Chapter Three - Karmia
Sunlight slants through the blinds, cutting pale bars across my sheets.
I blink up at the ceiling, disoriented for a heartbeat before the clock on my nightstand comes into focus.
Late. The city outside is already alive, horns and engines, faint voices drifting up from the street.
For a moment it feels like any other morning, but the quiet presses wrong, heavy, after last night’s high.
My body is rested. My mind isn’t. It keeps replaying fragments of the job like a scratched record—the encrypted files, the firewalls folding under my hands, the dizzy rush when the data flooded my screen. It had been a perfect hit, clean and precise.
Something about it gnaws at me. Too much money for too little work. Too anonymous, no trail to follow back. People pay for all kinds of shady reasons, I remind myself. My job is to deliver, not to ask. Still, the unease sticks to my ribs.
I drag myself out of bed, feet hitting cold floor. In the kitchen I move on autopilot: kettle, grounds, chipped mug. The smell of coffee blooms rich and grounding, wrapping itself around the edges of my frayed nerves.
I slide into my oversized hoodie, sleeves swallowing my hands, and lean against the counter while the machine hisses.
This is my safe zone—messy desk, mismatched mugs, the soft weight of my hair unbrushed and falling into my eyes. Ordinary intimacy, the kind of routine that usually holds me together.
Even as I scroll job boards, coffee cooling in my grip, my fingers hesitate over the keyboard.
New listings flicker past: minor breaches, security audits, freelance cleanup gigs.
Easy money. Nothing like last night. I tell myself again it’s nothing.
People pay for secrets all the time. My role is to open the door and walk away.
My hesitation betrays me.
I stand to stretch, glance out the window. Down on the street, a dark car is parked at the curb, its windows tinted too black to see inside. Probably a neighbor’s visitor. Delivery. Rideshare. My pulse flickers anyway. I tear my eyes away, shake my head, dismiss it. It’s nothing.
By dusk the unease has dulled into background static.
I set up a playlist, soft synth weaving under the click of my keys, and pull up a half-finished project—something harmless, a personal sandbox I tinker with when I need to clear my head.
My hoodie sleeves are pushed to my elbows, hair tied up haphazardly, and the glow of my monitors paints everything blue.
Half-eaten takeout sits on the desk beside me, chopsticks abandoned.
Headphones on, I fall into rhythm. The world narrows to code and sound. I don’t notice the black SUV idling below, windows dark. I don’t notice the soft creak of the stairwell or the faint metallic click outside my door.
The first noise registers as an off-beat in my song, a faint scrape. Then another. My fingers pause over the keyboard. Before I can pull the headphones off, the front door explodes inward. Splinters fly like shrapnel.
Men in black tactical gear pour into the room, faceless behind dark visors. They move with precision, no shouting, no wasted movement. My chair tips as I jerk to my feet, laptop clutched to my chest.
“Hey—” The word tears from my throat, half shout, half panic.
One of them lunges, wrenching the laptop from my hands with brutal efficiency. Another pins me against the desk, his grip like iron around my upper arms.
“Let go!” My voice breaks, muffled when a gloved hand slams over my mouth. The smell of leather fills my nose, sharp and chemical. My cries turn into ragged gasps against his palm.
I thrash, kicking backward, but they’re everywhere—boots on my floor, shadows swallowing the glow of my screens. My wrists are yanked behind me, zip ties biting into my skin, too tight, cutting circulation until my hands go numb.
I twist to look at them, to find some hint of human under the black armor. Nothing. Only precision. Only silence.
This isn’t a robbery. This isn’t random.
They know my name.
They know what I’ve done.
My heartbeat crashes against my ribs, wild and useless, as they drag me from the desk. My monitors flicker in the corner of my vision, code still scrolling across the screen, but everything that made me safe here—the mug, the hoodie, the hum of my machines—is gone, shattered under their boots.
The zip ties bite deep as they drag me down the hall, my bare feet skidding across scuffed linoleum. I dig in my heels, twist, try to slow them, but it’s like fighting a tide; unyielding, merciless. My shoulder slams the doorframe, pain bursting sharp down my arm, but they don’t falter.
The hallway is alive with sound—distant televisions, muffled arguments, someone’s baby crying—but no one opens their door. No heads peek out. Either they don’t hear or they don’t want to. My pulse spikes at the thought. They know. They’ve chosen silence.
The stairwell rattles with our descent. A cold slap of night air greets me when they shove me outside, my breath fogging in the chill. I catch the gleam of headlights, the shadow hulking at the curb. Black SUV, doors yawning open like a mouth waiting to swallow me.
I kick backward, my voice breaking free in a strangled shout. “Help! Somebody—”
The words choke off when I’m shoved forward, body folding, skull nearly cracking the frame as they force me in. The door slams behind me, the sound final, sealing me in. My world shrinks to the dark interior, the smell of leather and smoke.
Fabric grinds against my face as a blindfold jerks tight over my eyes. Darkness swallows me whole.
Disorientation hits fast. My breath ricochets inside the void, ragged, shallow, too loud. The SUV growls beneath me, vibrations crawling through the seat as the engine roars to life. A lurch forward and the motion swallows what little sense of direction I had left.
