Oak Ridge, Tennessee – Oak Ridge National Subsurface Lab
Agent Samsa leaned casually against his sedan, twisting the cap off his water bottle and taking a slow sip. His eyes scanned the quiet, tree-wrapped facility as if the forest itself might give him an answer. A cluster of FBI vehicles sat in the gravel lot.
The heavy metal doors to the lab's surface building hissed open, and Agent Martin walked out casually, adjusting his coat against the breeze.
"Man, I ain't seen a case like this in forever," Martin said to Samsa, letting his own back rest against the car.
Samsa didn't look at him. "How'd the search come out?"
"Clean." Martin shrugged. "Airports, seaports, train stations—nothing. No record of any of them leaving. Month's worth of travel data, and zilch."
Samsa's jaw tightened.
"We've been chasin' IDs, names, addresses… all dead ends. Nothing leading to anything reasonable enough to be a lead." Martin went on, his voice somewhere between disbelief and boredom.
