Chapter 2
Selina
I sat alone in the conference room thirty minutes after the world tilted. After Specter’s seizure. After his desperate, too-clear warning: “And neither does SENTINEL.”
The words hadn’t been delirium. Not the ravings of a fracturing psyche, but a truth he’d fought through neurological catastrophe to deliver.
A small red light pulsed from the wall panel. SENTINEL’s perpetual surveillance, recording every micro-expression, every involuntary reaction my body had betrayed.
I forced my spine straight, hands flat on the table, assuming the posture of composure even as containment scenarios spun through my head.
The dossier before me might as well have been blank.
Just specifications and threat assessments.
Nothing about the man who’d looked at me like he was drowning and I was the only thing to grab.
His name kept repeating. A violation of boundaries that had ended with questions I still couldn’t answer. He was something else entirely, broken in ways that invited fire.
The pneumatic hiss gave me a half-second warning before Commander Iain Dawson entered. No security detail. No assistant. Just him, filling the doorway with an authority that had nothing to do with position and everything to do with the predator beneath the tailored suit.
The seal clicked softly. That sound raised every hair on my neck. Being locked in with a threat.
Dawson advanced with careful control, each step calculated to claim territory. His navy suit fit like armor, immaculate. This was a man who understood that presentation was power, and power was everything.
“Dr. Crawford.”
My name carried both greeting and assessment.
In five years with SENTINEL, I’d seen Dawson only in carefully orchestrated meetings, always with layers of hierarchy between us.
The intelligence community whispered his name with the kind of respect reserved for natural disasters.
Inevitable, devastating, and best observed from a distance.
In person, I understood why. He radiated leashed violence that made even the air feel charged.
His gaze, green like broken glass, tracked over my face in a slow, exact sweep, cataloging what I tried to hide. I met it steadily, my clinical mask intact even as my pulse accelerated.
Then he smiled.
The transformation was deliberate, severity melting into warmth that never touched his stare. I recognized the technique because I’d used it myself. Creating false intimacy to lower defenses. But recognition didn’t provide immunity. Even knowing the manipulation, I felt its pull.
“I apologize for keeping you waiting.” He moved toward the table, footsteps sharp on polished concrete, like a countdown.
Morning light from the skylight divided his face. Half in shadow, half in light. Every choice with him felt intentional.
He extended his hand across the glass table. “Thank you for your quick thinking in there, Dr. Crawford.”
I took it, analyzing the interaction with clinical detachment. Skin temperature normal, pressure carefully calibrated, duration exactly three seconds. Professional. Controlled. Nothing given away.
“Just doing my job, Commander.”
“Iain.” The familiarity felt more like tactics than courtesy. “May I?” He gestured to the chair opposite mine, asking permission he clearly didn’t need.
From beneath the table, he produced a silver tray with coffee service. An impossibility given the sterile setup. The message was clear: I control things you don’t see coming.
“I thought you might need proper coffee after the morning you’ve had.” He poured without a spill. “One sugar, splash of cream?”
My exact preference. Not a guess. A demonstration of surveillance so complete it included my coffee order.
“Your intelligence gathering is thorough.”
“Not intelligence.” His mouth tightened by a fraction. “Observation. You ordered the same at the interdepartmental conference last spring. The one where you presented on cognitive fracturing in deep cover operatives.”
“You were there?” The blind spot in my memory disturbed me more than his knowledge.
“Your work on identity compartmentalization was… illuminating.” He leaned back, coffee untouched, using the pause to let me wonder what else he’d observed. “Particularly your thoughts on memory reconsolidation under extreme stress.”
I sipped my coffee, perfectly prepared and unsettling. “I assume we’re not here to discuss my academic work.”
“Aren’t we?” He set down his cup with care. “What you’ve studied, every paper you’ve written, has been preparing you for this moment. For him.”
The weight of that statement hit hard.
“Tell me about the organization.”
His expression shifted, the mask slipping just enough to show genuine concern beneath.
