Oryn Ashveil's Arc

Chapter 3 of 4

Oryn spread Nev's map on the floor of her hideout. The badge got her through the lobby. The keypad below still stopped her cold. Worse, she saw the real trap now. To reach the vault's lower level, she'd have to steal the proof and carry it out fast. But the broadcast needed her at the signal-splitter across the city, ready the moment the leader spoke. She couldn't hold the file and run the hijack at once. She needed someone else's hands on one end. A knock came at the door. Petra slipped in first. Behind her shuffled a soft-bellied man in a sweat-stained grey uniform, ink smeared across his fingers. He clutched a folder to his chest like a shield. "This is Foss," Petra said. "He logs vault access all day. He's the one filing copies where the regime can't find them." Foss wouldn't meet Oryn's eyes. "I shouldn't be here," he said. "If they find my duplicates, I'm gone." But he set the folder on the table. "I brought proof I'm not lying." Oryn opened it. Records. Access logs. Dates and names the regime buried. Her pulse jumped. "You have the keypad code." "I've seen it typed a hundred times," Foss said. His voice shook. "I can't walk it in. My face is on every camera down there." The door swung again. A lanky teenage boy leaned in, grease on his cheeks, a stolen access card taped to his forearm. Finn Tarro. Everyone knew he ran packages through locked zones and vanished through the old bunker between checkpoints. "Petra said you needed a runner," Finn said. He grinned. "I get in and out of places nobody else can." Oryn looked at the three of them. The plan came together like gears clicking. "Foss gives Finn the code. Finn takes the badge, clears the lobby, and pulls the file from the lower level. He carries it to the broadcast tower." She tapped the map. "I hold the signal-splitter. The second the leader's face hits the screens, Finn hands me the proof and I air it." Finn's grin held. "I can do the vault. Easy." Foss scrawled six numbers on a scrap and pushed it to the boy like it burned. "Don't get caught with that." Oryn split the load. Badge and code to Finn. The map memorized. Petra would watch the lobby door and signal if it turned bad. Two ends of one plan, held by hands she chose to trust. They shook on it. Foss left first, sweating harder than before. Then Petra's contact came running up the stairs, breathless. The regime had moved the leader's address. Not hours away now. Tonight. Oryn folded the map into her jacket. The plan was set. The clock had just cut itself in half.