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Chapter Text

Ghost In The Broadcast

Ostalis, 2025

The war between Westalis and Ostania had ended in 1999, not with victory but with exhaustion. What followed was something no one expected: unification. Under international pressure and decades of fragile diplomacy, the two former enemies merged into a single, uneasy nation— Ostalis . It was hailed as a miracle of peace. Borders were erased, currencies reformed, and a new government established in a hastily built capital city at the heart of the old demarcation line.

The unification into the modern state of Ostalis was meant to signal a new era—one of peace, cooperation, and shared prosperity. But peace as always, is temporary because the scars of war never truly fade. Especially when power still hungers in silence. To the public, Ostalis was stable, functional, peaceful. But in the shadows, WISE remained vigilant.

Originally a covert intelligence agency of Westalis, WISE had adapted with the times. Now operating as an independent, transnational force, it answered to no government, no flag—only to the cause of stability. Surveillance, counter-terrorism, black ops—WISE had become the scalpel in a world of blunt instruments.

And its finest blade was Agent Starlight , a woman in her early thirties, lethal and precise, forged in the crucible of modern espionage. She had no permanent address, disappeared from the social network after her graduation. She moved between safe houses and black sites like a ghost. Surveillance, infiltration, assassination—she did what others couldn’t, or wouldn’t.

Her presence in the headquarters meant the situation was critical. She was the scalpel sent when peace began to bleed.

It began with a sudden broadcast. Across every screen in WISE Headquarters , the feed shifted to black. Then came the crest of the National Unity Party —a golden eagle on a red field. The image resolved into the face of a man seated behind a desk, posture iron-straight, eyes like cold glass.

Demetrius Desmond , age 66. Chairman of the National Unity Party and Prime Minister of Ostalis. To the world, he was the architect of peace, but to those in the shadows, he was something else entirely.

“Citizens of Ostalis,” he began. “We live in an era born of compromise. Our so-called peace was purchased by sacrifice—sacrifices that, I fear, many have forgotten.” His voice was rich and gravelled, like it carried weight like falling stone, he was a symbol of the old Ostania elites.

Around Agent Starlight, the atmosphere turned sharp. Analysts froze mid-sentence. Operatives leaned toward the screens. She watched from the upper railing, silent, still.

“Peace without unity is an illusion. And unity without strength... is surrender. We cannot allow the ghosts of the past dictate our future. If we are to remain one people, then we must be ready—ready to defend our values, our sovereignty, our blood.”

He never said the word “war” but he didn’t need to. Everyone knew what he meant.

The moment the broadcast ended, WISE came alive . Screens flared to life, agents moved with trained precision. It was not in panic but in controlled chaos .

Starlight’s earpiece buzzed. “Agent Starlight. Briefing Room A. Now.”

She walked through the polished corridors, glass, steel, muted whispers. She passed a group of operatives speaking low, fast.

"...he timed it perfectly. Just after the joint trade bill failed..."

“…that wasn’t a speech, it was a signal. Not to us, but to Ostania’s military cells.”

“…you think he’ll really do it?”

“…if it comes to war, Demetrius won’t be leading for Ostalis.”

The voices quieted as she passed.

“…he’ll be leading for Ostania .”

That was the truth WISE had never forgotten: Though the National Unity Party held the peace over all of Ostalis, its loyalties had never shifted. Demetrius Desmond wore the title of Prime Minister of a unified country, but everyone at WISE knew that when the shooting starts, he would stand with the old Ostania. And he wouldn’t be alone.

“Word is,” one analyst murmured, just before the doors sealed behind Starlight, “the one really pulling the strings... is his younger brother.”

She stopped cold. His younger brother. Damian Desmond.

To most, he was a relic, a forgotten name. To WISE, he was a ghost wrapped in silk and shadow. Agent Starlight had been surveilling him for years—quietly, methodically. There were no orders, not officially, she had insisted on it. He had vanished from the public eye in the early 2000s, just after the unification treaties began. No speeches, little to no business holdings, no digital trail, not even a single footprint on social media.

The influence remained, trade deals collapsed after meetings he allegedly attended. Opposition leaders disappeared after visits to “private retreats” in the Ostanian countryside. Puppet politicians rose from nowhere, all connected by threads no one else could trace—except her.

To Agent Starlight, Damian wasn’t just a name. He was the shadow of Ostania’s will . And if his brother was the fire, Damian was the smoke that filled the lungs of power and suffocated opposition.

She stepped through the door into Briefing Room A —and stopped again. Not at the screen filled with satellite maps. Not at the anxious energy among WISE's top brass, but at the two people standing at the far end of the table.

A man with silvering blond hair, sharp blue eyes like a scalpel behind a calm face. A woman with silvering black hair tied neatly back, ruby eyes still radiating danger beneath the elegance.

Agent Twilight .

The Thorn Princess .

Her parents. Her adoptive parents, but more than that, they were legends.

Agent Twilight—now 62, once the most feared spy in Ostania. Methodical, brilliant, emotionally walled-off.

The Thorn Princess—61, was an assassin so lethal she had no official record. Her kills weren’t confirmed; they were only whispered about.

Together, they had been unstoppable. Together, they had once been her family. Now, they stood here, in a room she thought only belonged to the present. And that’s when she knew: this mission wasn’t just serious. It was personal.

“Agent Starlight,” the Director said, voice cutting through the silence like a knife. “You're aware of Demetrius Desmond’s speech.”

Agent Starlight nodded slowly, eyes flicking between the briefing screen and her parents.

“You may not remember this,” the Director continued, “but this isn’t the first time we’ve faced the Desmonds at the edge of war.”

The lights dimmed. A timeline appeared across the screen.

Ostania 1998.

Two faces.

Demetrius Desmond, age 39. Damian Desmond, 37.

