Flash let out a quiet laugh; the sound was like metal scraping against glass. It echoed through the room, heightening the tension.
— You serious? A project…? — he asked again, shaking his head.
His laughter faded, leaving only bitterness behind. He stepped closer, standing almost chest-to-chest with Ethan so that Ethan could feel the heat of his body and the faint smell of cigarette smoke.
— Look at what we found, — Flash said, gesturing toward the table. His voice dropped low, persuasive; that was all it took.
— You're not blind. These diagrams aren't for some school assignment. The photos aren't for a family album.
— They're evidence. And Maria was a soldier in this—whether you want to accept it or not.
Ethan jerked his gaze away, as though the items on the table had suddenly become capable of burning his eyes.
The photographs, the diagrams, the flash drive, everything now felt less like mere clues and more like living fragments of Maria's secret, hidden life, the one he thought he knew down to the last detail.
— She couldn't have… — he exhaled, but the certainty had already vanished from his voice, leaving only a crack through which the truth was seeping.
— She told me everything. We were always honest with each other. Always.
The words hung in the air, frail and thin, like a thread about to snap.
Flash tilted his head slightly to the side, a gesture that was almost sympathetic, yet carried the same cold precision he usually used when sighting down a barrel.
— She was honest… as honest as she could be, — he answered quietly.
— Her one goal was to protect you. So you wouldn't follow her path. So you would stay… alive.
It was like a jolt of electricity hit Ethan. His whole body twitched as though from a shock.
— Follow her path…? — he rasped.
Slowly, as if in a dream, he turned toward the small nightstand. The flash drive lay there, black, matte, almost invisible and for that reason all the more sinister.
— You're saying… she got involved in this… before me?
Gideon, who had been silent by the window the entire time, finally spoke. Quietly, almost without inflection, yet each word landed heavy, like a stone dropping into water.
— Long before.
Ethan slowly sank back onto the chair. His legs gave out on their own. His shoulders began to tremble with small, uncontrollable shivers.
He reached for the notebook lying on the edge of the table, but his fingers wouldn't obey, they slid across the cover, leaving damp trails.
Several pages slipped out and fell to the floor, opening to a spread filled with neat, almost calligraphic entries: dates, times, coordinates, three letters "K.R." followed by a question mark.
— Why… — he whispered, staring at the fallen sheets, — why didn't she tell me anything…?
Flash crouched down in front of him, resting his elbows on his knees. Now their faces were almost level.
Flash's eyes, tired, carrying too much knowledge, looked straight into Ethan's.
— Because if she had told you, you would have followed her, — he said calmly.
— And that means you would have died first. At the very least, they'll think you were involved now.
Ethan lifted his head. Pure, raw, defenseless despair swam in his eyes.
— She would have trusted me. We would have… handled it together!
Flash gave a short, joyless huff.
— Handled it? You? At your age?
He jabbed a finger toward the photographs spread across the table, blurred silhouettes in long coats, faces hidden in the shadows of hoods, a cargo terminal at three in the morning, a flash of light catching someone's unnaturally long fangs.
— Against those who have ruled the night districts for two hundred years? Against those who survived three world wars, two revolutions, and five coup attempts?
— Against those who see better in the dark than you do in daylight?
Ethan shot to his feet so violently he knocked Flash's hand aside. It flew away, but Flash didn't even sway.
— Don't talk to me like I'm a little boy.
His voice cracked, turning sharp, almost shrill. Rage and pain mingled in it.
— You didn't know her! You don't know what she was like! How she laughed, how she hugged me in the mornings, how… how she dreamed about children!
Flash slowly rose after him. His face turned cold.
— You're right, — he said evenly.
— I didn't know her.
A thick, heavy pause hung between them.
— But I know people like her.
Ethan shuddered from head to toe.
Flash continued, without raising his voice:
— People who see too early that the world is rotting from the inside. People who try to hold up the roof while the whole house is already burning.
— People who understand that if they tell their loved ones the truth, those loved ones will die first.
— Because truth is a target painted on your back.
