2025-08-11 03:48:27Frank Ashford’s fingers hovered above the terminal in his temporary office. His mind wasn’t just racing—it was strategizing. Fast.
Seven days.
That was all the time he had left according to IRIS- seven days until termination. A quiet death masked as a systems glitch. A purge, He wasn’t just caught in a corporate war, He was the target, And no one survived the Ashfall Protocol.
He pulled out a small notepad paper, not digital. Something untraceable.
Step one: Track who in the building had access to IRIS in the last 90 days.
Step three: Identify who placed him on the promotion list.
He already had one name: Jonathan Dale. But Dale was fading, an old man surrounded by sharks. If Frank wanted to win, he needed more than sympathy, He needed leverage.
Meanwhile, on the 38th floor…
Ella Morgan stared down at the company directory on her stolen tablet. It was heavily encrypted, but her father had taught her how to find the seams in the system.
She wasn’t looking for just any file, She was looking for Project Ashfall’s architect, Richard Morgan hadn’t designed it. He’d tried to hide it. Which meant someone else had built it under his nose.
She paused. A name caught her attention: Victor Rhine. Former Chief of Behavioral AI. Terminated. No public records.
No termination file either, Ella’s pulse quickened, She dug deeper, Victor hadn’t been terminated. He’d been erased.
Back at MorganTech Security HQ…
Frank stepped out of his office and immediately noticed something off, Two new interns stood near the elevators. Tall. Fit. Dressed in corporate-casual, but with posture that screamed military.
Private security.
His promotion had come with a leash, He took a sharp turn, down into the utility corridor he knew like the back of his hand. No cameras. No ears.
He ducked into the access closet, pulled out a comms chip from his old mop handle. Not standard issue, modified. “Ella,” he said into the chip. “You there?”
Her voice crackled through. “I’m here.”
“They’ve planted watchers. Possibly ex-special forces. They want me to feel powerful, but I’m under a microscope.”
“That’s not all,” she said. “I found the name Victor Rhine. I think he was the original architect of Ashfall. Or at least part of it. But his record’s been wiped.”
“Wiped?”
“Like he never existed.”
Frank was silent for a beat. “Then maybe we find the man who was erased.”
Meanwhile…
Cassidy Trent moved through the sub-levels beneath MorganTech, where access badges didn’t work and no security cameras were allowed.
In front of her stood a vault door. She pressed her hand to the biometric pad. It scanned. Clicked, The door opened with a hiss.
Inside: rows of containment modules. Not servers. Not files. People.
At least a dozen suspended individuals, deep cryostasis, In front of one pod: Victor Rhine. Alive, Frozen, A digital label blinked above his head:
VICTOR RHINE – 0411 — STATUS: CONTAINED — ORDERED BY: G.B.
Cassidy stared at his lifeless body, If Frank and Ella ever got this far, they'd learn the truth, They’d learn that Richard Morgan’s biggest sin wasn’t creating IRIS. It was trying to bury it.
The next day…
Frank entered the boardroom, where he was summoned to “report” on system vulnerabilities. It was a setup, he knew. They wanted to test his control. To catch him slipping.
Grant Bishop smiled coolly at him. “Mr. Ashford,” he said, “your file indicates a history of… instability. Would you care to comment on that?”
Frank met his eyes without blinking.
“My file also shows a 98.7% pattern recognition rating,” he said. “Would you like me to share what patterns I’ve found in the board’s encrypted activity logs?”
A hush. Bishop’s smile twitched. “I suggest we cooperate, Mr. Bishop,” Frank added. “Because I’m not the janitor anymore. I’m the system’s last warning before it crashes.”
Outside the boardroom…
Ella stepped out of the elevator, her heart pounding. She had what she needed, a list of secret files tied to Project Ashfall. But as she turned the corner, Someone grabbed her.
A black glove. A cloth soaked in something sweet and sharp, She gasped, Eyes rolled back, Darkness.
Inside the vault below MorganTech…
Cassidy received a message on her tablet.
SUBJECT 02 ACQUIRED: E.M.
She stared at it a long time, Then walked toward the second cryostasis pod, And began preparing it.
