Chapter 4
The heavy metal door of the archive room clicked shut, locking automatically from the inside. Clara wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her striped shirt and stood up, her legs shaking with adrenaline. She needed to move, and she needed to move fast. Before she could take two steps toward the emergency stairwell, a low voice spoke from the shadows near the corner water fountain.
"If you go out that front door, Miller’s men are waiting in the alley with a nondescript van," the voice said calmly.
Clara spun around, dropping into a defensive posture. Stepping out from behind a stack of architectural blueprints was an older woman with sharp, intelligent eyes, wearing a worn gray cardigan and carrying a heavy leather satchel. It was Mrs. Gable, the head archivist who had worked in the municipal basement for nearly thirty years, long before Victoria’s corporation bought out the surrounding industrial blocks.
"Who are you?" Clara demanded, her voice tight with suspicion. "Are you with them?"
"If I were with them, you’d already be tied to a chair upstairs," Mrs. Gable replied evenly, walking over and placing a warm, steady hand on Clara’s trembling arm. "I’ve watched corporations swallow this city piece by piece for decades. I watched them bulldoze residential blocks, bury environmental reports, and silence anyone who asked inconvenient questions. When I saw your broadcast this morning, I knew you were coming here."
Clara stared at the older woman, searching her face for any sign of betrayal. Seeing only genuine concern and a hardened, weary determination, Clara’s defenses finally crumbled. She lowered the box of documents onto a wooden sorting table. "They have my bank accounts frozen, my apartment is being watched, and the entire legal apparatus of the company is moving to declare me mentally incompetent. I don't know who to trust anymore."
"You trust the paper trail," Mrs. Gable said firmly, opening her leather satchel and pulling out a bundle of old microfilm cartridges and a portable scanner. "Victoria thinks she owns every digital server in this city, but she forgets that our municipal archives still rely on physical records that predate their cloud infrastructure. Look at this."
Mrs. Gable slid a yellowed index card across the table. Clara adjusted her glasses and leaned in close. The card detailed a land purchase made fifteen years ago by a shell company that shared the exact same corporate parentage as Victoria’s biotechnology firm. The location of the land purchase matched the coordinates of an abandoned subterranean waste facility situated just outside city limits—the very facility where Leanne had worked before her sudden disappearance.
May you like
"This is where they conducted the early trials," Mrs. Gable whispered, her eyes locking onto Clara’s. "The black veins you saw on the executive’s hand? That isn't a new disease, Clara. It’s an engineered pathogen from a containment breach that happened at that facility over a decade ago. They covered it up then, and they are covering it up now."
Clara stared at the index card, a cold shiver running down her spine. The puzzle pieces were falling into place with terrifying clarity. It wasn't just corporate greed; it was a biological cover-up of catastrophic proportions.
