Chapter 7 - Brother
"Julian... Julian, can you hear me?"
I pulled out my combat knife and began slicing through the heavy leather restraints holding his arms and chest to the titanium table. I ripped the neural electrodes from his temples, causing the hum of the torture computer to die down into a low whistle.
Julian’s eyes fluttered open. They were bloodshot, unfocused, filled with the terrifying glaze of extreme trauma and synthetic drugs.
"V... Victor?" he rasped, his voice barely a whisper. "Am I... am I dead?"
"No, little brother," I said, my hands trembling as I unhooked the IV lines draining his veins. "You're alive. I'm taking you home."
Julian let out a weak, ragged sob, his hand rising weakly to grab my tactical vest. "Maya... did she... did she find you?"
"She found me," I said gently, lifting his thin, frail body into an upright position. "She's safe, Julian. She's at the bunker. She gave me the locket."
Julian closed his eyes, fresh tears cutting through the sweat on his face. "I tried to protect them, Vic... I tried so hard... after Elena died... I didn't know what else to do..."
"You did good, kid," I murmured, wrapping his arm over my heavy shoulders and lifting him completely off the table. He was impossibly light—his body depleted from months of captivity and torture. "You did damn good."
Behind us, a raspy, painful laugh echoed from the floor.
Sterling was leaning against the ruined server rack, clutching his broken arm, blood pooling beneath his mouth.
"You... you think you can just walk out of here, Victor?" Sterling wheezed, a grotesque, bloody grin on his face. "This bunker is wired to a dead-man system! The moment my heart rate drops below sixty... or the main server goes offline... the thermal demolition charges in the support pillars activate!"
As if on cue, a deep, rhythmic mechanical tone began to chime through the bunker walls.
BEEP... BEEP... BEEP...
A automated female voice crackled over the intercom: "Structural integrity compromised. Facility destruction sequence initiated. T-minus three minutes to total thermal collapse."
"We're all dying in this hole, Victor!" Sterling laughed maniacally. "You, your brother, and my money!"
I looked down at Sterling with absolute coldness.
I didn't waste a bullet on him. I simply grabbed Julian tighter, hooking his arm securely around my neck.
"Enjoy the fire, Arthur," I said quietly.
May you like
I turned my back on the dying man and carried my brother out of the burning lab, heading straight for the subterranean secondary exit I had mapped on my way in.
Behind us, Sterling’s laughter turned into desperate, terrified screaming as the ceiling support beams began to crack under the intense thermal heat of the detonation charges.
