Ron Donaldo: Rise Of The Apex Don

Chapter 48

Sitting on the floor inside the cage was Dr. Aris. 

The old man’s hands were tied tightly with plastic zip-ties. He looked weak, pathetic, and terrified. He had felt the massive shockwave of the explosion. He knew exactly what it meant. 

Ron stood in front of the metal bars. He stared down at his old teacher. 

"Do you see what your partners just did, Aris?" Ron asked. His voice was incredibly quiet, which made it far more terrifying than a shout. "They murdered three thousand men in cages."

Dr. Aris swallowed hard. He could not look Ron in the eyes. He stared at his own shaking hands. "I... I told you, Ronald. The Syndicate does not leave loose ends. When a branch is compromised, they cut it off and burn it. The Director failed. You exposed Sterling Tech. So they erased everything connected to you."

"They missed me," Ron said simply. 

"They will not miss again," Dr. Aris whispered, finally looking up. His eyes were wide with a crazy, desperate fear. "You do not understand their power, Ronald! The Director was just a tiny ant. The people at the top... they control the world's money. They control entire governments. They are a shadow that covers the earth. You cannot fight the dark!"

"I am the Warlord," Ron said. "I am going to tear their shadow apart piece by piece. Starting with you."

Ron reached through the metal bars. He grabbed Dr. Aris by the collar of his neat gray sweater. He pulled the old man forcefully against the steel bars. 

"You built the bomb in my laboratory," Ron growled, his face only inches from Dr. Aris. "You took their money. You know their secrets. I want a name, Aris. Who is at the top of the pyramid? Who gave the order to blow up The Pit?"

"I don't know!" Dr. Aris cried loudly, tears falling from his eyes. "I swear to you, I don't know their real names! They never meet in person! They only use code names!"

Ron tightened his grip. The old man gasped for air. "Give me a code name."

"Janus!" Dr. Aris choked out, his face turning red. "The leader of the inner circle! They call him Janus!"

Ron slowly let go of the sweater. Dr. Aris fell backward onto the floor of the cage, coughing and rubbing his neck. 

"Janus," Ron repeated the name softly. 

Janus was the ancient Roman god of doors, gates, and transitions. The god with two faces. One face looking into the past, and one face looking into the future. It was a very smart, very arrogant code name for a criminal mastermind. 

"Where is Janus?" Ron demanded. 

"Nobody knows!" Dr. Aris sobbed, burying his face in his tied hands. "He exists everywhere and nowhere. He hides his wealth and his power in secret fortresses around the world. The Director used to talk about them when he was drunk. He called them... the Vaults."

Ron frowned. "The Vaults?"

"Yes," Dr. Aris nodded quickly, desperate to stay alive. "Massive, underground bunkers. They hold the Syndicate’s gold, their secret weapons, and their blackmail files on every president and prime minister in the world. If you find the Vaults, you find Janus. But they are completely hidden. There are no maps. There are no records."

Ron turned away from the cage. He looked at Silas, who had been listening to everything from his computer chair. 

"Did you hear that, Silas?" Ron asked. 

"Yes, Sir," Silas said, typing rapidly on his keyboard. "But the old man is right. I have searched the deepest parts of the dark web for five years. I have never seen a single file mentioning the Vaults of Janus. If they exist, they are completely cut off from the internet. They are digitally invisible."

Ron paced back and forth in the narrow space of the truck. His brain worked like a supercomputer. He pieced the puzzle together. 

The Syndicate was incredibly smart. They would never put the locations of their greatest treasures on a computer that could be hacked. They would keep the locations on an offline, highly encrypted, physical server. 

Ron stopped pacing. He looked back at Dr. Aris. 

"Aris," Ron said slowly. "You worked for The Director for four years in my old laboratory. You were his chief scientist."

Dr. Aris nodded weakly. "Yes."

"The Director was a paranoid man," Ron deduced, his eyes narrowing. "He did not trust anyone. Not even his bosses in the Syndicate. If The Director knew about the Vaults, he would have kept a secret record of them. A backup file. Just in case the Syndicate ever turned against him. He would want leverage."

Dr. Aris looked up, his eyes widening in surprise. "He... he did have a secret server. In the sub-basement of the lab. It was completely disconnected from the main network. He forced me to build it for him."

Ron smiled a cold, victorious smile. He turned to the other side of the truck.