Starlight’s eyes narrowed. Damian Desmond at thirty-seven looked almost like a different man. Still cloaked in that same unreadable, cold aura but there had been something else in that version of him: a trace of vitality, a glint of charm. She must admit, he had been handsome then, striking even. Some might’ve even called him beautiful. A far cry from the man seen in the most recent sightings, lifeless, his once-sharp eyes dulled by time and shadows. The contrast was almost haunting.

But then, another face popped up on the screen, showing the faded black-and-white image of a stern man in an Ostanian officer’s uniform.

The Director’s voice broke the silence. “Donovan Desmond.”

Starlight’s brow furrowed. The name was familiar, but distant like a chapter from a history book few bothered to read.

“He was the true architect of what we’re facing now,” the Director continued. “Most people remember him as a political figure in the early Cold Peace era. But to WISE… he was more than that. He was an ideologist, teacher, tactician.”

Twilight stepped forward, his tone calm but laced with buried tension. “He died in 1982 because of an unknown illness. But before he died, he raised his sons not as individuals, but as successors to a vision. A vision of a strong, pure, unified Ostania. A state that didn’t just survive the war, but grew from it.”

Twilight continued. “The Desmond family has been around for centuries. Aristocrats. Industrialists. War financiers. Their influence runs through Ostania’s history like a steel thread, unseen, but unbreakable.”

“They funded the old regimes,” the Director added. “Backed the militarists. Then pivoted to nationalism when the tide changed. Always adapting, always staying in power.”

Thorn Princess’ voice was soft, but firm. “Donovan wasn’t loud. He didn’t rally crowds or raise armies. He preferred his sons to be the faces. Demetrius became the voice—eloquent, refined, dangerous in public. And Damian …” She hesitated. “…was something else.”

Twilight stepped beside her, his voice turning colder. “I knew him in my Eden days. And even then, he was brilliant. He was the one who listened , the one who watched . Quiet, but calculated. He studied military doctrine by age ten. Diplomacy by fourteen. By the time he was thirty-five, he was orchestrating entire political movements, without ever stepping in front of a camera.”

Starlight’s eyes stayed on the photo. Damian at 37 was nearly unrecognizable now. Older, invisible, a ghost in every sense, but something in the stare felt the same.

The Director turned to her. “WISE launched Operation Strix in 1998 to stop the Desmond brothers from consolidating power under the guise of peace. We needed deep infiltration. Long-term observation. A cover that wouldn’t be suspected.”

Twilight’s gaze locked with hers. “And that’s where you came in.”

Starlight blinked. Slowly.

The Director nodded. “Your parents were recruited two years after they finished Eden, they showed true potential. By age 25, they were going into missions together. At day, Twilight posed as a psychiatrist. Thorn Princess, operated as his wife and a government clerk. It was seamless, they already knew each other since childhood. And Operation Strix required a child to fully embed into high society. An asset who could get close to the next generation of the elite—including the Desmonds’ children.”

“You weren’t just cover,” Twilight said quietly. “You were a key to the plan’s success. You were four, pretending six when I picked you from a list of orphans. Not because of your background, there wasn’t any. You were a blank slate. No known relatives, no records anyone could trace. But…” He glanced at his wife. “…you were sharp. You learned quickly. You adapted like no one I’d seen before.”

Thorn Princess’ expression softened for a moment. “And you weren’t afraid of us. Not even then.”

The Director resumed. “With the three of you embedded in Eden Academy, you attended galas, intercepted conversations, tracked movements. You helped us map the Desmond influence—from the fathers to their sons.”

“But then,” Yor added, “something changed. The mission ended in 1999, but the family stayed.”

Starlight inhaled, just slightly. Twilight didn’t look away. “I didn’t give you back to WISE. We kept the cover. Even after the Desmonds disappeared.”

“And now,” the Director said, voice clipped and sharp, “they’re back. Demetrius rules Ostalis under the National Unity Party. But WISE knows that if another war breaks out, his allegiance won’t be to peace or unity.”

Twilight stepped in. “It’ll be Ostania. The old Ostania. The one Donovan believed in. And the one Demetrius and Damian might still be building from the shadows.”

Twilight and Thorn Princess were no longer her handlers. They were no longer just tools of the state. They were her parents. They had raised her in a world where love and lies were inseparable.

Now they stood here not as allies, but as the only ones who truly knew the enemy. Twilight’s voice was quiet. “If Damian is moving again, he won’t make the same mistakes we saw back then. He’s had nearly thirty years to evolve.”

“And he learned from the best,” Thorn Princess added grimly. “Donovan taught them that patience is deadlier than force.”

Anya looked up at the screen, at the face of the man she’d chased through digital shadows for years.

“Which is why we need you, Agent Starlight,” said the Director.

The screen zoomed in on the last known photo of Damian Desmond , heavily blurred and captured from security footage.

“Find him. Follow the trail. Gather information or confirmation of his involvement.”

A pause.

“But if necessary… do not assassinate. He is far valuable alive than he is dead.”

The briefing room was silent for a moment.

Starlight’s jaw tightened as the image of Damian Desmond faded from the screen. The room was dim, humming faintly with surveillance equipment and tension. Then, the Director stepped forward again, face partially shadowed by the low ceiling light.

“Agent Starlight, your mission will require you to abandon this name.”

She blinked. Already knowing where this is headed.

The Director turned to her fully, arms crossed behind her back. “You will return to your original identity. You’ll go back to being… Anya Forger. Daughter of Loid and Yor Forger.”

The name echoed in the room, sharp as a blade. She said nothing.

“After your graduation from Eden Academy, Anya Forger vanished. A clean disappearance. No university enrollment, no job history. Just one quiet vanishing act—exactly how WISE planned it, but now, it’s time for her to reappear.”

The screen shifted to an old school photo: Eden Academy, Class of 2012. A younger Starlight stood near the edge—smiling faintly, eyes already more aware than most adults. Next to her, standing awkwardly but always too close, was Nathaniel Desmond.

