Chapter 2: Traces on the Tile
We descended the concrete service stairs into the sub-level staff corridors where the air smelled of damp earth and laundry detergent. The harsh fluorescent strips overhead flickered with a low, electrical buzz. My rubber-soled shoes squeaked softly against the freshly moaned gray tile as I pulled a master maintenance card from my apron pocket and swiped it against the heavy steel door of the sub-level security terminal.
The door clicked open, revealing a cramped room filled with glowing server racks, banks of monitors displaying silent loops of empty service hallways, and a central metal desk cluttered with discarded paper cups and half-eaten sandwiches.
Marquina walked in, ducking his tall frame beneath the low door-frame. He placed his large hands on the edge of the metal desk, leaning down to stare at the active routing console. "Open the local cache for the elevator bank sub-routers."
I moved past him, my knuckles brushing his sleeve, and tapped a sequence of keys. A black window of scrolling code and timestamped connection logs filled the primary screen. "Look right here. 04:12 AM. That’s when Vance’s handheld pinged the external relay. It bypassed the hotel firewall entirely."
The bodyguard leaned over my shoulder, his heavy breath smelling faintly of mint and stale coffee. His stern expression shifted as his eyes scanned the hexadecimal addresses. He tapped his earpiece twice. "Base, run a trace on local sub-net four. Do it now." He straightened up, looking at Marquina with a hard, grudging nod. "She's right. The feed was bridged."
Marquina didn't celebrate being proven correct. He stood upright, his jaw tight, his dark eyes reflecting the green glow of the monitor. "They weren't just monitoring the elevator. They were programming the counterweight safety brakes to trip at maximum velocity between the eighth and twelfth floors."
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"A drop," I whispered, the reality of what I had intercepted finally settling cold in my stomach. "If you'd stepped in, the cable tension would have sheared under a manual override."
Marquina turned his head slowly, looking down at me with an intensity that made the air feel suddenly thin. "My father walked into a trap just like this twenty years ago. The board called it an accident. He called it bad luck. I knew better." He reached out, his long fingers lightly touching the edge of the white towel still clutched in my hand. "And now you've saved me from repeating it. Why?"
