Chapter Four: The Files We Bleed For
2108 Words
The flash drive clicked into Kael’s laptop with a soft metallic snap. The screen lit up in the safehouse—an old loft tucked between two abandoned warehouses on the east side of the city, the kind of place the law had long since forgotten.
Kael leaned forward, eyes narrowing as the encryption wall blinked to life. “This thing’s built like a damn fortress.”
Aurora paced behind him, her arms wrapped tightly around her torso. “Thorne trusted us enough to take it. He wouldn't have passed it on if he didn't believe.”
“He doesn’t trust us,” Kael said. “He trusts her—Amara. That’s the only reason we’re still alive.”
She stopped pacing, guilt flickering in her chest. “And if this puts her in more danger…”
Kael paused his typing. “We don't protect people by hiding the truth from them.”
Silence. Then a soft chime as the first firewall fell.
“What’s inside?” she asked.
Kael’s eyes darted across the screen. “Schematics. Government networks. Internal memos. Budget reallocations under fake departments—‘urban renewal,’ ‘transportation review’—all codes for surveillance testing zones.”
He clicked into a folder labeled Project Sentinel.
Hundreds of video logs and transcripts appeared. The top file was a recent recording—time-stamped from just three days ago.
He hit play.
The video was grainy, clearly recorded from a hidden camera. Senator Leland sat at a long conference table, flanked by two unknown men in dark suits.
“We begin full activation next week,” the Senator said. “Target neighborhoods will be flooded with wearable tech and augmented systems.”
“What about backlash?” one of the men asked.
“We’ve manufactured the consent,” Leland replied coolly. “Through influencers. Fear campaigns. The public believes this is for their safety.”
“And the test subjects?”
“Expendable. We collect the behavioral data and discard the rest.”
Aurora’s breath caught.
Discard the rest.
Kael’s hands clenched into fists. “He’s testing psychological manipulation tools. Real-time AI control mechanisms. Aurora... they’re experimenting on civilians. Poor ones.”
“No consent. No warnings. Just... exploitation.”
And then—another voice in the video.
A woman’s voice. Hesitant. Soft.
“I didn’t sign up for this,” she said off-screen. “This isn’t what I agreed to.”
Aurora’s eyes widened. “That’s Amara.”
Leland turned sharply toward her. “You signed the NDA. You’re complicit now. If you walk away, you won’t survive the fallout.”
The screen froze.
Kael turned to Aurora, grim. “She knows. And she’s trapped.”
Aurora whispered, “No wonder Thorne watches her like a hawk. He’s not just guarding her—he’s guarding a witness.”
A dull throb built behind her eyes as the weight of the truth settled like a stone in her chest.
“She’s not just the Senator’s daughter,” Kael murmured. “She’s the key to blowing the whole thing open.”
Aurora looked at the paused video, her reflection caught in the glassy screen next to Amara’s frozen face.
“We need to get her out,” she said. “Before he uses her to silence this forever.”
Kael nodded. “Then we plan. Carefully. If Leland finds out we have this, we’ll be hunted. No second chances.”
Aurora’s heart pounded.
For the first time, the lines between love, loyalty, and war had fully blurred. And in the middle of it all stood a woman who knew too much—and a man who would kill to keep her silent.
Aurora stared out the rain-slicked window of the safehouse, fingers tapping the windowsill in a rhythm that matched the storm inside her. Every detail from the video played on loop in her mind—Amara’s trembling voice, the icy threat in Leland’s tone, the matter-of-fact way he called human lives expendable.
Kael stood behind her, arms crossed as he strategized aloud.
“We’ll need a clean route in and out. She’s under surveillance—no doubt about that. Best case, she's being tracked with biometric triggers. Worst case? They’ve embedded micro-surveillance directly into her devices.”
Aurora turned to him, her expression sharp. “So how do we get her out without raising every alarm in the city?”
Kael gave a grim smile. “We don’t.”
She blinked. “What?”
“We give them what they’re expecting. You and I? We stay loud. Visible. Cause a distraction big enough to make Leland send his eyes elsewhere. Meanwhile, Thorne gets her out.”
Aurora shook her head. “Thorne won’t go along with that plan. Not unless he knows the full truth.”
“Then we show him,” Kael said, already unplugging the flash drive. “But not the whole thing. Just enough to light the fire.”
As he slid the drive into a new casing, Aurora paced again. “What if we lose her before we can move? What if Leland already suspects?”
Kael stopped working, walking to her. “Then we move faster. We don’t let fear control the clock.”
His voice was steady, but she could see the tension behind his eyes. They were on a razor’s edge now—and one misstep could get them all buried.
Her phone buzzed.
A message from Thorne.
“Meet. 1 hour. Same place. Come alone.”
Aurora’s pulse spiked. “Thorne wants to meet. Alone.”
Kael didn’t hesitate. “Then you go. I’ll stay here and prepare the firewall copies. If he’s wavering, he needs to see for himself who Leland really is.”
Aurora grabbed her jacket, but Kael caught her wrist before she turned away.
“Hey,” he said, voice lower now. “Be careful. If he thinks for one second that you’re playing him…”
She nodded. “I know. But if anyone can get through to him—it’s me.”
She left the safehouse just as the storm outside broke open. Lightning forked across the sky, thunder growling like a warning.
