Chapter Twenty

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Chapter Twenty

The desert wind howled around us, a gritty whisper of everything we’d left burning behind.

Liam didn’t slow until the smoke faded into the horizon. We crouched behind a ridge, hearts racing, the bunker’s distant ruin still flickering against the sky.

I exhaled shakily. “She’ll come after us harder now.”

“She always does,” Liam replied. “But this time, we hit back.”

Freya wiped sweat from her brow, her braid loose and streaked with ash. “The upload reached the Ark, but it’s only a matter of time before Scarlett tries to intercept or spin it.”

“She won’t get the chance,” Liam said. “Not if we move first.”

I turned to him. “To where? Another bunker? Another trap?”

He shook his head. “No. To the capital.”

I stared. “What?”

“We need to expose her publicly. Face to face. In her own stronghold.”

Freya crossed her arms. “That’s suicide.”

Liam’s eyes locked with mine. “Not if Isla leads the reveal.”

My throat tightened. “Me?”

“She’s the only one who can trigger the embedded fail-safe,” Freya added, voice softer now. “The neural sync baton was just a backup. But the real command… it’s buried deeper. Tied to your memories.”

“My memories?” I blinked. “I barely remember my mother’s last words.”

Freya reached into her pack and pulled out a small silver cube. “Then maybe this will help.”

I took it carefully. “What is it?”

“A memory capsule. Your mother made it. Before she vanished.”

My fingers trembled as I activated the cube. A flicker of light bloomed, and her face appeared—hazy, older than I remembered, but unmistakably her.

“Isla,” she said softly, “if you’re watching this, then you’ve come far. Far enough to face the truth.”

Liam knelt beside me, silent.

My mother continued, “The Origin Protocol wasn’t just code. It was conscience. A way to stop control before it metastasized. That’s why I tied it to your neural patterns—because you’re my greatest creation. You were always the key.”

She looked away for a beat, emotion flickering across her holographic face.

“They’ll tell you you’re just a pawn. A piece in a war you never asked for. But they’re wrong. You are the final decision.”

The recording ended.

Silence clung to us like a shroud.

I closed the cube. “She believed in me. Even when I didn’t know what I was.”

Liam touched my shoulder. “Then believe in yourself now.”

“We leave tonight,” Freya said. “I have a contact in the capital. A journalist—Tamar Khan. Independent. Uncompromised. If we get her the proof, and Isla’s voice… we blow the lid off Scarlett’s entire empire.”

“And then what?” I asked. “They’ll arrest her? Just like that?”

Freya gave a bitter smile. “No. But the world will know. And knowledge is the first crack in a regime.”

We traveled under moonlight again, concealed by shadows and silence.

Freya led us to an abandoned airstrip, where a battered twin-engine plane waited in the sand.

“You trust this pilot?” Liam asked.

“With my life,” she replied.

A woman climbed out of the cockpit—leather jacket, sharp eyes, and a cigarette clinging to her lips. “About time,” she said. “I was starting to think you got vaporized.”

“Hello to you too, Nadia,” Freya smirked.

Nadia looked us over. “This everyone?”

Freya nodded. “Let’s fly.”

The plane lifted, rattling through turbulence and tension.

I sat beside Liam, staring through the cracked window.

“If this goes wrong,” I said quietly, “what happens to the people who helped us?”

“They knew the risks,” Liam replied. “But we’re going to make it count.”

We landed outside the capital just before dawn, in a ghost terminal buried beneath a smuggler’s route.

Tamar Khan met us at a secure safehouse—tall, shrewd-eyed, and already holding a recorder.

“You have five minutes to convince me not to turn you all in,” she said without preamble.

Liam stepped back, letting me forward.

I took a breath. “My name is Isla Ventris. I am the daughter of Clara Ventris—the scientist who created the Origin Protocol. My mother embedded a neural fail-safe in me before Scarlett’s regime assassinated her. I have the full code. And I have proof of Scarlett’s crimes.”

Tamar stared for a moment, then nodded slowly. “Go on.”

We showed her everything—Freya’s footage, the transmission logs, my mother’s memory capsule.

By the time we finished, her recorder lay forgotten on the table.

“Jesus,” Tamar whispered. “This… this is history.”

“It’s war,” Freya corrected. “And we need your platform to win it.”

Tamar stood. “I’ll do it. But you need to speak. On camera. Your face, your voice, your story.”

I hesitated. “They’ll come for me.”

“They already are,” Liam said. “Might as well make it count.”

I stepped in front of the camera. Tamar adjusted the lens.

The red light blinked.

And I began.

“My name is Isla Ventris. I was never meant to survive. I was meant to be erased—like my mother. But I carry her legacy. And the truth behind the Origin Protocol. Scarlett Monarch murdered my mother. She’s hunting me because I can expose her. But I’m done hiding.”

My voice steadied.

“I am not a weapon. I am not a threat. I am the line between their control—and your freedom.”

The recording stopped.

Tamar uploaded the footage to her network.

“Once it goes live, there’s no turning back.”

I nodded. “I wasn’t planning to.”

But before she could hit send, the lights flickered.

Freya spun. “EMP. They’ve found us.”

An explosion rocked the wall.1

Liam pulled me back. “Move! Now!”

Another blast. The door caved inward.

Scarlett’s soldiers poured in.

But this time—I wasn’t the one frozen.

I grabbed the neural baton, raised it high, and jammed it to my temple.

A scream tore through my skull.

And everything went white.

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