At eight o’clock on a Tuesday morning, Damian Russo walked into his Tribeca headquarters and stopped cold.

The air forty feet beneath the earth was like stepping into an industrial freezer. Water covered the floor up to Damian's ankles, so cold it numbed his leather boots within seconds.

"Check your corners," Damian whispered over the comms, his tactical flashlight cutting through the thick, foggy darkness of the subterranean corridors.

The sub-basement was a maze of vaulted stone rooms, rusted boiler pipes, and abandoned storage cells built during the late nineteenth century. The sound of dripping water echoed from every direction, creating a disorienting, haunting acoustic trap.

Suddenly, automatic gunfire erupted from the end of the corridor.

Sparks rained down off the wet brick walls as three of Julian's mercenaries opened fire from behind a reinforced steel barricade.

"Cover!" Leo yelled, diving behind an iron support beam.

Damian didn't slow down. He leaned around a concrete pillar, firing three precise, controlled bursts from his submachine gun. Two of the shooters collapsed into the freezing water. The third turned to run, but Damian cut him down with a single bullet to the back.

Damian sprinted forward, grabbing the wounded guard by his collar and slamming him against the damp brick wall.

"Where is she?!" Damian roared, pressing the hot barrel of his gun against the man's throat.

The guard choked, coughing up blood. "Cell... cell block C... down the east tunnel... Julian's... Julian's setting the charge..."

"What charge?!" Damian demanded, shaking the man violently.

"He... he opened the floodgate valves... from the harbor river," the guard gasped. "The whole level... is gonna be under ten feet of ocean water in five minutes..."

Damian shoved the dying man aside and sprinted down the east tunnel without waiting for his men.

"Boss! Wait for backup!" Leo shouted, running after him.

"There is no time!" Damian's voice echoed through the dark stone hallway.

He rounded the corner into Cell Block C. The water on the floor was rising rapidly, already reaching his calves. The current was cold, muddy, and fast-moving.

At the end of the long iron hallway, behind a rusted bar door, he saw a small flicker of lantern light.

"Khloe!" Damian roared, his heart pounding so hard it threatened to burst through his ribs.

Inside the dark cell, Khloe heard his voice. It sounded like thunder breaking through her dark, freezing nightmare.

"Damian!" she screamed, her voice weak, shaking uncontrollably from the rapid onset of hypothermia. "Damian, I'm here!"

Damian reached the iron cell door. He saw her slumped against the back wall, her face pale as snow, her lips blue, her white shirt stained with blood.

"Khloe... oh God, Khloe," Damian breathed, his fierce, terrifying composure instantly shattering into pure, raw heartbreak.

He grabbed the heavy iron padlock securing the door, raising his weapon to shoot the mechanism.