The room was dark but for the glow of monitors. Nolan sat back in his chair, sleeves rolled up, eyes flicking across five separate screens. One showed infrared outlines of his men moving like spectors through the maintenance tunnel. Another displayed the alley behind Janus Cosmetics, grainy with low-light static. The rest were hacked internal feeds Nolan had quietly gained access to the night before.
He spoke into the mic, voice calm, clipped, controlled. "Alpha Team, you're clear past the service door. No patrols within your quadrant. Bravo, hold position. One civ passed by on 32nd keep eyes on that car parked by the light."
A pause. Then Dre's voice crackled in, a whisper fed through a throat mic.
"Copy. Car hasn't moved. Lights off, engine cold."
Nolan's fingers tapped the edge of his keyboard. He enlarged the view on the infrared feed nothing. "Proceed."
The air was wet and full of rust. Terrell led the way, bent low, rifle slung tight across his chest. Behind him, Naima and a third man named Slink carried the breaching equipment silent tools, laser cutters, crowbars wrapped in foam. Above their heads, water dripped from old pipes like a ticking clock.
"Door's coming up," Terrell whispered.
The tunnel ended at a rusted maintenance hatch, chained shut decades ago. Naima pressed a gloved hand against it, felt the tremor of foot traffic above.
"Just like the maps said," she murmured.
Slink knelt, setting to work on the chain with bolt cutters, muffled beneath cloth. Sparks danced but made no sound. In seconds, the way was open.
[12:12 AM] New ɴᴏᴠᴇʟ ᴄhapters are published on novᴇl(ꜰ)ire.ɴet
Nolan zoomed in on the basement feed. Two guards. Bored. One leaned against a reinforced door smoking a cigarette, the other scrolling a cheap phone.
He clicked into the audio feed. Static. Then:
"Alpha, basement hallway's got two. You're forty seconds out."
Terrell moved like a shadow through the concrete hallway. His silencer hissed once twice. Both guards collapsed before their bodies hit the floor. Naima dragged one by the collar out of sight, and Slink covered the camera in black tape.
"Guards neutralized," Terrell murmured.
Naima tapped her mic. "We're approaching the vault stairwell."
Nolan leaned forward. "Bravo, status."
Marcy's voice came through next cold and steady.
"Front is quiet. Still no movement. One civ walked past fifteen ago, turned east. Cameras looped. We're clean."
He nodded to himself, adjusted one of the signal jammers on screen.
Then another window flickered.
Black. Windows tinted.
It slid slowly into view and stopped right beside Janus's back alley entrance.
Nolan's eyes narrowed.
Dre squinted from behind a stack of crates. "Car just parked. Something feels off."
The driver's door opened. First one man stepped out, burly, bald. Then another. Then…
No mistaking the carved, expressionless visage. His suit gleamed under the streetlight, and the men at his flanks moved with precision not junkies, not low-level runners. Killers.
Dre tapped his comm. "Eyes on Black Mask. I say again, Black Mask just arrived on scene."
Nolan's pulse surged.
He switched feeds, cycled infrared.
There Black Mask and four of his top enforcers entering the building through a rear keycard door.
"All teams," he said, voice suddenly sharper. "We have company. Mask himself. He's heading your way. Alpha, secure what you can, fast. Bravo, be prepared to cut them off if needed. You have ten minutes tops."
Terrell and Slink had the vault door open. The room beyond was more than a vault it was a small fortress.
Stacks of cash, crates of weapons, sealed black briefcases, ledgers on reinforced shelves. Naima was already inside, scanning and photographing every manifest she could find.
Slink whistled low. "This ain't a stash. This is a damn fail safe."
"Load what we can. Blow the rest," Terrell said.
Naima looked up. "They're already in the building. You know that, right?"
He gritted his teeth. "Then we don't leave a single piece for them."
Dre and two others slipped into a flanking position near the emergency exit Black Mask had entered through.
One of his men radioed softly, "They're heading down. Slow still they don't realize something's wrong yet."
Dre raised his rifle. "If they make it to the vault, we'll be boxed in."
"We'll," someone muttered behind him, "We should hurry then."
Nolan watched the feeds flicker again. One more minute. Maybe two.
The red dots of Alpha Team pulsed near the vault. Black Mask's heat signature was almost at the stairwell.
