Chapter 23 – Ellie
Finding out Katerina has managed to freeze one of Mike’s accounts sends my world crashing down. I don’t know why I’m still surprised at anything she does. She has proved again and again that she’ll do anything to have me.
The realization comes to me slowly, like a cold draft slipping through the cracks of a sealed room.
Katerina doesn’t want Mike dead.
She wants him obsolete.
At first, the difference seems small. But the more I think about it, the more chilling it becomes.
Death would be simple. Final. A violent punctuation mark at the end of Mike Rusnak’s empire.
Obsolescence is something else entirely.
It’s humiliation.
It’s erosion.
It’s the slow dismantling of a legacy piece by piece until nothing remains but a name people used to fear.
I sit at the kitchen counter in the safe house, my laptop open in front of me, lines of financial data scrolling across the screen. The numbers tell a story if you know how to listen.
And I know how to listen.
One offshore account frozen.
Two shipping partnerships quietly suspended.
A banking intermediary in Zurich suddenly “reviewing compliance.”
She’s tightening a net.
I exhale slowly, rubbing my temple as the structure of the strategy becomes clearer in my mind.
There are no shootouts.
No assassinations.
No dramatic declarations of war.
Just pressure applied in the right places.
Allied families who once depended on the Rusnaks are suddenly distancing themselves. Not openly—never openly—but enough to shift the balance. Contracts delayed. Calls unanswered. Meetings postponed.
Fear travels faster than loyalty.
And Katerina understands that better than anyone.
She isn’t attacking Mike the way his enemies used to.
She’s making him irrelevant.
Turning the empire he built into something unstable…outdated…too risky for anyone to stand beside.
It’s brilliant.
Terrifying.
And devastatingly efficient.
My fingers fly over the keyboard as I continue working on a countermeasure. If my ARGO algorithm is the weapon Katerina wants, then I can redesign it.
ARGO was never just a program—it was a living model, something adaptive, capable of learning from enormous streams of data. That also means it can be modified.
Protected.
Weaponized in a different way.
I pull up the core architecture, the skeletal structure of the algorithm that only I truly understand. Layers of predictive modeling cascade across the screen—logistics pathways, probabilistic forecasting, disruption mapping.
Anyone else would see chaos.
I see the blueprint of my own mind.
“Alright,” I murmur under my breath.
If Katerina wants ARGO, she’ll have to take it with me.
I begin rewriting key sections of the code, embedding hidden protocols deep inside the system’s neural framework. Not obvious failsafes—those can be detected and removed—but subtle, elegant traps.
Biometric authorization.
My retinal scan.
My neural signature from the cognitive response mapping I built during early testing.
I’m halfway through the redesign when a realization stops my fingers cold.
I can’t finalize any of this.
Not without the original architecture.
And the original architecture—the clean version of ARGO, the research logs, the baseline models—all of it sits on my university servers.
Servers that are now under federal seizure.
I stare at the screen for a long moment before slowly pushing my chair back.
There’s only one way to get to it.
And Mike’s not going to like it.
I slide off the stool and walk into the living room.
Mike is seated at the table, his laptop open, deep in a virtual meeting. Three faces stare back from the screen.
Timofey.
Konstantin.
Dimitri.
They’re mid-discussion when I speak.
“Mike, I want to surrender to the feds temporarily.”
The reaction is immediate.
“Ellie, what the fuck? How do you come up with these things?” Mike’s chair scrapes loudly against the floor as he stands. “Absolutely not.”
On the screen, Timofey’s eyebrows shoot up. Konstantin leans forward sharply. Dimitri mutters something under his breath in Russian.
Mike says, staring at me like I’ve lost my mind.
Timofey exhales. “Ellie…why?”
I walk closer to the laptop until I’m standing directly in front of the screen.
“I’m building a countermeasure,” I say calmly. “But I can’t complete it without accessing my original research.”
Their expressions tighten.
“The federal seizure includes my university servers,” I continue. “The original ARGO framework is there. The clean architecture. The predictive baselines. Everything.”
