Chapter 10 : The Predator and the Puppeteer
333 Words
POV
They didn't leave the apartment. They turned it into their forward operating base. Leo barricaded the door with a dresser, while Amelia, ignoring the dull ache in her side, took out her old laptop. She connected the Echo device to it with a series of makeshift cables, her fingers moving with a fluid precision Leo had never seen.
"This device is a backdoor," she explained, her eyes fixed on the screen. "It's designed to interface with the organization's network, to give me mission updates and data. He thought that because I didn't have my memories, I wouldn't know how to access it without him."
As she worked, Leo took his place beside her, the roles reversed. She was the one with the information, the raw, unfiltered data that came from years of training. He was the one who could make sense of it. He began cross-referencing the cryptic file names and encrypted network addresses with his vast knowledge of corporate shell games and offshore banking. He was the lens, and she was the subject.
Days of relentless work blended into a blur. They discovered that the Architect operated under a series of interlocking corporations, each one a front for a different illicit activity. There was a logistics company that shipped weapons, a technology firm that developed surveillance software, and a charity that laundered money. They were all connected, a web of deceit all leading to a single source.
They uncovered the Architect's true name: Elias Vance. The name was a gut punch, the final, brutal piece of the puzzle. He wasn't just a family friend; he had been the true head of her father's company. He had orphaned her, trained her, and used her, all to build his criminal empire. He didn't just take her past—he had engineered her entire life.
"His main hub... I remember the blueprints," Amelia whispered, her eyes wide with a newfound, terrifying clarity. "It's a decommissioned telecommunications building downtown. He made it his nerve center."
- Writer