"Alpha," he said quietly, "time's up."
[VAULT ROOM LOWER LEVEL 12:20 AM]
Naima zipped the last duffel shut, fingers moving fast. "That's everything we can carry."
Terrell yanked a set of small charges from his pack—compact thermite bricks, pre-rigged to destroy the unmovable. "Slink. Fuse 'em. We're lighting this place up."
Slink dropped to one knee beside the weapons cache. The moment the charges stuck, tiny LEDs blinked red.
"Timers are synced. Ninety seconds," Slink said, already retreating to the hallway.
Naima hit the mic. 'Vault's burning in ninety. We're heading to second exit.'
[STAIRWELL LOWER LEVEL SAME TIME]
Black Mask's shoes clicked sharply against concrete as he descended.
The two men at his flanks wore body armor and carried suppressed SMGs. One whispered, "Motion sensors picked up movement just past this hall."
Black Mask didn't respond. He simply tilted his head once. The two soldiers fanned out, eyes cold, sweeping the shadows.
Behind his mask, Black Mask's mouth curled.
"I can smell the rats."
Nolan's fingers danced across the keyboard. Every time he tapped, another hallway camera looped or blacked out. He toggled Bravo's signal for a silent flash—they were the closest to Black Mask's flank.
'Alpha, exit path red. Mask is at the first stairwell. Go blue north maintenance shaft.'
Terrell's voice came back strained. 'Copy. We're moving.'
Nolan added, low, almost to himself: "Get out. Get out now."
Then another screen lit up. Heat signature—Black Mask's team was splitting. One unit approaching the north shaft.
Dre received the new feed from Nolan. "They're cutting them off."
He turned to his two team members. "New plan. We give Alpha a door. Lay fire, draw them toward us."
One of the others smirked, chambering a round. "Thought you'd never ask."
They took positions across the alley, one man posting by the fire escape, the other kneeling behind an overturned dumpster.
Alpha Team bolted through the service corridor, duffels slung across their backs, hearts hammering. The lights above flickered power was being rerouted.
"Second shaft ahead," Slink said.
The voice came from behind—a masked soldier, one of Black Mask's elite, standing at the hallway's fork. Rifle raised. Finger twitching.
Terrell didn't stop. He fired before the soldier could finish inhaling.
The man collapsed, blood misting the corridor.
Naima didn't flinch. "Door go!"
Nolan leaned into the comms.
'Bravo move now! Mask's men are heading for your alley. Distract them or you're going to be the ones boxed in.'
Onscreen, he saw Dre nod.
Nolan glanced at the vault cam one last time. The thermite was down to twenty seconds.
The doors burst open. Terrell's squad staggered out, breathing hard.
A second later, the fire escape rattled—Black Mask's men had caught up.
Suppressors hissed. Bullets ripped the air.
The vault exploded behind them a white-hot bloom of fire blew the reinforced door outward, smoke and fire eating what they'd left behind. Black Mask's soldiers on that floor staggered. One was thrown into a wall.
Black Mask, still at the bottom of the stairwell, stopped mid-step.
Through the smoke, he saw burning stacks of cash.
"Find them," he growled. "GOD DAMNIT FIND THOSE RATS!."
Dre's squad moved with ruthless precision. The moment Alpha was clear, Bravo laid down a cover barrage. One of Mask's men caught a bullet clean through the jaw and dropped.
"Go!" Dre shouted. "We'll meet at fallback Charlie."
Terrell gave a short nod. "Owe you a drink."
Alpha melted into the shadows. Bravo pulled back seconds later, throwing a flash charge behind them that lit up the alley like a lightning strike.
Every feed was smoke, gunfire, or static now. But the GPS tags on his people's trackers showed motion fast, clean arcs headed away from the scene.
He turned off the monitors. Shut the laptop. Picked up his glass of whiskey, untouched till now, and took a slow sip.
He stared at his reflection in the dark window.
'We just hit one of his vaults,' Quentin said in his head.
'And made it out clean,' added Vey. 'That'll piss him off.'
Nolan didn't respond.
A/N: not sure if the time stamps where as cool as I thought when initially writing this chapter lmao, thought it added suspense lmk if you would like to see that style again in similar situations