Nathan did not reach a conclusion immediately.
He preferred numbers.
In the conference room, the same structural simulation played again and again. Load distribution. Fire intensity. Residual impact forces. Everything reduced to clean, indifferent curves.
"Under normal conditions," the engineer said,
"the building should have lost structural integrity within seconds."
He paused.
"But it didn't."
Nathan nodded.
"What level of counterforce would be required?"
The engineer flipped to another page.
"Continuous external support," he said carefully.
"The magnitude is beyond any known engineering or weapons system."
Nathan didn't ask for exact figures.
He didn't need them.
What mattered was already clear.
This was not an accident.
And it was not something conventional systems were designed to handle.
"Conclusion accepted," Nathan said.
"This capability has the potential to threaten national security."
No one disagreed.
The noise protocol went live immediately.
Clearer footage flooded the networks.
Stabilized frames.
Heroic angles designed to feel familiar.
Public reaction fractured on schedule.
Some believed.
Some mocked.
Others dissected every frame, convinced it was nothing more than advanced effects.
Nathan watched the data curves rise steadily.
"Let them argue," he said.
"As long as they're fighting over authenticity, they won't ask about the person."
Across the city—
Kent sat in the back of a bus, staring at his phone.
He didn't open any of the videos.
The headlines were enough.
— Unidentified Superpowered Individual Appears at Crash Site
— Experts Question Viral Footage
— Hero or Hoax? Officials Remain Silent
The bus was loud.
People argued, laughed, speculated.
No one looked at him.
That made it worse.
Kent locked his phone and clenched his fingers slightly, forcing them still.
Pressure from above arrived quickly.
Not as an order.
As a probe.
"Have you identified the individual?"
Nathan's answer never changed.
"Not yet."
It wasn't deflection.
It was the truth.
The real problem appeared in the casualty lists.
"Pull personnel data from the incident zone," Nathan said.
The screen shifted.
Fatalities.
Injuries.
Hospital admissions.
They should have formed a complete chain.
They didn't.
"There are almost no intact survivors from the core area," the assistant reported quietly.
Nathan looked up.
"Explain."
"Under those conditions," she said,
"anyone who survived should show signs—burns, fractures, concussion."
"But no such cases exist."
Nathan was silent for a moment.
"So it's not that someone survived."
"It's that—
someone isn't on the list at all."
The room went still.
The investigation pivoted.
They stopped looking for survivors.
They started looking for absences.
Witness statements were reprocessed.
Cameras reanalyzed from impossible angles.
The search narrowed, but no identity emerged.
"There are reports," the assistant said,
"of someone inside the fire."
"Not running. Not being rescued."
"Standing."
Nathan studied the blurred frame on the screen.
No facial detail.
No distinguishing features.
Only one certainty—
That person should not have been there.
"We know someone exists," Nathan said.
"But we don't know who."
Night.
Kent locked the door of his apartment and stood in the dark without turning on the lights.
City glow slid through the curtains, cutting the room into moving shadows.
He thought about the crash.
Not the flames.
Not the screams.
But the moment everything pressed down at once—
and didn't move.
He sat slowly, hands on his knees, breathing uneven.
"No one knows," he whispered.
The words didn't help.
"If he doesn't appear again," the assistant said,
"we can't narrow the field further."
Nathan leaned back.
He understood the implication.
They didn't have control.
"Then we make him appear," Nathan said.
The room tensed.
"A controlled event," he clarified.
"No casualties."
"But enough to trigger instinct."
No one spoke.
"There are only two responses to danger," Nathan continued.
"Run."
"Or reach out."
Later that night, Kent lay on his bed, staring at the ceiling.
He closed his eyes—then opened them again.
The same image repeated in his mind.
Not the news.
The moment his hand moved.
He finally understood something.
That hadn't been a one-time accident.
Nathan closed the final file.
"Prepare the next phase," he said.
"We're not trying to capture him."
He paused.
"We're trying to see
whether he'll step forward again."