Chapter 13 #2
“Right. So. Um.” She pulled her hand back gently. “Food. You should eat more.”
I let her go. For now.
The laptop notification dinged.
Single chime. Ordinary sound.
But Clare froze.
Her finger hovered over the trackpad. “That’s not the forum. Email.”
She clicked.
Email client opened. Inbox loaded. New message sat at the top, sender field displaying a string of random characters that meant nothing and everything.
Subject line: “You need to stop, idiots.”
My grip tightened on her leg.
Clare swallowed. “Should I...?”
I nodded once.
She clicked.
The email body loaded. Plain text. No signature. No greeting.
Just words that made my pulse kick hard.
Listen carefully, because I’m only saying this once. Delete that forum post. Delete your account. Scrub every trace of those X-rays from the internet and burn whatever device you used to upload them.
You think you’re being clever? You’re not.
That chip? It’s not a medical device. It’s worse. And the people who implanted it will want it back.
Blackout, I know who you are. The chip is the least of your problems. What they did to make you compliant? What they stole from you, and what you did for them, that’s the real horror show.
And you, American nurse playing hero? You’re already tagged. Clare Bolton, formerly of Boston General. Nice work on the VPN layers, by the way. Very YouTube tutorial of you. Unfortunately, hospital networks keep better logs than you think.
So here’s what happens next if you don’t listen: Best case scenario? They find you, kill you both, make it look like a murder-suicide. Worst case? They take you alive. Put you on a table. Do to you what they did to him.
Delete. The. Post.
Or don’t. Your funeral. Literally.
, Someone who actually knows what they’re talking about
Silence filled the room.
Clare’s breathing went shallow. Fast. Her hand trembled on the trackpad.
“They know my name.” Barely a whisper. “They know... they know where I worked.”
Her face had gone white. Actually white, color draining like water.
“They know...”
She twisted toward me, terror I’d never seen before written across her face. Not in the alley. Not when the cops came. Not even when I killed those men.
This was different.
This was her realizing she wasn’t harboring a fugitive. She was a target.
“Oh my God.” Her voice pitched higher. “Oh my God, they know my name, they know Boston General, they know.”
She stood abruptly, nearly knocking the laptop over. Started pacing. Three steps to the window, three steps back. Breathing too fast.
“How long? How long have they been watching? Since the hospital? Since I brought you here? Are they outside right now? Are they...”
I grabbed her wrist gently. Pulled her back down.
Breathe.
I wrote it fast, shoved the pad at her.
But her pulse hammered, rabbit-fast. Visible in her throat.
“Blackout.” Her voice cracked. “They called you Blackout. That’s... that was the name you rejected in the alley. Before Xavier.”
I nodded slowly.
“And they know about me. Specifically. Not just ‘some nurse’, they know my full name, where I worked, ...”
She pressed both palms against her eyes. Breathing ragged.
American nurse playing hero. Jesus Christ. They’ve been watching. How long have they been watching?
I grabbed the notepad, scribbling fast.
Trying to scare us. May not know exact location.
She read it. Laughed, sharp and bitter. “Oh, well, as long as they don’t know our exact GPS coordinates, we’re totally fine. What a relief.”
Sarcasm as armor. But underneath, pure terror.
Her breathing still too fast. Hyperventilating.
I wrote again.
We’re still alive.
“For now.” She gestured at the screen. “Until they decide alive is less convenient than dead.”
I reached for her hand. She yanked it away.
“Don’t.” Sharp. “Don’t try to comfort me when someone casually mentioned putting me on a table and doing... whatever the fuck they did to you.”
Fair.
I let my hand drop.
Waited.
She paced to the window. Back. To the door. Back. Hands fisting and relaxing.
Trying to burn off the adrenaline.
She scrubbed her face with both palms, breathing hard through her fingers. When she lowered them, some of the panic had crystallized into something colder.
Focus. Clinical mode engaging.
“Okay. Okay. Let’s think.” She pulled the laptop closer. “They want us to delete the post. Why?”
I tilted my head. Because they’re hunting us?
“No. I mean yes, obviously. But if they already know who we are, what difference does deleting the post make? The damage is done. We already asked the question. Already showed the X-rays. Taking it down doesn’t un-ring that bell.”
She leaned closer to the screen, reading again.
You’re waving a neon sign that says COME KILL US to people who are very, very good at killing. Her finger traced the line. “Not ‘I’m coming to kill you.’ Not ‘they’re on their way.’ It’s a warning. About other people.”
Smart. She was so damn smart.
I grabbed the pad.
Wants us to hide. Not threatening. Warning.
She nodded slowly. “This reads more... protective? In a really aggressive, asshole kind of way. Like someone trying to scare us into safety.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Wait. V_Actual_87. The forum troll. Same tone. Same aggressive energy. Same caps-lock rage.”
She switched tabs, pulling up the forum. Found the user’s posts.
This is false information. Remove immediately. Demanding we take it down. Getting angrier when we didn’t.
Back to the email.
