The helicopter roared above the broken skyline, cutting through the thick night like a blade. Damon sat hunched near the door, his knuckles white around the rifle still gripped in his hands. His crew was scattered across the small cabin—Callie slumped against the wall, bleeding from a graze across her forehead; Marcus clenching his jaw in frustration; Adrian feverishly working on a tablet, trying to understand how everything had gone so wrong. And Seraph, cool and composed, her eyes fixed out the window as if she weren't the reason they'd almost been slaughtered.
"You said we had a chance," Damon growled, his voice low but seething.
Seraph didn't even flinch. She turned to him slowly, her face calm as ever. "You're still breathing, aren't you?"
He wanted to scream. To choke the smugness out of her. But survival had to come first. His people needed him to stay sharp. Later, there would be time for reckoning.
As the city fell away beneath them, Damon realized something grim: this wasn't a victory. They hadn't weakened Victor. They'd only provoked him.
And Victor wasn't a man known for mercy.
—
The helicopter landed on the outskirts of the city in an abandoned industrial yard, the cold metal of the landing pad groaning under its weight. Damon jumped down first, his boots hitting the ground with a dull thud. The others followed, battered and worn but alive—for now.
"This way," Seraph said, already moving toward a rusted stairwell that led into a decrepit warehouse.
Inside, the place smelled of oil and old blood. Faded graffiti curled along the walls like dying vines, and broken machinery sat like forgotten corpses. Damon hated every inch of it.
"This is your safehouse?" Marcus scoffed, wiping blood from his brow.
Seraph shot him a look. "It's off the grid. Victor won't find you here."
"Forgive me if I don't share your optimism," Callie muttered, pressing a bandage to her forehead.
They moved deeper into the building, finding a room with battered cots and dusty supplies. It wasn't much, but it would have to do.
Damon sank onto one of the cots, exhaustion threatening to pull him under. But sleep wouldn't come easy. Not with the taste of betrayal still fresh in his mouth.
Seraph pulled out a battered map, spreading it across a table. "We have to move quickly. Victor won't wait for long."
"You knew," Damon said, his voice dangerously soft. "You knew it was a trap."
Seraph didn't deny it. "Of course I knew. That's why we needed to move now. Victor's too comfortable. We need to make him bleed."
"You set us up," Marcus said, stepping forward, fists clenched.
"No," she said, almost lazily. "I tested you. And you passed."
Damon's patience snapped. He was across the room in an instant, slamming Seraph against the wall with one hand on her throat. Her eyes widened, but there was no fear there—only a dark, mocking amusement.
"You think this is a game?" he hissed.
Her voice came out strained but steady. "You'll thank me later."
He shoved her away, disgusted. "Don't count on it."
—
That night, Damon couldn't sleep. He sat outside the warehouse, smoking a cigarette, watching the city lights flicker in the distance. Every muscle in his body ached, but it was the ache in his heart that gnawed at him more.
He thought about the faces he'd seen tonight—the men and women Victor had sent after them. They hadn't been street thugs. They'd been soldiers, mercenaries. Victor was building something much bigger than a crime empire. And now Damon and his crew were squarely in his sights.
Footsteps crunched behind him. Jasmine.
"You're quiet," she said, sinking down beside him.
"Trying not to lose my mind," he muttered.
She offered him a tired smile. "You've carried worse burdens."
"Doesn't mean it gets easier."
A long silence stretched between them. The city hummed like a distant beast, restless and hungry.
"You think we can win this?" he asked finally, his voice barely a whisper.
Jasmine didn't answer right away. When she did, it was with a quiet sadness that twisted something inside Damon.
"I think we'll bleed for it," she said. "But maybe, just maybe, it'll be worth it."
—
Morning came gray and cold. The crew assembled in the main hall of the warehouse, faces grim, movements sluggish from exhaustion and grief.
Seraph didn't waste time.
"Victor's next shipment comes in tonight," she said, pointing to a spot on the map. "Weapons. Manpower. If we can intercept it, we cripple him."
"Or die trying," Adrian said under his breath.
Seraph's gaze swept over them. "You're soldiers in a war now. You want to survive? Fight like it."
Her words sparked something in Damon. Anger. Determination. Fear.
But most of all, fire.
They suited up, checking weapons, loading ammunition. The warehouse buzzed with a nervous energy. This was madness. But what other choice did they have?
They weren't just fighting for themselves anymore.
They were fighting for every soul Victor had crushed under his boot.
—
The ambush was supposed to be quick.
Hit the convoy, grab the weapons, get out.
But things never went according to plan.
The first explosion rocked the lead vehicle, flipping it into a fiery heap. Damon and Marcus moved in from the sides, guns blazing. Callie and Adrian hacked the traffic lights, sending the convoy into confusion.
For a moment, it looked like they might actually pull it off.
Then the reinforcements came.
Dozens of Victor's men poured from hidden vehicles, surrounding them in a deadly circle of gunfire and smoke.
Damon ducked behind a concrete barrier, bullets chipping away at the edges. His heart hammered in his chest, adrenaline burning through him.
"We're pinned!" Marcus shouted over the roar of battle.
"Fall back!" Damon barked, laying down cover fire.
They moved as a unit, years of survival instincts kicking in. But the enemy was relentless, closing in from all sides.
Callie went down first, a bullet catching her in the leg. She cried out, blood blooming across her jeans.
"Callie!" Damon screamed, rushing to drag her to cover.
Adrian covered them, shooting wildly, but he was outnumbered.
And then—through the smoke—Damon saw him.
Victor.
Standing on the hood of a black SUV, watching the chaos unfold with cold satisfaction.
Their eyes locked across the battlefield.
And in that moment, Damon understood: Victor wasn't here to win a battle.
He was here to send a message.
You can run. You can fight.
But you'll never win.
—
They barely escaped with their lives, dragging Callie between them, bleeding and broken. They didn't win the battle. They didn't get the weapons.
All they got was pain.
And a promise that the worst was yet to come.
—
Back at the warehouse, Damon sat beside Callie's cot, wrapping her wound as best he could.
"I'm sorry," he whispered, the words tasting like ash in his mouth.
Callie's hand gripped his wrist weakly. "Don't be. We knew what we were getting into."
Her resilience broke something inside him.
He wanted to be strong. To protect them all.
But the truth was, he was just a man.
And men could only bleed for so long before they broke.
—
Late that night, as the others slept fitfully, Damon found Seraph standing by the window, smoking.
"You still think we have a chance?" he asked.
Seraph blew out a long plume of smoke. "Chance?" she echoed, almost laughing. "No. But we have purpose."
Damon leaned against the wall, feeling the weight of the night pressing down on him. "Sometimes, purpose isn't enough."
Seraph turned to him, eyes burning in the darkness. "Then you make it enough."
For the first time, Damon saw her not as a manipulator, not as a liar—but as something much more dangerous.
A true believer.
And maybe that was what they needed to survive.
Not hope.
Not trust.
Just the will to burn everything down, and rise from the ashes.
—