Chapter 81 Ethan
Ethan
The war room feels different now.
Not louder.
Not more chaotic.
Sharper.
Like everyone in it understands that what we just ended… wasn’t the whole thing.
Jonah hasn’t moved from his station.
Not really.
Three screens are lit in front of him, lines of data streaming, maps shifting, timestamps updating as he cross-references everything he pulled from Hayes’s system with external intel feeds.
Ava sits beside me.
Quiet.
Still.
But not shut down.
That matters.
Her hand rests on the table, fingers lightly curled.
I slide mine over it.
She doesn’t look at me.
But she turns her palm just enough to lace our fingers together.
Good.
Still here.
Still with me.
Jonah exhales hard. “Okay… okay, I think I’ve got it.”
The room tightens.
Ronan steps closer. “Talk.”
Jonah pulls up a new map.
Not just the Portugal facility.
A network.
Shipping lanes.
Medical supply routes.
Private aviation corridors.
It all overlays into something ugly and deliberate.
“This isn’t random movement,” Jonah says. “It’s structured. Timed. Controlled.” He taps the screen. “Helios isn’t just holding people—they’re moving them.”
Ava’s fingers tighten in mine.
I feel it.
“So Portugal?” Aaron asks.
Jonah shakes his head. “Portugal is a node. Not the source.”
Cal leans forward. “Meaning?”
Jonah zooms in on a timeline bar. “Transfers hit that facility every nine to twelve days. But they don’t originate there.” He taps another set of markers further inland. “They’re coming from smaller, harder-to-track acquisition points, then being processed through Portugal before redistribution.”
“Redistribution where?” I ask.
Jonah hesitates.
Then brings up another layer.
The room goes dead quiet.
Because the markers don’t stop in one country.
They spread.
Multiple continents.
Multiple endpoints.
Hidden behind legitimate infrastructure.
Hospitals.
Private research centers.
Contracted medical programs.
Ava’s voice is barely above a whisper. “They’re still building it.”
No one corrects her.
Because she’s right.
Ronan folds his arms. “What’s the next move window?”
Jonah zooms in again, isolating Portugal. “Based on the pattern… next transfer hits in approximately forty-eight hours.”
Aaron whistles low. “That’s not a lot of time.”
“It’s enough,” Ronan says.
Ava finally looks at the screen again.
Her face doesn’t crumble this time.
Doesn’t fracture.
It hardens.
Not cold.
Focused.
“What kind of transfer?” she asks.
Jonah pulls up the shipment classification. “Medical intake. Low visibility. Probably sedated subjects, moved under patient transport cover.”
Her jaw tightens.
I know what she’s seeing.
What she’s remembering.
I squeeze her hand once.
She doesn’t pull away.
“They won’t expect disruption there,” she says. “It’s too clean. Too public-facing.”
Cal nods slowly. “Which means it’s vulnerable.”
“Or heavily protected in ways we don’t see yet,” Aaron adds.
“Both,” Ronan says. “Assume both.”
Jonah flips to a building schematic—partial, reconstructed. “The facility itself is above ground, but there’s a restricted sublevel. Limited records. Similar pattern to Hayes’s site—official structure on top, real work underneath.”
Ava inhales slowly.
Steadying.
“I can help you map likely access points,” she says.
I turn to her immediately. “Not today.”
She doesn’t look at me.
But I feel the shift in her.
Not anger.
Control.
“I didn’t say today,” she replies.
Good.
That’s progress.
Ronan nods once. “We build a full profile first. No blind entry.”
Jonah scrolls again. “There’s something else.”
Of course there is.
He pulls up a manifest.
Encrypted.
Partially cracked.
One line is highlighted.
SUBJECT TRANSFER GROUP: FOUR UNITS
Ava’s breath catches.
Four.
Same number as the unknowns.
The room doesn’t move.
Doesn’t breathe.
Because now this isn’t abstract.
This is imminent.
“They’re alive,” Ava whispers.
Jonah doesn’t confirm it.
Doesn’t deny it.
But the silence says enough.
Aaron leans back slowly. “So we’ve got a forty-eight-hour window to intercept a live transfer tied to Helios.”
Cal nods. “And possibly the only chance to get ahead of them before they scatter again.”
Ronan’s voice is final. “Then we take it.”
Ava turns to me.
There’s something in her eyes now.
Not just fear.
Not just anger.
Purpose.
Raw.
Burning.
“You see it too,” she says quietly.
I do.
I hate that I do.
Because I know what it means.
“You want to go,” I say.
“Yes.”
“Even after yesterday.”
“Because of yesterday.”
That lands.
Hard.
I study her.
Really study her.
Not the fighter.
Not the survivor.
The woman sitting in front of me who cried herself empty in my arms hours ago and still came down here ready to face this again.
“You’re not leading entry,” I say.
“I know.”
“You’re not pushing past your limits.”
“I know.”
“You say that now.”
Her eyes lock on mine. “Then don’t let me.”
That one nearly takes me out.
Because she means it.
Because she’s trusting me with that.
I nod once. “I won’t.”
Something in her face softens.
Not weakness.
Relief.
Ronan cuts in. “We move on this together or not at all. No lone plays. No hero moves.”
Aaron mutters, “There goes my entire personality.”
“No one asked you,” Cal says.
Jonah doesn’t even look up. “I’m flagging potential entry routes and building a real-time surveillance pull. Give me six hours and I’ll have something actionable.”
Ronan nods. “You have four.”
Jonah sighs. “Of course I do.”
The room starts moving again.
Plans forming.
Gear being discussed.
Routes debated.
But I don’t move yet.
Neither does Ava.
She’s still looking at the screen.
At the four-unit transfer.
At the map that just got bigger instead of smaller.
I shift closer to her.
Low voice. “Hey.”
She blinks.
Comes back.
“I thought it was over,” she admits quietly.
“I know.”
“I wanted one minute where it was just… done.”
I lean in just enough that only she hears me. “We had that minute.”
Her eyes flick to mine.
Soft.
“Yeah,” she says.
Then she exhales.
Straightens.
And there it is again—
that strength.
Not forced.
Not broken.
Rebuilt.
“We don’t let them disappear,” she says.
“No,” I agree. “We don’t.”
Her fingers tighten around mine one more time before she lets go and turns back to Jonah.
“Show me the intake route again,” she says.
And just like that—
we’re not closing a story anymore.
We’re launching the next one.