38. Wynn
WYNN
One minute and forty seconds.
That was how long we had to identify the correct control.
Stop the biological device beside Elena.
And destroy the most dangerous weapons system ever created.
No pressure.
Three authorization positions waited beneath Hawk’s hand.
The symbols appeared genuine.
The written labels did not.
Kane had altered them to turn the permanent failsafe into one final trap.
The video on the wall showed Elena bound to the chair.
General Kane stood behind her, favoring the leg Boone had shot.
The portable biological unit rested beside them.
01:33.
01:32.
01:31.
“Minser,” Adam said. “Which one is Aegis?”
Minser leaned against the terminal, one hand pressed against the gunshot wound in his side.
“I don’t know.”
Roth aimed his weapon at Minser’s chest.
“You worked here.”
“I was stationed here.”
“You were part of Ghost’s team.”
“Yes.”
“Then you know this system.”
“I protected the facility. Dr. Arslan designed the permanent failsafe.”
“What was your assignment?”
Minser looked at Lucas.
“To prevent anyone from uniting the source archive, the physical key, and both custodians.”
Lucas held the original metal tag Kane’s men had stolen.
“You did a terrible job.”
“I trusted my commander.”
“So did Ghost.”
Pain crossed Minser’s face.
Real pain.
Not from the bullet.
Ghost and Minser had served together.
They had been part of the same team.
Ghost had hidden the original key with Lucas.
Minser had remained close to Fate.
Then Kane had turned one teammate against the other.
He had used Lucas and me to force the key back into the open.
And for eight years, Minser had waited for every piece to come together again.
The timer reached one minute.
Roth stepped toward the door.
“I’m going to Elena.”
“You’ll never reach Level Four in time,” Hawk said.
“I’m not standing here while my sister dies.”
“We stop the dispersal unit first.”
“What if you choose the wrong control?”
No one answered.
Because if we chose wrong, Elena wouldn’t be the only person who died.
The video changed.
Kane moved closer to the camera.
“Sixty seconds.”
Elena lifted her head.
Her face was pale.
Blood covered the collar of her shirt.
But she looked directly at her brother through the camera.
“Emil.”
Roth froze.
“I’m here.”
“I know.”
“I’m coming for you.”
Elena looked toward the dispersal unit.
“No.”
“Don’t ask me to leave you.”
“Stop the weapon.”
“I can do both.”
“You don’t have time.”
Roth’s hand shook around his gun.
“Listen to me,” Elena said. “Whatever happens, you stop Kane.”
The timer reached fifty seconds.
I stared at the controls.
Kane wanted us rushing.
Afraid.
Desperate.
Project Fate had been built around predicting what terrified people would do when time disappeared.
But Kane had made one mistake.
He had shown us all three choices.
I moved closer to the panel.
A shield containing two intertwined circles appeared above the first position.
Two circles divided by a straight line marked the second.
A sword marked the third.
“The symbols were part of the original panel,” I said.
Hawk looked at me.
“How do you know?”
“Dr. Arslan built Aegis to protect civilians. He used the shield containing the intertwined circles as its symbol throughout the quarantine tunnel.”
“Yes.”
“Kane changed the written labels. He didn’t replace the original controls.”
“The etched labels may still be beneath the black coating,” Lucas said.
Hawk pulled a multispectral scanner from his equipment bag.
Forty seconds.
He passed the scanner over the controls.
Nothing appeared.
“Try thermal imaging,” I said.
Hawk changed the setting.
The black coating began to reveal thin identification lines.
Original words emerged beneath Kane’s false labels.
AEGIS TERMINATION.
FATE CONTINUATION.
MERIDIAN DISTRIBUTION.
Minser stared at the sword.
“Meridian.”
“What?” Adam asked.
“That was Kane’s symbol before the organization had a name.”
“Which one is Aegis?” Roth demanded.
“The shield,” Lucas said.
The shield lay beneath the control Kane had falsely labeled FATE.
He had reversed Aegis and Fate.
The position labeled AEGIS would preserve the weapon.
Thirty seconds.
Hawk inserted Wynn’s encrypted source drive into the archive port.
Lucas placed the original tag inside the physical-key slot.
The system activated.
REGISTERED CUSTODIANS REQUIRED.
Two biometric panels illuminated.
One for Lucas.
One for me.
My fingerprints.
My voice.
My retinal pattern.
Kane had stolen that information and registered me six years ago because he believed controlling me meant controlling Lucas.
And controlling Lucas meant controlling Fate.
Lucas took my hand.