Twilight let out a quiet exhale. “He’s still in play?” he asked.

The Director nodded. “He never left. Nathaniel Desmond. Son of Damian Desmond and Rebecca Blackbell. He’s thirty-two now. He lives between Ostalis and Geneva, works in Desmond Foundation logistics, and attends most of their diplomatic events as a representative.”

Starlights’s eyes narrowed. “The last time I saw him, he was following me around the graduation gala like a lost puppy.”

Her mother smirked faintly. “That ‘puppy’ is now on the guest list for every major international fundraiser and gala the Desmonds host.”

“And he still remembers you,” the Director said flatly. “He still talks about you. He kept every class photo. Even submitted one to Eden’s alumni newsletter last year with a quote about ‘unforgettable people who changed him.’”

Twilight shifted slightly. “You're saying you want her to use that?”

The Director nodded once. “We need you to reconnect with him. Build rapport. Use the past if you have to. He’s still emotionally vulnerable where you’re concerned. If he’s even slightly loyal to his father, he could be your best link to Damian’s current location, inner circle, and movements.”

Starlight crossed her arms, staring at the old photo of Nathaniel. “I never liked him. He always acted like he had something to prove. Couldn’t take a hint when I rejected him. Thought being a Desmond made him untouchable.”

The Director’s voice was firm. “That might still be true. And it’s precisely why he’s valuable.”

Another image popped onto the screen—an invitation mock-up. Gold-embossed, with the Desmond crest. “The Dawn of Prosperity: A Desmond Foundation Fundraiser”.

“It’s scheduled in three weeks, held in the Desmond Estate. Half diplomatic dinner, half propaganda machine. All the players will be there—businessmen, politicians, international observers.”

The Director looked Starlight dead in the eyes. “Your first objective is simple: secure an invitation. Target: Nathaniel Desmond. Your cover will be Anya Forger, former Eden graduate turned international consultant recently returned from humanitarian work in Belgia. Use your background, use his nostalgia. Whatever works.”

Twilight’s voice was quiet, but with a razor edge. “If the Desmonds are really preparing for war again, that fundraiser won’t just be for show. It’ll be recruitment, financing, a quiet alliance summit hidden under champagne and music.”

Starlight nodded slowly, processing everything.

Thorn Princess leaned forward slightly. “Can you do this, Starlight?”

Starlight didn’t look at them. Her eyes stayed locked on Nathaniel’s photo. Her voice, when it came was calm and cold. “I can handle it”

The glass wall of the arrivals terminal shimmered with morning light. Jet engines hummed in the background, intercoms echoed through the halls, and suited travelers moved in efficient waves of muted conversation. Anya sat alone on a sleek bench near Gate 32, a soft leather bag at her side and a paper coffee cup cooling in her hand.

She wore a sharp, professional outfit in neutral tones and minimalist accessories. Forgettable, but polished. A global consultant, just as her forged identity claimed. The kind of woman people looked at once, then quickly moved on from.

It had been seven days since the Director gave the order. Seven days since Agent Starlight disappeared from WISE records again. Seven days since Anya Forger came back to life.

Twilight, or more known as Loid Forger gave her the keys to their upscale apartment building overlooking the city’s neutral zone that they abandoned years ago. WISE had also given her a fresh set of identification papers, and a full digital footprint to match her new “return” from Belgia. Bank accounts, employment history, an online presence—all seeded and scrubbed for legitimacy.

But it wasn’t the paperwork that had her on edge now. It was him. She kept one eye on the arrival board, and another on a book she wasn’t really reading.

Flight 1117 from Switzland—Delayed. Exactly as planned.

WISE had confirmed his itinerary. Nathaniel Desmond—“Nate” to his few remaining friends—was returning from a trade summit in Switzland. He would be coming through Gate 32 in minutes. Her instructions were clear: initiate contact, spark conversation, begin weaving her way back into his world.

The moment she saw the boarding bridge slide open, she stood just naturally enough not to raise suspicion. She walked toward the vending machines, deliberately slow, scanning the stream of passengers exiting the gate. Politicians, aides, corporate men.

And then she saw him.

Nathaniel Desmond.

He was no longer the awkward teen who used to hover beside her at Eden corridors. No longer the boy who stuttered over his words and left anonymous letters in her locker. He moved with rigid confidence now. Sharp jaw, sharper eyes, broader shoulders, black coat tailored to power and status. His expression was cold, focused, unreadable. A politician’s son through and through.

Until his eyes landed on her, and froze mid-step. For one second, two, three—he just stared. And then the mask cracked. The carefully built walls behind his eyes shattered into something startled… and undeniably warm.

“...Anya?”

She blinked, surprised at how soft her own name sounded from his voice. She turned with just the right touch of surprise she rehearsed. “Nate?” She let the old nickname slip, casually, deliberately. 

His steps picked up. “I—I can’t believe this. You’re here. I thought you’d vanished off the face of the earth.”

“An overreaction,” she said with a soft chuckle. “I took some time overseas. Belgia, mostly.”

“Belgia?” he echoed, like he was trying to connect the dots between the girl he knew and the woman in front of him. “You just… left after graduation. No goodbye, no explanation, nothing.”

She shrugged with a coy tilt of her head. “Well, my father had insisted I joined him at Belgia for business and well, he wanted to retire early.”

He stared at her—really stared at her, like trying to memorize every changed angle of her face. The way her hair fell now, the way she stood straighter, her tone more controlled. “You’ve changed,” he said at last.

“You haven’t,” she teased. “Still looking at me like I’m going to disappear.”

His throat bobbed in a swallow. “Can you blame me?”

Anya glanced at the flight board again, feigning distraction. “I’m actually waiting for someone. But their flight got delayed.”

