“Come out slowly, Ethan… unless you want to watch her die first.”Director Crowe’s voice echoed through the burning tunnel with terrifying calm, flames twisted along the collapsed passage while armed soldiers surrounded the only visible exit.Ethan’s heartbeat slowed dangerously. Crowe wasn’t angry, that was the worst part, he looked very prepared like every second of chaos since Blackwater Bridge had unfolded exactly the way he wanted. Lena stepped quietly beside Ethan.“We’re trapped.”Crowe smiled through the smoke.“You always were.”The soldiers raised their rifles simultaneously. Laser sights covered Ethan’s chest, his head, his throat. One wrong movement and he's dead.“Step forward,” Crowe ordered.Ethan stayed still, heat from the fire burned against his skin while pieces of the tunnel concrete continued collapsing behind them. The tunnel was becoming a furnace.“You destroyed the facility just to corner me?” Ethan asked coldly.Crowe adjusted his black gloves calmly.“That f

“Tell me something, Ethan… when you look at him, are you seeing your replacement… or your reflection?” Crowe’s voice echoed through the operations center while the image of the chained man filled the screen. The resemblance was perfect, same eyes, same jawline, same scar near the eyebrow. Ethan felt the room tilt beneath him. Impossible. “No…” he whispered. The unconscious man slowly lifted his head. Even the movement looked identical. Lena stared at the screen in horror. “What the hell is this?” Evelyn’s expression had turned pale. Crowe smiled calmly from the corner of the monitor. “Project Genesis,” he answered. “The future of controlled intelligence.” Gunfire thundered somewhere below the building. The resistance operatives scrambled into defensive positions while alarms screamed across the hidden base. Ethan barely heard any of it, because he was staring at himself. Crowe continued speaking casually. “Your father was brilliant, Ethan. Too brilliant. He believed geneti

Chapter Ten “Hold your breath, Ethan… because if we hit the water wrong, every bone in your body will shatter,” the duplicate said, his voice steady but urgent as his grip tightened around Ethan like a vise. They were falling through a storm-slashed night sky, swallowed by wind and chaos. The air tore at them, screaming in their ears like something alive trying to drag them apart. Above, the rooftop they had just escaped erupted in a violent explosion as the missile struck its mark. Fire bloomed outward, lighting the clouds in orange and red, while shattered concrete and twisted metal spun into the air like burning paper pieces. Ethan forced his eyes downward and immediately regretted it. The harbor rushed up to meet them with terrifying speed, dark and endless, like a mouth waiting to swallow them whole. The lights of the city blurred through rain and smoke, making the world feel unreal, like a collapsing dream. “We’re not going to make it” Ethan shouted, his voice crackin

“Don’t fight me unless you want to drown before the bullets reach you”The woman grabbed Ethan’s tactical vest the second panic crossed his face, her grip was surprisingly strong.Dark water spiraled around them while floodlights swept across the river above like giant white blades cutting through the darkness. Helicopters thundered overhead, their rotors sending vibrations through the water.The freezing current pulled at Ethan from every direction, his body screamed for air, his training screamed for survival.Every instinct he possessed told him to break free from the stranger dragging him into the depths, but something stopped him, maybe it was the confidence in her movements, maybe it was the fact that she had warned him, or maybe it was because everyone else currently wanted him dead.The woman never looked at him, her dark eyes remained fixed on the shifting lights above the river while she guided them deeper into the current. Ethan's lungs burned, his chest felt ready to expl

“If you get into that car, Ethan… there’s no guarantee you’ll come back alive”Rain hammered the abandoned shipping yard, the storm had intensified since they escaped the collapsing underground facility. Wind whipped across the harbor, rattling loose metal containers and sending sheets of water across the cracked concrete.The black SUV sat silently beneath the storm, its dark exterior reflected flashes of lightning from the sky above, the engine idled softly, waiting, watching, like a predator.Beside it stood the young boy holding an umbrella. He remained completely motionless, not nervous, not afraid, not even curious, just waiting. Something about him felt wrong, not dangerous in the usual way, but controlled, too controlled, the kind of discipline Ethan had only seen in elite operatives.Ethan pressed a hand against his wounded shoulder, pain shot through his body instantly, blood continued seeping through his fingers despite his efforts to slow it.The wound was getting worse,