Delete the post. Delete your account. Scrub every trace.
“It’s the same person. Forum troll is email sender. Which means...”
I wrote:
Someone who knows. Doesn’t want us asking where THEY can see.
“Exactly.” She chewed her bottom lip. “So who is ‘they’? The people who put the chip in you? The people hunting you?”
Both? Same?
“And this person...” She gestured at the email. “Knows enough to identify you by codename, knows where the chip came from, knows what ‘they’ did to you, knows my name...”
Her gaze found mine.
“But instead of turning us in or killing us themselves, they’re warning us.”
I nodded.
“Why?”
Good question.
I reached for the laptop, pulling it closer. My fingers found the keyboard, awkward, hunt-and-peck typing, but functional.
I hit reply.
Clare grabbed my wrist. “Wait. What are you...”
I typed anyway.
Who are you?
“Xavier, no. If they’re trying to protect us by scaring us off, engaging is...”
I kept typing.
Why warn us
I hit send.
The whoosh of outgoing mail felt final.
Clare stared at the screen. Then at me.
“That was either very smart or incredibly stupid.”
I shrugged. Wrote: Only way to know
She sighed.
“You’re right. God help me, you’re right. We have nothing else.”
We waited.
One minute. Two.
Clare refreshed the inbox. Nothing.
“Come on,” she muttered. “Answer. Just...”
Three minutes.
She refreshed again. Still nothing.
Her leg bounced, nervous energy. I put my hand on her knee. She stilled.
Four minutes.
“Maybe they’re not going to...”
The laptop pinged.
We both froze.
New message. Same sender.
Clare clicked it, hands shaking slightly.
Stop using this email. They monitor traffic patterns. Every message you send is another data point for them to triangulate your location.
Go dark. Ditch the laptop. Get a burner phone, cash only. Move locations. Do NOT contact me again.
You want to survive? Stop asking questions and START RUNNING.
Clare’s jaw set. “Fuck that.”
She hit reply before I could stop her.
We’re not running blind. If you know what they did to him, TELL US. Give us something. Otherwise we go to the authorities. Or journalists. Make this public. Force their hand.
I grabbed her wrist, yanking her off the trackpad.
Shook my head hard. Wrote fast:
NO. Bad move
She glared. “We need answers. This is the only person who’s given us any real information.”
Threatening them won’t work.
“Maybe not. But sitting here waiting to die won’t either.”
She pulled free and hit send.
The outgoing whoosh felt like a death sentence.
I wrote fast:
Mistake. Only ally.
“Good. Let them know we’re not rolling over.”
We waited.
One minute. Clare refreshed. Nothing.
Two. Refreshed again.
Her defiance started cracking around the edges.
No response.
Three minutes.
Clare’s fingers drummed the trackpad. “Come on. Answer. Please just...”
Nothing.
Four minutes.
“Shit.” She bit her lip. Hard enough to leave marks.
Five minutes.
“Shit.” She refreshed. Still nothing. “Shit shit shit.”
Six minutes.
The silence felt heavy. Final.
“I fucked up.” Quiet now. “I... I threatened the one person trying to help us and...”
She dropped her head into her hands.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, I panicked, I wasn’t thinking.”
I touched her shoulder. Squeezed.
Not your fault. We wrote together on the pad, my hand guiding hers. Not your fault.
“It is. I was scared and stupid and...”
Her phone rang.
The sound shattered the quiet.
We both jumped, stared at the device vibrating on the floor.
Unknown number.
Clare’s hand hovered over it, frozen.
“They found us.” Her voice flat. “They traced the email and...”
I grabbed the phone, hesitated one second, then put it on speaker.
Silence on the other end. Just breathing.
Steady. Controlled. Male.
Then a voice. Dry as bone and sharp as glass. American probably.
“Okay, nurse. Let’s talk.”
Clare’s face went white again.
I positioned myself between her and the phone.
Like that would help against a voice.
“Who is this?” Her voice steadier than I expected.
“Someone who knows exactly what you’re sitting next to.” A pause. “You’re making my life difficult.”
Clare glanced at me. I nodded. Keep him talking.
“If you want us alive, help us. Tell us what the chip is. What they did to him.”
“Not over the phone.” Flat. Definitive. “And not until you prove you’re worth the risk.”
“What risk? You already know where we are.”
A dry laugh. No humor in it.
“I know you’re in Lyon. I know you’re in Guillotière. I could narrow it down further, but I’m choosing not to. That’s called courtesy. Don’t make me regret it.”
My jaw locked tight.
“What do you want?” Clare’s hand found mine. Squeezed hard.
“Delete the post. Burn the laptop. Move locations within twenty-four hours. Do those three things, and I’ll consider making contact again using this phone. Safely. In person.”
“In person?”
“Those are my terms. Non-negotiable. I’d suggest you hurry.”
“Wait...”
The line went dead.
Clare stared at the phone. Then at me.
“What the fuck just happened?”
I had no answer.
Just a countdown timer in my head.
And decisions we couldn’t afford to get wrong.