— She was tracking their movements, — Bruno said, flipping through the pages.
— Look… here are the patrol routes. Here are the gathering points and even the places where they reload… something.
Flash quickly flipped further.
— Look… these are maps of the underground lines. The ones considered sealed after the 2028 accident.
— Sealed for humans, — Gideon clarified.
— Vampires use them every night. God knows what goes on down there, transports, meetings, laboratories, warehouses… everything that can't be shown aboveground.
Ethan stared at the diagrams without blinking.
— Maria…?
Gideon pulled a stack of photographs out of the bag—old ones, slightly yellowed at the edges. Vampires at cargo terminals, strange containers with red markings, faces circled in red.
On one of the photographs—a man who looked very much like Roy, only younger.
Year of the shot—2031.
— This is a dossier, — Flash whispered, sorting through the prints.
— On who? — Bruno asked.
— On vampire nobility, on members of the senate. Officers of the night patrols.
— On those who decide who lives and who becomes… expendable material.
Flash slowly turned to Ethan.
The room became very quiet, only the distant hum of drones somewhere far away.
— Kid… — Flash began, and for the first time in all this time a note resembling pity appeared in his voice.
— I'm afraid to ask, but… did you even know who you were living with?
Ethan didn't answer.
He just stared at the photograph of Roy—young, smiling, with a red circle around his face.
And at that moment something inside him finally broke.
The reality in which Maria didn't just brew coffee in the mornings and kiss him goodnight.
She was waging a war.
Alone.
And he hadn't even suspected.
The bullet on his shoulder gave a short, plaintive squeak.
Ethan slowly closed his eyes.
— Let's continue, — he said quietly.
— Show me what's on the flash drive, in the notebooks, show me everything.
His voice was even.
But there was no longer a drop of the former confusion in it.
Only cold, precise rage.
Ethan stood in the middle of the room, staring at the objects laid out in front of him.
Yellowed photographs, diagrams covered in notes, a flash drive with a worn label, and a small notebook with hasty scribbles.
His hands trembled, fingers clenching and unclenching as if trying to grasp a slipping chain.
The room, once the cozy bedroom of his wife, now felt alien; the air was thick with dust and the smell of old paper, and on the walls hung with family photos, shadows from the single lamp danced like ghosts of the past.
— She… worked… against them? — Ethan whispered, his voice cracking, echoing off the bare walls.
Gideon, leaning against the windowsill, nodded slowly; his usually impassive face now marked by deep lines of fatigue.
He crossed his arms over his chest, trying to hide his own agitation.
— No, maybe for herself, — he answered quietly.
— She was right on their tail and got very close. Very close, otherwise they wouldn't have taken her out so fast.
Ethan sank onto the edge of the bed, where the faint scent of her perfume still lingered—lavender and something warm, domestic.
He ran his hand over the empty pillow; the fabric was cold, as if Maria had left not a week ago, but years ago.
The pillow crumpled under his fingers, and for a moment it seemed he could feel the warmth of her body, but it was only an illusion, a cruel trick of the mind.
— She never told me anything… — he said, his voice becoming muffled, full of pain and bewilderment.
Memories flooded in their quiet evenings over dinner, her smile when she came home late, blaming "work." Now all of it took on a new, sinister meaning.
Flash, standing by the table, leaned closer to the items; his cold, calculating eyes slid over every detail. He was like a predator waiting for the moment to pounce.
— She couldn't, — he said, straightening up.
— Otherwise she would have put you in the line of fire. Those creatures don't forgive even indirect involvement,they clean everything.
Ethan lifted his head; his gaze wandered around the room, catching on the photograph on the nightstand—the two of them on the beach, laughing, carefree.
«How long ago was that? A year? Two?» — he thought to himself.
Now it felt like another person's life.
— But why was she alone? — he asked quietly, almost in a whisper, as if afraid to wake sleeping monsters.
— Why didn't she ask for help? The police, friends… me?
Gideon sighed, stepping away from the window. Beyond the glass the evening city darkened; lights of distant buildings flickered like the eyes of an invisible enemy.
— Maybe she did, — he suggested, sitting in the old armchair by the wall.
The chair creaked under his weight, adding tension to the air.
— But not to the right people. In this world there's little trust, and plenty of traitors.
Bruno, the silent giant, stepped forward from the shadow in the corner. In his huge hands a small metal locket looked like a fragile toy.
He carefully opened it, revealing a tiny chip inside, gleaming like an insect's eye.
— This is a beacon, — he said in a low, rumbling voice.
