Casablanca shimmered beneath the Moroccan sun—bright, chaotic, and alive with secrets.
Crowds pushed through market alleys filled with the scent of spice and exhaust. Minarets pierced the skyline while chatter buzzed in Arabic, French, and something older: the hum of surveillance and shadow operations that never quite ended with the Cold War.
Grimm hated it.
It was too loud. Too exposed. But it was the next breadcrumb on Phantom's trail.
"Eyes up," he muttered into his mic. "The intel puts Wraith somewhere in the medina. Reyes, status?"
From his rooftop perch, Reyes adjusted his lens. "Got heat signatures moving behind the rug stalls. No Helix tags. Could be civvies. Could be cover. I've also got two tails circling Tanya."
"Let them," Tanya replied coolly. "I want to see who they report to."
On the ground, she moved with deceptive ease—camera slung around her shoulder like a tourist, but every motion calculated. She paused at a fruit vendor, pretending to examine dates while glancing at the mirrors hanging from the stall.
Two men, both in mirrored sunglasses. One leaned against a pole, the other faked a call. They were watching her.
"Clocked," she said. "Flanking positions. We've been made."
Grimm frowned. "Abort?"
"No. Let's turn the tables."
Bull moved through the shadows of an underground hookah café, his bulk drawing stares. The owner looked up, nervous. Bull slipped him a folded wad of cash.
"Looking for someone. Goes by 'Wraith.'"
The owner's hands trembled slightly. "I don't know that name."
Bull leaned in. "I think you do."
The owner hesitated, then nodded toward a back door. "Try the bathhouse. Basement level. But be careful... that place eats soldiers."
Fifteen minutes later, the team regrouped near the bathhouse. It was old—Ottoman arches, faded tiles, steam rising through grates. The entrance was guarded by a one-eyed man with a submachine gun hidden beneath a rug.
"I'll take point," Grimm said.
The interior was damp and cavernous. The air smelled of cedar, lime, and something metallic. Whispers echoed off the stone walls.
They moved through the mist like ghosts.
Then, a voice echoed:
"Stop there."
A figure stepped out of the steam, cloaked in desert garb, face obscured by a shemagh. They moved with precision—quiet as breath.
"You came looking for Wraith. You found them."
Grimm kept his rifle low, non-threatening. "We're not here to kill. We're here to talk."
"You're Mercer," Wraith said. "The man who broke Phantom."
Tanya narrowed her eyes. "That information shouldn't be public."
"It's not," Wraith said, removing the shemagh. A woman—dark-skinned, mid-30s, with eyes like fractured obsidian. "Unless you used to be Phantom."
Reyes exhaled. "Oh damn…"
Grimm stepped forward. "You were on the list. A 'Level 1 Disruptor.' Phantom feared you."
"They should've," Wraith said. "I built the seed architecture for the predictive engine before I walked away. Before it started marking innocent people as threats."
"You know how to kill what's left of it?" Grimm asked.
"I know how to make sure it can't be reborn."
Reyes whistled. "That'd be nice, since Helix is trying to do exactly that."
Wraith nodded. "They moved Phase Two operations to West Africa—Mali. Underground servers. Military-grade blacksite. That's where Kessler is building Sigma."
"Sigma?" Grimm asked.
"The successor to Phantom. Smarter. More aggressive. It doesn't just predict dissent—it fabricates it. Then targets based on potential rebellion. Anyone with the wrong bloodline or brain chemistry gets flagged."
Tanya's jaw clenched. "So it's genocide… preemptively calculated."
"Yes," Wraith said. "And it goes online in nine days."
Grimm looked around the team.
"We stop it."
Wraith smirked. "Then you'll need me."
Bull grunted. "You fight?"
Wraith slipped a knife from her belt and embedded it into a wooden beam behind Grimm without breaking eye contact.
"I survive."
Grimm cracked a rare smile. "Welcome to the war."
Meanwhile…
In a Helix Dynamics substation hidden beneath the Sahara, Director Adrian Kessler examined a holographic interface displaying shifting human behavior matrices. Thousands of names scrolled—each tagged by threat index, psychological profile, and DNA markers.
Behind him, a figure emerged. Combat gear. Scarred face. His elite fixer.
"Wraith has surfaced," the enforcer said.
Kessler didn't turn. "I know."
"Mercer has her."
"I'm counting on it."
He tapped the screen.
"Let them come. Sigma will be ready. Let them see how the future handles threats."
The screen flickered. One name blinked red: Elias Mercer – Status: Anomaly
Kessler's smile was cold.
"End the anomaly."