Ron Donaldo: Rise Of The Apex Don

Chapter 46

"It is a highly concentrated, fast-acting neurotoxin," the lawyer explained in a polite, professional voice. "If you swallow it, you will fall asleep in exactly thirty seconds. Your heart will stop. The medical examiner will record it as a massive heart attack brought on by the extreme stress of your arrest. It is completely painless."

Marcus shook his head violently. "No! I will not take it! I will go to prison! I will survive!"

The lawyer leaned forward. His dead eyes locked onto Marcus. 

"If you do not take the pill, Marcus," the lawyer whispered, "you will go to prison. And the Syndicate will make sure that your time in prison is the most agonizing, terrifying experience a human body can endure. You will pray for death every single day. And worse..."

The lawyer turned to look at Theresa. 

"...the Syndicate will visit your families. Your mothers. Your siblings. We will burn their houses down with them inside. We will erase your entire bloodlines from the earth. That is the price of failure."

Theresa began to cry silently. The tears washed the mud down her face. She realized the terrible truth. There was no escape. She had tried to play a game with monsters, and the monsters had finally come to collect their debt. 

"You have two choices," the lawyer said, looking at his expensive gold watch. "A quiet, painless sleep. Or a very loud, very painful accident for everyone you have ever loved. You have one minute to decide before the FBI returns."

Marcus looked at the white pill. His hands shook as he reached out and touched it. He looked at Theresa. The anger between them was gone. There was only a mutual, deep understanding of their complete doom. 

They had cornered themselves. 

...

While Marcus and Theresa faced the ultimate consequence of their greed, a massive black armored truck was driving at incredible speed down a dark, empty highway. 

The rain slammed against the windshield. 

General Silas Vance gripped the heavy steering wheel with both of his massive hands. His one good eye was focused on the wet road ahead. The truck engine roared as he pushed it past ninety miles per hour. 

"Faster, General," Ron Donaldo commanded from the back of the truck. 

Ron was pacing back and forth in the tight space. He ignored the burning pain in his bandaged left shoulder. He could not sit down. The lives of three thousand men were on the line. 

"I am giving it everything she has, my King!" General Vance shouted back. "We are five miles away from Blackgate Penitentiary! We will be there in four minutes!"

Silas, the hacker, was sitting at his computer terminal. His fingers were flying across the keyboard in a desperate blur. Sweat dripped off the end of his nose. 

"Sir, I finally broke through the prison's external firewall!" Silas yelled. "I am accessing their live security cameras right now!"

"Put it on the main screen!" Ron ordered. 

The large monitor on the wall flickered. The screen split into twelve different video feeds, showing different areas of Blackgate Penitentiary. 

Ron stared at the screens. His breath caught in his throat. 

The prison was completely dark. The main power was out, running only on dim, red emergency lights. 

But that was not the worst part. 

"Where are the guards?" Ron asked quietly. 

Silas typed a command. The camera zoomed in on the main guard tower. It was totally empty. He checked the main armory. Empty. He checked the front gates. Empty. 

"The Syndicate bought the Warden," Ron realized, his voice turning cold with horror. "Warden Miller. I spared his life when I left. He took their money. He evacuated all the guards."

"Sir, look at the cell blocks!" Silas cried out. 

The camera switched to Sector 4. The Pit. 

The long, dark hallways were lined with heavy steel doors. Behind those doors were three thousand prisoners. They were yelling, banging on the steel, reaching their hands through the small feeding slots. They knew something was terribly wrong. They were completely trapped in their cages. 

"Silas, unlock the cell doors!" Ron commanded. "Hack the main server and open them all!"

"I am trying, Sir!" Silas shouted, typing frantically. "But the system is completely locked down! It is running a localized override program! It is called Protocol Zero. The doors are physically bolted shut from the main control room. I cannot open them from the outside!"

"How much time until the bomb goes off?" Ron asked, his eyes locked on the terrified faces of the prisoners on the screen. 

Silas hacked into the main control room feed. 

On the screen, sitting in the middle of the empty guard station, was a large black box with a digital timer. 

The timer was counting down. 

"Ten minutes, Sir," Silas said, breathing a tiny sigh of relief. "We are four minutes away. We have time. We can break into the control room and stop the timer."

Ron watched the red numbers on the screen. 

10:00.

09:59.

09:58.

Suddenly, a massive, harsh warning buzzer sounded through Silas’s computer speakers. 

The red numbers on the bomb timer on the screen suddenly glitched. They did not tick down by one second. They jumped entirely. 

The timer dropped from 09:55 directly down to 00:30. 

"What happened?!" General Vance yelled from the driver's seat. 

"The Syndicate!" Silas screamed in pure panic. "They are monitoring the system remotely! They saw me hack into the cameras! They know we are coming! They triggered the early detonation!"

Ron’s heart stopped. 

The timer on the screen flashed violently. 

00:29.

00:28.

00:27.

"General!" Ron roared. "Brace for impact!"

Ron grabbed the heavy metal handles on the wall of the truck. Silas dove under his desk, covering his head. 

Through the front windshield, General Vance saw the massive, dark walls of Blackgate Penitentiary rising up into the rainy night sky, just a few miles ahead on the horizon. 

On the screen, the timer hit zero. 

00:00.

Before the truck even reached the prison gates, a blinding, terrifying flash of pure orange fire completely lit up the dark horizon. 

The night sky turned into day. 

A split second later, a deafening, earth-shattering boom rolled across the land, shaking the heavy armored truck so violently that all four tires lifted completely off the ground. 

Ron watched the horizon burn. The Pit had exploded. And his army was trapped inside.