“Project Marionette was a Cold War relic. Crude psychological programming through drugs, deprivation, and conditioning. Twenty years ago, Tobias Dresner acquired the research and transformed it into something far more sophisticated. Dresner’s network doesn’t just program operatives, it rebuilds them from the ground up.
It was one of the goals of this organization. ”
SENTINEL’s official mandate. Counter-terrorism, transnational threats, the usual diplomatic language that masked bloodier truths. But the weight in Dawson’s tone suggested something more personal.
“Dresner doesn’t see himself as a criminal.” He watched me over the rim of his cup. “He believes he’s advancing human evolution. Removing the inefficiency of free will.”
The coffee turned bitter on my tongue.
“Specter isn’t just a patient, Dr. Crawford.
He’s evidence. Proof that Dresner’s network exists beyond rumor and redacted files.
” Dawson leaned forward, elbows on glass.
“The UN Security Council has authorized extreme measures to dismantle Oblivion, but first we need to understand how deep their conditioning goes. Whether it can be reversed. And with this newfound memory, we can gather true knowledge on how Dresner operates, which will help us bring the whole structure down.”
“And if it can’t?”
“Then we’ve lost him.” Simple. Final. “But your work suggests otherwise. Memory reconsolidation, emotional anchoring, the techniques you pioneered with trauma victims.”
“Those were civilians suffering PTSD, not trained killers with systematic neural conditioning.”
“Exactly.” His smile returned, sharper now. “Which is why you’re the only person qualified to try.”
The weight of Dawson’s analysis settled over me like humidity.
“Why did he cooperate?” The question cut sharper than I’d intended. “Specter. Once he was in S?o Paulo police custody, he could have stayed silent. Could have waited for extraction or leveraged his information differently.”
Dawson’s expression shifted, something like approval flickering across his features.
“You read the intelligence brief.”
“I read what I could about him.” I set down my cup. “The police report said he initiated contact. Asked specifically for SENTINEL representation.”
“He did.” Dawson’s fingers drummed once against the table, the only tell he’d given me.
“Specter made a calculated assessment. In his position, surrounded by compromised law enforcement, he had three options: silence until Oblivion reclaimed him, cooperation with local authorities who’d sell him back, or… ”
“The lesser evil.”
“Precisely.” Green locked onto mine. “He chose the organization least likely to return him to Dresner and most likely to help him even if he doesn’t trust us. SENTINEL may not be benevolent, Dr. Crawford, but we’re predictable. Transparent in our self-interest.”
The honesty surprised me more than the content.
“He traded his freedom for protection from something worse.”
“And for leverage.” Dawson pulled back. “The intelligence he provided has already been of use. He’s valuable, which means we’re invested in keeping him functional.”
Functional. Not safe. Not protected.
Just useful enough to preserve.
He touched a hidden panel, and the wall screen came on. The footage showed Specter, eighteen months ago according to the timestamp, moving through what looked like an embassy. Each movement was economical, lethal. Three guards down in four seconds. No hesitation. No wasted motion.
“Complete skill implementation without conscious learning.” His tone stayed neutral. “Total compliance without moral hesitation. The perfect deniable asset.”
“Until now.”
“Until now.” His attention sharpened. “When he contacted us, he said the conditioning was breaking down. Said he wanted to remember who he was before that outfit rewrote him. That’s why I want you to heal him.
” The sincerity in his statement was either genuine or masterfully performed.
“These men were taken against their will, erased, rewritten. They deserve the chance to reclaim themselves.”
I studied his face, looking for the lie beneath the nobility. Found none, which worried me more than obvious deception would have.
“I’ll need complete autonomy with the patient. Unrestricted access to all files. And my reports go directly to you, no filters.”
“Demanding.” But he smiled, genuine this time, appreciating the negotiation. “Your terms are acceptable. With one addition.”
I waited, refusing to fill the silence.
“If I determine the risk to you, to him, or to my facility becomes unacceptable, I terminate the project immediately.”
The euphemism hung between us. We both understood what “terminating the project” meant.
“Understood.”
He stood, buttoning his jacket by habit. “Dr. Prieto will arrange your access. What we have on Specter, the network, and Project Marionette.”
