All Chapters of The Sterling Accord : Chapter 171
- Chapter 180
200 chapters
Chapter 171
After the darkDarkness didn’t come all at once.It seeped in, the way water fills a cracked vessel—slow, silent, inevitable.Clara floated in it.No sound.No time.No pain.Just a heavy, muffled quiet, as if she existed beneath the surface of a frozen lake, unable to break through.Then—somewhere far, far away—machines hummed.A rhythm.A pulse.A quiet mechanical breathing.Light split the darkness into trembling shapes.Clara inhaled sharply, the air metallic and cold. Her body jerked awake before her mind caught up.She was lying on a narrow metal cot.Straps around her wrists.Electrodes attached to her temples.A faint antiseptic smell in the air…A medical facility.No—worse.A containment facility.Her vision blurred, then steadied. A ceiling panel flickered above her, glitching like a dying screen. The entire room buzzed with unstable power.Fragments flashed through her mind—the catastrophic blackout, the Dead Zone collapsing, Ethan falling away from her, the scream she did
Chapter 172
Fractured signalThe city didn’t look like the one Clara remembered.Blackout scars streaked across the skyline—dark towers, blank billboards, crashed transport pods scattered like dead insects along the streets. What lights remained flickered erratically, glitching in and out like broken memories. The digital heart of the city—once bright, loud, alive—beat weakly now, as if struggling to remember how to function.Thunder rumbled overhead, the night swollen with storm clouds.Clara moved through the ruins with the blanket still wrapped around her shoulders, the cold biting into her skin. Every step echoed through the deserted blocks. Screens sputtered on as she passed—flashes of static, fractured color, faces half-formed then lost. Some broadcast distorted fragments of news, others just emitted broken code.Nothing was stable.Nothing was safe.A burst of static crackled overhead. Clara glanced up at a street display panel hanging by a single cable. The screen blinked, garbled pixels
Chapter 173
Board decree Ethan Sterling woke to the metallic taste of recycled air, Cold, Sterile, Artificial.He blinked hard, vision sharpening against the white fluorescence humming overhead. His wrists were bound—tightly, professionally—against the metallic chair bolted to the interrogation floor. A faint vibration rumbled beneath the tiles, the heartbeat of Sterling Enterprises’ subterranean security wing.They had dragged him here.The CEO of Sterling.Like a criminal.A door hissed open. Echoing footsteps entered.Ethan barely lifted his head. “You could’ve just asked for a meeting,” he muttered.A voice he knew too well answered. “We tried. You didn’t pick up.”Mara Lockwood—chief legal officer, polished, precise—stopped in front of him. Her posture was straight as a blade. Behind her, two security commanders and three board members filtered in: Harold Green, Vivian Shaw, Marcus Tran. All dressed in tailored suits, but their eyes were cold.They formed a semicircle around him.Formal. De
Chapter 174
Between two huntersThe tunnels smelled of rust and burnt circuitry.Clara Bennett squeezed herself into the narrow gap between two concrete support beams as a drone pack screamed past overhead, searchlights slicing through the abandoned subway line like blades.“Sterling Unit-7. Sweep complete. Subject not located.”Metallic voices bounced off the walls.Clara held her breath. Her palms stung where she’d scraped them against concrete while running. Her hair stuck to her forehead, damp with sweat and dust.The drones hovered for a moment—listening.Waiting.Her pulse hammered.Then a sharp tone.“Redirect to South Junction. Protocol: TERMINATE ON SIGHT.”They shot forward, leaving a gust of hot exhaust.Clara collapsed back against the pillar, exhaling shakily.“Okay… okay… keep moving.”But before she took a step—The lights around her flickered.Once.Twice.Then died.Pitch black.Her stomach knotted. She reached for the wall, grounding herself, grounding—Then a voice.Soft.Deep.
