Chapter 46
2404words
Sinclair Dominion HQ | Sublevel 3
The man—mid-forties, wiry, still sweating through his cuffs—wasn’t trained for this.
He hadn’t asked for anything. Not water. Not a break. Not even the time. Since being flown in hours ago, bound and blindfolded, he hadn’t said a word. Just sat hunched in the metal chair, fingers twitching, eyes downcast.
Now, under the glare of too-bright fluorescents, he sat alone at a desk that wasn’t built for this. The room wasn’t an interrogation suite—just a stripped logistics office on Sublevel 3. Bare walls. Scuffed tile. A single camera wired to a terminal nearby.
Across from him, Lucian stood, arms at his sides, unreadable.
Eli leaned against a file cabinet in the corner, expression harder than usual, his silence colder than threat.
Sebastian sat beside the desk, a slim folder resting open near his hand—not thick, not theatrical, but precise. A quiet signal: we know more than you think.
Beyond the one-way glass, three more figures watched.
Kristina stood motionless, arms folded tight across her chest.
Ash lingered just behind her, silent and tense.
Vex stood closest to the glass, one shoulder braced against the wall, eyes tracking every twitch in the room.
They could hear everything. See everything. But the man couldn’t see them.
Inside the room, the silence stretched—sharp, coiled.
Then Lucian stepped forward.
“What were you doing in that building?” he asked, voice even but without preamble. “It’s a shuttered defense contractor on paper—nothing active since 2004. But you weren’t there for inventory.”
The man said nothing. His fingers twitched faintly.
Lucian didn’t wait. “It’s one of three shell properties still linked to old Alton Biotech filings. Site ownership changed hands after ‘06—quiet transfer, zero public record. You were spotted three times over two weeks, coordinating inbound shipments.”
Still, the man kept his eyes on the desk.
Eli spoke next, voice low. “You didn’t show up in our systems until last week. No formal ties. No records. But you knew how to move. You kept off-grid. Until you didn’t.”
He pushed off the cabinet and took a slow step forward.
“Badge scans. Elevator logs. Same elevator. Same floor. Same pattern.” He paused. “But only one person caught your attention.”
Another silence.
Lucian’s voice dropped. “Who were you watching?”
The man’s jaw worked—tensing, unclenching. Then, quietly:
“I wasn’t told names. Just instructions.”
“What kind of instructions?” Sebastian asked, without looking up.
“To monitor and relay movement,” the man said, dry-voiced. “No contact. No interference. Just verify presence.”
Lucian narrowed his gaze. “Verify whose presence?”
A pause. Something flickered behind the man’s eyes—resignation, maybe.
Then, slowly:
“A woman. Said she was the daughter of two former bioengineers tied to a classified research fire from the early nineties. I didn’t know names, but when I saw her… I recognized her photo from the file.”
Eli’s expression didn’t change, but his posture did—like something inside him had clicked into place.
“What name was on the file?” Lucian asked.
The man didn’t hesitate this time.
“Kristina Alonzo.”
Behind the glass, Vex stiffened. “What the hell—?”
Ash blinked, glancing at Kristina, then back into the room.
But Kristina didn’t move. Her hands were clenched at her sides now. She stared at the man—eyes locked, unblinking. No sound escaped her. No reaction. Just the tightening of her jaw. The lift of her shoulders. The slow, deliberate control of someone who refused to let the floor fall out again.
The men inside the room didn’t flinch. They hadn’t been caught off guard—not really. They’d already suspected the truth. Had seen the threads winding back to eighteen years ago. This only confirmed it.
Eli didn’t speak. But something in his silence changed.
Lucian’s voice cut back in. “Who gave the order?”
“We don’t get names,” the man muttered. “Just protocols. Track her. Confirm sightings. Report back. That was it.”
“And now?” Sebastian asked.
The man exhaled. “They went dark in ‘07. We all thought it was buried. But something changed a few weeks ago. The old lines lit up again. Same protocols. Same phrasing. Someone wants her accounted for.”
Lucian stared down at him. “Are there others?”
The man hesitated—then nodded. “Yes.”
Inside the observation room, Kristina’s arms dropped to her sides.
She didn’t speak. Didn’t have to.
They were still hunting her.
The door hissed shut behind the man they’d interrogated, and the silence that followed felt heavier than anything he’d confessed.
Kristina didn’t move.
Neither did Ash.
Vex had turned his back to the glass, one hand resting against the wall beside it. His jaw clenched tight. The air in the observation space was stale and charged, like the kind of silence before a detonation.