“We do this together.”
Twenty seconds.
We placed our palms against the scanners.
The cameras mapped our eyes.
VOICE AUTHORIZATION REQUIRED.
Lucas leaned toward the microphone beside me.
“Every life carries tomorrow.”
I spoke with him.
“Every life carries tomorrow.”
The screen flashed.
AUTHORIZATION ACCEPTED.
Two options appeared.
TEMPORARY CONTAINMENT.
PERMANENT ERASURE.
The timer reached twelve seconds.
Lucas looked at me.
“Permanent.”
“Do it.”
He turned the physical key.
I locked the source-drive lever into place.
A mechanical sound moved beneath the floor.
The chamber in front of us filled with white light.
On the wall, every location connected to Project Fate appeared.
Geneva.
Turkey.
Garrison Eighteen.
Sites across Europe, Asia, Africa, and North America.
Hidden facilities.
Financial accounts.
Biological inventories.
Research archives.
Names.
Then each location began disappearing.
At every connected dispersal site, Aegis initiated the sterilization systems built into the containment units.
Heat.
Chemical neutralization.
Pressure destruction.
The portable unit beside Elena shut down.
Its timer stopped at:
00:03.
The lights on the device turned green.
BIOLOGICAL AGENT STERILIZED.
Roth exhaled.
Elena closed her eyes.
Across the network, source files erased.
Accounts vanished.
Laboratories disconnected.
Every biological unit displayed the same message.
AEGIS COMPLETE.
FATE DESTROYED.
For one heartbeat, no one moved.
We had done it.
We had ended Project Fate.
Then Kane fired.
The shot exploded through the speakers.
Elena’s body jerked.
The bullet struck high in her shoulder.
Roth shouted her name.
Kane caught her before she fell and dragged her away from the chair.
Blood spread across the front of her shirt.
The video disappeared.
Roth ran for the door.
Adam caught him.
“Let me go!”
“Kane wants you angry.”
“He shot my sister!”
“And if you charge upstairs without a plan, he kills both of you.”
Roth turned on him.
“I don’t care what happens to me.”
“Elena does.”
The words stopped him.
Hawk pulled up the facility plans.
“The main stairwell is locked.”
“Service elevator?” I asked.
“Disabled.”
“The old team passage,” Minser said.
Everyone looked at him.
He slid down the terminal, his face losing color.
“What passage?” Adam asked.
“We used it during containment drills.”
“Where does it go?”
“Level Nine to Level Four.”
“Show us.”
Minser pressed his blood-covered palm against the wall beside the central chamber.
Nothing happened.
“Biometric access was erased,” he said.
Lucas removed the original tag from the Aegis controls.
“The network is gone.”
“Not the independent physical-security system.”
Minser pointed toward the sword symbol on the control panel.
“Place the tag there.”
“Kane’s Meridian protocol?” Hawk asked.
“It also controls his private access routes.”
Hawk caught Lucas’s wrist.
“Aegis destroyed the network. Activating that control could restore it.”
“No,” Minser said. “The tag’s command sequence was erased when Aegis completed. It can only operate local physical locks now.”
“How do we know?”
“You don’t.”
Roth grabbed the tag from Lucas.
“My sister is bleeding to death.”
He pressed it against the sword.
The wall opened.
A narrow staircase climbed through the darkness.
Roth entered first.
Adam followed.
Hawk moved behind them.
Lucas reached for me.
“You stay here.”
I stared at him.
“We already settled this.”
“You can’t put weight on your leg.”
“I can still shoot.”
“Wynn.”
“Elena has information Kane doesn’t want exposed.”
“So do you.”
That stopped me.
Lucas stepped closer.
“Kane built all of this around us because he believed he could control one through the other. He doesn’t need us to operate Fate anymore.”
“No.”
“But you copied part of Minser’s financial archive.”
My stomach tightened.
“If Kane escapes, those records may be the only proof Meridian existed.”
“And you’re the only person who knows where they are.”
“I never told you I hid them.”
“You didn’t have to.”
His hand touched my face.
“You always keep a second copy.”
He knew me.
Even after six years apart, he knew exactly how my mind worked.
“What are you asking me to do?”
“Stay with Minser.”
“You don’t trust him.”
“No.”
“Then why leave me alone with him?”
“I trust you.”
The words reached the place inside me that had remained broken since our marriage ended.
Not because he believed I needed protection.
Not because he thought I was safer behind him.
Because he believed I could protect the truth.
Lucas placed his spare gun in my hand.
“I’ll bring Elena back.”