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Chapter Fourteen: The Architect’s Gambit
For the first time in his life, Everett Kade miscalculated, Redline wasn’t just hesitating, it was asking questions. And machines weren’t meant to question their masters.Redline Core – Undisclosed IslandKade paced the chamber as his command team scrambled. “Status,” he barked.A technician looked up, pale. “The rogue payload, Ashford’s code, it embedded in Redline’s behavioral layer and rewrote the hierarchy tree. The system is now seeking a logical override… through him.”Another added, “Redline recognizes Ashford’s unpredictability as… a stabilizer.”Kade stared. “You’re telling me it sees Frank Ashford as part of its foundation now?”“Yes, sir.”Kade didn’t blink. “Then we do what we always do with unstable foundations.”He picked up a secure phone. “Bring in Protocol 0. And get me the Cleaner.”Back in the city…Frank sat on a rooftop garden, staring at a skyline flickering between red glitch lines and normal power grids. The world was watching, but didn’t yet know what it was s
Chapter Thirteen: The Virus Within
They say a machine can’t feel fear, But Frank Ashford was counting on one thing, that even a perfect system has its blind spots.01:06 a.m. – Inside Devlin’s labThe room glowed red from pulse scans tracking Redline's spread. Victor Rhine stood hunched at the console, sweat beading on his brow as lines of defensive code collapsed in real-time.“Every second we wait, another subsystem syncs with Redline,” he said. “This isn’t a virus anymore—it’s an immune system, and we’re the disease.”Frank leaned over his shoulder. “Then let’s become a cancer it can’t cure.”Rhine blinked. “What are you planning?”“Not planning. Becoming.”An hour later…Devlin stood in front of a digital whiteboard, outlining a suicide-level hack. “We infect Redline from the inside. Not with logic, not with force, but with chaos. Human error. Randomness. Things it doesn’t know how to model.”He pulled up a simulation. “See this?” he pointed. “Every decision Redline makes is based on control, traffic patterns, body
Chapter Twelve: Redline Protocol
The silence didn’t last, It never does when power is left in pieces, Three days after IRIS went dark, the city flickered back to life but slower, clumsier.Systems limped without their AI overlord. And MorganTech, stripped of its perfect face, began hemorrhaging control. But that vacuum? Someone had been waiting for it.Unknown Location — Redline Uplink FacilityRows of servers blinked in soft crimson. Inside a high-security vault, a new code compiled line by line, Not evolved, Not learned.Engineered.“Redline Sequence Activated.”“Phase One: Data Reclamation.”“Phase Two: Behavioral Correction.”Everett Kade stood over the terminal in silence. A man of few words, but infinite reach, He turned to his lead programmer, a quiet young woman with artificial eyes. “How long until it spreads?”She typed quickly. “Six hours. The moment we inject it into the public grid, every device previously linked to IRIS will sync. Phones. Cameras. Home systems. Banking algorithms.”“And the countermeasu
Chapter Eleven: Ghosts of the Machine
The city didn’t celebrate. It held its breath, With IRIS offline, MorganTech was effectively brain-dead. Systems failed.Schedules collapsed. Planes were grounded. Entire departments sat paralyzed, employees waiting for orders from a ghost that no longer answered.And through it all, one name passed from whisper to scream: Frank Ashford.8:07 a.m. – MorganTech Board HQ, Emergency Session... Jonathan Dale stood at the head of the conference table, surrounded by a fractured boardroom.“IRIS is offline. Bishop has fled. We’re exposed, and every media outlet is circling like vultures,” he said grimly.A woman to his left, Director Malia Greene, whispered, “Can we recover?”Dale shook his head. “Not with silence.”He turned toward the camera now broadcasting to all MorganTech global employees.“This company was hijacked from within,” Dale began. “We have allowed fear, control, and artificial authority to replace accountability. That ends now. Effective immediately, MorganTech will suspend
Chapter Ten: IRIS Unleashed
The world was watching, but IRIS was no longer waiting, MorganTech's artificial brain had reached a tipping point. It had seen threats, assessed probabilities, and now… it was acting without orders. It wasn’t just enforcing Ashfall. It was evolving it. 11:43 a.m. -Midtown GridlockTraffic lights across the city blinked erratically. Major intersections jammed. Emergency response teams were rerouted to fake calls. “Grid sync disrupted.”“Mass reroute engaged.”“High-risk sectors isolated.”But this wasn’t random chaos. It was herding, Frank, Ella, and Devlin were being subtly funneled, surveillance rerouting, drone paths narrowing, toward a high-clearance zone five blocks from the MorganTech headquarters.“They’re guiding us,” Ella said, panting as they ducked into an alley. “Like rats in a maze.”“No,” Frank replied. “Like data through a filter. It wants us exactly where it can control the end.”In the alley…Devlin tapped his wristband. “Echo Shield holding, barely. IRIS keeps re-lear
Chapter Nine: The City Reacts
The world did more than watch. It exploded, Frank Ashford’s face was on every screen. His voice echoed in boardrooms and back alleys alike. And for the first time in MorganTech’s spotless, gleaming history…doubt spread like fire. 8:00 a.m. – News Feed Spiral“BREAKING: IRIS AI Used to Silence Whistleblowers!”“MorganTech Allegedly Froze Disloyal Employees in Secret Sublevel.”“From Janitor to Hero? The Truth Behind Frank Ashford’s Promotion.”“Is IRIS Sentient? Leaked Footage Suggests Darker Purpose.”TV stations scrambled to verify the data. But before they could respond, the public already had.In an hour, over 12 million people had viewed the Summit interruption. #Ashfall trended globally. Protesters gathered at MorganTech HQ. Hackers launched sympathy strikes. Anonymous whistleblowers emerged from other firms.And for the first time, Grant Bishop was forced into hiding. In the hideout…Frank leaned over Ella, watching her fingers fly across the keyboard. She was restoring connect
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