Jax stared at the floating digital file, then back at her. The word "idealistic" hit him harder than any data point. "A corporate cover-up," Jax echoed, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisper. "You risked your career, Maya, to hand a highly classified theory to a Phantom Division officer. What do you gain from exposing the truth?"
Maya met his gaze directly. "If I take this theory to my director, he doesn't even think about it and fires me," she explained, her voice low and steady. "But if I help you in the investigation, I believe I can get some evidence against Nexus Corp. Then I can secure my job."
She wasn't asking for payment or fame; she was asking for the chance to earn her own story and her own career. This kind of brutal honesty resonated with the lonely conviction Jax carried. He saw the fire of a true journalist who was willing to bet everything on a hunch, just as he was willing to bet his career on a gut feeling. Jax didn't move for another agonizing moment, seeing the calm, fearless conviction in her eyes. Without a word, he leaned forward and terminated the holographic file with a swipe, the data instantly transferring to his encrypted local drive. Jax put the car into drive, the smooth hum of the electric engine filling the sudden void of the basement. Maya watched his intense profile, confused and relieved at the same time. "Where are we going?" she asked. He didn't reply.
The black car moved with silent, aggressive speed, climbing out of the secure bunker and merging onto the expressways. They drove away from the polished glass towers of the city center and toward the sprawl of the city outskirts—an area of old industrial parks and abandoned residential zones. The trip took 100 minutes, the skyscrapers receding into the hazy distance until they were just a glittering line on the horizon. The car stopped in front of a sprawling, old two-story house; the paint was faded, and the lawn was overgrown, but the windows were dark and intact.
The car's doors silently unlocked. Jax stepped out, his hand instinctively going to the small, concealed sidearm beneath his jacket—a habit, even though they were only scouting. He walked around the vehicle and opened the door for Maya. "Get down," he commanded.
Maya slowly stepped out of the car, her gaze sweeping over the eerie silence of the old house. The air was colder here, carrying the faint, metallic scent of the industrial zone. "What is this place?" Maya whispered, the investigative urgency now mixed with genuine fear. The house was old, isolated, and silent—a perfect hideout, or a perfect trap.
"Come with me," Jax said. He slowly started moving toward the house, his hand never straying far from the weapon under his jacket. He knocked on the heavy wooden door twice, then paused for a second, his posture tense, before knocking again once. It was a clear, deliberate signal.
The door slowly, silently unlocked from the inside. It opened to reveal a young man with intense, tired eyes and an unshaven jaw. He looked completely worn out, but alert. Maya froze, her shock palpable. "Ethan?" she gasped. "Come in," Ethan said, stepping back.
Jax looked at Maya, his expression unreadable, and gestured her inside. The moment they stepped over the threshold, Jax put a hand on Maya's shoulder and steered her past a small, dusty living room. "This way." They stopped at a door inside the house that led to the garage, and Jax pushed it open.
The garage was dimly lit and cluttered with old furniture, but in the center, a complex array of monitors glowed, surrounded by advanced CORE processing units and cooling systems. It was a setup designed for serious, demanding digital work—just to find the password.
And there, hunched over the keyboards, were the two faces plastered across every news feed in the city: Kael, the accused hacker, and Zoe, the rogue employee. The moment Maya saw Kael and Zoe, she was completely puzzled and utterly shocked. She wasn't just frozen; her entire reality shifted. She had been hunting them.
"Hey, I'm back," Jax announced, stepping fully into the garage. Zoe, who looked older and far more stressed than her corporate photo suggested, spun around. "Jax, who is the girl? Why did you bring a civilian here?" she demanded, her voice tight with panic. "Yeah, who is that girl?" Ethan echoed, stepping in from the front room, his eyes scanning the windows.
"She is Maya. She's a journalist," Jax stated simply, the weight of the betrayal hanging in the air. Kael, looked up from his work, his face a mixture of fear and accusation. "A journalist? Are you serious? You broke protocol for this?" "I can't tell you all that right now," Jax interrupted, his voice firm and overriding. "But you all need to listen to her. Maya, tell them what you found. Start from the beginning. Why are you here?"
Maya took a ragged breath, forcing herself to focus. She looked from Jax to Kael, then to Zoe, her prosthetic arm feeling suddenly heavy and vulnerable. She had to convince the people who had every reason to believe she was a spy. "Okay," Maya began, her journalistic instinct finally overriding the shock. "My name is Maya. I work for Optic Media. I was given one week by my director to find an exclusive lead on your case, or I'd be fired. He didn't believe I could do it."
She gestured toward the screen. "Your official story is a complete lie. The media says you were a coordinated partnership that stole data for profit. But that narrative is weak." Zoe folded her arms tightly, her eyes narrowed. "Get to the point, journalist."