— Homemade. It transmitted coordinates… but to whom? To someone who could help, or maybe someone who betrayed her?
Flash nodded; his lips twisted into a grim smirk. He carefully gathered everything on the table.
The flash drive, the notebook with pencil sketches of secret paths, diagrams of underground tunnels, photographs of blurred figures in dark alleys, and the locket now lying like an accusing finger.
— Maria wasn't the victim of chance, — Flash said, his voice gaining strength, echoing through the room.
— She climbed into the place where monsters live. Right into the heart of their lair and found something that scared the hell out of them.
Gideon leaned forward; his fingers drummed on the armrest, a nervous rhythm betraying inner tension.
— Something that could have destroyed their entire system, — he added, his eyes blazing with fanatical light.
— Their whole web of lies, power, and blood. If she had dug deeper…
Bruno nodded; his massive figure seemed even larger in the half-light.
— And now it's lying on our table, — he said, pointing at the items.
— Her legacy. Our weapon.
Ethan lifted his eyes from the floor.
They were no longer lost. A fire had kindled in them.
Then Gideon said:
— So… we continue her work, — he declared firmly, standing up. His voice grew stronger, ringing through the room like an oath.
Flash smiled predatorily; his teeth flashed in the lamplight like a wolf's fangs.
— Damn right. She was somehow trying to stage a coup…
A heavy silence hung in the room like a leaden cloud. Flash, hands planted on the table, stood motionless, as if afraid to spill the barely contained rage inside.
His shoulders tensed, muscles showing under his shirt, his breathing even and controlled, the sign of someone used to such situations.
Ethan, on the contrary, sat hunched on the edge of the bed, as if punched in the solar plexus.
His face paled, lips pressed into a thin line, hands gripping the edge of the mattress.
Fragments of memories spun in his head,Maria coming home with a tired smile, her secret late-night calls she explained as "work."
Now it all fit into a mosaic he didn't want to see.
Outside, somewhere far away, a door slammed, sharp, unexpected, as if slicing through the thread of consciousness, tearing the silence to pieces after Flash's words.
Ethan flinched as if from a gunshot and forced out words, hoarse and full of despair.
— A coup? I decided to help you, not to take part in world events, excuse me, but I'm out!!
He stood up abruptly; the chair beside him crashed against the wall with a loud bang that made the frames on the shelves tremble.
The room suddenly felt cramped, stifling; the walls closed in like in a nightmare.
— You shouldn't even say anything extra about her! — he shouted, his voice cracking into a squeal, echoing off the ceiling.
Flash met his gaze calmly, too calmly. There was something menacing in that calm, something unkind, like the stillness before a storm.
His dark, piercing eyes didn't blink, locking onto Ethan like a target in crosshairs.
— Or what? You'll hit me? — he said evenly, without emotion, but with a hint of irony in his voice.
— Maria was digging under them, under the very highest. Under those who rule from the shadows. If she'd had more time…
— More time?! — Ethan stepped forward; his face twisted with rage, veins bulging on his neck.
— You talk like she was like you! Maria was… an ordinary person!
— She loved cooking, reading books in the evenings, walking in the park! She wasn't… wasn't part of this madness!
Gideon winced and looked away, staring at the floor. His hands clenched into fists—he knew the truth but didn't want to interfere, letting Ethan live through this moment.
In general, everyone already understood that she had been anything but ordinary.
Bruno sighed heavily; his broad chest rose and fell like bellows. He leaned against the wall, trying not to look at Ethan, but his eyes betrayed rare sympathy for such a giant.
Flash didn't even blink.
He stood like a rock, unmoved.
— Ordinary people don't walk through tunnels where half the city disappears without a trace, — Flash said quietly, but every word rang true.
— They don't photograph vampire senators at cargo terminals at midnight. They don't surveil secret passages, risking their lives every second.
— And they don't make beacons used by scouts in the most dangerous operations.
Ethan went even paler; his skin almost translucent in the lamplight. He stepped back, leaning against the wall to keep from falling.
The walls of the room, with the floral wallpaper Maria had chosen, now felt like a mockery.
— She… she just… — he began, but the words stuck in his throat like a lump.
He swallowed, trying to find an excuse, clinging to the straw of normalcy.
— It's all coincidences! Maybe she wanted… I don't know… to make some money?
— Earn a little extra? Some project? She talked about a journalistic investigation, said she needed to draw a portrait, but it was… harmless!
Ethan just wanted to find an excuse for all of it; even now he didn't want to believe what was happening.