Gjirokastër, Albania – 48 Hours Later
The city slumbered beneath a blanket of fog and silence, its cobbled streets and Ottoman-era rooftops hiding secrets as old as the Cold War. But nestled in the hills just beyond the city limits sat a modern anomaly—a bio-research facility with no public record, no corporate ties, and a satellite uplink powerful enough to punch through military-grade encryption.
That was where Dr. Yelena Moravec had disappeared. And it was where Grimm's team was going.
Reyes peered over the edge of the ridge through a pair of night-vision binoculars. "Facility has thermal scanners, two drone nests, and a fence rigged with current. Not exactly inviting."
Tanya lay beside him, rifle slung across her back. "You think they're protecting Moravec… or holding her prisoner?"
Grimm checked his gear. "We'll know soon enough."
They had a 20-minute window before the next drone sweep.
Infiltration – 0300 Hours
The plan was simple. Bull and Tanya would cut power to the outer grid and draw security to the west wall. Grimm, Reyes, and Wraith would breach the eastern side using a maintenance tunnel Reyes had uncovered through thermal mapping.
As the wind howled across the ridge, Tanya's blade cut clean through the junction box cable.
Sparks. Alarms. Guards scrambled toward the perimeter.
Perfect.
"Go," Grimm ordered.
They descended into the tunnel—a narrow, rust-stained shaft once used for wastewater. Now, it led to salvation or death.
At the end of the tunnel, Wraith set a low-charge breaching cap.
Boom—subtle and clean.
They emerged into a sterile corridor lit by red emergency lights.
Facility Interior
Grimm's boots moved in silence. The deeper they went, the colder the air became—not from temperature, but from dread.
Every room they passed had been abandoned in haste: overturned chairs, shattered screens, and hastily shredded files.
"Someone wiped this place," Reyes muttered. "But not clean enough."
He tapped a console, bypassing layers of firewalls. Lines of code scrolled.
"Got something. Internal log—Moravec refused the transfer. She tried to shut down the backup server."
Grimm stepped closer. "Where is she?"
"Level B3. Containment Wing."
Containment Wing – B3
They reached it in minutes—but found the hall blocked by a reinforced steel door.
Wraith stepped forward, examining the lock. "Biometric scanner. Retinal. I can't crack this."
Reyes cursed under his breath. "We need her to open it."
Then a voice crackled through the speaker above the door—old, tired, but sharp.
"You're not Helix. Who are you?"
Grimm raised his head. "Captain Elias Mercer. We're not here to hurt you."
Silence. Then:
"SIGMA... Did you stop it?"
"A node. In Zurich. But we need your help to finish the job."
The door hissed open.
Inside, they found a woman in her mid-fifties—lab coat stained, eyes sleepless, but alert. She held no weapons. Just a tablet in her hand and a tremor in her fingers.
"Yelena Moravec," she said. "I've been waiting for someone to come."
Containment Lab – 10 Minutes Later
The lab wasn't just a safe room—it was a war room. Maps, models, strings of code, and fragments of SIGMA's neural core filled the walls and drives.
"I designed the second-layer logic," Yelena said. "The predictive reflex system. Kessler corrupted it. He turned what was meant to save lives into a tool for digital genocide."
She tapped the screen, revealing a simulation.
"If SIGMA's remaining cores activate together, they'll overwrite national defense AIs in six countries. Drones, satellites, kill-chips—everything. A world war without soldiers."
Grimm leaned in. "How do we stop it?"
She turned to him, eyes burning.
"We don't deactivate it. We have to trick it. Corrupt its truth source."
Reyes frowned. "You mean feed it false data?"
"Exactly. Trigger a paradox loop—make it question its own predictions. If it can't trust its inputs, it halts."
Grimm exhaled. "How do we build that?"
Yelena smiled grimly. "We already have the ghost code. We just need a place to broadcast it."
Wraith looked up. "Satellite array. There's one in the Carpathians. Russian Cold War relic—still functional."
Grimm nodded. "Then that's our next stop."
Outside the Facility – Dawn
As the team prepared to exfil, Grimm pulled Moravec aside.
"Why stay hidden? Why not come forward earlier?"
She looked out at the rising sun, guilt heavy in her expression.
"Because I helped build the monster. And monsters never get pardons."
He offered her a hand. "Maybe not. But they can help kill it."
She took it.