Outside Athens, Greece- 02:17 a.m.
The warehouse sat alone in an abandoned industrial zone, surrounded by rusted fences and broken streetlights. No signs. No cameras in obvious places.
That alone made Alexandros certain this was the place.
"Thermals show movement inside," his security chief said quietly through the comms. "Multiple heat signatures. One small."
Alexandros's jaw hardened.
"Go," he said.
The team moved in silence.
The first guard never saw it coming. A blade, clean and fast. The second reached for his weapon and went down with a suppressed shot to the chest. The side door was breached in seconds.
Inside, the air smelled wrong like chemicals, rot, and fear.
They moved room by room.
Tables lined with restraints. Medical equipment is still warm. Bloodstains that had been scrubbed but never erased.
"This is a lab," one of the men muttered.
Alexandros said nothing.
Then they heard it. A weak sound.
Not a voice but something closer to breathing that had forgotten how to ask for help.
"Back room," Alexandros ordered.
The door was reinforced. Two men kicked it in.
And there it was. A cage.
Small, steel bolted to the floor. Inside sat a boy.
He couldn't have been more than a teenager. His hair was matted, his skin pale and bruised. One arm hung unnaturally, marked with injection scars. His eyes were too large for his thin face to lift slowly.
He didn't scream, he didn't move.
Alexandros felt something tear open in his chest.
"Get him out," he said, his voice tight.
One of the men knelt carefully, cutting the lock. "Easy, kid. You're safe now."
The boy flinched at the sound of the lock snapping open, curling in on himself.
Alexandros crouched in front of him.
"No one will hurt you again," he said quietly. "I swear it."
The boy stared at him for a long moment.
Then, very slowly, he reached out and grabbed Alexandros's sleeve, Alexandros didn't move.
Athens, Greece - Private Medical Facility
The doctors worked through the night.
Malnutrition. Dehydration. Chemical exposure. Early neurological damage.
"He's been experimented on," the doctor said grimly. "Long-term."
Alexandros stood at the glass wall, fists clenched.
"Will he live?" he asked.
"Yes," the doctor said. "But he'll need time. And protection."
Alexandros nodded once. "He'll have both."
Zurich, Switzerland
Seraphina nearly dropped her phone when Alexandros called.
"I rescued a child," he said without greeting.
Her heart skipped. "What kind of child?"
"A boy. From an illegal lab."
She closed her eyes.
"I need you," Alexandros continued. "Not as my wife. As a scientist." Silence stretched.
"I'm coming," she said finally.
Zurich International Airport, Switzerland
Seraphina spotted Alexandros before she reached the arrival gate.
He stood apart from the crowd, dressed in black, posture rigid, eyes scanning every face that passed. He looked out of place and completely in control.
Her steps slowed. He didn't need to be here.
When their eyes met, something quiet but powerful settled between them.
"You didn't have to come," she said when she reached him.
"I did," Alexandros replied. "For your security."
She almost smiled. 'Almost.
As they walked toward the exit, she felt it again, the strange pull she had been avoiding. His presence was grounding and unsettling at the same time.
In the car, silence pressed close.
"What were you working on?" he asked suddenly.
She turned to the window. "Research."
"That's not an answer."
Her fingers tightened in her lap. "It's enough."
He studied her profile, his instincts sharpening. She was calm but too careful.
"You're hiding something," he said.
Seraphina swallowed. "You asked me to mind my business. I am."
The guilt sat heavy in her chest.
Alexandros didn't push further but he felt it too.
Something was slipping through his fingers.
At the Private Medical Facility
Seraphina stood outside the hospital room, staring through the glass.
The boy lay curled on the bed, thin and fragile beneath white sheets. Monitors beeped softly around him.
She stepped inside, moving slowly so she wouldn't frighten him.
When he opened his eyes, he looked at her and something strange happened.
He relaxed. Seraphina swallowed.
She reached for his wrist, checking his pulse.
And froze. The readings, the cellular markers.
Her breath hitched, this wasn't random.
She turned slowly toward Alexandros who had been watching her, how gentle her hands were, how focused her eyes became when she worked.
"You're different when you're doing this," he said quietly when she came outside.
She didn't look up. "This is who I am."
"And the rest of the time?"
She paused. "The rest of the time, I'm careful."
He understood that more than he wanted to.
Later that night, outside the room, they stood too close.
"You didn't have to come," she said again.
"Yes, I did," Alexandros replied. "Not as your husband. As someone who trusts you with his life." Her breath caught, for a moment, it felt like something fragile might form between them.
Then she stepped back.
"You asked for distance," she said softly. "I'm respecting it."
He watched her walk away, jaw tight.
For the first time, Alexandros Drakos realized the danger was not only outside his empire.
It was in wanting a woman he had sworn not to need.