Sean looked at her, then at the glass-walled building rising before them like a fortress.“Okay,” he muttered, voice calm but clipped.Nova didn’t smile. She simply pushed open the heavy front door and led the way, her coat flaring behind her like a warning flag. Sean followed, ignoring the stares burning into his back.Inside, the temperature dropped. The air smelled sharply of disinfectant and buzzed with tension. Scientists scurried across the tiled floor, murmuring to each other, fingers flying over tablets, eyes wide and sleep-deprived.As they moved deeper into the lab, Nova waved her ID over scanners, bypassed fingerprint locks, and led Sean through a thick set of steel double doors into a darker, colder room filled with blinking monitors and humming servers.“This is where it happened,” she said, gesturing to a desk in the far corner where two scientists were whispering over a frozen screen of code. They straightened the moment they saw her.Nova nodded. “He’s here to find the

Sean’s jaw tightened.Wren stepped forward, setting her sketchpad on a nearby table and flipping it open.“When the compound enters the system through the lungs, it interacts with the thalamus and the prefrontal cortex—fast. Within twelve seconds, the subject becomes… open. Their brainwaves start mimicking suggestive patterns. Commands, even soft auditory triggers, take root like instinct. They don’t question them. They just… follow.”“So, if someone told them to jump off a building…” Nova began.“They’d do it,” Wren said quietly.Nova looked horrified. “Wren, why didn’t you tell us it had reached that point?”Wren’s lips trembled slightly. “Because it wasn’t supposed to work. Not that well. I thought I’d hit a wall with the synthesis, but the last test batch... it reacted faster than anything we’ve seen before. I was going to delete it. I swear. But someone made a backup—someone with admin access.”Sean narrowed his eyes. “You think someone in the lab helped the hacker?”Wren didn’t a

The hacker froze when he heard the footsteps. He spun around, eyes wide behind a cheap plastic mask.“Don’t move,” Sean said, stepping closer.“Too late,” the man growled, reaching for the canister.Sean raised a hand. “You release that, and you’re dead before it hits the air. That formula isn’t perfected. One miscalculation, and you’re the first casualty. Your brain will melt before you even hear the screams.”The hacker hesitated—just for a second.Nova’s voice slipped through the comms: “Nice bluff.”“It’s not a bluff,” Wren whispered. “He’s right. The version he’s holding could backfire.”Sean saw it—the man’s hand trembled slightly. His confidence was starting to crack.“You think you’re in control,” Sean continued, voice low. “But you’re playing with a formula you don’t understand. That little girl over there?” He gestured toward Wren. “She made it. You’ve barely scratched the surface.”Wren stepped forward, steadying her breath. “You mixed it wrong. Your release nozzle’s off by

The mask hit the ground with a soft clink. Sean’s eyes locked onto the face beneath it.Pale. Sweating. Gaunt.The man looked like he’d seen a ghost. Now that his mask had been pulled off, he held his breath, refusing to inhale even a wisp of the green gas curling faintly in the air.Sean released his grip. The man dropped to his knees, still refusing to breathe. His cheeks puffed out, veins bulging in his neck, as if sheer willpower could keep the formula from entering his lungs.Sean didn’t move. Arms folded, expression unreadable, he simply watched.Seconds passed. Then more.The man’s lips quivered. His eyes watered. His face turned red… then purple.Still, Sean waited.If the man was choosing to hold his breath, then fine. Sean would let him. He was curious now—how long could he actually hold it?Thirty seconds. Forty.Then—Gasp!The hacker’s body finally gave out. He collapsed to the floor, sucking in a ragged breath through clenched teeth—And froze.His eyes went wide with fear.

"Like you asked, we didn’t tell anyone what happened when we went to find the hacker," Nova said as she stepped into the room, her expression serious.She had just returned from outside, where she’d spoken with the researchers.Now she stood in the room with Sean and Abrill. Sean sat on the sofa, not far from the bed where Abrill lay, a tablet in his hand.At the sound of Nova’s voice, he looked up from the screen to meet her gaze.Nova’s eyes flicked briefly to Abrill, then back to Sean. The way he sat near her—the way his attention kept drifting toward the bed—was there something going on between them? Something private?She hadn’t seen Sean this still, this watchful, around anyone before. If they were secretly dating... well, that wouldn’t be such a bad thing. Abrill could use someone steady. Someone who—"Has Director Hale done anything yet?" Sean asked suddenly, cutting off her thoughts.Nova blinked. She hadn’t expected that to be the first thing he’d ask."Not yet," she replied.