“Friend?” he asked casually, but she saw it, the flicker of curiosity in his eyes.

“Yeah,” she nodded.

“Boyfriend?”

She blinked, actually caught off guard for a half second. The Nate she remembered would’ve stuttered through that question. This Nate just asked it outright. He really had changed.

“…No,” she said, her tone shifting into something feigned and shy. She looked away, then smiled to herself. Inside, she was grinning.

“Really?” Nathaniel’s reaction was instant. His face lit up—not dramatically, but with a quiet, unmistakable lift of the eyes. The mask slipped again.

“I’m allowed to be single, you know,” she said, leaning a little closer. “Unless that’s shocking to you.”

“No—no, it’s not surprising at all. You have always been…. unreachable” He scratched the back of his neck, suddenly sheepish.

“Tch.” She rolled her eyes at the subtle compliment. Then she turned the question on him. “What about you, Nathaniel? Anyone special?”

That caught him off guard too. He actually looked away, clearing his throat. “Not really. Nothing serious,” he muttered. “Been… too busy.”

She grinned. “Too busy to fall in love? Wow. That’s not the Nate I knew back in Eden.”

“You knew me as a tongue-tied teenager with a bad haircut and a crush the size of the moon.”

“Oh?” she said with mock innocence. “Crush, huh?”

He blushed slightly—an actual blush, despite the years. “I wasn’t exactly subtle was I?”

“No,” she said with a teasing smirk. “You weren’t.”

He gave a breathy laugh, eyes drinking her in like she might vanish if he blinked. “You know,” he said after a beat, “I used to imagine seeing you again. At a coffee shop, or some random party. I used to think about what I’d say if I ever got the chance.”

“So?”

He smiled faintly. “I don’t remember a single thing I rehearsed.”

She chuckled, and let the silence hang, just long enough for tension to stretch between them.

Then his phone buzzed in his coat pocket. He sighed, pulling it out and glancing at the screen. She saw the shift in his expression, the visible annoyance. “I… have to go,” he said, clearly disappointed. “Car’s waiting. Stupid Foundation schedule.”

Anya stepped back slightly, giving him space, but her eyes stayed on him, sharp and curious.

Nathaniel hesitated, then looked up. “Do you have a phone on you?”

She nodded, pulling it from her coat pocket. She gave it to him.

“Let me give you my number,” he said, already typing. “We should… catch up sometime.”

She nodded, watching him type. “Sure. I’ll text you.”

He handed the phone back with a smile—small, real, and not the political kind. “Same number?” he asked.

“New one,” she said.

“Then don’t forget to text,” he said as he stepped away. “Seriously. Oh and, by the way, you look gorgeous as always, Anya.”

Anya gave a rehearsed smiled as he turned and walked off, blending into the crowd with practiced ease. But she didn’t move, not yet. She stood there, watching him disappear, the number still glowing on her screen.

Then, her smile twisted into a subtle, knowing smirk. Hook set. Line tight. Let the reel begin.

Chapter Text

How The Past Watches

Sunlight streamed through the sheer curtains of Anya’s old room, without the traces of her old things of course, now it looked more modern, clean, and just impersonal enough to keep her detached. A half-drunk cup of black tea sat untouched on the edge of her desk. Files lay open in front of her: surveillance data, floor plans of the Desmond Foundation gala venue, social registries, and asset cross-checks.

She was already assembling a guest profile of the likely attendees like corporate heads, diplomats, security contractors in civilian clothing. The gala would be as much a political theater as it was a fundraiser.

But there was one name she hadn’t written down yet.

Nathaniel Desmond. The boy who had once been awkward and too eager and now the man who walked like his father and smiled like he didn’t know how dangerous that legacy could be.

For three days, she hadn’t contacted him, not a single text. She saw his name pop up on social media feeds. He was photographed at some ribbon-cutting for a clean energy facility. A few blog posts speculated about his love life again where one even paired him with a socialite from the Fein family.

She ignored it all, her silence was part of the strategy. Give him just enough doubt and just enough space to wonder if she had vanished again.

When the fourth morning arrived, her fingers hovered over her phone before she finally tapped his contact. She didn’t text, she called. Might as well be bold, right?

The phone rang once.

Twice.

Three times.

Then came the answer, a sharp, irritated, and laced with frustration. “Hello? Who is this?”

Anya smiled. She could hear it his restlessness, annoyance, maybe even a little disappointment. “…You sound annoyed,” she said coolly.

Silence.

Then came the shift.

“…Anya?”

Her smile widened, though he couldn’t see it. “Did you forget my voice already?” She teased.

“I—I, No! Of course not.” He exhaled, and she could almost imagine him running a hand through his hair. “You didn’t text. I thought you were ghosting me again.”

“I got busy,” she said simply. “Paperwork, all the boring stuff.”

“You’re still the worst,” he muttered. But there was no real heat behind the words. She could hear his voice change, it was softening, like warmth bleeding through steel. “So, you called.”

“Maybe I just got bored.”

“Liar.”

She chuckled. “A little.”

A beat of silence.

“…Are you free today?” he asked, casual on the surface, but she could feel the weight behind it.

“Depends, why?”

“Dinner?” His tone almost pleaded, then quickly covered with casual arrogance. “I mean, if you’re not too busy drowning in paperwork or whatever you’ve been doing since Eden.”

She played with her teacup rim as she leaned back into the chair. “Sure. I’ll bite.”

“You’ll what?”

“Agree,” she clarified, laughing. “Where?”

“I’ll text you the deets. Somewhere quiet, with no cameras.”

She raised an eyebrow, despite herself. “Since when do you care about privacy?”

“Since I realized people tend to talk louder when they feel like they’re alone.”

She paused.

That wasn’t just nostalgia speaking. That was Damian Desmond’s son speaking.

“I’ll see you then,” she said, before he could say anything else.

“…You sure you’ll show?”