“Where are you taking me?” My voice cracks, wild with panic. “You can’t do this. Do you know who I am?”
Silence.
I thrash against the binds, wrists scraping raw, plastic cutting deeper. “Let me go! You’ve made a mistake. I didn’t—”
Still nothing. Only the low rumble of the engine, the shuffle of armored bodies around me.
My throat burns. “I’ll pay you. Whatever you’re getting, I’ll double it. Triple. You don’t have to—”
A voice cuts through, low and sharp, Russian curling hard around consonants I don’t understand. Just a few words, muttered like an afterthought, but the tone slices me open. Cold. Certain. Not a man bluffing for effect.
Ice floods my veins.
I sink back, heart hammering, lungs shrinking. My mind whirls, desperate to cling to reason. Was it the job last night? That anonymous message, the obscene payout, the system that felt too large, too clean. Did I cross someone untouchable? Was it bait?
Denial claws in first. It’s too soon. No one could’ve traced me, not that fast. My encryption is airtight. I was careful. I’ve always been careful.
Then anger, burning hot through the cracks. They’re wrong. They think I’m someone else. They don’t know who they’ve taken.
The fire fizzles quick, replaced by terror. Deep down, I know. This isn’t random. This isn’t mistaken identity. They came for me, and they know exactly what I’ve done.
The blindfold digs into my skin, fabric rasping every time I move.
My wrists throb from the ties, circulation cut off until my hands buzz with numbness.
The SUV jolts over uneven pavement, nausea curling low in my stomach.
I try to count turns, track speed, measure the time in heartbeats, but everything bleeds together.
Minutes, miles, I can’t tell. Exhaustion licks at the edges, pulling me down.
I force myself to focus, to gather scraps like I would behind a keyboard. Data. Clues.
The language, it was Russian. Professional, though I couldn’t understand the words themselves.
The silence of the others was disciplined. No nervous chatter, no hesitation. Precision even in their stillness.
The smell of expensive leather, sharp cologne undercut with smoke. Not the stink of amateurs. These men are owned, commanded.
Even blind, even bound, my brain claws for patterns, details, anything to hold on to. It’s instinct, the part of me that refuses to go blank, but data doesn’t soften the truth.
I’m in their hands now. Whoever they are, they came prepared.
The SUV slows, the growl of its engine dropping to a low, deliberate purr. My stomach lurches with the shift, nausea swelling as the tires crunch over gravel.
The air feels thicker here, quieter, except for the faint groan of iron gates parting. Their hinges scream before clanging shut again, the sound reverberating like a lock snapping shut on a cage.
Muffled voices drift in from outside, deep and commanding, their Russian tones sharp even through the closed doors. Orders, maybe. Warnings. The kind of voices men obey without hesitation.
The vehicle jerks to a halt. Hands seize me, dragging me out into the night. Cold air smacks my skin, heavy with the scent of rain-soaked stone and something acrid underneath; oil, smoke, wealth. The blindfold is yanked away, and light slams into my eyes.
I flinch hard, tears stinging as the world bursts back in too bright, too sharp. For a moment, I can’t see. The afterimage of the SUV headlights burns into my retinas, white blotches swimming. Then slowly, the scene bleeds into focus.
An estate opens before me, sprawling and terrible.
The architecture rises in looming slabs of stone, old and immovable, the kind of building meant to outlive centuries and intimidate anyone who approaches.
Wrought-iron gates gleam behind us, spikes catching the floodlights, a barrier as final as prison bars.
Gardens stretch along the drive, manicured hedges sculpted into perfection, every line precise. But the symmetry suffocates, more a display of dominance than beauty. The air itself tastes expensive—polished, refined—but edged with menace, like perfume over blood.
Guards stand along the drive, motionless, statues dressed in tailored black.
Their eyes never shift, but I feel them all the same, heavy and unrelenting.
Cars glitter under the lights, sleek and gleaming, luxury lined up like trophies.
The wealth radiates, but so does danger. It’s a kingdom carved out of both.
My knees nearly give out. The realization crashes in hard, stealing the air from my lungs.
This isn’t random. This isn’t about money, or trafficking, or being in the wrong place.
I’ve been delivered directly to someone powerful enough to send men into my home, rip me from my world, and bring me here.
Last night’s job flashes through me again—encrypted files, impossible payout, the thrill of cracking open a fortress that should’ve been unbreakable. It hadn’t been harmless. It hadn’t been anonymous. It had been bait, or worse, a trap I walked into with my eyes wide shut.
Fear drags at me, heavy and paralyzing. I want to move, to run, to fight… but my body rebels, legs quivering as though they might buckle beneath me. The binds still bite into my wrists, anchoring me, forcing me to stand there exposed.
Movement at the front doors catches my gaze.
A silhouette emerges, blurred against the brilliance of floodlights.
Tall. Straight-backed. Waiting. The presence radiates control, a weight pressing down even from a distance.
I can’t see the face, but I don’t need to. Power clings to him like a second skin.
The thought crystallizes sharp as glass in my chest: I’m not in control anymore. The screen, my shield, is gone. The game has changed.