Mike’s jaw hardens. “So your solution is to walk into federal custody?”
“Yes.”
Silence drops over the room.
“If I cooperate publicly,” I explain, keeping my voice steady, “they’ll allow me supervised access to my academic work. Universities fight hard for research integrity. They’ll frame it as helping investigators understand the technology.”
Timofey’s eyes narrow slightly as he begins to see where this is going.
“And once you’re inside the system,” he says slowly, “you alter the code.”
I nod.
“I embed the failsafes directly into the original framework. If anyone—including Katerina—tries to weaponize ARGO…it collapses.”
Konstantin folds his arms. “You’re suggesting bait.”
“No,” I correct quietly. “It’s control.”
Mike is still staring at me, his expression somewhere between fury and disbelief.
“You’d be in federal custody,” he says slowly.
“Temporarily,” I reply.
His voice lowers. “Ellie….”
“If I don’t do this,” I say, meeting his eyes, “then the moment someone gets their hands on ARGO, the entire world becomes their chessboard.”
The room goes quiet.
Mike’s reaction is immediate and explosive.
“No,” he says sharply. “Absolutely not.” He starts pacing, one hand dragging through his hair. “Do you have any idea what federal custody means right now? You’d be completely exposed. No protection. No control.”
“That’s not entirely true,” I counter. “It’s controlled access. Academic supervision. I’d be inside the system where they think they’re containing me.”
“That’s exactly the problem,” he snaps.
Timofey’s voice cuts through the tension from the laptop speakers. “Mike.”
Mike ignores him, eyes locked on me.
“We escaped them. That’s why we’re in the safe house. You want me to hand you over to them? Just like that?”
“You’re not handing me over,” I reply calmly. “I’m choosing to go.”
Konstantin leans forward on the screen. “She kind of has a point, Mike.”
“Shut up!” Mike lashes out furiously. “It’s insane.”
“No,” Timofey says quietly. “It’s strategic.”
Mike turns toward the screen. “You’re supporting this?”
Konstantin folds his arms. “We’re recognizing reality.”
Dimitri nods once. “Your war has always been territorial. Territory, influence, alliances.”
Timofey adds, “But Ellie’s battlefield is different.” He looks directly at me through the screen. “Her war is intellectual.”
The words settle heavily in the room.
Mike stops pacing.
I can see the conflict on his face—every instinct he has screaming to shut this down, to lock the doors, to keep me close where he can protect me.
But this fight isn’t one he can win with guns or soldiers.
Finally, Konstantin exhales and leans back.
“We’ll give you two time to decide,” he says.
Timofey nods. “Call us when you reach a conclusion.”
The call ends.
The screen goes dark.
And suddenly it’s just Mike and me standing in the quiet room, the weight of the decision pressing between us.
It takes me an hour.
An entire hour of arguments, logic, frustration, and stubborn silence.
Mike paces the length of the living room like a caged predator, every instinct in him rebelling against the idea. He lists every risk, every possible way the plan could go wrong. Federal custody. Isolation. Interrogation.
Every scenario ends with the same conclusion for him.
I’m not safe.
But I don’t back down.
Finally, when he refuses again, I say the one thing I know will force him to listen.
“If you won’t help me do this,” I tell him quietly, “I’ll run away and do it myself.”
He stops pacing instantly.
The room goes very still.
Mike turns slowly, staring at me like he’s trying to determine whether I’m bluffing.
I’m not.
“You would do that?” he asks.
“Yes.”
The word comes out calm and certain.
For a long moment, neither of us moves.
Then his shoulders slump just slightly, the fight draining from his posture as reality settles in.
He knows me well enough by now.
If I’ve decided something…I will do it.
Even without him.
Mike drags a hand down his face and exhales heavily. “Damn it, Ellie….”
A few minutes later, we call his brothers back.
Their faces reappear on the screen.
“Well?” Konstantin asks.
Mike glances at me once before answering. “We’re doing it.”
