“Too far,” Dante said. “Slate Harbor is a decoy now.”
The words landed heavy between them.
“Then what are you saying?”
“I’m saying he needs someone to trigger it manually. And with Daniel dead, that someone is Matthew. The only way to stop it,” he finished, “is to get there first.”
Shannon said, “You can’t even walk more than one minute on the treadmill.”
“I don’t need to walk,” Dante argued. “I just need to get underground.”
She stood abruptly. “No.”
He reached for her hand. “Shan, you have to help me. If you don’t… you know what will happen.”
“We can notify NYPD. They have people who can handle it.”
“Krueger will be in the wind the minute they enter the subbasement,” he warned.
Her voice broke. “Don’t move. I’m getting Ford and my dad. They can do it.” She leaned in and kissed his forehead hard. “I’ll be right back. I swear. And I’ll help you.”
She ran.
UNITED NATIONS
No one stopped him. That was the mistake.
Chase Medical sat in Midtown. So did the UN. And no one was watching people leave the Chase building. Everyone was watching who and what were coming in.
Dante moved slowly, deliberately, hood pulled up. His gait was off—anyone looking for it might have noticed. But no one was.
He stuck to service corridors, loading docks, delivery entrances. He followed memory and instinct and the ghost of a city he’d studied for years but never walked like this.
Security hardened the closer he got. Barricades. Armed patrols. Dogs. Federal badges layered over foreign ones. It was a fortress above ground.
So Dante went where fortresses always forgot to look. Down.
48THSTEET UN CORRIDOR
The utility hatch was old—part of a substation entrance that hadn’t been updated in over a decade. The electronic lock looked modern, but it wasn't networked—standalone, magnetic.
Dante reached into his pocket and pulled out arepurposed RFID scanner he’d lifted from a utility worker’s belt during his walk from the hospital. Just a brush of contact in the crowd. He barely felt bad about it.
He pressed it to the pad and held his breath.Green flash. The gate buzzed open. He slipped inside.
Down the first stairwell. Then the second.
No alarms.
At sublevel three, the air changed. Cooler. Denser. Echoing in long concrete shafts lined with pipes and steam risers.
He reached a maintenance junction sealed with a grated metal cover, words stenciled into the wall:INFRASTRUCTURE TIER 2 – UN PROPERTY – RESTRICTED ACCESS.
He pulled an abandoned, rusted bolt wrench from his jacket pocket and cracked the latch.
One groan of metal. One breath. He ducked into the dark. Below, the tunnels ran wide.
DANTE’S SUITE