“I guess you’ll just have to wait and find out.”

She hung up before he could answer. Her smirk lingered as she stood up and walked to her closet. This wasn’t just a reunion anymore. This was the first step into the lion’s den, and she had just been invited for coffee by the lion cub himself.

The breeze was warm against Anya’s skin as she walked down the quiet avenue, sunlight flashing between glass windows and cars. She was walking down from the market when her mind lingered briefly on the dinner she was invited to tonight. What do you have planned for me Nate?

Then she saw it.

A faint chalk WISE sigil marked discreetly near the crosswalk pole just a block from the coffee shop. It was hidden in plain sight, civilian eyes would see nothing but a fading graffiti tag. But to her, it meant ‘Come in immediately.’

She didn’t hesitate.

At the WISE headquarters, Anya’s heels clicked softly on the polished floors of the lower levels, her steps brisk as she bypassed biometric gates and retinal scans. The corridors were unusually busy. Engineers, intel officers, and surveillance techs moving faster than normal with quiet urgency hummed in the air.

Near the north hall, she passed a secure sublab with thick polyglass walls. Inside, she saw a metallic, ring-like structure, thrumming faintly with energy. Pulses of violet light shimmered from within its curved surface.

She caught fragments of a hushed conversation between two analysts as she walked by.

“...they said it stabilized for 2.7 seconds this time—”

“If we can sync the core modulator to the frequency, it might actually hold—”

“What if it works? What if we can send something back?”

Anya didn’t even stop to listen because she’d seen projects like that before. Most never worked so she didn’t need to worry about it now. Or so she thought.

The heavy door slid open. Inside sat the Director flanked by her mother and father. Anya entered without a word and closed the door behind her.

“Is this about Operation: Eagle?” she asked, folding her arms. “I was just invited by Nathaniel Desmond to have dinner. If this is about progress, I am working on it—”

The director raised a hand. “It is. But there’s more.”

The director gestured for her to sit, and Agent Starlight obeyed, tension humming beneath her calm surface.

Twilight exchanged a glance with the Director.

“The machine,” he said, voice measured. “You passed it on the way in. Project Heure. Classified Level Four.”

Anya nodded slowly. “The time travel prototype.”

“It’s nearing viability,” the Director said. “Stabilization tests are improving for the past months. But…. we got word back from Agent Sky, he found out that we are not the only ones who know about it.”

She narrowed her eyes. “Let me guess, the Desmonds?”

“Possibly,” Thorn Princess said. “We believe Demetrius and Damian Desmond might be orchestrating a plan to either acquire, sabotage, or replicate our work.”

Anya digested that in silence. “Okay. So, what do we know about Operation Eagle’s true objective now?”

The Director stood and turned to the digital display behind her, pressing a button. A series of names and dates scrolled across. “Operation Eagle was never just about surveillance and information. It’s about prevention”

Anya’s breath caught. They didn’t have to say it, she knew that already. She was sent to the lion’s den to prevent an upcoming war. It was never just to ‘seek information’. She was sent to stop the war before it even begun.

The Director continued. “We already know they’re crafting a plan to force a false flag operation, blaming Westalis factions, reigniting Ostania’s supremacy, and dissolving the Ostalis union. We believe they’re doing it by—”

She didn’t let him finish because she already knew, “Using time manipulation.”

“Yes, that’s the worst-case scenario,” Thorn Princess said. “If they gain access to the prototype—or to a working version of their own—they could rewrite the outcome of 1998. Erase the failures, cement power, wipe us out before we even knew them.”

“And that,” Twilight said solemnly, “is why we’re activating you at full clearance. You are the last line of preemptive defense. Your mission is no longer just limited to gathering information, you are now allowed to assassinate on the spot if you deemed it necessary.”

There was a long silence. Anya nodded once, if they are saying this, that means that the threat was real and starting to get out of hand. If they are allowing me to assassinate on the spot, then that means that they are indeed out of options.

Agent Starlight left the room with her mission redrawn. She realized that she was not just tasked to stop the Desmonds, but to stop time itself from becoming their greatest weapon. Whatever means necessary, no matter what the cost.

Dinner came, Anya was five minutes late. Intentionally, of course. She stood just outside the restaurant’s entrance, watching through the pristine glass windows as Nathaniel Desmond sat alone at the corner table. He checked his watch once, then again, and began bouncing his knee nervously under the table.

He thinks I’m not coming, she noted, lips curling into a quiet smirk. Good. Let him feel the edge of uncertainty.

She entered the restaurant with poise, heels clicking gently on the marble floor, dark silk dress hugging her frame just enough to draw attention without invitation. All eyes drifted her way for a heartbeat, but she saw only one.

Nathaniel looked up, his entire face shifted. From anxious and tense to lit up. He stood quickly, almost knocking his glass over, eyes wide with that same boyish awe he used to wear in Eden, like seeing her again was a dream he thought would fade. “You’re here,” he breathed.

“I said I would be,” Anya replied with a soft smile, letting her voice land somewhere between apologetic and teasing. “Sorry I’m late.”

“It’s okay. You look...” He fumbled for a word. “Beautiful.”

“Thank you,” she said lightly, slipping into the chair he pulled out for her. “You clean up too, Nate. Very... professional.”

They sat, wine was poured, a candle flickered between them. Halfway through dinner , Anya watched Nathaniel closely between sips of Chianti, mentally mapping his movements, gestures, and words.

He was still polite, still smart but sharper around the edges now. He was older, more mature and composed. Yet beneath the surface, he was that same boy from Eden who used to follow her around with stars in his eyes.

“You never told me,” she said, carefully swirling her glass, “what exactly it is you do these days.”

He gave a small shrug, toying with the hem of his napkin. “A bit of everything, honestly. I coordinate private contracts, oversee some tech-side logistics for my father and uncle, and... occasionally attend these old-money political functions I can’t escape.”

