2:04 p.m. – The Alley Behind the Clinic
"Hello, brother."
The words drifted through the smoke like a ghost, too real to be imagined. Stray froze. Rain hissed against the cracked pavement, masking the silence that followed. His fists clenched instinctively.
A girl stood in the haze, just beyond the flickering alley light. Her silhouette was slight, delicate. But her voice had been steel. Her coat, scorched at the hem, fluttered in the wind. Blood trickled from a cut above her eyebrow. Stray took a slow step forward, eyes narrowing.
"Who are you?"
Not because he didn't know. But because he didn't want to be right.
She tilted her head, and for a heartbeat, something shifted in her gaze—recognition? Pity? It vanished before he could place it.
"You don't remember me," she said, not as a question.
The sirens had faded. The city was too quiet. Stray's mind flicked through the pieces—the explosion, Aria's disappearance, and now this.
"You were in the lab," he murmured. "Project Widow."
"I never left."
A rush of wind parted the smoke enough to show her face clearly. She looked no older than Aria, but her eyes—those were old. Worn. Full of things children weren't meant to survive.
Stray's heart beat louder.
"You were one of the others."
She nodded. "They called me Subject 9."
He took another step. The weight of the moment pressed against his chest.
"Why are you here?"
"They sent me."
The cold way she said it told him everything. Whoever 'they' were, they'd gotten better at their game. This wasn't just another assassin. This was someone like him. Modified. Conditioned. Weaponized.
But she wasn't attacking. Not yet.
"The girl," he said, his voice steady. "Aria. Did you take her?"
"No. They did. I was just the message."
Stray's fists unclenched. He didn't have time for riddles.
"Where?"
"They're bringing her back to the Source. Where it all began."
Stray's jaw tightened. The Source. That meant the original Widow facility—the one buried under Rustmark before it was supposedly shut down.
Before he could respond, a soft metallic click echoed above.
Snipers.
He grabbed Subject 9 and threw both of them behind the alley dumpster just as gunfire raked the concrete. Sparks flew. Shards of brick exploded from the wall.
"Four shooters," he hissed, peeking out. "High ground. Suppressors. Trained."
She wiped blood from her cheek. "They're just here to slow you down."
"Then let's make them regret it."
Stray yanked a rusted pipefrom the ground, snapped the end to a jagged point, and motioned upward. They moved in sync—like they'd done this before, even if they hadn't.
He scaled the side of the building, leaping from dumpster to ledge, then hoisting himself up with fluid precision. The rain made everything slick, but he moved like a ghost.
The first shooter didn't see him coming. Stray cracked the pipe across the back of his skull, then rolled over the next one's rifle and drove the jagged metal into the man's vest. Two down.
Subject 9 handled the third—disappearing into the shadows, only to emerge behind the gunman and twist his arm until something snapped. The last shooter fled.
"Let him go," she said.
Stray wiped his face. "That's not my style."
But he let him go anyway.
3:14 p.m. – Warehouse Ruins
Stray found Aria exactly where he feared he would.
The warehouse had once been part of a freight yard before the war, later repurposed by Project Widow as a temporary containment site. It was condemned now, eaten by rust and rot. But the walls still whispered.
Aria stood by a broken window, arms crossed, staring into the gray sky.
"You came," she said, without turning.
Stray: "You didn't make it hard."
Aria: "I left clues."
Stray: "You left blood."
A flicker of guilt passed across her face.
"I had to get out," she said. "I couldn't breathe. Not with what she said."
"She?"
"Subject 9. She told me about the others. About you."
Stray stepped closer. The air inside was damp, heavy with mildew. Old memories lived here. Ones he hadn't wanted to revisit.
"She's not wrong," he said. "But she's not right either."
Aria looked at him. "What happened here?"
He didn't answer immediately. His eyes swept across the room—the rusted surgical tables, the stained tiles, the hooks that still hung from the ceiling.
"This is where they broke us," he said.
Silence settled.
"I saw your name," she said softly. "On the wall. Next to mine."
He nodded. "We were both in File 17."
"They said I was a defect."
"They said the same about me. Until I stopped being useful."
The words hung between them.
"They took you back," she said. "Didn't they?"
Stray's breath caught. A brief flash—needles, restraints, electric hums, voices screaming in another room.
"I escaped," he lied.
Aria didn't push.
"They'll come again," she whispered. "They always do."
"I know."
She turned to him, something shifting in her posture. "Then let's not run this time."
4:00 p.m. – Rustmark Underground Transit
They moved fast.
Subject 9 had vanished again, but Stray knew she wasn't gone. Just waiting. Watching. Maybe she'd show up when it mattered. Maybe not.
Stray and Aria descended into the abandoned transit tunnels beneath Rustmark—old routes used during the war to move supplies and soldiers. Now they were cracked, flooded, and crawling with rats.
The Source was five miles east. Deep below.
As they moved, Aria's breathing slowed to match his. She kept pace, never asking to stop.
"You trained yourself?" he asked.
"No. I survived. There's a difference."
He nodded. He respected that.
"I kept hearing your name in the labs," she added. "Subject 12. The one that got away. The one they still fear."
He didn't respond.
"You hate them, don't you?"
"I don't hate. I remember."
They kept walking.
5:03 p.m. – Platform Delta
The tunnel opened into a wide loading bay, with rusted rails and carts long buried under dust. But the lights—those were new. Someone had powered up the grid again.
Footsteps echoed.
Stray held a hand out. Aria crouched behind a pillar.
Figures emerged—four of them. Clones. Or close. Enhanced soldiers from the newer Widow batches. The same uniforms. Same dead eyes.
But they weren't here to talk.
Stray stepped forward.
"I'm not going back."
The lead soldier tilted his head.
"You never left."
Then the fighting began.
End of Chapter 5.