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Chapter 61: Aftershocks
The sea kept its secrets.Ethan stood at the edge of the shattered glass wall long after the sirens faded into distance, watching the water churn as if it might spit Shaw back out—smiling, smug, unfinished.It didn’t.Vale stepped closer, wrapping a thermal blanket tighter around her shoulders. “If you’re waiting for him to float,” she said quietly, “he won’t.”“I know,” Ethan replied.“You’re still hoping.”He glanced at her. “I’m verifying.”She snorted softly. “That’s the most you answer you could’ve given.”Behind them, boots crunched over glass. Rao approached, phone pressed to her ear, voice clipped. “No, I don’t care what the satellites say. If you don’t have a body, you don’t have certainty.” She paused, listening. Her jaw tightened. “Run it again.”She ended the call and looked at Ethan. “He planned this place too well.”“He always did,” Ethan said. “Beautiful exits. Multiple contingencies.”Vale folded her arms. “You’re saying he wanted the option to disappear.”“I’m saying
Chapter 60: Fault Lines
They moved Ethan before sunrise.No sirens. No convoy. Just a quiet transfer through underground corridors that smelled of concrete dust and old secrets. Rao walked beside him, tablet tucked under her arm, her expression unreadable.“You trust us?” she asked suddenly.Ethan didn’t look at her. “No.”“Good,” she said. “Then we’re clear.”They emerged into a hangar carved into rock. A matte-black transport sat waiting, engines already humming. No markings. No tail number.Rao stopped at the foot of the ramp. “Once we lift, you’re off the books. If this goes wrong—”“I don’t exist,” Ethan finished.She nodded. “Vale is being moved. Shaw doesn’t keep assets still for long.”“Neither do I,” Ethan said, and boarded.The cabin lights dimmed as the aircraft banked hard. A man across from Ethan slid a folder onto the seat between them—thin, deliberately so.“Everything we know,” the man said. “Which isn’t much.”Ethan opened it anyway.Photos. Blurred satellite shots. Shipping manifests. A nam
Chapter 59: The Price of Light
The holding room had no windows.That was the first thing Ethan noticed when they shut the door behind him—not slammed, not locked with any theatrical flair. Just a quiet seal, airtight and final, like the room itself was designed to forget whoever sat inside it.He flexed his fingers once, feeling the faint tremor still running through them.The adrenaline was wearing off.That was dangerous.A camera blinked to life in the corner. One red dot. Watching. Always watching.Ethan leaned back in the chair, metal cold against his spine. “You can come in,” he said calmly. “I know you’re already listening.”Silence.Then a voice—female, composed, threaded through unseen speakers.“You’re remarkably comfortable for a man who just destabilized the global intelligence ecosystem.”Ethan smiled faintly. “I was uncomfortable when you were lying to everyone.”A pause.Footsteps approached outside. Multiple. Measured.The door opened.Three people entered.The woman from the helipad led them—dark c
Chapter 58: After the Dark
The lights did not come back on.For a long moment, there was nothing—no hum of servers, no whisper of cooling systems, no artificial voice counting down the end of the world. Just the ocean pounding against steel and Ethan’s own breathing, too loud in the dark.Vale broke the silence first.“What did you do?” she asked quietly.Ethan didn’t answer.The console beneath his palm was warm, then cooling rapidly, like a body losing heat. The screens around them remained black, their reflections ghosting faintly in the glass.Lucas’s voice crackled once in Ethan’s ear.Then stopped.“Lucas?” Ethan said sharply.No response.Vale’s jaw tightened. “You didn’t shut it down, did you?”Ethan finally turned to her. His face was unreadable, carved into something hard and distant.“I ended it,” he said.“That’s not an answer.”“It’s the only one that matters.”The platform lurched—not violently, but decisively. Somewhere deep in its core, massive mechanisms disengaged with a sound like locks slidi
Chapter 57: Checkmate
The helicopter didn’t wait.Ethan watched it lift off from the offshore platform, rotors slicing through fog and wind, the sound fading until there was nothing left but the sea and the creak of metal beneath his boots.“That’s it?” he muttered. “No final speech?”The platform groaned, as if answering him.Ethan turned back toward the interior, jaw tight. Shaw had walked away too cleanly. No threats. No chase. No attempt to finish him.Which meant this wasn’t over.Not even close.His phone vibrated.The fourth phone—the one he’d sworn he wouldn’t power on unless everything else went wrong.The screen lit up on its own.UNKNOWN:MOVE.Ethan frowned. “I’m already moving.”He typed back.ETHAN:JUST LEFT SHAW.Three dots appeared.Paused.Disappeared.The floor shuddered.Not an explosion. Not damage.Activation.Ethan’s instincts screamed. He spun, weapon up, as the lights along the corridor snapped from white to red.A voice filled the platform—female, synthetic, disturbingly calm.“SI
Chapter 56: The Unraveling
“Something’s wrong.”The thought surfaced before Ethan even opened his eyes.The motel stairwell smelled wrong.He stood at the top step, hand resting lightly on the rail, eyes fixed on the dark stain just beneath his fingers.Oil.He let out a slow breath.“Cute,” he murmured to no one.Ethan stepped back, testing the floor behind him instead. Solid. He turned, pushed through the fire exit, and slipped into the alley without ever touching the stairs.From across the street, a man lowered his phone.Ethan caught the reflection in a puddle.He didn’t run.He walked.Three blocks later, the man was gone—and so was Ethan.---Two hours later, Ethan sat in a narrow café that smelled like burnt coffee and disinfectant. He kept his back to the wall, recorder in his pocket, phone face down on the table.The waitress eyed him. “You gonna order, or just glare at the furniture?”“Coffee,” Ethan said. “Black.”She snorted. “Of course.”As she walked away, Ethan’s phone buzzed.Unknown number.He
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