Timofey nods slowly, already shifting into strategy mode. “The feds left their warrant notice when they surrounded the estate the other day. There’s a number on it.” He pauses, thinking it through. “I’ll call them. Tell them to come to the safe house for the extraction.”
The brothers exchange a few final words before ending the call.
The screen goes dark again.
Silence fills the room.
And then, suddenly, Mike is moving.
In two long strides, he’s in front of me.
His hands grip my arms before pulling me into him, his mouth crashing against mine in a kiss that’s fierce, desperate, almost angry.
I gasp softly as he holds me tighter.
When he finally pulls back, his forehead rests against mine.
“I’m never going to forgive myself if anything happens to you,” he murmurs, his voice rough with emotion. His hands cradle my face, his eyes searching mine like he’s trying to memorize every detail. “Do you hear me, Ellie?”
“I hear you.”
I wrap my arms around him, holding him just as tightly.
Because for the first time since this war began…we both understand just how much we’re about to risk.
***
Hours later, the sound of engines cuts through the quiet outside the safe house.
Unmarked vehicles.
They roll to a slow stop at the perimeter, dark and official, their presence heavy with finality.
I knew this moment was coming, but now that it’s here, my chest tightens anyway.
Mike stands beside me near the doorway, his hand resting lightly at the small of my back.
Protective.
Reluctant.
Silent.
Timofey confirmed the arrangements earlier—controlled extraction, no unnecessary theatrics. Just federal agents doing their job.
Still, the tension in the room is thick enough to choke on.
A knock sounds.
Two agents stand outside when the door opens, their expressions professional, watchful.
“Ellie Carver?” one of them asks.
“It’s Rusnak,” Mike snaps. “Ellie Rusnak.”
The men nod. “Are you ready?” one asks.
“I’m ready.”
Mike’s hand tightens briefly at my back.
For a moment, neither of us moves.
Then I step forward.
The cool evening air brushes my face as I walk toward the vehicles. Gravel crunches softly under my shoes, every step deliberate.
No one stops me.
No one rushes me.
An agent opens the back door of one of the SUVs.
I pause for half a second before getting in.
And I glance back.
Mike is still standing near the entrance of the safe house.
His posture is rigid, arms folded tightly across his chest like he’s holding himself together by force alone.
His face is controlled.
Carefully restrained.
But I know him well enough now to see the truth beneath it.
The tension in his jaw.
The storm barely contained in his eyes.
For the first time since I met Mike Rusnak, he looks like a man being forced to let go of the one thing he cannot protect.
The door closes, and the vehicle pulls away.
For several minutes, no one speaks.
The inside of the SUV is quiet except for the low hum of the engine and the muted crackle of a radio somewhere near the driver’s seat. The windows are tinted so dark that the world outside becomes little more than shifting shadows.
I sit with my hands folded in my lap, forcing my breathing to stay steady.
This was the plan.
Federal custody.
Controlled access.
A way back into the system.
One of the agents who escorted me from the house sits across from me now, watching me with an expression that’s a little too calm for someone conducting an arrest.
Something about it feels…off.
Finally, he exhales slowly.
“Ms. Carver,” he says.
His voice is relaxed.
Too relaxed.
He reaches up and removes the badge clipped to his jacket, turning it in his fingers before slipping it into his pocket like it suddenly means nothing.
Then he looks at me again.
“My name is Viktor.”
I blink, my stomach tightening.
The car continues moving, the city sliding past unseen behind the dark glass.
“I’m not law enforcement,” he says.
My pulse spikes. “What are you talking about?”
“I’m a liaison.” The word lands heavily in the small space between us. “A liaison working for Katerina Morozova.”
For a moment, the air disappears from my lungs.
The realization crashes into me all at once.
The warrant.
The extraction.
The agents.
Every careful step we thought we controlled.
It was never federal custody.
It was never the government.
I stare at him, the truth settling into my bones like ice.
I didn’t surrender to justice.
I walked directly into the enemy’s hands.