OPERATION GHOST RIG

THE BURDEN OF TRUTH

The USB drive sat on the table between them.

Elias stared at it, the word "TRUST NO ONE" scrawled in black marker on its side. The plastic was cheap, the kind you could buy at any gas station. But the weight of it felt enormous.

"We need to see what's on it," Becky said.

"We need to be careful," Reyes countered. She stood by the door of the small briefing room, her arms crossed. "It could be a trap. A virus. A tracking device."

"It's a USB drive," Mateo said. "Not a bomb."

"We don't know that."

Elias picked up the drive. It was warm from being in his hand. He turned it over, studying the connector. Standard. Nothing unusual.

"Mercer left this for a reason," he said. "He could have taken it with him. But he didn't. He wanted us to find it."

"Or he wanted us to plug it in and destroy the ship's systems," Reyes said.

"Then we don't use a ship's computer." Elias looked at Becky. "Is there a standalone system? Something not connected to the network?"

Becky thought for a moment. "There's a maintenance laptop in the engineering section. It's old, but it's isolated. No wireless, no network access. We could use that."

"Do it."

Reyes hesitated, then nodded. "Fine. But I want armed guards on the door. And if anything looks wrong, we pull the plug."

They moved through the ship to the engineering section. The maintenance laptop was stored in a locker, covered in dust. Becky wiped it off and carried it to a small office. The room had no windows, no external connections. Perfect.

Elias inserted the drive.

The computer recognized it. A single folder appeared on the screen: "GHOST RIG."

Inside were dozens of files. Documents. Schematics. Video files. Audio recordings. And a text file named "READ FIRST."

Becky opened it.

*If you're reading this, I'm already gone. My name is Daniel Mercer. I was a test subject on the Prometheus Platform three years ago. I escaped, but I've been watching ever since. The people behind the Ghost Rig are still operating. This drive contains everything I know. Use it. Stop them. And remember: trust no one.*

Elias leaned back. "He was a test subject."

"He said he escaped," Ava said. She had joined them, the boy still at her side. "But he joined the crew of the Halcyon. That's why he was here."

"He was embedded," Jesus said. "Watching."

"Or he was planted," Reyes said. "We don't know if he's telling the truth."

Becky scrolled through the files. "There's a lot here. Research notes. Medical records. A list of facilities."

"Facilities?" Elias leaned forward. "Plural?"

Becky nodded. "The Prometheus Platform wasn't the only one. There are at least three other rigs. Maybe more."

The room went silent. Three other rigs. Three other experiments. The scale of it was staggering.

"Where?" Elias asked.

"According to this, one is in the North Sea. Another in the Gulf of Mexico. And a third somewhere in the South Pacific." Becky clicked on a file. "They're connected. All part of the same network."

"The submarine," Reyes said. "It's the hub. A mobile command center."

Elias felt a cold knot form in his stomach. They'd escaped one rig, but the nightmare was far from over.

"What else is on there?" he asked.

Becky opened another file. "There's a roster. Test subjects, staff, observers. It's dated three weeks ago." She paused, her face going pale.

"What is it?" Ava asked.

"Elias... you're on the list." Becky turned the screen toward him. "Not as a test subject. As staff. 'Asset 7. Consultant. Status: Active.'"

The words hit like a punch. Elias stared at the screen. His name. His designation. Active.

"I told you," he said quietly. "I don't remember being part of this."

"The memory gas," Henry had said. "It erases memories. But the truth is still there."

"Maybe you were," Reyes said. Her voice was careful. "Maybe you worked for them. Maybe you still do."

Elias stood abruptly, his chair scraping against the floor. "I am not working for them."

"Then why is your name on the list?"

"I don't know." He ran a hand through his hair. "But I'm going to find out."

Ava placed a hand on his arm. "We'll figure this out. Together."

Elias looked at her. The distrust from the rig still lingered, but there was something else now—a tentative hope. "You believe me?"

"I believe you want to stop them," she said. "That's enough for now."

Becky continued scrolling. "There's more. Mercer flagged several files. He thought they were important."

