Chapter 47 - The Danube Interception
Yet the dragon did not die easily.
Before the tactical police could cross the crowded ballroom, two smoke canisters detonated near the side exit. Thick, blinding chemical fog engulfed the stage. Helena’s elite private guards fired suppressed weapons into the ceiling, inciting immediate, screaming pandemonium among the hundreds of wealthy guests.
David lunged forward through the smoke, but a concussive blast from a flashbang knocked him backward onto the carpeted floor. By the time the air cleared enough to breathe, Helena von Steiger and three of her closest operatives had vanished through a subterranean service passage leading toward the Danube canal.
"David! Can you hear me?" Marcus’s voice crackled frantically through his earpiece. "She’s heading for the private marina at the Reichsbrücke! She has an armored hydrofoil waiting on the river!"
David hauled himself to his feet, ignoring the ringing in his ears and the bruise spreading across his ribs. "Marcus, where is Veta?"
"She’s with me! We're intercepting the bridge approach in the van right now! But David, Helena’s men are armed with heavy ordinance—they’re shooting to kill!"
"Don't engage them alone!" David yelled, sprinting through the service corridors, kicking open an emergency exit that led into the cold Vienna night.
Rain had begun to fall, slicking the cobblestone streets as David commandeered a parked hotel security motorcycle, firing the engine to life with an override key. He blasted into the traffic of the Ringstraße, dodging incoming police cruisers that were still struggling to navigate the chaotic perimeter around the hotel.
Down at the riverbank, the dark waters of the Danube churned violently. A sleek, military-grade black hydrofoil was idling against the pontoon dock, its twin turbo-diesels throbbing with deep, menacing power. Helena, her ivory coat stained with soot and rain, was being escorted aboard by two heavily armed mercenaries.
Suddenly, Marcus’s utility van crashed through the perimeter chain-link fence, skidding across the wet tarmac and blocking the dock’s primary gangway.
"Get down!" Marcus shouted from inside the driver’s cabin, drawing his firearm as the mercenaries opened fire. The van’s windshield spiderwebbed under a barrage of armor-piercing rounds. Marcus fired back through the driver’s side window, taking down one of the gunmen, but a return shot shattered the van’s side mirror, sending fragments of glass into Marcus’s shoulder. He collapsed across the steering wheel with a stifled groan of agony.
"Marcus!" Veta cried from the rear compartment.
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Helena turned on the gangway, seeing the girl trapped inside the smoking vehicle. A look of grotesque, desperate triumph flashed across the old woman's face. She snatched a sidearm from her remaining guard. "Bring the girl! Leave the rest!"
Helena stepped onto the tarmac, raising the gun toward the van’s door—just as the roar of a high-displacement motorcycle engine tore through the darkness above.