“And Kane?”
His silver eyes turned cold.
“Kane doesn’t leave this mountain.”
He kissed me.
Not quickly.
Not carefully.
His mouth moved against mine with eight years of grief, rage, and love.
Then he pulled away.
“I love you.”
My heart stopped.
He had said it before.
Years ago.
In bed.
At airports.
On the morning we married.
But never like this.
Never when both of us finally understood what those words required.
“I love you too.”
A gunshot echoed from the staircase.
Lucas turned and ran.
I watched him disappear into the darkness.
The hidden door began to close.
“Lucas!”
“It’s automatic,” Minser said.
I lunged toward the opening.
Too late.
The wall sealed.
I pressed the original tag against the sword symbol.
Nothing happened.
The control panel had gone dark.
“Open it.”
“I can’t.”
I aimed Lucas’s gun at Minser.
“Open the door.”
“Fate’s destruction disabled the access system.”
“Then find another way.”
Minser laughed weakly.
“You really are exactly as Ghost described.”
I moved closer.
“Ghost talked about me?”
“Constantly.”
“Why?”
“Because he knew Kane would come for you.”
“And he gave Lucas the tag instead of warning us.”
“He believed Lucas was the only person who could keep you alive.”
“He was wrong.”
“No.” Minser looked toward the sealed wall. “He underestimated what keeping you alive would cost.”
I pressed the gun against his shoulder.
“What aren’t you telling me?”
“Kane maintains an offline Meridian registry.”
“What is that?”
“A personal command drive containing the identities of every person Meridian owns.”
“I already copied the financial records.”
“The records contain the people Meridian paid.”
“And his registry?”
“Judges. Military commanders. Intelligence officers. Politicians. People powerful enough to bury everything you expose.”
“We need that drive.”
“Yes.”
“And Kane knows it.”
“Yes.”
Minser’s gaze moved toward the camera in the corner.
A red light appeared.
Someone was watching us.
The monitor on the wall activated.
General Kane appeared.
He stood inside a hangar.
Elena lay unconscious near his feet.
Blood covered her shoulder and chest, but she was breathing.
Behind him waited a small aircraft.
Kane kept most of his weight off the leg Boone had shot.
Roth, Adam, Hawk, and Lucas were nowhere in sight.
Kane held up a small black drive.
Not Wynn’s source archive.
Not the booby-trapped decoy he had left at Garrison Eighteen.
His personal Meridian registry.
“You destroyed my life’s work,” Kane said.
“No. We destroyed the weapon you used to destroy lives.”
“You believe there’s a difference?”
“I know there is.”
He turned the registry drive between his fingers.
“Do you know what happens if these identities become public?”
“You go to prison.”
“Governments collapse.”
“Maybe they should.”
“Wars begin.”
“You’ve already started wars.”
“To prevent worse ones.”
I almost laughed.
Every monster believed he was saving the world.
“What do you want?”
“You.”
Lucas had been right.
Kane still needed me.
“Why?”
“The financial archive you copied.”
“You don’t know where it is.”
“No. But I know you sent it to someone.”
I kept my expression blank.
“Give me the location, and I release Elena.”
“And if I refuse?”
Kane lowered the gun toward her head.
“You have six minutes to reach the hangar.”
The screen went black.
I looked toward the sealed door.
Lucas and the others were somewhere between us and Level Four.
Kane had already moved Elena to the private airstrip.
Another route existed.
One Minser hadn’t mentioned.
I turned toward him.
“How do I reach the hangar?”
“You don’t.”
I pressed the gun against his wound.
He groaned.
“Wrong answer.”
“You won’t shoot me.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m the only person who can get you there.”
“That sounds like an excellent reason to keep you alive.”
He studied my face.
Then smiled.
“Ghost was wrong about one thing.”
“What?”
“He said Lucas was the dangerous Spencer.”
Minser pulled himself to his feet and moved toward the central Aegis chamber.
He reached behind it and opened a concealed mechanical panel.
Inside waited an emergency lever untouched by the destroyed network.
He pulled it.
A second door opened behind the chamber.
Cold air entered the laboratory.
Beyond the opening, a narrow rail tunnel descended through the mountain.
A small maintenance cart waited on the tracks.
Straight toward the private airstrip.
Minser lowered himself into the driver’s seat.
“Come on, Mrs. Spencer.”
I tightened my grip on Lucas’s gun and climbed onto the cart beside him.
We had destroyed Fate.
Now we had to save Elena.
Recover Kane’s registry.
And end General Kane.