"Open them."

The first file was a video. Grainy footage from a surveillance camera. It showed the interior of a rig—not the Prometheus, but similar. The camera angle was high, looking down at a corridor. A door opened, and a man walked out. He was tall, with broad shoulders and a familiar stride.

Elias's blood went cold.

"Is that...?" Mateo started.

"It's you," Jesus said.

Elias watched himself on the screen. He was wearing a dark uniform, similar to the ones the hunters wore. His face was calm, his movements confident. He walked down the corridor and disappeared through another door.

"When was this taken?" Elias asked.

Becky checked the file properties. "Three years ago."

Three years. He'd been on a Ghost Rig facility three years ago. And he hadn't been a prisoner.

"There are more videos," Becky said. "I'll play the next one."

The second video showed Elias again. This time he was in a white room—the same white room from his visions. He was sitting in a chair, talking to someone off camera. His voice was clear, cold.

"The subjects are responding to the isolation protocol," he said. "Subject Four is showing signs of psychological fracture. I recommend increasing the dosage of the memory suppressant."

Elias felt sick. The voice was his. The words were his. But he had no memory of them.

"That's not me," he said. "That can't be me."

"It looks like you," Mateo said quietly.

"Turn it off," Ava said. "This isn't helping."

Becky closed the video. "There's one more file. It's a document. Mercer wrote a note with it."

She opened the note.

*Asset 7 was one of the designers. He helped create the memory suppression protocol. He was supposed to have his memory wiped after each session. But something went wrong. The wipe failed. And Asset 7 started to remember.*

Elias's mind raced. If he'd been a designer, why was he on the rig as a test subject? Why were his memories gone?

"Maybe they tried to erase everything," Becky said. "But it didn't work completely. That's why you had visions. Fragments."

"Or maybe he volunteered to have his memory wiped," Reyes said. "To escape what he'd done."

The room was silent. Elias felt the weight of their eyes on him. The evidence was damning.

But he couldn't accept it. Not yet.

"Mercer left this drive because he wanted us to stop the experiment," he said. "That includes me if I'm part of it. But right now, we have a bigger problem. The submarine is still out there. The other facilities are still operating. We need to do something."

"What do you suggest?" Reyes asked.

Elias looked at the screen. "We use this information. We find the other rigs. We shut them down."

"That's a military operation," Reyes said. "We don't have the resources."

"Then we get them." Elias turned to the others. "We have a ship. We have weapons. We have a lead. We can't just sit here and wait for them to attack again."

Reyes shook her head. "The Halcyon is damaged. We need to return to port for repairs. And we need to report this to higher command."

"Higher command?" Jesus said. "How do we know they're not part of it? The experiment has people everywhere. Trust no one, remember?"

The words hung in the air. Reyes's jaw tightened.

"I'm not the enemy," she said. "I'm trying to keep my crew alive."

"Then help us," Elias said. "Give us a boat, supplies, and let us go after them."

"Where would you even start?"

Elias pointed at the screen. "The Gulf of Mexico. That's the closest facility. We go there. We find out what they're doing. And we burn it to the ground."

The room fell silent. The boy, who had been quiet until now, stepped forward. He looked up at Elias with wide eyes.

"The tall man is waiting," he whispered. "He knows you're coming."

Everyone stared at the boy.

"What tall man?" Ava asked.

The boy didn't answer. He just pointed at the screen, where a third video had begun to play. It showed a figure standing in a dark corridor, facing away from the camera. The figure was tall, impossibly thin, and seemed to flicker in and out of focus.

Then the figure turned.

And Elias saw his own face.

But it wasn't him. The eyes were wrong. Dark. Empty. And the smile was too wide.

"Asset Zero," Becky read from the file. "The first successful integration of human and machine. Codename: Echo."

The figure on the screen raised its hand. The video ended.

Elias felt a chill run down his spine. Not just because of what he'd seen. But because of what it meant.

The experiment wasn't just creating monsters. It was creating copies.

And one of them had his face.