Chapter 7 - The Stress Test
The glass doors of the executive office shattered inward as a concussive shockwave blew the emergency fire suppression seals.
“Down!” Moretti shouted, tackling Rachel and shoving Thomas behind the heavy steel-reinforced core of the structural drafting table.
Automatic gunfire stitched a ragged line of bullet holes across the mahogany desk, sending splinters and paper flying into the air. Through the smoke, three black-clad operatives in tactical gear poured into the room, their suppressed submachine guns tracking left and right in synchronized sweeps.
Moretti didn't panic. Rolling out from behind a filing cabinet, he fired two calculated shots. The lead operative dropped instantly, his tactical vest absorbing the impact before he crumpled to the carpet.
“Vinnie! Front lobby check!” Moretti barked into his comms, firing again to pin the second operative behind a structural pillar.
Thomas ducked low, his engineering mind instantly calculating the room's geometry. His eyes landed on the heavy, motorized steel fire shutter built into the ceiling beam—designed to isolate the executive suite in the event of a catastrophic structural fire.
“Rachel, stay down!” Thomas yelled over the gunfire.
He lunged toward the master control panel mounted on the wall, dodging a stray bullet that gouged a chunk out of the plaster inches from his ear. His fingers slammed down on the manual override toggle and punched in the master security code: 8-8-0-4—Madison’s birthday.
With a deafening mechanical shriek, the heavy, industrial-grade steel shutter dropped like a guillotine from the ceiling, slamming into the floor and cutting the boardroom completely in half.
The remaining two operatives cursed in frustration, their gunfire pinging uselessly against the thick steel barrier.
“They’re trying to blow the structural columns on the lower utility floor!” Thomas shouted, his face pale as he stared at the digital schematic flashing on his desk console. “They aren't just here to assassinate me—they’re going to bring the entire thirty-second floor down to cover their tracks!”
Moretti reloaded his pistol with practiced, icy speed. “How much time do we have before the primary load-bearing pillars fail?”
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“Four minutes!” Thomas yelled. “The building uses a cantilevered concrete design. If they detonate the core stabilizer on level B2, the entire middle section of the tower will pancake!”
Moretti gripped Thomas by the collar of his shirt, his dark eyes locked onto the engineer’s face. “Then stop talking like an academic and show me the maintenance hatch, engineer. We need to go down.”
