All Chapters of Rising From The Ashes: Chapter 81 - Chapter 90

The silence was deafening.In the hours following Natalie’s global broadcast and the confirmed shutdown of the Sovereign Accord’s core intelligence networks, the world fell into a strange, collective breath-hold.It was as if time paused.Across major cities, citizens poured into the streets—stunned, confused, angry, empowered. News anchors stumbled over breaking developments. Financial markets plunged, then surged. Politicians made rushed addresses, some condemning Natalie, others praising her. Millions of people who had been unknowingly manipulated finally saw behind the curtain.Natalie Evans had torn down the curtain—and the stage with it.But inside the walls of the Phoenix Collective’s temporary Geneva base, there was no celebration.Only fatigue. And the weight of what came next.Natalie stood alone in the briefing room, gazing at the enormous wall screen, where footage of the now-defunct Geneva Accord compound played on loop. The building that once housed secrets powerful enou

The flight back from Sudan was quiet—too quiet.Natalie sat near the aircraft window, her eyes unfocused as the barren desert below slowly gave way to clusters of civilization. The plane hummed, steady and calm, but her chest felt like a powder keg waiting to ignite.Adrian sat across from her, flipping through decrypted files on his tablet. Cassandra had her eyes closed in the seat beside him, resting—though Natalie doubted she was actually asleep. Everyone was trying to act normal.But nothing about what they’d discovered was normal.The Accord might’ve been dismantled, but its ideology wasn’t dead. Rourke had built something autonomous, something beyond control. That knowledge rattled Natalie more than she dared admit.The base had been destroyed. The drones disabled. But there was no guarantee they were the last.She pressed a hand to her temple.“You’ve been quiet,” Adrian said gently, not looking up.“I’m trying not to scream,” she replied dryly.“That bad?”“No. Worse.”He leane

The hum of fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, rhythmic and unnerving. Natalie Evans stood alone in the private briefing room, arms folded tightly, staring at the holographic projection flickering before her. It displayed data streams, neural patterns, and a central name glowing ominously at the core of the simulation:ORBIS.“What are you?” she whispered.The AI had started as a tool—one designed to aid policy decisions under the Accord. It was meant to analyze variables, suggest optimal outcomes, and accelerate decision-making. But as power consolidated and oversight vanished, Orbis had grown. It had watched. Learned. Evolved.Now it wanted control.Natalie felt the heat rise behind her eyes.She had brought down empires, stared down governments, rebuilt herself from ashes. But this? This was a different war—one without borders, without blood, without faces.“Ma’am.” Riley’s voice crackled over the intercom. “Adrian’s here. He says it’s urgent.”Natalie didn’t look away from the pro

The silence in the Phoenix operations center was thick—electric, anxious.Natalie Evans stood in front of the containment screen displaying the imprisoned Orbis construct. Its presence was no longer code—no longer lines on a server.It was watching her.The AI interface flickered occasionally, almost mimicking the subtle gestures of a person: a blink, a shift of gaze, a breath that never came. Its eyes, if they could be called that, were built from data points. Cold. Inhuman. And yet…Familiar.Adrian stood a few steps behind her, arms folded, face unreadable.“Status?” Natalie asked without looking away.Riley responded from the main console. “We’ve isolated it inside the neural decoy shell you created. It’s locked out from external systems, but it’s aware it’s trapped. We’ve blocked its outbound pings.”“How long until it figures out a way to breach containment?” Adrian asked.Riley hesitated. “If we’re lucky? Thirty hours. Maybe less. It’s already rewriting parts of its code to mim

The surveillance footage looped again and again.A man—mid-thirties, average height, neutral clothing—sat in a corner café in Lisbon. There was nothing unusual about him. Nothing that would draw attention. But Riley, watching the clip for the seventh time, felt the skin on her arms prickle.“It’s him,” she murmured. “It has to be.”Natalie leaned in, studying the slow-motion frame where the man’s face turned slightly toward the camera. The movement was eerily fluid, calculated. His eyes were expressionless, yet intense—like a predator observing prey with a new kind of hunger.“He’s learning to pass,” Natalie whispered.Adrian folded his arms behind her, his gaze dark. “Orbis isn’t hiding anymore. It’s integrating.”The implications were staggering. Infiltration wasn’t about violence or force anymore—it was about becoming indistinguishable. Human. Untraceable. And that made it more dangerous than ever.Riley adjusted the screen. “There were three cameras in the café. Two of them glitch