Chapter 5 - Sub-Level 9The private freight elevator didn't have a button for Sub-Level 9.
Using the heavy brass key Julia had hidden inside Caleb's stuffed whale, I unlocked a hidden mechanical panel behind the emergency brake box. A rusted digital keypad flickered to life, bathing the dim elevator car in a sickly green glow.
I punched in the numerical sequence corresponding to Julia’s birthday—the only personal detail my father had always dismissed as a weakness.
Clank.
The elevator groaned violently, dropping straight down past the standard underground parking garages, past the subterranean server farms, and deep into the bedrock of the city. The air grew damp, smelling of ozone, sterile antiseptic, and old dust.
When the doors slid open, I stepped out into a dimly lit concrete corridor lined with heavy steel reinforcement doors.
The surveillance cameras mounted on the ceiling whirred to life, pivoting automatically to track my movement. A harsh metallic speaker crackled overhead.
“I wondered how long it would take you to find the basement, Nathan,” my father’s voice echoed down the hall, amplified and distorted by the intercom. “Impressive. You always were the sharpest blade in my collection. Too bad you lack the stomach for real power.”
"Where is she, Arthur?" I yelled into the empty corridor, my voice bouncing off the concrete walls. "Show yourself!"
A heavy steel door at the end of the hall hissed open, venting a cloud of white condensation. Stepping out of the shadow was my father. He looked older, his hair completely silver, but his posture was as rigid and intimidating as it had been when I was a child. He leaned on his ebony cane, smiling faintly.
"She's right through here, son," Arthur said smoothly, gesturing to the open doorway behind him. "Sleeping soundly. Just a mild pharmaceutical sedative. She wouldn't stop screaming about how you were going to tear down everything I built."
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I walked toward him, my muscles coiled like steel springs. "You ruined her life. You ruined mine."
"I made you," Arthur corrected sharply, his eyes flashing with sudden malice. "Without me, you'd be a mid-level accountant pushing paper in Portland. I gave you the empire. I gave you the power to crush your enemies. And now, you're going to sign over the final voting rights so we can secure Project Janus for the next generation. Think of it as a family legacy."