"The point is, I didn't come here to expose you," Maya countered, holding Zoe's glare. "I came here because I need evidence to save my career, and the only way to find it was by proving the Phantom Division was chasing the wrong motive." She walked forward, stopping a few feet from Kael's station.
"I made a digital files. They prove you and Zoe were strangers. No past connection. And I know it doesn't immediately proves you were framed." She turned to Kael. "But more importantly, I found the archive of your university work—the files on your pure companion AI." Kael's eyes widened slightly; that archive was buried deep.
"Your ideology, Kael—your belief that AI should be ethical, not commercial—was the real threat to Nexus Corp. They didn't frame you for stealing data. I believe they framed you for being an idealist who could expose their true operations. I gave this interpretation to Jax because I need him to change the investigation's focus—to stop hunting fugitives and start investigating Nexus Corp for the cover-up." She finished, standing straight and defiant.
"I risked my job and my freedom to give this file to the lead operative. I did not do that to report a theft. I did that because I believe you are being set up, and I want the true story of why."
But Zoe didn't look convinced. Her eyes narrowed as she studied Maya's face; the sheer audacity of a reporter appearing in their safe house was terrifying. "You risked your career for a theory," Zoe challenged. "How can I trust you?" "We can totally trust her," Jax replied, his voice firm, stepping slightly closer to the group. He didn't elaborate, the trust rooted purely in Maya's dangerous conviction and the immediate need to act on her interpretation.
Zoe hesitated, glancing at Kael and Ethan, who remained silent but watchful. "Okay, leave it," she finally conceded, dismissing the argument. The crisis of their situation outweighed the risk of a single journalist. She straightened up, her expression changing from suspicion to frantic focus. "Jax. We found a way to open the file."
Jax blinked, instantly snapping into his investigator role. "Oh, really? How?"
Zoe walked over to her station, pointing to a rapidly decrypting data stream on one of the screens as Kael and Ethan both turned to watch. She looked back at Jax, her eyes intense. "The file was connected to Marcus's CUBE." Maya frowned, the name immediately signaling the Nexus Corp CEO.
"When I first opened the file that day—the day of the alleged hack—I accessed it because, at that exact moment, Marcus had already opened that same file on his system." Zoe tapped the screen, showing two digital pathways merging. "That day, when Kael was trying to breakthrough the firewalls and entered into Database, unknowingly he somehow managed to connect Marcus's CUBE to my CORE."
"Wait," Jax interrupted, his voice sharp with realization. "You gained access because Marcus was already looking at it, and the system was temporarily bridged by Kael, so your access credentials...?"
"Exactly," Zoe confirmed.
"So what we have to do now?" Jax asked, his focus entirely on the screens and the newly identified target: Marcus.
"I have a plan for it," Zoe replied, a small, confident smile appearing on her tired face. It was the first time she'd looked like a programmer ready for a challenge, not a fugitive on the run. "Since we don't know the password and the key, we have to connect Marcus's CUBE to our NODE," she explained, gesturing to the complex setup in the garage. "Then, the moment he opens that file again, we can mirror the access and download the file without needing the key."
"And how do we link to his CUBE?" Jax pressed.
Kael, who was already typing commands, took over the explanation. "I'll send a link to Marcus's CUBE, which connects to his CORE system. That link is the bridge. But he won't click links like that by himself." "Yeah," Zoe confirmed. "Someone has to go into his cabin and physically click on that link. Only then will the connection be established."
Ethan—the one maintaining their physical security—scratched his chin. "Why don't we do all this at night? Security is usually lower." "No," Zoe immediately countered. "At night, security is high. No one's allowed to enter the main office floors. If we break through, it'll become a mess again. We need to do this during the day, when access is allowed but controlled."
"But during the day, he's at his desk," Jax pointed out. "Exactly," Zoe continued. "That's why we need to make Marcus busy, keep him away from his cabin, and keep him at a long distance during the whole process. That way, he won't see the connection happen."
Zoe paused, looking around the room at the three men and the one reporter. "The person who clicks the link needs high-level building clearance," she summarized. "The person who distracts him needs to be someone he wouldn't suspect, someone who can maintain a conversation smoothly." The air in the garage grew thick with silence. Jax couldn't go; he was too high-profile. Kael and Zoe were wanted fugitives. Ethan didn't have access to higher floors. All eyes inevitably landed on Maya. She was the only one in the room who wasn't a criminal and still had some kind of corporate access—and the highest possible motive to risk everything.
"We have the Clicker," Zoe announced. "That's Lyra. She was my friend at Nexus Corp, and she still has the access needed to get into Marcus's cabin and activate the link." She paused, her voice dropping. "But the plan needs a Lure. Someone who can maintain Marcus away from the cabin long enough for the access to complete." She said, directing the statement to Jax, but her eyes locked pointedly on Maya.
Maya felt the weight of the plan settling on her shoulders. Her career, and the fugitives' freedom, depended entirely on her next move.