“Your father still has you running through the political scene?” she asked, feigning casual curiosity.

Nathaniel gave a small scoff. “Not the public political scene. He likes to keep things under the table. Discreet... and efficient. My uncle deals with the more overt stuff.”

Her mind sharpened.

Anya nodded softly, listing keywords in her head. She’d dig into those names, trace those footprints. Somewhere in the mess would be threads to the Desmond operations WISE needed.

“And your father?” she asked, letting her tone soften. “Is he still... intimidatingly scary?”

Nathaniel gave a slight laugh. “He’s mellowed down with age. A little. But still... Damian Desmond. Always ten steps ahead.”

She smiled, masking the flicker in her pulse. Always ten steps ahead, huh? Let’s see if that’s still true.

The server returned with a plate, setting it down gently before Anya with a quiet “On the house.” Anya blinked, it was peanut cream mille-feuille . A rare dessert she hadn’t seen in years.

Her eyes flicked to Nathaniel. “You remembered.”

He looked pleased with himself. “You used to eat peanut-based snacks constantly in Eden. I gambled... is it still your favorite?”

Anya stared at the layered dessert, heart briefly unsure what to feel. She hadn't told anyone about that particular favorite. It was all him, he knew her more than anyone. “Yes, it still is. I’m impressed,” she said, letting warmth bleed into her voice.

Nathaniel smiled, suddenly looking like that nervous boy again. “I, uh... hoped you’d like it.”

She took a bite, it was sweet, rich, textured. And for a second, she forgot to be Agent Starlight—just for a second. She couldn’t be too comfortable with him, he was still the enemy.

They lingered over dessert, the conversation wandered again. He grew more relaxed, more candid.

“So,” Nathaniel began, trying to sound offhand. “Are you busy next weekend?”

Anya tilted her head, playful confusion on her face. “Oh? Why are you asking?”

“Nothing big,” he said quickly. “Just… there’s this thing. A fundraiser my family’s throwing. I thought you might want to come with me. You know, catch up more. Network. Enjoy some overpriced wine?”

She blinked once, smile not fading. Inside, her mind buzzed. The Gala. This is it. The in. He didn’t say Desmond Gala , but she knew that’s what he meant. The private fundraiser her entire operation revolved around.

She couldn’t push too eagerly. So instead, she put on her best innocent voice. “Hmm... a fundraiser? Like a gala? I’ll have to see. I’m pretty busy with... work.”

His lips twitched in disappointment, and that was the exact reaction she was fishing for. Then he quickly added, “I mean, no pressure of course. If you can’t, it’s totally fine.”

Anya leaned her chin on her hand, voice light. “You really want me to come?”

He flushed. “I mean, of course. I’d like it a lot if you’d come.”

She smiled. “Okay, then. I’ll try to get off work.”

As they stood outside again, Nathaniel watched her like he couldn’t believe his luck. Her ride pulled up and she turned to him, letting her fingers brush his sleeve just barely. “Thanks for dinner, Nate.”

He swallowed. “Thanks for coming.”

She stepped into the car with a final glance, she caught him watching her again. Eyes full of hope and full of belief. For a moment she felt the guilt creeping in, she quickly brushed it off. I don’t have time to feel guilty, I have a mission to do.

Anya lay sprawled on the couch, phone balanced loosely in her hand as the city hummed faintly outside her window. The documents from her surveillance prep lay scattered on the coffee table: guest lists, floorplans, facial recognition profiles.

But none of that mattered tonight. Her thumb hovered over Nathaniel’s name on her phone.

She hit call.

Two rings.

“Hello, Anya?” he picked up, his voice catching slightly in that familiar mix of eagerness and surprise.

She leaned back, eyes drifting toward the ceiling, keeping her tone light. “So,” she began with just enough tease in her voice, “is that fundraiser invitation of yours still valid?”

There was a beat of silence, then she heard it. That low chuckle of amusement that slipped out when he was both relieved and delighted. “For you? Of course. Why?”

“Mm. I thought about it and might have scheduled a day off” she said smoothly. “But then again, I wouldn’t want to crash if the list was... exclusive.”

“It is,” he admitted, “but you’re already on it.”

Anya raised her brows.

“I made sure,” he added, quieter.

Of course you did, she thought, lips curving upward.

“I assume there’s a dress code?” she asked aloud, voice a touch more playful now.

“Formal,” he said, then paused. “But honestly? You could wear a paper bag and still light up the entire ballroom.”

Anya let out a laugh, it was genuine, quick, and sharp. “That’s the cheesiest thing I’ve heard in weeks.”

“You laughed though.”

“I snorted.”

“That’s basically the same thing.”

She rolled her eyes, the smile never leaving her lips. “I’ll wear red,” she said offhandedly, almost like a challenge.

There was a pause, one heavy with meaning.

“You’ll look amazing,” he murmured.

Anya’s gaze flicked back to the intel files laid out in front of her. Photos of Desmond executives, hidden security networks, the shadow of Damian and Demetrius Desmond’s names scrawled in red. She smirked to herself, voice honey-sweet and sharp beneath. “I’ll see you.”

Anya had prepared everything. Hidden mic in her clutch, emergency tracker behind her earring, taser disguised as a compact mirror and a mental checklist of all targets in attendance.

Earlier that day, Nate had sent her a gift to her pretend work place. It was a black designer heels she swore costed more than her paycheck in WISE. She stared at it for quite some time and smirked to herself, He still likes giving expensive gifts, huh.

She stood in front of the mirror in her apartment, zipping up the blood-red satin gown that clung to every perfect curve, a red shawl on her neck, and the black heels Nate had given her. She allowed herself to admire the transformation. From shadow operative to socialite. Time to play the game.

The knock on her door came precisely at 7:15 PM.

