The USB felt like a live wire in Amir's palm
Project Rebirth
The words pulsed in his mind as he and Lina crouched in the back of a stolen delivery van, its engine rattling toward The Line's new safehouse.
Karim drove, his knuckles white on the wheel. The scarred man Yami, he'd finally growled his name sat opposite them, cleaning his pistol with methodical precision.
"Play it," Lina demanded, nodding at the USB.
Yami's gaze snapped up
"Not here. Walls have ears now."
Amir's jaw tightened
Trust was crumbling faster than the city.
Safehouse Gamma was a derelict subway station, its tunnels repurposed into a war room.
Chomo waited at a makeshift desk, his face illuminated by a flickering lantern.
"You survived," he said, though it sounded more like an accusation.
Amir slammed the USB onto the desk.
"What's Rebirth? And why does The Silhouette think you're hiding something?"
Chomo's eyes darkened. He plugged in the USB.
The hologram erupted a blueprint of a massive, cylindrical structure buried beneath the city.
"Project Rebirth: Atmospheric Purification System,"
a robotic voice intoned
"Activation will neutralize airborne pathogens and pollutants."
Lina frowned "That sounds… good?"
Yami snorted. "Keep watching."
The hologram shifted. A chemical formula spun in the air C12H24O6S3
"Nano-toxins," Chomo whispered. "Rebirth isn't a purifier. It's a disperser. Release this into the atmosphere, and it'll bind to oxygen. Anyone without the antidote serum..."
"Dies," Amir finished, cold creeping into his veins. "But why?"
"Population control." Yami leaned forward, his scars twisting in the lantern light.
"The Silhouette's investors want a clean slate. New world, handpicked survivors."
Lina recoiled. "And The Line knew about this?"
Chomo's silence was answer enough.
The Argument erupted like a detonated mine.
"You're sitting on a genocide plan and didn't think to mention it?!" Lina shouted, kicking a chair." We needed proof!" Chomo barked.
"Without the USB, we were just conspiracy theorists!"
Amir stepped between them. "Doesn't matter now. How do we stop it?"
Yami tossed a photo onto the table—a sleek, silver briefcase handcuffed to a man in a tailored suit. EchoTech CEO: Elias Vorne. "Rebirth's activation codes are biometric. He's the key."
Karim smirked. "Assassination?"
"Extraction," Yami corrected. "We need him alive to reverse the codes."
The plan was razor-thin: Infiltrate Vorne's penthouse during his midnight board meeting. Disable security. Get out before The Silhouette's reinforcements arrived.
Amir's role? Hack the penthouse's surveillance. Lina refused to stay behind—again.
"I'm done hiding," she said, strapping a stun gun to her thigh.
The Penthouse was a glass fortress atop EchoTech Tower. Amir crouched in a service elevator, his laptop wired into the building's security grid.
"Cameras looped," he whispered into his comm.
"Move," Yami's voice crackled.
They slipped into a ventilation shaft, the meeting's murmur rising below. Vorne stood at the head of a marble table, the briefcase gleaming beside him.
"Phase One complete," Vorne announced. "Rebirth launches at dawn."
Amir's fingers flew over his keyboard—download the data, find the antidote formula.
A board member frowned at his phone. "Security breach in Sector"
Yami dropped from the ceiling, pistol raised
"Nobody move!"
Karim tasered guards while Lina lunged for the briefcase. Vorne scrambled back, slamming a panic button.
Sirens blared.
"Got it!" Lina yelled, snapping the briefcase free.
But Vorne smiled. "You think we'd store the real codes here?"
The hologram on the table flickered. A countdown materialized: 01:59:59
"Remote activation," Vorne hissed. "Rebirth goes live, and you've just killed us all."
The Escape was a blur of gunfire and shattered glass. They rappelled down the tower, the briefcase heavy on Lina's back. Yami covered their retreat, his bullets buying seconds.
In the van, Amir scoured the downloaded data. "The antidote… it's not a serum. It's a frequency. Broadcast at 872 MHz to destabilize the toxins."
Chomo's voice cut through the comms
"Use the emergency radio tower. But it'll take time to calibrate!"
"We don't have time!" Lina screamed as the countdown hit 00:43:12.
Yami grabbed Amir's shoulder. "There's another way. The Line's… prototype." His voice faltered. "A resonance bomb. It'll emit the frequency in a blast radius—but it's unstable."
"How unstable?" Karim asked.
"City-block-leveling unstable."
Amir stared at the briefcase. The weight of the choice crushed him—save the city by risking annihilation, or gamble on a tower they might not reach in time
The Decision split The Line.
Chomo argued for the tower. Yami and Karim for the bomb. Amir stood in the safehouse, the device's red activation button in front of him.
Then—a gunshot.
Chomo collapsed, a bullet in his leg.
Yami stood in the doorway, his pistol smoking. "We're out of time."
Amir's finger hovered over the button.
The countdown hit 00:00:00.
To Be Continued…