The rain hadn't stopped for hours.
Ethan Ward leaned against the rusting guardrail of a dilapidated overpass on the edge of Elmhaven. His coat, soaked and heavy, clung to him like the weight of every decision he had made since his descent into the city's underworld. Below, streets shimmered with reflections of red lights, sirens howling in the distance like wolves circling the wounded. He could still smell the scorched metal and gunpowder from the last job. The warehouse fire hadn't just destroyed evidence—it had drawn attention.
Too much attention.
"Are you even listening to me?" Iris snapped, pacing behind him in the dim orange glow of a streetlamp. Her voice was hoarse, irritated—tinged with fear.
Ethan's fingers tightened on the rail. "I heard you."
"Then say something. They're onto us, Ethan. The fire—someone tipped off Delacroix. We don't have much time before he starts connecting the dots. We need to disappear."
Ethan didn't turn. "We're not running."
"We're not prepared!" Iris shouted. "We're a teacher with PTSD and a hacker with a record. That's not an empire, that's a suicide pact."
He finally turned to face her. His eyes burned—not with rage, but with clarity.
"That warehouse was just one node in a bigger web. And Delacroix isn't the spider. He's just another fly feeding off the rot."
"So who's the spider?"
Ethan's jaw tensed. "We're going to find out."
Iris shook her head, stepping closer. "You're changing. You're not the man I met six months ago."
"No," Ethan said coldly. "That man died the night they tried to burn me alive."
A silence hung between them, thick with unspoken truths. Behind them, a car pulled up quietly—a black sedan with no plates.
Ethan didn't flinch. "Right on time."
From the back seat emerged a woman. Tall, mid-30s, tightly braided hair and a scar tracing from her temple to the edge of her jawline. She wore a long leather coat and carried herself like someone who had spent her life walking through warzones and coming out cleaner than the battlefield.
"Iris, meet Selene Kade," Ethan said. "She's not with Delacroix. She's…off the grid. Ex-intelligence, ex-mercenary, current ghost."
Selene extended a hand, her expression unreadable. "You burned down a government stash site. That's reckless."
"Calculated," Ethan replied. "I sent a message."
She scoffed. "You sent a death warrant to your own door."
"Why are you here?" Iris asked.
Selene turned her eyes toward the city skyline. "Because you're disrupting a power chain no one talks about. And I want in."
"In?" Ethan raised a brow.
Selene met his gaze. "You're planning to take apart the machine from the inside. So am I. Our methods… align."
Ethan's mind worked quickly, dissecting every word, every twitch in her face. She was hiding something—but so was he.
"I don't trust easily," he said.
Selene smirked. "Good. You'll live longer."
Two Hours Later — Abandoned Subway Terminal, Ward HQ
The HQ was dark, quiet, its walls still charred from the last breach. Ethan sat at the central table, surrounded by screens flickering with surveillance footage from across Elmhaven. Iris poured over blueprints of the Delacroix estate, while Selene disassembled a pistol with the fluidity of muscle memory.
"Here's what we know," Ethan began. "Delacroix controls a fraction of the Halberd cartel's reach. But he's not the source. He answers to someone higher."
"Higher than Delacroix?" Selene asked, slotting a round into the chamber.
Ethan nodded. "He calls them 'The Hollow Court.' Ghost investors. Old money. Corrupt politicians. Black-ops remnants. They fund and shield every major operation in Elmhaven—from drug trafficking to tech development and experimental warfare."
Iris pulled up a digital chart. "I found encrypted financial flows linking Delacroix to a front company called AUREX Dynamics. They funnel tech and experimental gear through orphanage grants and psychological research programs."
Selene's eyes sharpened. "You're telling me they use kids as lab rats?"
"Worse," Ethan said. "They're designing psychological warfare agents. Emotional suppression, pain endurance, even empathy inhibitors. Project MIRAGE. We've seen traces of it before."
Iris hesitated. "There's something else… The funding was pushed by a senator. Senator Vance Roth."
Selene froze.
"What?" Ethan asked.
"I know that name," she said slowly. "Roth was one of my last missions. The agency asked me to gather leverage on him, but when I uncovered evidence of child experiments tied to MIRAGE… the files disappeared. My handler vanished the next week."
Ethan's heart pounded. Pieces were snapping together.
"This isn't about drugs or power," he muttered. "This is about control. Psychological, societal, generational."
A silence followed, then Iris whispered, "Then we burn them all."
Ethan nodded. "We hit Roth's estate tomorrow. We find the files. And we tear the mask off."
Next Night — Roth's Estate, North Elmhaven
The storm hadn't let up.
Lightning slashed the sky as the team moved through the perimeter. Iris hacked security while Selene and Ethan descended from the roof like phantoms.
Inside, the mansion was hollow—too quiet.
"Something's wrong," Selene whispered. "No guards. No movement."
They reached the basement. Ethan pried open the door, revealing a laboratory of horrors—vials, broken restraints, photographs of children hooked to machines.
A voice echoed from the dark.
"I must say, I'm impressed you got this far."
From the shadows stepped a tall man in a white suit. Perfectly composed. Cold eyes. Senator Roth.
"I thought you were a myth," Ethan growled.
Roth smiled. "Oh, I am. Myth is power."
Suddenly, gas hissed from vents. Selene shouted, "Down!"
A flash—then chaos.
Explosions rocked the floor. Iris's scream crackled through the comms.
Ethan woke, disoriented, buried under rubble. His arm was pinned.
"Ethan!" Iris's voice. Distant, but alive.
Selene dragged him out as fire licked the walls.
They stumbled outside, coughing, bleeding.
"I got it," Iris said, clutching a hard drive. "All of it. Files. Names. Footage. Roth's confessions."
Sirens howled in the distance.
Roth was gone—but the curtain had lifted.
Later — Safehouse
Ethan stared at the hard drive. The truth sat inside, fragile and dangerous.
"We're at war now," he said. "And it's not about survival anymore. It's about legacy."
Selene handed him a new mask. Sleek, dark, armored. "Time to stop reacting. Start becoming what they fear."
Ethan took the mask. His reflection stared back.
No longer Ethan Ward.
Not just a man.
A reckoning.