She opened it to find a sharply dressed Desmond chauffeur in black and gold, standing by the luxury sedan she insisted she didn’t need, but Nathaniel sent anyway.

Of course he did.

The ride was smooth, but the moment the car turned the final corner toward the Desmond estate, the flashing lights were already visible. It was chaos incarnate. A horde of photographers, reporters, influencers, and political observers formed a wall of noise and light at the base of the red carpet. Cameras clicked, questions were screamed, names shouted over one another.

As the car pulled up to the entrance, security approached swiftly, clearing a path. The door was opened for her and Nathaniel was already there, waiting. He offered his hand. She took it without hesitation.

Her heel touched pavement, and the world exploded into blinding flashes and frenzied shouts.

"Miss, over here!"

"Is that Anya Forger?!"

"Who’s she wearing?"

"Is that Nathaniel Desmond’s date?!"

Nathaniel leaned in slightly as he tucked her hand into his arm. “Was the ride okay?”

Anya gave a small, tight smile and nodded. “You enjoy this circus?”

“I do now,” he said, guiding her forward he glanced once at her then taking note that she wore the heels he gave. “Was it too much?” He asked as they descended the red carpet like a pair carved out of a dream.

“A little.” Anya admitted, “but it was sweet. I loved it, thank you.” She smiled softly.

“I’m glad you did.”

The reporters were relentless, but security kept them from getting too close. Still, Anya moved with practiced grace smiling just enough, nodding with precision, her eyes scanning the crowd for familiar faces.

“Everyone’s looking at you,” Nate murmured beside her, eyes burning with something between pride and desire.

“No they’re not,” she replied, lips curving with intent.

They reached the grand entrance, ushered in under crystalline chandeliers and marble arches. Inside was a glittering palace of polished power, servers glided with silver trays, and music drifted from a string quartet in the corner.

Nathaniel leaned close again, his voice more hushed this time. “I wasn’t sure if you’d actually come.”

Anya tilted her head, brushing a strand of hair from her face. “Were you disappointed I did?”

“I’m not!” he said quickly, then softer, “You look... breathtaking.”

Her smile this time was real, not because of the compliment, but because everything was going exactly to plan.

The ballroom sparkled with the illusion of elegance, but Anya had long trained herself to see through expensive lies. She didn’t miss the whisper of Nate’s name rippling through the crowd as they entered. He was a Desmond, after all. But tonight, she wasn’t just his plus-one.

She was a weapon in disguise. Still, nothing prepared her for the swarm that descended on them the moment they stepped through the double doors.

"Nathaniel! Oh my god ! Is that you now? You look so much like your father when he was younger!”

“And who's this you brought?"

"Did you finally bring someone worthy of that smug grin of yours?"

Nathaniel smiled easily, but the flush at his neck gave him away. Anya slid her arm more firmly around his, radiating the perfect blend of demure charm and subtle dominance. She laughed at the right moments, asked questions with just the right touch of curiosity. But the entire time, her eyes were cataloging names, affiliations, expressions.

Until Nate leaned in and murmured near her ear. “There’s someone I want you to meet.”

She nodded, eyes still tracking the exits, the catering staff, the security patterns. Her mission hadn’t even started yet, and the noose already felt tight.

Nathaniel guided her away from the throng of socialites and business magnates down a polished corridor lined with portraits of Desmond ancestors. The laughter and clinking glasses faded behind them.

She spotted him before Nate said a word— Demetrius Desmond , the man who had just weeks ago broadcast the most subtle yet devastating threat to the fragile peace of Ostalis. He was taller in person. Older, of course—sixty-six and commanding. His suit was black, understated, expensive. But it was the way the crowd thinned around him that confirmed his power. Nobody lingered too long, nobody got too close. Until Nathaniel.

“Uncle Deme,” Nate said respectfully. “I wanted to introduce you to someone important.”

Anya swallowed the tension in her throat and stepped forward, her spine straight.

Demetrius turned toward them, “Nate,” Demetrius greeted, voice gravel dipped in aged wine. “You’ve arrived.” Then, his eyes found her instantly. There was no flicker of surprise, no polite hesitation, only recognition and a slow, chilling smile. “Oh,” he said, voice rich and deep, “Miss Forger. How you’ve returned. That’s wonderful.”

The words landed like glass cracking under pressure, too precise, too deliberate. Anya froze for only a half-inch in posture, but it was enough for a man like Demetrius to notice. He wanted her off-balance, he was testing her.

He shouldn’t know that. He shouldn’t even have noticed she left.

Her pulse hammered against her ribs. Her face didn’t flinch, but the sharp breath in her lungs caught. “I’m sorry?” She tilted her head, feigning confusion. “Have we… met before, Prime Minister?”

He smiled again, the kind of smile that politicians weaponized. “I only meant... you disappeared for quite some time, didn’t you? After graduation? Left Eden... vanished, even. And now... here you are. At our gala. On my nephew’s arm.”

Every word was intentional, her sweat was starting to form. He knows. How does he know? What does he know? Should I just kill him on the spot?

Nathaniel, oblivious to the slow, poisonous dance playing out between them, chuckled. “She’s always been a little mysterious, you know. She moved abroad for a while,” he offered innocently. “It was kind of a shock when we bumped into each other again.”

“Yes,” Demetrius murmured, eyes never leaving Anya’s. “What a coincidence.” His voice sounded innocent but there was something sharp behind that smile. Something knowing , something dangerously obvious if you looked closely.

Then, without breaking the tension, he continued, “You’ll be pleased to know my nephew has spoken about you… often.”

Anya blinked once. Cover. He’s shifting gears. The line was too well-timed, too practiced, as if covering a truth with a convenient lie. Demetrius Desmond definitely knew who she was, and it wasn’t because of Nathaniel’s schoolyard crush. Does he know she’s an Agent? What does he know?

