2025-03-25 05:46:47Soho, Manhattan – Cipher’s Apartment – 9:32 A.M.
The screen glowed with decrypted data, the pieces of a deadly puzzle finally coming together.
Leo “Cipher” Marquez cracked his knuckles, his bloodshot eyes scanning the code at lightning speed. **Lines of financial transactions, offshore accounts, military-grade equipment orders—**all leading to one thing.
Operation Solstice.
Ethan leaned over his shoulder. “Tell me what I’m looking at.”
Leo exhaled sharply. “This isn’t just some run-of-the-mill arms deal. It’s an attack. A large-scale, coordinated strike.”
Evelyn narrowed her eyes. “Where?”
Leo clicked a few keys, pulling up a heatmap of international wire transfers. The majority of the funds were funneled into three locations—New York, London, and Dubai.
Ethan’s jaw tightened. “Three targets. Three days.”
Leo muttered, “These aren’t just random targets. The money trails lead to energy grids, financial hubs, and government communication relays. If The Dominion pulls this off, they’ll send entire cities into chaos.”
Evelyn’s expression darkened. “This isn’t just about power. They’re resetting the global order.”
Ethan stood abruptly, reaching for his gun.
“We need to move.”
But then—
BANG!
The window shattered as a bullet punched through the glass, embedding itself in the monitor next to Leo’s head.
“DOWN!” Ethan roared, shoving Evelyn to the floor as another silenced shot whizzed past.
The Dominion had found them.
The Escape – 9:35 A.M.
Ethan’s instincts took over. Three snipers. Rooftops across the street. The Dominion wasn’t just sending a warning—they were sending executioners.
“Leo, back door. NOW.”
Leo scrambled, grabbing his laptop as Ethan and Evelyn covered him.
Ethan grabbed a flashbang from his belt, pulled the pin, and hurled it toward the window.
BOOM!
The explosion of light and sound bought them seconds, but seconds were all they needed.
They burst through the back door into a narrow alleyway, where a black SUV skidded to a stop.
The driver’s side window rolled down. A man with slicked-back dark hair and ice-cold blue eyes stared at Ethan.
Adrian Locke.
One of The Dominion’s top enforcers.
“Cross,” Adrian said smoothly, tapping a cigarette against his wrist. “You always were a pain in the ass.”
Ethan raised his gun. “You always were a smug bastard.”
Adrian smirked—and then the alley erupted in gunfire.
The Chase – 9:40 A.M.
Ethan and Evelyn sprinted for cover as bullets tore into brick and concrete.
Leo, panting, gasped, “I—am—not—built—for—this!”
Ethan grabbed him by the collar and yanked him forward. “Move your ass, Cipher!”
Evelyn spotted a motorcycle chained to a lamppost. Without hesitation, she pulled a lockpick from her sleeve, jamming it into the ignition.
“Ethan!” she shouted.
He turned just in time to see her kick-start the engine.
Ethan shoved Leo onto the bike behind Evelyn.
“What about you?” she yelled.
Ethan glanced back at Adrian Locke, who was stepping out of the SUV, a custom-made silencer pistol in hand.
Ethan smirked. “I’ll catch up.”
Then he ran straight at Adrian.
The Showdown – 9:42 A.M.
Adrian aimed.
Ethan dodged left, grabbed a metal pipe from the ground, and swung.
CRACK.
Adrian blocked at the last second, but the impact was enough to throw off his aim.
Ethan followed up with a vicious elbow to the jaw, sending Adrian stumbling.
“Still quick, I see,” Adrian muttered, wiping blood from his lip.
Ethan spun the pipe in his grip. “Still slow, I see.”
Adrian lunged.
They clashed—brutal, fast, efficient. No wasted movement. No hesitation. Just two trained killers fighting to survive.
Then—
A siren wailed in the distance. NYPD.
Adrian cursed, stepping back. “We’ll finish this later, Cross.”
Ethan didn’t wait. He bolted toward the fire escape, climbing as the sirens grew louder.
Regrouping – 10:15 A.M.
Ethan caught up with Evelyn and Leo at a safe house in Queens.
Leo was still gasping for breath. “I—want—a—raise.”
Evelyn ignored him. “We need to split up.”
Ethan nodded. “I’ll take New York. You head to London.”
Evelyn hesitated. “And Dubai?”
Ethan clenched his jaw. “We’ll need an inside man for that.”
Evelyn’s eyes darkened. “You mean him.”
Ethan exhaled. He didn’t like it either, but they had no choice.
They needed to contact Sebastian Vance—a man with deep ties to The Dominion.
A man Ethan once called his best friend.
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Chapter 247 – Echoes Beneath the Ashes
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Chapter 246 – The Reckoning Begins
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Chapter 245 – The Earth Vessel
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Chapter 244 – The Prime Ascension
The transmission crackled to life just as the last node in the Triarch Array surged with light. A pulse rolled through the Citadel’s network like a tidal wave—data streams flared in frantic motion, scattering red and blue across every screen in the Command Atrium. Ethan Cross stood frozen, his eyes locked on the main display where the final encryption layer collapsed. The Dominion Core was no longer dormant.“Talk to me, Amara,” Ethan said, his voice steady despite the tremor beneath his skin.Across the console, Amara’s fingers flew, her face a study in both awe and anxiety. “The Dominion’s prime code is awake. The last firewalls are gone—we have full access to the system. All of it.”Keller stepped forward, gun still drawn though the immediate danger had subsided. “Define full.”Amara looked up. “Control over the Sentinel grid. The blacksite armories. Project Lazarus… Every c
Chapter 243: Echoes of an Unwritten Future
The fallout was immediate.Within hours of the Dominion’s core being obliterated, global data streams destabilized. The carefully veiled surveillance grids—the “Sentinets”—began crashing in synchronized failure. News stations flickered with partial truths, governments issued hasty denials, and in underground networks across Berlin, Jakarta, Buenos Aires, and Lagos, whispers spread fast: The Dominion has fallen.But with collapse came vacuum—and in that vacuum, chaos.Ethan, Aria, Malik, Selene, and Donovan regrouped in an abandoned listening post in Lucerne, Switzerland—a former Consortium relay site now dark, its satellite dishes snapped like brittle bones against the snow-covered mountainside. Inside, they stood around a central terminal broadcasting intercepted frequencies.“Sixteen sovereign military units have gone dark,” Donovan said, scrolling through encrypted feeds. “Looks like they were
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