed.
The path was blocked.
Ramon turned.
Alternative.
The archive maintenance shaft.
Half a mile.
Too far.
Then he remembered something.
Isabel had said they were moved through doors.
The children had been brought in somehow.
“Who knows another way out?”
Silence.
Then a girl raised her hand.
“The food elevator.”
“Show me.”
They followed her through the corridor.
Ninety seconds.
The food elevator was an industrial lift large enough for supply carts.
Ramon opened it.
No power.
“Inside.”
The children crowded in.
Lucia remained outside.
“Go.”
“What about you?”
“I'm coming.”
“You won't fit.”
She was right.
Ramon stared at the manual pulley.
The lift could be released upward using a counterweight system.
But someone had to stay outside.
Lucia understood.
“No.”
Ramon crouched.
“Listen to me.”
“No!”
“You're going up.”
“You promised!”
“I promised I'd come.”
“You said you came!”
“I did.”
“Then come again!”
The words nearly destroyed him.
The countdown reached one minute.
Ramon gripped her shoulders.
“Lucia, look at me.”
She sobbed.
“You run when the door opens. You get everyone away from the clearing.”
“What about you?”
“I'll find another way.”
“Promise?”
Ramon hesitated.
He did not make blind promises.
He remembered saying that to Isabel.
Then he looked at the terrified children.
“I promise.”
Lucia entered the lift.
Ramon pulled the emergency lever.
Nothing.
He pulled harder.
Metal groaned.
The platform moved.
Slowly.
Too slowly.
Ramon put his entire weight against the mechanism.
The lift climbed.
Ten feet.
Twenty.
Children cried.
Lucia pressed her face against the metal gate.
“Ramon!”
“Keep going!”
Forty seconds.
The lift rose out of sight.
Ramon released the lever.
A locking mechanism caught.
He ran.
Behind him, the computer voice continued.
THIRTY SECONDS.
He sprinted toward the maintenance shaft.
The first explosion hit before he reached it.
The wall threw him sideways.
His ears rang.
Smoke filled the hall.
He forced himself up.
Twenty seconds.
He reached the archive.
Door jammed.
He rammed it with his shoulder.
Nothing.
Again.
The frame bent.
Again.
It opened.
He crawled into the shaft.
Ten seconds.
Metal tore at his coat.
Five.
He had covered maybe thirty feet.
Not enough.
One.
The world exploded.
Above ground, Lucia emerged screaming from the food lift hidden inside a storage shed two hundred yards from the clearing.
“Run!”
The children ran.
She turned back.
The forest floor rose.
A violent shock wave tore through the trees.
The ancient oak split down the middle.
The clearing collapsed inward.
Lucia fell.
Victor reached her first.
He had arrived with reinforcements seconds earlier.
He pulled her up.
“Where's Ramon?”
Lucia pointed toward the collapsing earth.
“He's inside!”
Victor's face went blank.
Gabriel limped toward them.
Blood covered one side of his face.
Esteban was nowhere visible.
“Ramon?”
Victor shook his head.
Gabriel looked at the crater.
“No.”
He started forward.
Victor grabbed him.
“It's collapsing.”
“Let go!”
“You'll die.”
“He's my brother!”
“So help me find another way.”
Lucia stood trembling.
Then looked toward the forest.
“The pipe.”
Everyone turned.
“What pipe?” Gabriel asked.
“The man with the cane showed me before. When he helped me run.”
Gabriel stared.
“What?”
Lucia pointed downhill.
“The big pipe where the air comes out.”
Gabriel understood.
“Ventilation exhaust.”
They ran.
The outlet sat nearly half a mile away behind thick brush.
Smoke poured from a concrete opening.
Victor shouted Ramon's name.
Nothing.
Gabriel dropped beside the vent.
“Ramon!”
A faint sound came from inside.
Coughing.
Lucia began crying.
“He's there!”
Victor and two men removed the grate.
Minutes later, Ramon crawled out.
His coat was torn.
Blood ran from his forehead.
But he was alive.
Lucia hit him so hard he fell backward.
She climbed onto his chest.
“You lied!”
Ramon coughed.
“About?”
“You said you'd find another way.”
“I did.”
“You took too long!”
For the first time since entering the forest, Ramon laughed.
A real laugh.
Painful.
Exhausted.
Alive.
He hugged her.
Then Isabel arrived.
She jumped from Helena's vehicle before it stopped.
“Lucia!”
The reunion was louder this time.
Angrier.
Isabel cried while scolding her daughter.
Lucia cried while apologizing.
Ramon sat on the wet ground watching them.
Gabriel lowered himself beside him.
“Children?”
“Thirteen.”
Gabriel closed his eyes.
“Thank God.”
Ramon looked at him.
“Esteban?”
“Escaped.”
Of course.
Victor approached holding the remote.
“He dropped this.”
Gabriel examined it.
“It's dead.”
“So what now?” Victor asked.
Ramon stood slowly.
“Now he has nothing.”
Gabriel looked toward the ruined clearing.
“Not nothing.”
“What?”
“He still has the dead man's archive.”
“You said we had the master.”
“We had one master.”
Ramon's expression darkened.
“One?”
“Salvador never trusted a single copy.”
Victor stared.
“How many?”
“Two.”
“Where's the second?”
Gabriel looked at the ruined oak.
“I thought it was down there.”
Ramon understood the implication.
If Esteban triggered the explosion, he wouldn't have destroyed his only leverage.
“So he moved it.”
Gabriel nodded.
Ramon's phone rang.
Unknown number.
He answered.
Esteban's voice.
“Touching reunion?”
Ramon looked around the dark forest.
“Where are you?”
“Somewhere with excellent internet.”
Gabriel went pale.
Esteban continued.
“You saved thirteen children. Admirable.”
“What do you want?”
“Nothing now.”
That was worse.
“Esteban.”
“Your brother taught you about the protocol, I'm sure.”
Ramon looked at Gabriel.
“Yes.”
“Then you'll appreciate the elegance.”
A notification appeared on Ramon's phone.
A website.
A countdown.
11:59:21.
Almost twelve hours.
Beneath it:
ORTEGA ARCHIVE PUBLIC RELEASE.
Esteban laughed softly.
“At noon tomorrow, every secret becomes public.”
Ramon stared at the timer.
“If you wanted the archive released, you'd do it now.”
“Correct.”
“So this is leverage.”
“Still quick.”
“What stops the clock?”
“You.”
Ramon's eyes narrowed.
“Explain.”
“Tomorrow morning at eleven, you will walk into federal headquarters and confess to every crime your father ever committed.”
Victor cursed.
Esteban continued.
“You will accept responsibility for Arden, the forest facility, bribery, kidnapping, trafficking, everything.”
“Things I didn't do.”
“Truth is a luxury for men without families.”
Ramon looked at Isabel holding Lucia.
“If I confess?”
“I destroy the archive.”
“If I don't?”
“At noon, judges fall, marriages collapse, informants die, witnesses are exposed, and every criminal organization named in those records begins hunting anyone connected to the Ortega family.”
Ramon understood.
Thousands of lives.
Lucia among them.
Isabel.
Gabriel.
Victor.
Everyone.
Esteban's final words were almost gentle.
“Your father built an empire from fear, Ramon.”
May you like
The line went quiet.
“Tomorrow we'll discover whether you're willing to bury yourself to end it.”
