The hum of the digital timer vibrated through the damp steel beams overhead, a sharp, metallic rhythm counting down toward an unknown zero.
Leo didn’t flinch. His eyes remained locked on the scarred face of his former commander, tracking the micro-twitch in the man’s right jaw—the telltale sign of hesitation before a trigger pull.
«Drop the glass-breaker,» the commander ordered, his finger tightening slightly on the trigger guard. «Or the next sound you hear won’t be a timer.»
«You died in Nine-Nine,» Leo said, his voice cutting through the hollow acoustics of the warehouse. «I pulled your dog tags out of the wreckage myself.»
«Did you?» A cold, humorless chuckle escaped the man’s lips. «Dog tags are easily forged, Leo. Just like identities. Just like the little bundle of blankets that supposedly started this entire chase.»
From the shadows above, the sharp, artificial wail of the infant echoed again—too rhythmic, too mechanical. It wasn’t the ragged breath of a living baby; it was a looped audio file playing on an encrypted frequency.
A heavy wave of realization hit Leo with brutal force. There was no baby. There never had been one. The entire scene at the promenade—the spilled bag, the prescription bottle, the tearful mother—had been a meticulously orchestrated trap designed to pull him off the grid and walk him straight into this cage.
He dropped the tactical glass-breaker. It hit the concrete floor with a dull, heavy clatter that vanished instantly beneath the relentless drone of the overhead timer, now flashing a bright amber LED light down from the rafters.
«Smart boy,» the commander muttered, stepping closer while keeping the suppressed barrel leveled at Leo’s chest. «Now turn around and place your hands against the steel pillar.»
Leo didn’t move. Instead, his gaze shifted past the man’s shoulder toward the back of the warehouse, where a rusted service door stood ajar, revealing the gray expanse of the harbor beyond. A solitary figure in a dark trench coat was stepping onto a waiting motorboat idling against the concrete pier.
It was Elena. And she wasn’t running away—she was holding a sleek, silver briefcase that bore the exact same military encryption seal as his former unit’s classified communications cache.
«You’re chasing ghosts, Leo,» the commander warned, pressing the cold muzzle of the pistol firmly against the back of Leo’s neck as he forced him forward. «And today, you’re going to join them.»
Before Leo could leverage his weight to disarm him, a deafening explosion shattered the glass skylights overhead, raining white-hot sparks down across the empty concrete floor as the countdown timer abruptly stopped at zero.