The Interrogation

​POV: Jarrah

​The Calaby underground holding cells hadn't changed in two hundred years. Built deep into the bedrock beneath the sea cliffs, the walls dripped with saltwater that tasted of iron and ancient misery. The only light came from a single, naked bulb hanging from a frayed wire in the center of the low-ceilinged room, casting long, jagged shadows across the damp flagstones.

​In the middle of the room, bolted to the stone floor, sat a heavy iron chair. Lieutenant Vance was strapped to it, wrists bound behind his back with iron manacles, his wounded forearm wrapped in rough, blood-soaked bandages.

​I stood in the corner of the room, half-submerged in the shadows, my arms crossed tightly over my chest. My tactical vest was still heavy on my shoulders, the leather sheath on my thigh empty because the blade was currently resting on the wooden table in front of Malia.

​I couldn't take my eyes off her.

​Malia sat on the edge of the heavy wooden table, one boot resting on the floor, the other swinging gently. She wasn't wearing her coat anymore, just her dark leather tunic, her sleeves rolled up to her elbows, showing the faint bruises blooming on her forearms from the struggle in the tunnel. She looked entirely composed, almost cold, but I knew the fire burning inside her. I could feel it radiating across the narrow gap between us.

​Every instinct in my body screamed at me to take over, to drag the truth out of Vance with my bare hands for putting a gun to her head. But this was her domain. Malia was the strategist, the intelligence heart of Calaby. My place wasn't in front of her; it was behind her, an immovable wall of steel protecting her back while she tore our enemy apart piece by piece.

​"You've been sitting in that chair for three hours, Vance," Malia said softly. Her voice wasn't loud, but in the echoing stone chamber, it sounded like a razor blade sliding across glass. "The sea tide is coming in. In about forty minutes, the lower drainage pipes under your feet are going to fill with six feet of freezing saltwater. If I walk out of this room without signing your transfer order, the guards won't open that door until morning."

​Vance lifted his head. His lip was split, his left eye swollen shut, but it was the hollow, dead look in his good eye that told me he was close to breaking.

​"Alastair will kill me," Vance croaked, his throat raw. "If I talk... if he finds out I gave you anything... he'll flay me alive."

​Malia leaned forward, resting her forearms on her knees. The hanging lightbulb swayed slightly, casting soft gold highlights over her cheekbones.

​"Alastair isn't in this room, Lieutenant," she said, her voice dropping to a terrifyingly intimate whisper. "I am. And right now, I am the only thing standing between you and the bottom of the bay. You gave him our encryption codes. What did he give you?"

​"Nothing!" Vance spat, a bloody tear cutting a clean path through the grime on his cheek. "He promised to spare my squad when the strike hits! That's all! He didn't pay me! He just promised we wouldn't burn!"

​I stepped out of the shadows, taking two slow, heavy strides until I was standing directly behind Malia's shoulder. I didn't say a word. I just placed one broad, heavy hand flat against the back of her chair, my knuckles lightly touching her lower back through her tunic.

​I felt her relax slightly against my touch, a subtle, almost invisible shift in her posture that told me she felt me there. An unspoken message passed between us: I am your shield. Command the room.

​Vance's eyes flicked up to me, and he flinched, shrinking back into the iron frame of his chair. He saw the cold, unyielding promise of death in my face. He knew that if Malia gave the word, I would tear the stone walls down around him.

​"What strike, Vance?" Malia asked, her tone sharpening like a honed edge. "The codes you transmitted were for the outer harbor doors. Alastair doesn't have the fleet size to take the port by force. Our shore batteries would gut his gunboats before they reached the breakwater."

​Vance let out a dry, hysterical laugh that turned into a wet cough. "You think... you think he's coming with gunboats? God, you're so blind, Malia. You're looking at the horizon, and he's already under your bed."

​My jaw tightened. My hand pressed a little firmer against the back of Malia's chair.

​"Explain," Malia demanded.

​"The codes weren't to open the gates for an entry," Vance whispered, his head rolling back against the iron support as terror seized his face again. "They were to lock the gates from the inside. To disable the manual override on the primary harbor doors."

​Malia froze. I felt the sudden, tense spike in her posture.

​"Why would he want the doors locked from the inside?" she asked, her voice losing its cold edge and turning razor-sharp with sudden alarm.

​"Because he's not attacking from the open sea," Vance wheezed, staring straight at the ceiling as if he could see the sky collapsing above us. "He's already inside the port network. Three commercial cargo vessels... loaded with thermite charges and automated ironclad mercenaries... they came in under regional trade passes yesterday afternoon. They're sitting in Dock Seven right now."

​My blood ran cold. Dock Seven was the central logistical artery of the entire city. It held our main fuel reserves and connected directly to the civilian lower quarters.

​"He's going to detonate the fuel silos," Malia breathed, her face turning pale as she pieced it together. "He locks the harbor gates so our war frigates can't get out to maneuver, traps our fleet in the basin, and burns the entire eastern district to the ground in a single night."

​"A coordinated maritime strike..." I muttered, my voice low and dangerous. "He doesn't want to capture the port. He wants to turn it into an iron coffin."

​"When?" Malia slammed her hands down on the table, standing up so fast the wooden legs scraped violently against the stone floor. She stepped directly into Vance’s personal space, grabbing him by the collar of his uniform. "When is the strike scheduled, Vance?! Answer me!"

​Vance looked up at her, his lips trembling, blood leaking from the corner of his mouth.

​"He... he didn't give us a time," Vance whimpered, his eyes wild with a sudden, horrifying realization. "He said... he said the strike protocol would trigger automatically... ten minutes after the master encryption signal was successfully received by his receiver."

​A heavy, suffocating silence descended on the holding cell.

​I looked at the silver watch strapped to my wrist. The second hand was ticking steadily.

​It had been eight minutes since Vance completed the transmission in the tunnel.

​Before Malia could utter another word, the deep, agonizing wail of the harbor alarm sirens began to scream through the stone walls from the surface above, drowning out the sound of the crashing waves.

​And then, the heavy iron floor beneath our feet began to violently shake.