Chapter 20 - The click of the iron lever
Ethan’s face went completely bloodless. His hand shook so violently that the black detonator rattled against his sweaty palm. "He's bluffing! Julian, shoot him! He's an old man bluffing to save his life!" Ethan screamed, his voice cracking into sheer panic as he raised his arm, his thumb hovering directly over the red execution button on the transmitter. Julian hesitated, his tactical instincts screaming that an old billionaire who walked into an armed ambush alone was never bluffing. "Lower the transmitter, Ethan," Julian ordered through gritted teeth, taking a cautious step backward toward the elevator shaft. "I said lower it!"
"No! I'm not going back to the gutter! Everything in this city belongs to me!" Ethan shrieked like a cornered animal, and with a wild, uncontrollable convulsion of rage, his thumb slammed down hard on the detonator switch. A sharp, high-pitched electronic chirp echoed through the cavernous chamber. For a single heartbeat, absolute silence gripped the underground vault. Then, deep within the bedrock beneath their boots, a monstrous, grinding roar of tearing steel resonated through the stone floor, followed by the deafening sound of millions of gallons of rushing, violent water crashing through the outer sluice barriers.
Frank did not run. He smoothly rotated the heavy brass key in the rock face and pulled the iron lever downward with a resounding, metallic snap. High above them, the massive three-ton hydraulic blast door of Level Zero slammed shut with the force of an avalanche, sealing the four men inside the rising dark. From the shadows behind the emergency intake tunnel, a pair of headlights suddenly ignited through the blinding spray of incoming water, illuminating a silhouette that nobody in the room expected to see.
