The lock surrendered. Cruz shoved the door open, and a wave of deeper, more complex cold washed over us – the dry, sterile chill of cryogenic preservation, layered over the formaldehyde and decay. Rows of stainless-steel freezers hummed against the walls. Workbenches held microscopes, centrifuges, and stacks of petri dishes.
But Cruz's attention snapped to a large, standalone unit in the corner, its digital display glowing a steady -80°C. It bore no patient labels, only a stenciled designation: PROJECT LAZARUS - V.S.
"Vivian Shaw," I murmured, the pieces clicking. Her private blood bank.
Cruz didn't hesitate. He bypassed the electronic lock on the freezer lid with a device clipped to his keychain, its screen flashing rapid code. The heavy seal hissed, releasing a plume of vapor. Inside, nestled in custom foam cradles, were rows of thick cryovials.
Each was filled with a deep, viscous red fluid that seemed to pulse with its own inner light under the lab lights. RH-null. My blood. Dozens of vials, meticulously labeled with dates and barcodes. Lot numbers included 114-P.
"Her lifeline," Cruz spat, snapping photos with his burner phone. "Stockpiled while she doses others with poison." He pocketed several vials – evidence.
Suddenly, he stiffened. His gaze locked onto a small, framed photo tucked beside a microscope on a nearby bench. It showed a younger Cruz, his arm around a girl of maybe sixteen. She had his olive skin and dark, laughing eyes, but around her irises, even in the slightly faded photo, was the faintest, unmistakable hint of a brownish-copper ring.
"My sister," Cruz said, his voice raw gravel. He picked up the frame, his thumb tracing her face. "They diagnosed her with Wilson's too. At Cook County. Said it was rare, aggressive." He looked up, his eyes burning into mine. "They gave her Prometheus. Called it a 'compassionate trial for terminal cases.' Said it might stabilize the copper." He slammed the frame down on the bench, the glass cracking. "She liquefied from the inside out. Just like Anya. Just like the others."
He pointed a shaking finger at Vivian's freezer. "They called it Wilson's. But it was Prometheus that killed her. This… this Lazarus project? It's not Vivian's first rodeo. She's using the sick to test the poison, and the poison to cover her tracks."
The horrific symmetry stole my breath. Vivian wasn't just dying and desperate. She was refining her weapon on the doomed. Mateo's sister. Anya Petrova. Countless unnamed others. All collateral in her bid for survival.
A new sound erupted – not alarms, but the heavy, grinding clunk of massive industrial deadbolts slamming home, reverberating through the walls. "FACILITY-WIDE CONTAINMENT ACTIVATED," a robotic voice announced over the PA. "INCINERATION PROTOCOL INITIATED IN T-MINUS FIVE MINUTES."
"Incinerators!" Cruz snarled. "She's torching the evidence! The whole damn wing!" He grabbed my arm. "Out! Now! Back door!"
We burst into the corridor. The air was thicker now, hazy with smoke pouring from vents near the ceiling. The distant fire alarms were deafening. The red emergency lights flickered erratically. Ahead, the hallway terminated at a heavy fire door marked EAST WING EXIT - EMERGENCY USE ONLY.
We were ten feet away when it slammed open. Not firefighters. Three figures in black tactical gear, faces obscured by respirators, submachine guns held at ready positions. Archer's extraction team. Midnight had come early. Their leader's eyes, visible above the mask, locked onto me with chilling recognition. He raised his weapon.
Cruz moved like lightning. He didn't go for a gun he didn't have. He flung the heavy rib spreader like a throwing axe. It wasn't meant to kill; it was meant to distract. The lead mercenary instinctively flinched, ducking as the steel claws whistled past his head and clattered against the wall behind him.
In that split second, Cruz was on them. He flowed into the second man's space, trapping his weapon arm, driving the heel of his palm up under the respirator in a vicious strike to the nose. Cartilage crunched. The man staggered back, choking. Cruz pivoted, using the disoriented mercenary as a shield against the third, who was bringing his weapon to bear. Gunfire erupted, deafening in the enclosed space. Rounds sparked off the steel doorframe near my head. The mercenary Cruz held jerked violently as bullets meant for us struck him.
Cruz shoved the dying man towards the third shooter, creating a tangle of limbs and screams. "The door! Kick the release!" he yelled at me, grappling with the leader who had recovered.
I lunged for the bright red emergency bar on the exit door. A mercenary, blood streaming from his shattered nose, lunged at me. I didn't think. The switchblade Cruz had returned was in my hand. I slashed downwards, not aiming to kill, but to disable. The blade bit deep into the muscle of his gun arm. He roared, dropping his weapon, clutching the wound.
I slammed my shoulder into the emergency bar. Alarms shrieked directly overhead as the heavy door unlocked and swung open violently, revealing a narrow loading dock and a rain-lashed alley beyond. Icy wind and smoke blasted in.
"CRUZ!" I screamed over the din.
He broke free from the leader, leaving the man clutching a dislocated shoulder. Cruz sprinted towards me, dodging wild shots from the third mercenary. He grabbed the fallen submachine gun from the floor near the man I'd slashed.
"Go!" he roared, turning and firing a controlled burst down the smoky hallway, forcing the remaining mercenary and the injured leader to take cover behind an overturned gurney. The staccato thunder of the weapon filled the space.
I stumbled out into the alley. The cold rain was a shock, washing away some of the smoke and terror. Behind me, Cruz backed through the door, still laying down suppressive fire. He slammed the heavy metal door shut just as bullets sparked against its outer surface. He jammed the barrel of the stolen gun into the emergency bar mechanism, bending it, effectively jamming the door shut from the outside. Muffled pounding and shouts came from within.
He turned, his chest heaving, rain plastering his dark hair to his forehead. His eyes scanned the alley – dumpsters, overflowing bins, a high brick wall at one end, the open street at the other, shimmering with rain and distant city lights. Sirens wailed, approaching fast. Police? Fire? Archer's reinforcements?
No time to choose. "This way!" Cruz grabbed my arm again, pulling me deeper into the alley, away from the streetlights, towards the shadowed dead end and the looming brick wall. "We climb!"
He boosted me onto a overflowing dumpster, its surface slick with rain and grime. As I scrambled for purchase on the wet bricks, the East Wing of Aster Institute erupted behind us. Not with gunfire, but with a deep, rolling whumpf that shook the ground. Orange light flared from high windows, followed by billowing black smoke as the incinerators, overloaded or deliberately sabotaged, consumed Vivian's evidence – and likely, anyone still trapped inside. The heat pulsed against my back even from the alley.
Cruz hauled himself up beside me, his face grim in the hellish flicker. "Lazarus just went up in flames," he shouted over the roar of the fire and approaching sirens. "But we carry the virus, Doc. We carry it right out." He pointed over the wall. "Now move! The real hunt starts now!"
Below, in the churning smoke pouring from the jammed exit door, something small and metallic skittered across the wet asphalt, unnoticed. A digital voice recorder, its casing scorched, its tiny red light still faintly blinking. Anya Petrova's final testament, ejected from its hiding place in her shroud by the force of the incinerator's ignition. It came to rest against a storm drain, silently recording the rain, the fire, and our escape into the night.