Chapter 6 - The Chemical Fuse"Move!" Rafael roared, grabbing my arm and yanking me toward the service corridor as alarms began to shriek through the facility.
Damon and the enforcers didn't panic; they moved with military precision, forming a protective wedge as we sprinted down the concrete hallway. The air grew hot instantly, the scent of burning solvents turning acrid and suffocating.
50 seconds... 49 seconds...
"The ventilation shaft!" I shouted over the blaring alarms, pointing to a heavy access panel near the floor. "Alan’s automated system is purging the primary solvent tanks with pure oxygen! If those tanks blow, the blast radius will level this entire block!"
Damon dropped to his knees, slamming a heavy steel crowbar into the seam of the access hatch. With a deafening screech of metal, the panel popped open, revealing a dark, cramped concrete drainage pipe leading out toward the river.
"Go! Go!" Rafael pushed me toward the opening, refusing to enter himself until I was sliding down into the damp, cool darkness.
I scrambled through the concrete tunnel, the sound of the explosion echoing behind us like rolling thunder. A wall of searing heat chased us through the drainage pipe, propelling us outward into the muddy weeds along the riverbank just as the back half of the textile mill erupted in a blinding flash of orange fire.
We hit the wet earth hard, coughing and sputtering in the smoke.
I rolled onto my back, staring up at the starless Providence sky, my chest heaving, my black work pants soaked in mud. Rafael pulled himself up beside me, brushing soot off his expensive suit with grim determination. His face was streaked with ash, but his eyes were burning brighter than the fire behind us.
"He thinks he destroyed the data," Rafael said, his voice dangerously quiet.
I pushed myself up on my elbows, wiping sweat and ash from my forehead. "He didn't."
Rafael looked down at me, a sharp eyebrow raised. "Explain."
"Alan is arrogant," I said, a cold, clinical focus taking over every fiber of my being. "He keeps a redundant cloud server for his personal extraction logs because he doesn't trust Caldera-Kline's IT department. When we were at St. Mercy, we used a decentralized encrypted network for our research backups. I know the server address by heart."
Vincenzo emerged from the smoke, limping slightly, carrying a heavy tactical bag he had managed to salvage from the lab. He dropped it onto the grass beside us and looked at Rafael.
"Boss, we have a problem," Vincenzo said, tapping his encrypted phone. "The federal authorities are already en route to the blast site. And worse... Alan Vance just broadcasted a fabricated emergency alert to every major news outlet in the state."
I scrambled to my feet. "What did he broadcast?"
"He didn't just frame you for the attempt on Rafael's life," Vincenzo said grimly, holding out his phone screen. "He leaked documents claiming that Dr. Nell Hart—the disgraced toxicologist from Boston—is the mastermind behind an underground syndicate manufacturing synthetic poisons to destabilize the East Coast pharmaceutical market."
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Headline banners flashed across the local news feed: FUGITIVE TOXICOLOGIST LINKED TO MOB ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT. DR. NELL HART WANTED FOR DOMESTIC TERRORISM.
The net had just closed completely. I wasn't just a dishwasher hiding in plain sight anymore; I was public enemy number one.
