LOGINThe digital disco of Gary "The Phantom" hummed with the quiet, frenetic energy of an invisible war. The mirrored walls reflected not dancers, but the exhausted faces of fugitives staring at screens.
Jack Sterling sat in the command chair, his leg propped up on a velvet ottoman. The pain in his hip was a constant, gnawing reminder of his mortality, but his mind was sharp, focused on the scrolling lines of code Ben Carter was projecting onto the wall."He's panicking," Jack said, his voice low."Who?" Hailey asked, looking up from where she was braiding Bessie the cow's tail."Valerius. Look at the data traffic." Jack pointed to the screen. "Encryption levels on his personal server just tripled. He's locking down. He knows we're alive, and he knows we're close.""He doesn't just know," Ben said, tapping a key. "He's reacting. Check the Dark Web forums."A new window popped up. It was a site called The Red Ledger—a notorious marketplace for assassinsWaking up was getting harder. The line between nightmare and reality was blurring. When Jack opened his eyes, he wasn't in a tunnel. He was in a clean, white room. The air smelled of antiseptic and... strawberries? "He's awake," a voice said. Jack sat up. He was in a medical bed in Gary's bunker. The disco ball was still there, but the lights were dimmed to a soothing blue. Olivia was sitting next to him, peeling a strawberry. She looked cleaner, her face washed, wearing a borrowed tie-dye t-shirt that said "Make Love, Not War." "How long?" Jack asked. "Two days," Olivia handed him a slice of fruit. "You exhausted your core. The Tinker warned you about overusing the Hand." "We have Arthur?" "We do," Ben Carter's voice came from the command chair. "And boy, does he have stories. We thawed him out yesterday. He's... traumatized, but talking." "Where is he?" "In the server room, helping Gary decrypt Valerius's files. Turns out, Arthur b
The Ghost Train was not built for passengers; it was built for silence and suffering. The interior of the rear car was a dimly lit corridor of steel cages. The air was frigid, kept at near-freezing temperatures to sedate the occupants.Jack Sterling, limping heavily on his PVC crutch, moved through the shadows. The rhythmic clack-clack-clack of the tracks beneath them was deafening, masking their footsteps."Don't look at them," Olivia whispered, gripping Jack's arm.But Jack looked. He had to.Inside the cages were the discards of Valerius's ambition. Men and women with limbs twisted into impossible shapes, skin grafted with metal plates, eyes glowing with the dull, sickly green of unstable runic energy. Most were unconscious, drugged into oblivion. But some stared back with hollow, pleading eyes."We can't save them," Marcus said, his voice tight. "Not now. We have to secure the engine.""We'll come back," Jack promised, his voice low and dangerous. "
While Jack and his team navigated the subterranean labyrinth, the world above had transformed into a nightmare of steel and shadow. Victor Valerius stood on the balcony of what used to be the Mayor's office. He had redecorated. The colonial furniture was gone, replaced by stark, black obsidian desks and wolf-skin rugs. The American flag had been burned; in its place hung the banner of the New Order—a golden wolf's head on a field of blood red. He wore a suit that cost more than most people earned in a lifetime, but beneath the fine silk, his body was a war zone of muscle and scar tissue. Around his neck, hidden beneath his collar, hung a small vial containing a sliver of white bone—a fragment of the Progenitor. "Report," Valerius commanded, not turning around. He was watching the smoke rise from the Sterling Tower excavation site miles away. "The blast was successful, my Lord," a lieutenant in tactical gear said, kneeling. "We have breached the outer seal of
The digital disco of Gary "The Phantom" hummed with the quiet, frenetic energy of an invisible war. The mirrored walls reflected not dancers, but the exhausted faces of fugitives staring at screens.Jack Sterling sat in the command chair, his leg propped up on a velvet ottoman. The pain in his hip was a constant, gnawing reminder of his mortality, but his mind was sharp, focused on the scrolling lines of code Ben Carter was projecting onto the wall."He's panicking," Jack said, his voice low."Who?" Hailey asked, looking up from where she was braiding Bessie the cow's tail."Valerius. Look at the data traffic." Jack pointed to the screen. "Encryption levels on his personal server just tripled. He's locking down. He knows we're alive, and he knows we're close.""He doesn't just know," Ben said, tapping a key. "He's reacting. Check the Dark Web forums."A new window popped up. It was a site called The Red Ledger—a notorious marketplace for assassins
They walked for hours. The adrenalin faded, replaced by the deep, bone-weary exhaustion of survival.Jack leaned heavily on a makeshift crutch Marcus had fashioned from a piece of PVC pipe. Every step was a negotiation with pain, but Jack was a stubborn negotiator."We need a base," Jack said. "A real one. Not a hole in the ground.""And we need comms," Ben added. "My laptop battery is at 12%. Once it dies, we're blind. We can't access the dark web, we can't track the Hounds, we can't even play Solitaire.""Priorities, Ben," Catherine said dryly."Solitaire keeps me sane, okay?" Ben shot back."Grog knows a place," the Rat King rumbled. He was carrying Bessie the cow over his shoulders now, claiming the "moo-dog" was tired. "Old man lives in the wall. Has magic lights.""Another Tinker?" Olivia asked warily."No. Ghost," Grog said. "Digital Ghost."They followed Grog through a series of narrow service tunnels that seemed to be going up. T
The darkness of Sub-level 9 was not empty. It was heavy, textured, like breathing in wet velvet.Jack Sterling lay on a mattress of scavenged subway seats, the foam brittle and smelling of decades-old dust. The pain in his hip was a dull, throbbing bass note to the symphony of his recovery, but the fever had broken. The Tinker's green sludge—some kind of military-grade nanite cocktail—was working.He could feel the metal pin in his pelvis. It felt cold, alien, a permanent reminder that Jack Sterling, the man of flesh and blood, was being replaced piece by piece."Water," he rasped.Olivia was there instantly. She looked exhausted, her face smudged with grease, her eyes hollowed by lack of sleep. But her hands were steady as she held a dented tin cup to his lips."Slowly," she whispered. "It's filtered, but it still tastes like iron."Jack drank. The water was metallic, sharp. It tasted like the underground."Where are we?" Jack asked, p