Across town, behind bulletproof windows and layers of lies, Senator Leland watched his daughter’s location on a glowing screen, her movements logged in real time.
“She’s active again,” said a man in a gray suit. “Leaving the compound.”
Leland sipped his scotch, calm as a predator at rest. “Where is she going?”
“Tracking... looks like she’s heading east. Alone.”
He leaned forward slightly.
“Let her go,” he said after a beat. “If she’s nervous... she’ll run straight to the threat. And when she does, we’ll follow the smoke to the fire.”
Amara Leland sat alone in the solarium of her father’s estate, surrounded by walls of glass and creeping vines that masked the reinforced steel beneath. Outside, the gardens were manicured into submission—just like everything else her father touched.
But she didn’t feel like a daughter in a palace. She felt like a prisoner in a gilded cage.
The storm outside rattled the windows, thunder echoing like a warning she couldn’t quite decode.
She stared at her reflection in the glass. Her features were perfect. Controlled. Her makeup subtle, her curls cascading in soft waves. On the outside, she looked every inch the polished heiress of Senator Leland’s empire.
But on the inside, she was fracturing.
Ever since she stumbled into that boardroom—ever since she heard her father say “expendable” like it was just another line item—something inside her had changed. She’d tried to forget. To rationalize. To bury it under charity fundraisers and carefully curated press statements.
But now she couldn’t unhear it.
And lately, something else was off. The guards were tighter. Her phone slower. Her privacy thinner. Every message felt watched, every call too quiet.
A knock sounded behind her. She turned quickly.
It was Silas, her assigned “driver” for the past year. But she knew better. He wasn’t there to drive her. He was there to watch her.
“Your father wants you to stay in tonight,” he said. “He’s concerned about the weather.”
Amara raised a brow. “I wasn’t aware a little rain could threaten national security.”
Silas didn’t flinch. “He’s also worried about your headaches. He says the pressure changes could trigger another one.”
Of course he did.
“I’ll be in my room,” she said, standing. “Tell him I appreciate the... concern.”
As she walked past him, she felt the weight of his gaze on her back, heavy and cold.
Back in her room, she locked the door—not that it mattered—and sat at her desk. She reached into the back of the drawer and pulled out a hidden drive. One she’d made the night of that meeting. A recording. A copy of the truth.
She hadn’t told anyone. Not yet.
But every day, the silence felt heavier. And the lies louder.
Her fingers hovered over her encrypted laptop. A blank email drafted and ready for weeks. Addressed to a single contact.
Aurora Blake.
Amara had always admired her from afar—fierce, unyielding, everything Amara wasn’t allowed to be. And now, more than ever, she needed someone who could act without being paralyzed by fear.
Her finger hovered over send.
A knock again.
This time more urgent.
“Amara?” It was her father’s voice.
She quickly shoved the drive back into the drawer and slammed the laptop shut. “Yes?”
“Come downstairs. There’s someone I want you to meet.”
She opened the door slowly, and for a moment, the mask on Leland’s face cracked—revealing a flicker of something colder beneath.
Someone was coming.
And Amara had just run out of time.
Amara followed her father down the sweeping staircase, the soft pad of her bare feet on the marble floor echoing in eerie rhythm with the rain tapping against the windows.
“Who am I meeting?” she asked quietly.
Senator Leland didn’t answer immediately. His back was rigid, shoulders squared like a soldier heading into war. Or commanding one.
In the sitting room, the fire was lit. Soft jazz played from hidden speakers. The illusion of warmth. Comfort. Control.
Then she saw him.
A tall man in a slate-gray suit stood with his hands clasped behind his back, eyes cold and calculating. His head turned slowly at the sound of her steps.
Amara’s breath caught.
Not because she recognized him—but because he looked like someone who’d studied her far too long.
“Amara,” her father said, placing a firm hand on her shoulder, “this is Mr. Kovak. He’s a specialist in counterintelligence.”
Mr. Kovak gave a slight nod, no smile. “A pleasure, Ms. Leland.”
Her spine stiffened. “Why is a counterintelligence agent here, Father?”
Leland’s lips curved into something resembling a smile—but it didn’t reach his eyes. “There’s been a breach. In a recent high-security session. One that you may have accidentally walked in on.”
Amara’s blood ran cold.
“No one’s accusing you of anything,” he added smoothly. “But with tensions rising, and protests outside the Capitol growing louder, we must make sure our house is in order.”
“I wasn’t aware the truth was a national security breach,” Amara said, forcing her voice to remain calm.
Leland’s eyes narrowed just slightly.
Kovak stepped forward. “We’d like to check your devices, with your permission, of course. Your father assures us you’re as loyal as he is.”
Amara gave a tight smile. “Of course.”
Inside, she was screaming.
She had to get to that drive before they did.
---
Back in her room minutes later, she fought the panic clawing at her throat.
They were going to search it.
She had one shot.
She yanked the flash drive from the drawer, crossed to her vanity, and popped open the compartment of an old music box—a gift from her mother.
She tucked the drive inside and snapped it shut just as her door opened without warning.
Kovak stood in the doorway, a technician behind him.
“We’ll be quick,” he said.
Amara nodded, stepping aside.
But as they began their search, her mind was racing—not about if they’d find it…
But about who she could trust with the truth before someone like Kovak made her disappear too.
- Writer
