Page 117 of Agency

Andrew looked to me, and I simply shrugged in response. He lowered his weapon and went over, planted both hands on the credenza’s corner. Three feet, and two seconds, later, a patch of sliced carpet was revealed. Aunt Val flipped back the floor cover, revealing a recessed safe door with an electronic key pad installed on the surface.

“It’s down here. Everything you need.” Kneeling down, she typed in a code on the pad and lifted and drew aside the door. No, not a safe. A hatch to what could only have been a subbasement below this one. Reaching inside and drawing out the topmost sliding extension of a ladder, she locked the rails in place. Already descending down the shaft, she glanced over to Andrew and me.

“You two coming?”

Fuck me.

She slipped into the hatch and began to lower herself to the subbasement without waiting for either of our responses.

“Charlie, you seeing this?” Jericho’s voice snapped.

“Seeing it.”

“Seeing what, Alpha?” Andrew barked as my aunt’s head descended past the basement floor.

“Cargo van coming up,” Morgan replied from on high. “Looks like delivery, or some shit, but lights are off and it’s creeping like a Catholic priest in Southie.”

“Perfect size for a team,” Jericho said. “Be careful Bravo, might be our three hostiles. This could go sideways faster than we think.”

“How long we got?” Andrew barked as I began to clamor down after my aunt.

“How long do you think you need?” Jericho asked, his voice even and calm.

“No idea.”

“Not much of a time-frame,” Jericho replied. “But we’ll make it work. Suspected hostile vehicle is coming to a stop, now. I am exiting the vehicle.”

I paused at the top of the ladder and glanced to Andrew, who was already looking at me.

“Go,” he said. “I’ll stay up here and make sure we maintain our exit path.”

Nodding and swallowing hard, I tightly gripped the rungs. “Okay. Be careful.”

“You know it,” he said with his normal grin.

I descended the rest of the way into a small, mostly unfinished room carved directly from the rock. The air was different from upstairs, more earthy and humid, and my eyes spun around the place in confusion until they found Aunt Val bent over in front of a large, ancient-looking safe, her fingers frantically working a dial combination.

I began to wonder how she’d even gotten the massive thing down here in the first place, but tumblers were already clicking and locks were unlocking before I could finish the thought. The giant door swung open to reveal a small, brightly lit room beyond.

“Ambyr! Come here!”

I followed after my aunt without hesitation, and found her bending over a metal file cabinet within an almost sterile clean-room environment, not much larger than a closet.

Now, I really didn’t want to consider the cost of this place. Not with this kind of facility.

“Here,” she said, pulling out and placing a thick file on a steel desk positioned next to the cabinet. Then: “Here,” another pulled down from an above-mounted shelf and place atop the first. “And here.” Another file produced from another, smaller safe.

Three files, all thick with printed pages and clippings.

My mouth dropped open.

A USB stick came next, which she held up for my cursory inspection, before tucking the thumb drive into my hip pocket.

“I knew he’d fuck me over,” she said, spitting the words as she gestured to the accumulated documents, then reached down to grab a satchel with a long cross-bodied shoulder strap. “I knew he’d fuck both of us. But I was so deep, and I had you in it all, I didn’t think we had a way out. But, still, I tried.”

“What is this?” I asked, pushing past my first sputtering reaction. “What is all this, Val?”

“It’s Backlund. It’s Management.” She’d begun stuffing the files into the satchel. “It’s everything you need to take out both him and the Agency. More than anyone has ever had on him in one place, besides maybe the server farm at his residence.” She offered the satchel to me. “That USB in your pocket will wipe the Agency’s servers. Just plug it into the PC monitoring everything, and a virus on there will do the rest. No need to run or even click anything–complete plug and play. And these files contain everything about him, including his current location.”