Chapter 28 - The Ghost Network
Black smoke billowed through the shattered entryway as flashbangs detonated in a blinding sequence of magnesium light and deafening thunder.
*"Breach! Breach!"* Miller shouted, his machine gun roaring instantly into life as a storm of suppressing fire ripped across the concrete floor.
Four Cleanslate operators, moving in rigid, textbook urban-assault formation, flooded through the opening. Their weapons were fitted with heavy suppressors, spitting subsonic 9mm and .300 Blackout rounds that hissed through the smoke with lethal accuracy.
Sterling didn't hesitate. With a feral snarl, he raised his silenced pistol, aiming directly at General Hayes’s head.
I didn't think. The carbine swung up in a smooth, mechanical arc. My trigger finger squeezed twice.
Two 5.56mm rounds hammered directly through Sterling's right wrist and forearm, shattering the bone and sending both his pistol and the satellite terminal spinning across the oily concrete. Sterling shrieked, clutching his ruined arm as blood sprayed across the front of his pristine dress shirt.
"Hayes! The terminal!" I roared, driving myself forward and throwing my shoulder into Eleanor, slamming her down behind the protective lip of the elevator shaft just as a burst of automatic fire tore through the space where she had been standing.
Hayes dove across the slick floor, his fingers catching the antenna of the terminal just as a round sparked against the concrete an inch from his hand. He rolled behind a concrete pillar, his thumb furiously working the keypad. "The strike package is on a three-minute deadman loop! Marcus, I can’t override the authorization without the Chairman's master cipher!"
"The dossier!" I yelled back, firing a controlled three-round burst that dropped the lead Cleanslate operator in the smoke. "The sealed folder from the ballroom! The Chairman's cryptographic keys were logged in the annex!"
Miller’s gun ran dry with a sharp metallic clack. "Reloading!" he screamed, dropping behind a heavy steel workbench as bullets pulverized the tool racks above him, showering him in sparks and severed cables.
The remaining three operators advanced with lethal efficiency, bounding in pairs, their laser designators cutting through the dense gray smoke like crimson blades. They weren't here to negotiate. They were sweeping the room to confirm kills.
Vance, completely unhinged by the deafening gunfire, broke cover.
"Don't shoot! I'm Vance Holloway! I'm an executive asset!" he screamed, waving his hands wildly as he sprinted out from behind the crates toward the main hangar exit.
"Vance, no!" Eleanor screamed, trying to scramble up, but my hand clamped onto her shoulder like a vise, holding her down against the floor.
"Stay down!" I ordered.
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The lead Cleanslate operator didn't even pause his stride. His rifle pivoted smoothly toward the running figure. A single, double-tap cracked through the suppressor.
Vance’s run came to an abrupt, violent halt. The momentum carried his upper body forward while his legs went completely limp, his chest taking both impacts center-mass. He hit the wet concrete face-first, sliding three feet through a pool of oily rainwater, his fingers twitching twice before lying perfectly still.
