Chapter 4 - THE ELEVATOR STOPPED BETWEEN FLOORS
The building alarm was not a fire alarm.
Thomas knew that immediately.
Bellwether’s evacuation tone pulsed in three slow bursts.
This was one continuous mechanical scream.
“Server fault,” Helen said.
Grant was already reaching for his phone.
Thomas pointed at him. “Put it on the table.”
Grant ignored him.
Thomas’s security chief entered with two officers from a private firm Thomas had used for years.
“Mr. Bell, we have a deliberate power interruption on forty-one and forty-two. Data center alarms are active.”
Thomas looked at Maya.
“What did the message say?”
She showed him.
Adrian laughed once. “Anyone could send that.”
Maya turned. “Then why do you look scared?”
He stopped laughing.
Thomas told security to escort Grant, Adrian, and the other executives to the legal conference room downstairs. Helen volunteered to remain.
Maya expected Thomas to send her home.
Instead he said, “You are coming with me.”
“Where?”
“To find out whether someone is deleting Project Lantern.”
They took the service elevator because the executive bank had shut down.
Thomas stepped inside first.
Maya followed with Helen and one security officer.
The doors closed.
The elevator descended one floor.
Then stopped.
Not at a floor.
Between them.
The lights blinked.
Maya grabbed the rail.
The security officer hit the emergency control.
Nothing.
Helen whispered, “That is not a power failure.”
Thomas looked at the ceiling panel.
“No.”
His voice was too calm.
Maya stared at him. “You know how to get out?”
“I know this building.”
“You built it?”
“I argued with the architect for three years.”
Despite herself, Maya almost laughed.
Then the elevator jolted downward.
She screamed.
It dropped less than a foot before the brake caught, but the sound of metal grinding above them erased any humor.
The security officer pulled open the emergency compartment and reached for a manual release.
Thomas caught his arm.
“Wait.”
“What?”
Thomas pointed at the small service screen beside the floor controls.
A maintenance code flashed.
He frowned.
“Someone has put this car into inspection override.”
Helen whispered, “From where?”
“Building operations.”
Maya looked at Thomas. “Can they make it fall?”
“No.”
A beat.
“Not easily.”
“That is not comforting.”
The old man gave her a quick look. “It wasn’t meant to be.”
His phone still had signal.
He called his security team.
No answer.
Then Maya’s phone rang.
Unknown number.
She stared at it.
Thomas nodded once.
“Speaker.”
She answered.
A man’s distorted voice filled the elevator.
“Ms. Chen, your internship is over.”
Maya said nothing.
“Go home. Forget what you saw. Your father already made the mistake of believing Bellwether would protect people who told the truth.”
Thomas stepped closer.
“Who is this?”
The caller paused.
Then laughed.
“You spent six weeks pretending to be invisible, Mr. Bell. You should have stayed that way.”
The line went dead.
Thomas’s expression changed.
For the first time that morning, Maya saw anger break through the old man’s control.
Not wounded pride.
Rage.
He looked at the ceiling hatch.
“Officer, get that open.”
The security guard braced himself and released the panel.
Cold air rushed in.
Thomas removed his janitor jacket and rolled up his sleeves.
Helen stared at him. “You are seventy-six.”
“I’m aware.”
“You cannot climb an elevator shaft.”
Thomas looked up.
“I spent the first ten years of this company crawling under raised floors and through cable tunnels because we couldn’t afford contractors.”
He pointed at the hatch.
“Get Maya out first.”
Three minutes later, Maya was climbing through the emergency opening into a narrow maintenance landing between floors.
She reached down to help Thomas.
A door opened at the end of the corridor.
Adrian Cross stood there.
He was holding a company access badge in one hand.
And a red emergency override key in the other.
Maya froze.
Adrian smiled.
May you like
“You really should have gone home.”