Kristina’s gaze stayed locked on the now-empty interrogation room. Her name still echoed in her ears, cold and precise from the man’s mouth. Daughter of two bioengineers. Legacy risk. Alonzo.
At some point, she had stepped back from the glass. She didn’t remember doing it — but Ash had.
“He knew your name.”
Kristina swallowed. “Not just my name. My parents’. They knew about the crash. They’ve always known.”
From inside the room, through the one-way glass, Lucian stood still, arms crossed, as Eli and Sebastian exchanged quiet, clipped words. But Kristina’s eyes caught the flicker—Eli glancing up toward the glass as if he could see her. He couldn’t, not really. And yet… she felt seen.
Then Vex spoke, voice sharp. “Did he say A.M.?”
Ash turned. “Yeah. Said it like it was just another line on a file.”
Kristina’s brows furrowed. “You recognize it?”
Vex didn’t answer immediately. Then: “Savannah’s dad. Alistair Miller. That was on his old files—A.M. I’ve seen it in some of the blacklisted compliance archives before.”
Ash blinked. “Wait. Savannah’s father? What the hell does he have to do with any of this?”
Kristina’s chest tightened. She remembered Savannah’s stories. The tense silences about her family. The way she dodged questions about her father’s past. It never seemed important—until now.
“Alistair Miller was part of Quintis,” Kristina said slowly. “Not just a scientist—he was one of the board’s silent funders. I saw the name when I was sorting through my parents’ archived files. Back when I didn’t know what any of it meant.”
Vex looked over his shoulder. “So not just a scientist. He was management.”
“Higher than that,” Kristina murmured. “He might’ve been the one who funded the programs they were assigned to.”
Vex let out a slow exhale, the anger barely masked. “Which means he’s not just connected—he’s one of the people who could’ve signed off on the research itself. Or worse... ordered the cover-up.”
Ash ran a hand through his hair. “Shit. Savannah’s been here this whole time.”
And then, as if summoned by the weight of it all, the comm crackled again. Lucian’s voice, smooth and cutting:
“You three. Situation room. Now.”
Sinclair Dominion HQ | Situation Room
Late Evening
The projection screen flickered as Sebastian pulled up internal archival records. Lucian stood at the center of the room, arms behind his back, gaze locked on the flood of decades-old files.
“Code QBT-212,” Sebastian said. “Filed under bioethics risk logs in Quintis Biotech, back when they were under Alton Division. Redacted on the surface—but Dominion has backdoor clearance for the old shadow files.”
He tapped twice. A log expanded.
Subject: Emil and Janine Alonzo Date: October 12, 1992 Flag: Unauthorized Access / Project D-Helix Filed by: A. Miller
“Subjects flagged for unsanctioned data duplication and non-cleared inquiry into core genome series. Risk level: high.” “Recommended mitigation: controlled removal from active research registry.” — A.M.
Kristina stared.
“Controlled removal?” she repeated. “That means termination.”
Eli’s voice was low from her side. “Not always. Sometimes it’s just cover language. For suppression, reassignment…”
He trailed off. Even he didn’t believe it this time.
Lucian turned slowly, meeting her eyes.
“Your parents found something. Something they weren’t supposed to. And Alistair Miller signed off on silencing them.”
Kristina didn’t realize she’d sat down until she felt the chill of the chair. Her thoughts spun—faster than she could hold them. Her parents. The car crash. The blackout that followed. And now a man—Savannah’s father—at the center of it all.
Ash exhaled shakily. “Does Savannah even know?”
Vex muttered, “I doubt it. She’s loyal, but she’s not dirty.”
Lucian gave a sharp nod toward Sebastian. “Find out where Alistair Miller is. And how many people he’s burned in the past twenty years.”
“If he sanctioned one death,” Lucian said, “he’s sanctioned more.”
Sebastian was already typing. “On it.”
Kristina sat on a bench just outside the debriefing room, elbows resting on her knees, eyes vacant. Her palms were clasped together, fingers unmoving — like if she let them go, the grief might start to spill through the cracks.
Lucian saw her first when he stepped out. He didn’t speak, only took in the sight of her — the way her shoulders had folded inward, how carefully composed she looked even as something inside her was clearly unraveling.
A few paces behind him, Eli had stopped at the threshold. He didn’t move forward. Just stood in the shadowed corner of the hall, watching Kristina with a quiet, unreadable expression.
Lucian turned to him.
