The compound was a fortress in the Romanian woods—stark walls, cold steel gates, emptiness that dripped like venom. Catalina moved under dusk, wearing a dark paramedic uniform patched with fake insignia. She approached the perimeter disguised as part of a containment unit sweep.
This was Bright Light, a real CIA black site known in rare declassified accounts to have been located in Bucharest—a place prisoners were moved to by private aircraft and rail, only a handful of US officials aware of the site’s exact coordinates. It was an unacknowledged prison, a whispered rumor until leaked cables placed it beneath Romanian vaults and steel cameras; she’d studied the details in intercepted logs Isa had pulled from encrypted forums. She told herself she was ready. Prepared.
The night before,
