Chapter 49 Ava
Ava
No
Something’s wrong.
The patterns don’t line up—timing too exact, movements too clean—no hesitation, no adjustment.
Not human.
My fingers hover over the screen, tracking the sequences again.
Same result.
Every time.
Too precise.
Like someone’s feeding commands straight into it.
“Jonah—backend routing. Now.”
“I’m on it—”
“Now.”
His fingers move faster—then slow.
Then stop.
“Oh… that’s bad.”
My stomach drops before he even turns the screen.
“What?”
He angles the tablet toward me.
A signal trace.
Buried deep.
Layered.
Encrypted.
But the structure—
I know it.
I know it.
My breath catches.
“Impossible…”
Jonah looks at me sharply.
“You recognize it?”
I don’t answer.
Because saying it out loud makes it real.
“Ava.” Ethan’s voice cuts in, steady but sharper now. “Talk to me.”
I swallow.
My throat tight.
“That signal… it’s not new.”
A beat.
Ronan—
“Meaning?”
My fingers hover over the display.
Cold.
Unsteady for the first time tonight.
“I’ve seen it before.”
Jonah’s voice drops.
“Where?”
I close my eyes.
Just for a second.
Then open them.
No hesitation left.
“With Hayes.”
Silence slams across the comms.
“That’s not possible,” Aaron says immediately. “We burned his operation.”
“No.”
My eyes stay locked on the signal.
Tracing.
Unraveling.
“He let us burn it.”
That shifts everything.
Ethan’s voice comes back lower.
Colder.
“Explain.”
I zoom in—layer after layer peeling back.
“He’s not reacting because he doesn’t need to,” I say. “This was already set in motion.”
Ronan steps in.
“What are we dealing with?”
My chest tightens.
Because I know this.
Because I helped build pieces of it.
“A predictive command system.”
Jonah exhales hard.
“You mean it—anticipates—”
“Yes.”
I cut him off.
“It predicts responses. Counters before we even act.”
Silence again.
Heavier now.
Aaron mutters—
“So we’re fighting a ghost.”
“No.”
My eyes lock onto the signal source as it resolves.
A location.
Hidden.
Shielded.
Active.
“He’s not a ghost.”
My pulse spikes.
“He’s watching.”