He pressed a finger, not hard, against Ethan's chest.
— That's exactly the kind of person she was terrified of losing.
— That's not true… — Ethan whispered, but even he could hear how the words trembled and broke.
Gideon spoke up gently, without rising from the chair.
— She might have thought you wouldn't be able to handle it. That you wouldn't accept it.
— Could I have kept such a secret?
— Probably not. And also because you… hadn't seen what she had seen.
Ethan spun toward him sharply:
— Are you saying I'm weak?
Gideon lowered his eyes.
There was no judgment in his gaze, only endless exhaustion.
— No. I'm saying you're still a child in this world. And she was already grown up and carrying it all herself.
Silence crept through the room again, like cold river fog.
Ethan clenched his fists.
Flash took a step closer. Now he spoke almost in a whisper, but every word sank straight into the soul.
— Ethan… she didn't think you were weak.
Pause.
— She thought you were too good.
Those words broke something inside. Tears glistened in Ethan's eyes; he turned sharply toward the window, hiding his face, gritting his teeth, refusing to let himself sob.
— She wanted to keep you safe from the very thing she got herself into, — Flash continued quietly.
— From those tunnels where the echo of footsteps sounds like a death sentence. From traitors who smile to your face while holding a knife behind their back.
— From blood on your hands, from that dark side where they'll devour you without even noticing.
— She didn't want you to become… like her.
Ethan nearly shouted:
— But she died anyway! SHE STILL DIED!
His voice turned hoarse, torn, as though ripped from somewhere deep inside.
— Then what was the point of it all?! Why did she do it?!
Flash was silent.
For a long time, longer than the entire evening, he lowered his gaze, and in that gesture there was more pain than in all his words combined.
Bruno, who had been standing in the shadow by the door the whole time, finally spoke. His voice was low and heavy, like a hammer striking an anvil.
— Sometimes… to protect someone, you have to lie. Even to the person you love most.
Ethan exhaled sharply, as though punched in the solar plexus. He covered his face with his hands; his fingers trembled, his shoulders shook.
Flash slowly approached. He placed a hand on Ethan's shoulder, carefully, almost tenderly.
— Ethan…
His voice became softer, more human.
— She was a soldier fighting alone. They took her out because she got too close, far too close.
Ethan slowly lowered his palms from his face. Tears had finally rolled down his cheeks.
— And now we'll find the ones who did it.
Flash smiled.
— Now that sounds right.
Gideon snapped his fingers to draw attention. The locket was back in his hand, small, metallic, with the tiny chip inside.
— And we should start with the beacon, — he said.
— The chip is still warm. That means it was active recently.
All three looked at the locket. A new, more thoughtful silence settled over the room.
The fire in Ethan's eyes flared brighter. He quickly wiped his face and said:
— Then let's find out who she was sending the signal to.
Bruno nodded, never taking his eyes off the chip resting in his huge palm. The metal still held a faint warmth, like a living heart that had only just stopped beating.
— I can read its signal if I have half an hour and a laptop, — he said calmly, but the same steel certainty that always appeared when he talked about tech rang in his voice.
— Just make sure no one twitches.
Flash shifted his gaze to Ethan. He was leaning against the wall, still wiping his eyes with the sleeve of his jacket.
His face was wet, red from tears and strain, but his eyes were no longer clouded by grief. A cold, stubborn light burned in them.
The kind of light that appears when a person stops asking "why" and starts acting.
— You ready? — Flash asked in a whisper.
Ethan drew a deep breath, so deep it felt like the air in the room had suddenly grown thin. He exhaled slowly through his nose.
His shoulders straightened.
— Yes, — he answered. His voice still trembled.
— Now, yes.
Flash extended his hand, not for a handshake, but the way someone seals a blood pact, even if no blood has been spilled yet.
— Then we go all the way.
Ethan looked at the offered palm for one single second. Then he gripped it hard.
Flash's fingers were cold, dry, calloused, like the hands of someone who had held too many weapons for too long.
And in that very moment, very quietly, almost inaudibly, something clicked in the darkness of the corridor.