January 8, 2030 – Present Day
The jet cut a silent path through the upper atmosphere, its black silhouette nearly invisible against the starlit sky. Inside, low blue lights bathed the cabin in a calm that didn't match the tension humming through the air. Silence held its breath between the walls—thick, heavy, and alive.
Agent September sat at the helm, hands steady on the controls. Outside, the world turned slowly beneath them, a vast scroll of night and cold weather patterns. His eyes didn't stray from the instruments, but his mind retraced the chaos they'd left behind.
Behind him, in the rear compartment of the O.Y.A. stealth jet, Agent April sat across from Agent December, her posture taut. Her hair—still dyed and styled to match Anne Ryker—was matted with sweat. A bruise swollen beneath her jawline. But her eyes burned bright.
Between them rested a black flash drive. Matte, innocuous, deadly.
April reached out and tapped the device once. "This is why Anne Ryker was taken," she said.
December leaned in. "Go on."
April's voice was low and controlled, but each word hit with precision. "HelixCross wasn't just being used to smuggle chemicals to Blackridge. It was being used to stage something bigger. Russia was stockpiling precursors—stabilizers, neurotoxic agents, biologics—all routed through HelixCross by dummy companies with falsified export licenses. The orders were small, designed not to raise flags. But over time…"
She looked him dead in the eyes. "They're building something. Not a weapon, not in the traditional sense. A system. For interrogation. For control. Biological compliance."
December's brows narrowed. "Coercive neurochemistry?"
April nodded. "Doses small enough to be untraceable, but powerful enough to trigger memory erosion, moral pliability, emotional override. It's not just about prisons anymore. It's about making dissidents forget why they ever resisted. That's what Blackridge is. A human testing ground. Chemical reprogramming. Mind-breaking. Russia is preparing to turn its own people—and maybe others—into perfectly controlled assets."
She slid the flash drive across the table. "Anne found out. That's why she was taken. They sent the Black List after me, dressed as Federal Service Intelligence as a cover up."
December stared at the flash drive as though it were radioactive. In a way, it was.
He closed his eyes briefly, then exhaled. "Then we proceed to Phase Two."
April leaned forward, voice sharp. "Just as planned"
He tapped the edge of the drive. "We give the world a mirror. One they can't look away from. First, we leak the HelixCross manifests, with Anne Ryker's recovery footage. Authentic. Painful. Viral. Then we expose Blackridge—not as a prison, but as a testing site. Every file. Every scream. Every buried truth. Then we release the list."
April's blood went cold. "The Black List."
"Yes."
December's voice was no longer calm. It was thunder in a bottle.
"Every agent, every death they orchestrated, every cover-up, every politician they manipulated. This isn't just about Russia anymore. This is about global complicity. NATO wanted to hold the line in Eastern Europe. Russia answered with shadow wars and human compliance experiments. We don't just reveal them. We burn their legacy to ash."
April looked out the jet's narrow window, where the first edge of dawn scratched the horizon. "What happens when the world sees?"
December's answer was ice. "They'll deny it first. Then they'll panic. Then they'll act. And when they act, we'll be ready to finish this."
September's voice crackled over the comm. "Base in visual range. Touchdown in ten."
April stood, adjusting her coat. Her bruises caught the light, and for a moment, she looked exactly like the woman the world would soon believe had survived the unthinkable.
Anne Ryker.
But her mind was sharper, deadlier. Her mission wasn't survival. It was vengeance by truth.
As the jet descended into the hidden O.Y.A. base, the assassins prepared for the next movement of their war.
They had exposed the edge of the Black List.
Now, they would pull it thread by thread—until the world unraveled.