Chapter 42 - Blood on the Altar
The subterranean corridors beneath the National Cathedral were an endless labyrinth of cold granite, subterranean humidity, and resting vaults of forgotten statesmen.
Claire carried Maya under her left arm like a football, the captured assault rifle held locked against her right hip, sweeping every archway with cold, computational efficiency. Behind her, Marcus strained with all his might, pushing Ethan’s heavy tactical transport chair down the narrow, moisture-slicked brick ramparts.
"Claire, my legs are useless baggage," Ethan grunted between ragged breaths, his fingers clutching a combat knife Marcus had shoved into his lap. "Leave me at a choke point with two magazines. You take Maya and run. You know that’s the doctrine!"
Claire halted instantly at the junction of the central crypt. She turned slowly, her pale blue eyes blazing with a fury so cold it made Ethan stop breathing.
"Shut your mouth, Ethan," she said, her voice a low, terrifying vibration that echoed off the tombs. "I spent seven years believing I buried you in an unmarked grave in Helmand. I dug through sixteen feet of burning aluminum and crushed bones with my bare hands trying to find your dog tags while Vance's helicopters flew away. I am never leaving you behind again. Understood?"
Ethan’s throat tightened, swallowing hard as a single tear cut through the plaster dust covering his hollow, battle-worn face. "Understood, sister."
Footsteps above. The metallic clack of fresh magazines seating into receivers. Heavy boots crunching across shattered glass.
"They're deploying thermal optics," Marcus whispered, checking the stairwell with his tactical mirror. "They’re using the heat signatures radiating off the cathedral’s heating pipes to mask their approach. They'll be down here in thirty seconds."
Claire handed Maya gently to Ethan. "Cover her eyes, Ethan. Marcus, stay behind this pillar and cover our rear flank."
"What are you doing?" Marcus hissed.
"I’m the One-Eighty-Seven," Claire said softly, stripping off her ceremonial uniform jacket. Beneath it, she wore only a black tactical undershirt, revealing the labyrinth of jagged shrapnel scars crisscrossing her shoulders and arms. "They brought thermal optics into a tomb. Big mistake."
Claire moved into the central hall of the crypt, where a series of antique brass gas lanterns lined the stone vaults. With three precise, knife-edge slices, she severed the emergency low-pressure gas tubes running along the baseboards. The sweet, pungent smell of natural gas began pooling along the stone floor.
When the heavy blast door at the top of the stairwell kicked open, three black-clad commandos descended into the darkness, their red infrared designator beams cutting through the gloom like bloody laser ribbons.
"Thermal contact detected. Target stationary behind the central sarcophagus," the lead point-man barked through his closed-circuit comms.
Claire stepped out from behind the monument of a former bishop.
The three lasers converged instantly on the center of her chest.
The point-man lowered his rifle an inch, his voice crackling through his exterior speaker: "Claire Walker. The ghost herself. Drop the weapon and you die quickly. The syndicate only requires the brother."
Claire smiled. It was a cold, wolf-like smile that had haunted the nightmares of warlords from Kandahar to the Syrian border.
"You should have checked the atmospheric pressure," Claire whispered.
May you like
She didn't fire at them. She fired her pistol once—directly into the iron base of the leaking brass gas lantern three inches from the floor.
***
