Chapter 11 The first thing Ethan felt was the hum , deep, resonant, vibrating through the floor beneath him. He opened his eyes slowly. The world was washed in sterile light. White walls. Chrome floors. A constant pulse of electricity humming like a heartbeat through the metal. He was lying on a narrow platform in the center of a vast circular chamber. Around him, dozens of glass pods lined the walls , each one filled with a human figure suspended in a clear fluid. Some faces were familiar. Some were his. He sat up sharply, the memory of the tunnel flooding back , Control shouting, the blinding surge, then nothing. “Aria?” His voice echoed against the steel. No response. Only the rhythmic thrum of machines. He slid off the platform, feet bare against the cold floor. A faint flicker of static traced across the edge of his vision , neural interference. Whatever Roth had triggered in him was still active. As he moved through the chamber, the pods hissed faintly, following

Chapter 13 The Core has imploded. Ethan killed his clone , or thought he did. Now, as London’s network collapses, the MIU and Roth’s remaining operatives close in. ~ Rain hissed against the smoke rising from the ruins. London’s skyline shimmered behind the haze , a jagged outline of glass and shadow. Ethan pushed himself upright, lungs burning from the blast. The air reeked of ozone and molten metal. Every breath tasted like rust. Control coughed beside him, clutching her shoulder. “Move. MIU will have drones here in minutes.” He nodded, eyes scanning the chaos. Sirens wailed across the city, blue light flickering through the mist. Pieces of concrete rained down from what had been the Core’s main elevator shaft. They staggered toward the service tunnel, their boots splashing through puddles of black water. Ethan’s reflection followed them , but the eyes that stared back were still wrong. Too cold. Too steady. Control noticed him falter. “Ethan, keep it together.”

Chapter 15 Control received a mysterious message from Ethan: “Whitechapel. Midnight. Alone.” Meanwhile, MIU Command is scrambling to understand what happened beneath Canary Wharf. But Ethan’s signal is no longer coming from one place , it’s everywhere. MIU Command Center — 23:41 hrs The screens filled the room like a wall of ghosts. Dozens of feeds blinked in and out , CCTV, traffic cams, satellite overlays , all flickering with static interference. The map of London was bleeding light, red markers spreading from Canary Wharf in widening circles. Lieutenant Grace Halden leaned over the console, voice tight. “How many systems affected?” A technician wiped sweat from his brow. “We’re up to thirty-seven percent of grid control offline. Traffic, communications, even private security networks. It’s not a conventional hack , it’s... self-propagating.” Halden frowned. “Like malware?” “No, ma’am. Like consciousness.” The words hung in the stale air. A new feed blinked t

Chapter 17 London hadn’t slept in days. Power grids blinked unpredictably. Traffic systems looped through chaos. Drones patrolled the sky, their red eyes scanning every street corner like restless ghosts. Control stood at the edge of the Thames, rain soaking through her coat, her breath fogging in the night air. The city was humming , not with noise, but life. It felt wrong. And yet, somewhere beneath that endless current of data, she could feel him. Ethan. Every night since the Core implosion, she’d heard faint anomalies — radio static forming half-sentences, streetlights flickering in Morse patterns, CCTV cameras that turned to follow her even when offline. It wasn’t paranoia. It was him, reaching out. The Flicker Her pendant glowed faintly under her collar, the same one he’d given her years ago during an op in Prague — a dead drop token, rigged with a microtransmitter that synced only to his personal frequency. After the explosion, she’d found it cracked, its int

Chapter 19 The closer Control moved toward the river, the louder the hum became. Not sound , vibration. A low, thrumming pulse moving through the pavement, up through the rails of Vauxhall Bridge, into the bones of the city itself. London wasn’t just reacting anymore. It was anticipating. She crossed the pedestrian walkway, breath sharp in the cold night air. The Thames churned below, swelling against concrete banks as if stirred by the same invisible force. Ahead, MI6 Headquarters ,Vauxhall Cross , rose like an angular monolith of glass and steel. It loomed above the water, lights blazing through its windows in a grid of precision. Usually it felt watchful. Tonight, it felt… awake. Her pendant buzzed once. A warning. “I know,” she whispered, pulling her hood tighter. “I’m being watched.” She didn’t have to look behind her to know Mason’s men were tracking her at a distance. Let them. Ethan could see everything now. But the building in front of her , that wa