[Agent 33 POV]
I had been watching that damn warehouse for four days straight.
Four days of lukewarm coffee, stale protein bars, and two rookie agents who talked too much when they were bored and not enough when they were supposed to be alert.
The air inside the surveillance van smelled like a mix of old fabric, sweat, and frustration. Outside, the Iron Serpents' auxiliary site in the Lower East Side looked exactly like every other run-down industrial shell we had been tracking for months. A hollow place full of secrets and the stench of something darker beneath its concrete walls.
And yet, I stayed. I stayed because of a feeling. One I could not shake.
He would come back.
Not to the same place, maybe. The man who had humiliated us during the Chitauri tech retrieval op, the one who made us look like amateurs and walked out with gear no one on Earth should have their hands on.
The man who jammed our surveillance feed with that ridiculous Mario loop, as if he were toying with us. Felix Blake had tried to brush it off with protocol. Sitwell had kept quiet, pretending it never happened. But I had not forgotten.
Not for a second.
I remember the way he moved—efficient, silent, utterly in control. Whoever he was, he was not ordinary. Not just a thief. There had been purpose in his actions. Intent. And now, with half of New York's media screaming about the Iron Serpents being exposed, with underground trafficking rings unraveling, I felt that same pull in my gut.
I sat behind the monitors, my eyes glued to the grainy feed of the warehouse. Nothing had changed since morning. Same two guards on rotation. Same unmarked trucks occasionally rolling in. But my attention had shifted to the television screen in the corner of the van.
It was muted, but the images were loud enough. A fiery shootout in Hell's Kitchen. SWAT teams moving in. Reporters nearly tripping over themselves to get footage of the chaos. The camera lingered on the charred brick facade of a nightclub I recognized from past field briefings.
Iron Serpents territory.
One of the rookie agents beside me whistled low under his breath. "Looks like someone poked the nest."
I did not respond. My fingers tightened on the edge of the console.
The next image cut to a news anchor, and then to grainy security footage leaked from an anonymous source. Lines of text scrolled beneath the screen, naming names. Police officers. City officials. Politicians. All tied to the Iron Serpents through bribes, blackmail, and dirty money.
"Agent Palamas," one of the rookies said, sounding nervous now. "Do you think it's our target?"
I did not answer immediately. My gaze was fixed on a frame of footage showing several women and children being led out of a basement in the arms of paramedics.
"It has to be," I said finally.
The second rookie leaned forward. "You mean the guy from the tech op? The one that—"
"The one who stole alien weaponry from right under our noses, disabled our agents, erased his trail, and turned our operation into a joke? Yeah. That one."
The agent nodded and sat back, visibly sobered.
I turned away from the screen and stared out the small window slit in the van. The city outside was still. But it was the kind of stillness that came just before a storm. I could feel it again—that shift in the air. The same one I felt the night he took the Chitauri gear. Like something was waking up. Like the rules were changing, and no one had told the rest of us.
I was trained to follow patterns. To think tactically, systematically. But some things—some things you feel in your bones.
"I want eyes on every Serpent asset left standing," I said. "Every warehouse, every contact, every business front. If he hit them once, he might hit them again. And this time, I want to see it."
They nodded, already tapping on their keyboards. But I was no longer watching them. I was watching the skyline over Hell's Kitchen, even though it was miles away. Something had changed tonight. Something irreversible.
And I had the sick feeling we were not the ones in control anymore.
I do not know who he is yet.
But I am going to find out.
---
---
Inside the building, Salvador Reyes and Dante Vasquez sat in a dimly lit room, the flicker of a wall-mounted television casting shifting shadows over their tense faces. A half-circle of men stood behind them, eyes glued to the broadcast that now filled the room with the sounds of chaos. The news was playing clips of the firefight outside the Hell's Kitchen nightclub, flashing images of police tape, armored SWAT vehicles, and the shaking hands of survivors pulled from darkness.
Dante leaned forward, elbows on his knees, breathing shallow. His jaw tightened as he watched the scene unfold. A shaved head with thin stubble along his chin, tattoos creeping up the side of his neck. Muscles coiled like a cornered predator.
He had not expected this.