“You should talk to her,” he said, voice low, even. “You can’t read her mind just standing there.”
Eli’s jaw tightened, eyes flicking to Lucian. “I don’t want to make it worse.”
“She just learned her entire childhood was a cage. That her parents weren’t just killed — they were hunted. She’s not going to break because you sit beside her.” Lucian’s gaze didn’t waver.
“But you might.”
The silence stretched between them. Not hostile — just heavy. Measured.
Lucian let out a soft breath and looked away. “Go on. She trusts you.”
There was no challenge in his voice. No accusation. But the weight of the words was real. And Eli heard what Lucian didn’t say aloud: So do I.
Eli stepped forward.
He approached slowly, and Kristina didn’t lift her head until his shadow fell across her. She looked up at him — and something in her eyes cracked just a little. The sharp edges of grief, anger, and exhaustion all blending into something quiet and frayed.
“You okay?” he asked gently.
She didn’t answer right away. Just shifted slightly to make space for him on the bench.
He sat beside her without touching her. Just close enough.
“I don’t know what to feel,” she whispered. “All this time,” she said, voice quiet, “I tried to believe it was just… a freak accident. I told myself I must’ve imagined it — the fear, the way it all felt wrong. But now I know. I was right. Someone made sure they died. And I was supposed to follow.”
“I know,” Eli said. His voice didn’t waver, but something in him buckled quietly. “I tried to stop it back then. I was just a kid. I couldn’t. I’ve been trying ever since.”
Kristina pressed the heels of her palms against her eyes. “I don’t even know what to do with this. I feel like I’m remembering things that didn’t exist.”
Eli lowered his head. “You’re not crazy. You’re remembering what they wanted you to forget.”
For a long moment, she didn’t speak. Then she turned slightly toward him — not fully, just enough to let her shoulder brush his.
“I missed you,” she said quietly. “Back then, after the crash… after everything. I didn’t understand what happened. One day you were there — and then you weren’t. And part of me kept wondering if I just imagined you. If maybe you were never real at all.”
Eli looked at her, his eyes quietly wrecked. “I never stopped looking.”
“I know that now.”
It was so soft, it barely left her lips.
From across the corridor, Lucian watched. He had stayed behind the glass wall, unseen, unheard.
He didn’t interrupt. Didn’t move.
But in the space between them, he felt it — the old tether that hadn’t broken. The history that neither time nor silence had erased.
And still, he stayed. Because Kristina had earned the truth.
And Eli — Eli had earned this moment.
Lucian stood near the glass wall, arms loosely crossed as he watched the two figures on the far end of the room. Eli had approached her gently, cautiously — like someone unsure if their presence would help or wound. Kristina sat on the edge of a low bench, eyes downcast, the tension in her shoulders refusing to ease.
Whatever words passed between them were too low to hear, but Lucian didn’t need the sound. He could read it in the way Eli leaned forward just slightly, and in the flicker of movement when Kristina’s fingers closed around the edge of her coat. Grief, anger, and exhaustion all blending in her posture. Familiar. Ancient.
He didn’t flinch when Sebastian spoke beside him.
“You trust him with her now?” Sebastian asked, his voice low, not loaded with challenge but something closer to curiosity.
Lucian kept his eyes on them for a breath longer. “I trust what he’s been willing to lose,” he said quietly. “And I trust her to choose who she lets in.”
Sebastian didn’t answer at first. He followed Lucian’s line of sight, watched the way Eli’s hand hovered — not touching, not quite — until Kristina gave the smallest nod, and only then did Eli sit beside her.
“She’s unraveling,” Lucian murmured, more to himself.
Sebastian glanced at him. “And you’re not stopping it.”
“I don’t get to,” Lucian said. His jaw tightened. “She deserves the truth — all of it. And he’s part of that.”
There was silence again, the kind that stretched thin in the air between them. Then Sebastian said, “I never thought I’d see the day you’d let someone else stand that close.”
Lucian’s smile was faint, tired. “Neither did I.”
Across the room, Kristina finally spoke — voice small, but steady. Lucian could see the wet shimmer in her eyes from here. Eli didn't flinch. He listened.
“She’s still in there somewhere,” Lucian said, softer now. “The girl who didn’t know how to grieve properly because the world kept teaching her to run first.”
Sebastian’s expression shifted — not pity, but understanding. “And him?”
Lucian exhaled through his nose. “He’s the boy who stopped running.”
Some truths wait in silence, but they never stay buried.
—To be continued.
