Madison: I just heard back from Victor. A localized proxy tried to hack directly into our secure network servers, but our firewalls completely locked them out. But they didn't stop there. They bypassed us entirely and pulled your foundational background registry straight from the centralized government database.
Liam sat frozen in his chair, his mind racing. A government database pull? Who possesses that level of localized authority or black-market bypass capability except—
Suddenly, another text popped up from Madison, shattering his train of thought.
Madison: Did you get yourself entangled in something?
The pieces instantly clicked together in Liam's mind. A cold sweat broke across his neck. It wasn't an application process. It was a trap.
He whirled his head back toward the primary biometric tracking screen. The real-time vital streams—heart rate, oxygen levels, GPS coordinates—suddenly began to stutter violently. The digital numbers flickered, glitched into hexadecimal errors, and then went completely dark. The connection was dead.
"No!" Liam shouted, slamming his palms against the desk.
He lunged for his comm-unit, speed-dialing Ethan's tactical line.
In the adjoining quarters, Ethan had just pressed the end button on his video call with his mother. The sudden, frantic ring of Liam's breakthrough line made him tensed up instantly. He swiped green. "Liam? Did the tracking data lock in?"
"Ethan, get over to the tech lab right now!" Liam's voice cracked with uncharacteristic panic. "The entire op is a trap, from the beginning!"
Ethan didn't even hang up. He bolted out of his quarters, his tactical boots tearing down the concrete corridor until he threw the heavy tech lab doors open. "What do you mean, a trap? Explain."
"The moment we submitted Allen's registry for that street race, we were approved almost instantly. We thought we bypassed their processes," Liam said, his hands flying across the monitors trying to reboot the frequencies. "But they didn't just accept him, Ethan. They ran a deep-dive background check on his identity hours ago. They let him through the gates entirely on purpose."
Ethan's eyes narrowed into a dangerous, lethal focus. "Are you telling me they investigated Allen, realized his operational history, and tracked his connection back to us... back to me? They knew he was an infiltrator from the start."
Liam gave a grim, heavy nod.
"What about the biometrics? Where is his location?" Ethan demanded, leaning over the console.
"We completely lost the signal," Liam admitted, his voice tight. "The SUV he's riding in just entered the high-altitude mountain pass. The atmospheric cold up there is too intense—the dermal-induction sensors on those glasses were an experimental prototype. The extreme sub-zero temperatures completely froze the battery cell and shattered the frequency loop."
Ethan turned on his heel, his expression hardening into pure steel. "Get the gear. We're going to pull him out right now."
"I'm already on it," Liam replied, grabbing a tactical data pad and punching a direct line to the hangar crew. "Get a stealth-variant transport helicopter prepped and idling on the tarmac. Maximum priority!"
Seconds later, the heavy blast doors of the underground base ground open against the snow. Through the howling, freezing wind of the arctic storm, Ethan and Liam ran side-by-side toward the roaring blades of the military helicopter waiting on the snow-covered runway.
Allen, just stay alive, Ethan thought, his jaw clenched as the chopper lifted off into the dark, turbulent sky. Hold on until I get there.
Elsewhere
The heavy front door of the Murphy estate clicked shut. Murphy stood quietly on the porch, watching the taillights of Uncle Benson's car disappear down the snow-dusted avenue. Turning back inside, Murphy walked straight down the hallway and locked himself inside his private, soundproof study.
He sank into his heavy leather chair, pulling up an encrypted intelligence feed across his multi-panel monitor. A striking, grim news headline immediately caught his eye.
The screen displayed a high-resolution forensic photograph. A man's body was hanging suspended from the concrete ledge of a high-rise commercial building, completely lifeless.
The synthetic voice of an automated intelligence reporter bled through the speakers:
"Local authorities have recovered a high-profile casualty hanging from the commercial sector perimeter. Initial forensic assessments indicate the deceased was operating as an elite reconnaissance asset, equipped with military-grade, unregistered espionage gear. According to specialized medical examiners, the target was neutralized days prior to display. The clean, calculated nature of the execution suggests a high-level specialist operator was responsible..."
Murphy's eyes narrowed to razor slits as he analyzed the specific knots used on the suspension rigging. He reached out, picked up his hardwired, un-traceable desk telephone, and dialed a secure, direct frequency.
The line encrypted, clicking open after a single half-ring.
"Yes, Boss," Victor's calm, sharp voice answered from the other side.