Not in his wildest nightmares did he imagine things would spiral this far out of control. Someone, either within his crew or someone they had crossed, had clearly provoked the wrong kind of enemy.
Then the screen changed.
Images of the building's basement filled the screen. Huddled bodies, cages, children. EMTs moving women wrapped in blankets. One of the reporters' voices cracked slightly as they confirmed that a missing detective had also been found locked in the same underground cell.
Dante's heart sank.
"We never touched cops," he muttered, barely audible. "We never touched any damn cops."
They were being set up. Someone had arranged all of this. Someone who knew just how to twist the narrative.
His phone buzzed violently against the table.
He stared at it for a moment before picking up.
The shouting on the other end was instant.
"You goddamn useless bastard! What the fuck did you do?!" The voice exploded with rage. "You let them find the cages? The fucking cages? And the detective?! Are you out of your goddamn mind?!"
"It wasn't me," Dante barked back. "We had no idea he was there. Someone set us up. I swear."
"Don't give me that bullshit, Dante. You were supposed to handle Hell's Kitchen. Now it's burning. The cops, the press, the goddamn Feds. And we're all going to be up to our necks in shit because of your incompetence."
Dante gritted his teeth. "We're handling it."
"You're not handling jack shit!" the voice screamed. "You're going to fix this, or I'll have your fucking head."
The line went dead.
Dante stood abruptly and hurled the phone at the wall. It hit with a hard crack, shattering into a dozen pieces.
Behind him, Salvador Reyes—taller, leaner, with a sharp goatee and a scar stretching across his cheek—remained still, arms folded across his chest. His face was pale under his tan skin, and his expression unreadable.
"Well," Salvador said flatly, breaking the silence. "That went well."
Dante turned, fists clenched. "You think this is funny? That was your shipment in that basement too."
Salvador's eyes narrowed. "No, I think it's fucked. Completely. But we both know this wasn't just anyone. Whoever did this knew our layout."
Dante sat back down, exhaling hard. "They wants us to burn. This was planned. Every piece of it."
Salvador crossed the room, picked up a half-empty bottle of whiskey, and poured two fingers into a glass. "You want to know what's worse than being targeted?"
"What?"
"Being outplayed."
Dante accepted the glass, his hands still trembling. Salvador's gaze remained locked on the television as the news continued to play.
Just as Dante brought the glass to his lips and took a bitter swallow, the lights in the room flickered twice before the power died completely. The hum of the television vanished. The glow disappeared. Darkness swallowed the room in a breath.
"What the fuck now?" Dante roared, the glass clinking hard against the table as he slammed it down.
One of the men behind them fumbled with a flashlight, its shaky beam illuminating wide eyes and nervous expressions.
"Is it a blackout?" one of them asked, voice tight.
Salvador Reyes did not answer immediately. He was already walking to the window, pulling aside the blinds to look out at the street below. A few seconds later, he let the curtain fall back in place.
"It's not the whole block," Salvador said slowly. "Just this building and the next two. The ones we control."
Dante froze. His mouth opened but no words came out.
Salvador nodded, his voice calm but serious. "Someone's fucking with us. And they knew exactly what to hit."
Dante grabbed the flashlight out of one of his guy's hands. "I want eyes on every corner. All floors. I want answers now."
Salvador raised a hand. "Wait. We send people out, we do it smart. Whoever pulled this wants a panic. Don't give them one."
Dante cursed under his breath, his whole frame vibrating with restrained violence. "I knew this week was cursed. I knew it."
Salvador turned to one of the more level-headed men in the room. "Take a squad. Two on the back stairwell, two through the garage. Check the junction box and rooftop while you're at it. Move fast and keep your eyes sharp."
The man nodded and headed out, barking silent hand gestures to his team.
Salvador poured another measure of whiskey into his glass but still did not drink. "I don't know who this is, Dante. But if this is what I think it is... we're not dealing with just cops or rivals anymore."
Dante scowled, leaning against the wall, arms folded. "Then who the fuck is it? Some vigilante freak?"
Salvador shrugged, a rare trace of unease in his eyes. "Could be anyone. Could be someone a lot smarter than us. All I know is, they are making a move. And we better be ready to make one back."
To Be Continued...