Chapter 23 - THE SHOWDOWN IN THE GLASS SANCTUARY
Dante’s eyes met mine. There was no hesitation in my mind. “Prepare the operating room,” I commanded Dr. Mercer.
“Empress, without a neuro-blocker, removing a chip linked to a live heart rate is suicide!” Mercer argued, his hands shaking. “One slip of the scalpel and—”
“Then I will do it myself,” I interrupted, tearing off my pearl necklace and tying my hair back into a tight bun.
While Dante led a elite squad of fifty snipers out into the surrounding forest to locate Valentina’s signal-jamming truck, I took my place in the estate's private surgical bay. The room was sterile, illuminated by bright halogen lights.
Lyra lay on the operating table. I held a local anesthetic syringe, my hands steady as steel. Six years of enduring starvation, six years of physical torture, and six years of surviving bullet wounds had forged my mind into an unyielding weapon.
“Trust me, my sweet girl,” I whispered, pressing the needle gently into her collarbone to numb the area.
Outside, explosions shook the mountain as Valentina’s mercenaries launched a full-scale assault on the outer gates, trying to break our focus. Bullets shattered the reinforced glass of the upper conservatory, sending showers of crystal flying through the hallways—a terrifying echo of the night at Lumina.
I ignored the gunfire tearing through the estate. I ignored the smoke rising outside the window.
With surgical precision, I made a two-centimeter incision over the glowing red light. The blood began to pool, but I clamped the artery with expert speed. Using micro-forceps, I reached into the tissue, feeling the metallic edge of the bomb resting less than a millimeter from her jugular vein.
“Signal spiking!” the heart monitor shrieked. 160 bpm... 170 bpm...
“Valentina is triggering the signal!” Dr. Mercer screamed.
I didn't flinch. With one swift, blind movement dictated purely by a mother’s instinct, my forceps pinched the fiber-optic wire connecting the chip to her blood vessel. I ripped the micro-device free and threw it into a lead-lined container just as the red light flared blindingly hot.
CLICK.
May you like
The container absorbed the tiny internal muffled blast. The heart monitor stabilized.
I collapsed against the side of the surgical table, tears of pure relief washing through my blood-stained gloves, as Lyra’s soft, steady breathing filled the quiet room.
