Episode 4: The Safe House Isn'tSafe
247 Words
The cabin was no longer an option. Whoever was playing this game had already breached her security net.
By dawn, Sera was three hours deep into the forest, her phone disassembled, SIM burned, GPS removed. She reached an abandoned ranger station—a forgotten checkpoint known only to Echo insiders. She had used it once before, years ago, when everything first fell apart.
Inside, she reset her gear, connected a hardline laptop to an encrypted satellite signal, and began combing through Rachel’s data logs. Most files were corrupted—someone had tried to wipe them. But one folder remained.
"CARNIVORE//ECHO_PULSE"
Her hand hovered over the file.
Click.
A video played: Rachel, visibly shaken, speaking directly into the camera.
"If you’re seeing this, it means they found me. I uncovered something. Viktor Roman isn’t dead. He’s alive. And he's trying to rebuild Echo. Only this time, it’s not for national defense. It’s for total control.”
Static flickered across the screen.
"There’s a list of agents… five of us. We each carry a piece of the cipher that unlocks Echo Pulse. If he gets all five—”
Suddenly, Sera’s laptop froze.
Then, the screen went black.
A new message appeared.
“HELLO, SERA.”
Her blood ran cold.
Before she could shut it down, the entire screen lit up with surveillance images—live feeds of her current location. The camera in the hallway. The camera in the woods. The drone above the trees.
She wasn’t alone.
- Writer