He crossed toward the exit, then paused, turning back with studied casualness that was anything but casual.
“One more thing, Dr. Crawford.” His tone shifted, silk over steel. “I want you to be careful. I’ve seen the feed and how he looked at you, and how you…”
“Patient-doctor confidentiality…”
“I don’t give a fuck about ethics.” The profanity cracked like a whip, designed to shock. “I care about results. And your safety.”
He stepped nearer, invading my space with deliberate intent. This proximity allowed me to smell his cologne, something expensive and sharp, like winter forests and gun oil.
“Specter isn’t just lethal because of what they made him.” His statement dropped to an intimate register that raised goosebumps on my arms. “He’s a threat because even broken, he knows exactly how to find your weaknesses. How to make you want to save him. How to make you want him.”
“My professional judgment…”
“I’m trying to keep you alive.” Another step, forcing me to tilt my head back to maintain contact. “Men like Specter, like us, we don’t love the way normal people do. We possess. We consume. We destroy the things we want most.”
The confession hung between us, too honest to be anything but the truth.
“Is that a warning or a threat?”
“It’s recognition.” His hand moved, not touching, but almost, fingers hovering near my cheek before dropping. “I see what he sees in you. The damage hidden under all that polished composure. The darkness you’ve learned to dress in daylight. The jagged broken edges that fit against his.”
My breath held for a beat. No one had ever seen that clearly, that quickly.
“Stay away from those edges, Dr. Crawford.” His statement lowered enough to scrape. “Or you’ll find yourself cut on both sides.”
He withdrew, the instant breaking cleanly. Professional distance restored, masks back in place. But the current remained in the air between us, two predators who’d shown their teeth and decided not to bite. Yet.
“Your first session with Specter is scheduled for tomorrow, 0800 hours.” Administrative precision returned. “Dr. Prieto will brief you on security protocols.”
He went to the exit, paused one final time. “And Selina?”
The use of my first name was deliberate, intimate.
“Don’t let him inside your head. Once he’s there, he never leaves.”
The lock engaged behind him with that same final snap, leaving me alone with his cautions and the metallic taste in my mouth. On the wall screen, the image of Specter remained frozen, mid-strike, lethal and terrible in his violence.
Dawson was something else entirely. Another predator who’d seen through my work armor to the fractured thing beneath. His caution ran on a loop: Men like us possess. We consume. We destroy.
Us. He’d said us.
I stood at the intersection of two different kinds of threat: one damaged and desperate for redemption, the other polished and coiled with restraint. Both of them saw me too clearly. Both of them wanted something I wasn’t sure I could give without losing myself in the process.
Tomorrow, I would walk back into that space with Specter. I would maintain clinical boundaries. I would not let him under my skin again.
Even as I thought it, the lie tasted sharp.
The game hadn’t just begun. I was already three moves behind, and both players on the board were hunters who’d scented prey.
The question was no longer whether I’d survive intact.
The question was which one would devour me first.
Or if, somehow, I could turn the board and become the hunter myself.
My reflection caught in the black screen of my phone. Tailored blazer, careful makeup, all of it neatly in place. Except my stare. Wild and desperate and recognizing something that felt like coming home to a house on fire.
Dawson’s words: The darkness you’ve learned to dress in daylight.
He was right. That was the real threat. Not that they saw my damage, but that they recognized it as kin to their own. Three broken things, sharp enough to cut, dragging toward the same wreck.
Tomorrow would tell which of us would bleed first.
I was betting it would be me.
And the worst part? Some twisted part of me was looking forward to it.
Because at least bleeding meant feeling something real, something that couldn’t be controlled or categorized or diagnosed away. Something that existed in the space between hunter and prey, where survival was law and truth was the metallic tang in your mouth.
I gathered my files, turned off the screen, and prepared to walk back into daylight wearing my work mask like armor.
But underneath, in the places where Dawson had seen and Specter’s words had marked, something had already begun to unravel.
Whether I’d have enough thread left to weave myself back together when this was over.
Or if I even wanted to.