Chapter 175
ConditionedClara sat on the cold concrete floor of the old maintenance room deep in the subway tunnels. Pipes hissed above her like something alive, and the flickering lights turned every shadow into a threat.Her hands shook as she opened the cracked tablet she’d taken from the resistance contact before he died. The moment the screen powered on, static crawled across it.Then a voice—smooth, deep, terrifyingly familiar—bled through the speakers.Kane.“Clara… You’re slipping.”She flinched. “Get out of my head.”A soft laugh echoed through the tunnel, vibrating through the pipes.“I’ve never left.”The tablet glitched, flashing fragments of images—children in white rooms, tapping screens, answering commands; teenage girls staring blankly at holograms; a young woman with Clara’s face but empty eyes.Clara’s breathing quickened.“No. That’s not me. That’s not—I don’t remember any of this.”Kane’s voice deepened.“Of course you don’t. You weren’t supposed to.”The lights flickered hard
Chapter 176
Ghost file The Ghost File finished decrypting with a soft click—too gentle, too calm for the dread seizing Clara Bennett’s chest.She stared at the flickering screen.ACCESS GRANTED — NEURAL SIGNATURE: C. BENNETT (UNIT-0)Her heart dropped.“Neural… signature?” she whispered.The tablet responded with a soft hum like it recognized her—like it had been waiting for her.A video file opened automatically.The screen shook, then stabilized on a sterile white room.Electrodes.Machinery.A metal chair bolted to the floor.And in the center—A girl.Clara’s breath hitched. “No…”The girl looked maybe sixteen. Younger. Thin. Pale. Eyes dull and obedient. A shadow of who Clara had become.Her own voice, high and fragile, murmured through the speakers:“Ready for sequence alignment.”Clara recoiled. “That’s not me— I never said that, I don’t remember—”The footage zoomed in on the younger Clara’s face as a scientist stepped into frame.DR. VERAS — Sterling Enterprises Neurodevelopment Divisio
Chapter 177
Broken linesRain hammered the rusted metal rooftops of the lower district—loud enough to cover footsteps, quiet enough to hide gunfire.Ethan Sterling pressed his back to a concrete pillar, breath sharp, pulse erratic. A flashlight beam swept across the alley he had just crossed.“Mr. Sterling! Come out!”A mercenary’s voice echoed.“You’re under corporate lock directive!”Ethan muttered under his breath, “Yeah? Come read it to my face.”The beam moved away.He darted forward, slipping into an abandoned service tunnel beneath Sterling City. The stench of oil, mud, and broken wiring filled the air. The place felt like it could collapse at any moment—like everything else in his life.His comm unit vibrated weakly.PING — UNVERIFIED SOURCEEthan frowned. “Who is it now…”He swiped to open the message.CLARA BENNETT — ALIVE. LOCATION: UNKNOWNSignal fragment detected.His entire body went still.“Clara… she survived.”For a moment he couldn’t breathe.Then the second line loaded.MENTAL
Chapter 178
The collapse The abandoned lab was freezing.Clara Bennett shut the rusted door behind her and slid down against it, her breaths coming fast and uneven. The room smelled like dust, wires, and something burnt. Old monitors sat stacked on metal tables like skeletal remains.She pressed her palm against her forehead.“Just… stop. Please.”Her tablet flickered as the Ghost File continued to pulse like a heartbeat. She placed it on the table and forced herself to stand.“Alright,” she whispered to herself. “One more time. One more look. One more truth.”Her fingers trembled as she opened the file.LOADING NEURAL SIGNATUREMATCH: CLARA BENNETT — UNIT-0The screen brightened, displaying distorted footage. A younger version of her—maybe seventeen—strapped to a metal frame, wires along her spine, eyes blank from sedation.Clara’s breath hitched.“No… no, that can’t be me. That can’t—”“It is you.”Kane’s voice slithered through the room like static.Clara staggered backward. “Get out of my he
Chapter179
The last threadThe abandoned lab is dead silent when Ethan slips inside, breathing hard, dust swirling around him. The broken monitors cast thin blue reflections across the floor—ghost light, barely alive.He sees her.Clara stands in the center of the room, hair disheveled, eyes red and unfocused. She’s clutching a plasma weapon with trembling hands, pointed straight at him.Her voice cracks:“Don’t come closer. You’re not real.”Ethan freezes.He lifts both hands slowly.“Clara… it’s me.”She flinches.“Kane keeps doing this. I’m not falling for it again.”Her finger tightens on the trigger.Ethan’s heart clenches—but he doesn’t argue, doesn’t tell her she’s wrong. Logic won’t save her now. Kane has twisted too much. Instead, Ethan reaches into their past—the one place Kane can’t fabricate.He speaks gently:“Clara… do you remember the old rooftop in Arcadia? The night after the blackout? You said the city looked like a broken star map.” He steps closer. “And I told you—if we ever
Chapter 180
Underground AgainThey’re deep underground again—past the networks, past Sterling’s surface patrols. Cut off. Battered.But alive.Together.Clara leans against the wall, sliding to the floor. Ethan kneels in front of her, gently brushing debris from her hair. She watches him through tired, vulnerable eyes.For the first time since the Ghost File, her breathing steadies.They didn't speak at first—words felt too heavy, too fragile.Then Ethan reaches out his hand again, palm open, waiting.Clara places hers in his.Their fingers lock.No speeches.No promises.Just a silent pact:Whatever the truth holds, whatever Kane has twisted, whatever Sterling unleashes next… they face it together.The underground hums quietly around them—dark, dangerous, uncertain.But for the first time in a long time, Clara doesn’t feel alone.The underground lab smelled faintly of burnt circuitry and ozone. Smoke from the last cascade of overloaded servers curled along the ceiling like restless ghosts. Ethan