The safe house on 79th Street buzzed with a sickening stillness. Von stared through the curtain slit as passing cars sprayed mist over the cracked pavement. His nerves were fraying, but his instinct screamed louder, someone was watching. Someone always was.
Shanice stirred behind him, wrapped in an oversized hoodie and the weight of everything they'd just done, not just physically, but emotionally. The night before hadn't just been passion. It was a silent declaration of war against everything holding them apart, her father, the CIA, Project Oracle, the lives they were both born into.
And now? War had come.
Across the city, in a fortified CIA blacksite cleverly disguised as a warehouse near Lake Calumet, Agent Carter Mays, Shanice's father stood in front of a glowing touchscreen wall, the air thick with tension. The footage had been enhanced, zoomed, slowed down, run through heat filters. It was Von, no doubt about it. The leaked Oracle files had led back to him.
"Freeze it," Mays ordered.
The tech analyst tapped the screen, halting the footage as Von slipped into an unmarked sedan outside a known BD drop spot.
"Track the plates. I want an address in the next five minutes. And wake the sleeper team in South Shore. I want eyes everywhere."
Mays' jaw clenched. His daughter was missing. The timing was too perfect to ignore. But the conflict inside him was louder than the commands he barked.
Was Shanice involved? Was she in danger? Or had Von turned her too?
Back in the safe house, Von's burner phone buzzed, a hidden thread into the dark web nodes he'd rigged to detect CIA sweeps. His eyes flicked across the screen. West Side heat signatures detected… triangulated asset sweep inbound.
He cursed under his breath and grabbed the Glock beside the TV remote. Shanice looked up, startled.
"What is it?" she asked, pulling her hoodie tighter.
"They found us," Von said simply. "Not yet, but soon."
Shanice's face paled. "My father…"
Von paused. He could see it now, the heartbreak behind her eyes. Torn between blood and the only person who ever made her feel real.
"I'm not going to let them hurt you, Shanice. But you need to know… this isn't just about Oracle anymore. There's something else."
She stepped closer. "What do you mean?"
Von pulled a folder from under the couch, stolen CIA intel, decrypted and printed. "Project Seraph. An extension of Oracle. They've been testing neurological control methods. Using AI to influence behavior… but only on chosen subjects."
"Chosen?" she echoed.
He flipped a page. There was a list. Photos. His photo. Shanice's too. A few others, now redacted.
"We're not just being hunted. We were created for this. Bred, molded. Oracle didn't just predict our actions… it manipulated them."
Shanice backed up slowly. "No. No, that's not possible. My dad"
"Your dad's the lead architect of Seraph," Von said. "I found his clearance ID embedded in the primary access logs. That's why he's always gone. Why he never let you into his world."
Shanice crumbled onto the couch. Her fingers trembled. "Then who am I?"
Von knelt down in front of her. "You're real. This moment? Us? That's real. Whatever they tried to program into us, I'm done following their script."
She leaned in, forehead to his. "Then let's burn the whole thing down."
At CIA HQ, Mays sat alone in his office. His walls were lined with decades of secrets. Black ink, red stamps, and whispers of operations that never officially existed. He stared at a faded photograph, Shanice, age eight, at a science fair, smiling with a ribbon in her hand. The only smile he hadn't ruined yet.
But duty called louder than love. Always had.
The intercom buzzed. "Sir, the 79th Street sweep team is ready."
"Send them in," Mays replied. His heart didn't flinch, not yet. Maybe she wasn't there. Maybe Von was using her. Maybe he'd save her from herself.
Maybe.
The pounding on the door was expected, so Von wasn't surprised. He was already out the back window with Shanice. He'd memorized the alley patterns around South Side years ago, before the CIA ever caught scent of his life. Now he ran through them like muscle memory. Rain slammed the pavement as they ducked behind dumpsters and tore through broken fences.
Helicopter blades beat above. Shanice slipped, Von caught her, and they rolled into a garage filled with dusty tools and paint cans. He slid the door shut just as boots hit the ground outside.
Voices. Dozens of them.
"This way!"
"They were spotted by the drainpipe!"
"Secure the east perimeter!"
Von held her close, whispering, "No sound. No light. No breath."
They waited.
Ten minutes felt like hours. Then the voices faded. Silence returned.
Shanice finally exhaled. "We can't keep doing this. They'll always find us."
"Not if we get ahead of them," Von said. "There's a terminal in East Garfield. Hidden in an old subway tunnel. If we get there, I can hack into their next protocol activation."
"And then?"
"Then we crash Seraph from the inside."
Meanwhile, Mays sat in front of the safe house CCTV footage recovered by field agents.
He watched frame after frame, fingers steepled. There was Von, moving with purpose. Calm. Strategic. Calculated.
Then there was his daughter. Her hand in Von's. Her head on his chest. Her smile.
And Mays realized… she wasn't kidnapped.
She'd chosen this.
His gut twisted. The room fell silent except for the hum of the footage loop.
He picked up his encrypted satellite phone. Dialed a code that hadn't been used in five years.
"This is Agent Mays. Initiate Protocol V."
The voice on the other end was cold.
"Are you certain?"
"Yes," Mays said. "Von Royner is now classified as a rogue Oracle Subject. No more surveillance. I want him terminated."
"And the girl?"
Mays hesitated. Just long enough.
"…Neutralize if necessary."
He hung up and stared blankly at the screen.
The war had changed. And now?
There would be no more rules.