Nathaniel laughed, embarrassed, but pleased. “Uncle—”

“You never mentioned that before, Nate” she teased, bumping her shoulder into his.

Demetrius watched the exchange like a hawk watching two mice flirt near the edge of a cliff. “I imagine the past always circles back for the future,” he said slowly. “One way or another.”

For a breath, the air felt thinner. Her training screamed at her. Demetrius wasn’t just playing host, he was circling her, testing boundaries, probing her history. And something in him definitely knew .

Before she could speak again, he turned slightly toward Nathaniel, that calculated smile never fading. “I see your taste hasn’t changed, Nate” he said. “Bold, brilliant... and special.”

Anya’s spine tightened. Nathaniel just laughed awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck. “She’s definitely... special.”

Demetrius’ eyes flicked back to her, colder now. “You’ll fit right in, Miss Forger. I’m glad you’re back.”

There it was again. A veiled threat. A coded message.

They stood in silence for half a beat. Then Nathaniel cleared his throat. “We should probably get back to the others—”

“Yes,” Anya agreed quickly. “It’s a beautiful event, Prime Minister.”

Demetrius nodded with a smile that didn’t touch his eyes. “Enjoy the night, Nathaniel, Miss Forger. I hope you find what you’re both looking for.” Then, with a nod of old-world grace, he turned to greet another cluster of high-ranking guests across the hall, leaving Anya and Nathaniel standing alone in the wake of a conversation that felt more like a duel.

Nathaniel turned to her, still smiling, unaware. “I told you he’d like you.”

Anya’s expression didn’t change, but in her chest, her instincts were screaming.

He knows something. Maybe everything. I might have to kill him tonight.

The champagne was cold, the music lively, and Anya had already gathered more information than most operatives would in a month, names, affiliations, donor patterns, subtle glances exchanged between men in power. But one ghost still hadn’t appeared.

Casually, she swirled her drink, golden liquid catching the chandelier’s gleam, and leaned closer to Nathaniel. “Your father...” she began lightly, “is he coming tonight?”

The question was almost offhand, but she studied his face closely as she asked. Nate hesitated. His jaw tensed just slightly before he responded, voice quieter.

“He doesn’t usually attend these, not anymore at least. Mom runs most of the social affairs.”

That alone told her a lot. So still hiding, huh? Anya nodded, filing the emotional restraint in his tone into memory. “So you don’t know?”

“I never know with him,” Nate admitted, glancing toward the upper balcony. “He shows up when he wants. Or when he’s needed. Never because he’s invited.”

That was when the room began to still. Like someone had shut off the sound at the edges of the hall. First it was just a pause in the laughter. Then the violins dipped. Then the waiters slowed.

Anya turned toward the grand entrance. And there she was.

Rebecca Blackbell-Desmond, “Becky” only to her closest of friends, although no one really calls her that—not anymore at least. She was beautiful, poised, regal even with age, a woman born of old wealth and older power. She wore emerald silk and diamonds older than the country, her smile precise, her posture flawless. Everything about her spoke of perfection shaped like a blade.

And behind her just a few feet away… was him.

Damian Desmond. He had changed last time she saw him, he was no longer the man she saw in older photographs where he looked almost charming. Now, his face was carved harder and older, jaw heavier with age, eyes dead with exhaustion, the silver in his hair were like deliberate streaks of frost. He stood tall, hands tucked neatly behind his back, suit dark and unadorned.

The moment the crowd registered his presence, the silence became reverence. Even the music adjusted to a softer, slower tempo.

Nate murmured under his breath, “…Well. That’s new.”

“You didn’t expect him?” Anya asked, tone calm.

Nate shook his head, eyes narrowed. “No. I didn’t.”

Anya’s heart pulsed but she didn’t show it. She watched as Damian walked behind his wife, not beside her. Eyes scanning the room like a general inspecting a battlefield. And though he hadn’t looked in their direction yet, she could feel it the moment he would.

The man WISE suspected to be the true hand behind the rising chaos had just entered the stage. Agent Starlight, his son’s “date,” had been placed at center spotlight.

As soon as the hush began to break and the murmurs returned in excited waves, Nate straightened beside her, catching sight of his parents. His eyes lingered on his mother, then shifted warier to the man behind her.

He leaned slightly toward Anya, his voice low. “Hey, uh… before we walk over there, just a heads up.”

Anya arched a brow, heart already tapping a little faster in her chest.

“They’re technically still married,” he muttered, “but don’t let that fool you. They don’t talk. Barely look at each other. It’s... been that way since before I was born.”

Anya blinked. “So… like a political alliance.”

“Exactly like that.” Nate gave a dry smile. “You’d think they were longtime rivals forced into a peace treaty. Because, well… they were. Mom used to be one of the Blackbell heirs. Dad... was a Desmond. Back in their youth, the families were always clawing at each other over influence.”

“Sounds romantic,” she said lightly, trying to cover the way her pulse had jumped.

“It’s not,” he deadpanned. “I’ve never seen them in the same room without something freezing over.”

They were getting closer now. Her heels clicked gently on the polished marble, her red gown whispering around her ankles as she matched Nate’s stride. But inside, she was calculating every detail and every possible reaction.

She had trained for assassinations, espionage, survival behind enemy lines without ever so much as anxiety. But this? Meeting the man who might very well be orchestrating the fall of the entire country made her stomach knot.

As they approached, Nate gave her hand a small, reassuring squeeze before letting go. “You’ll be fine. They’re just people.”

She gave a soft chuckle, masking the tension she felt. “Right. Just people.”

Nate cleared his throat. “Mother. Father.”

Rebecca’s eyes flicked to him, “Nathaniel. How... punctual.” Then, her eyes landed on the supposed shy woman on his arms, her eyes lingering in that appraising way only women born to tear people apart socially could do. “And you brought a guest.”

Rebecca Blackbell stared at her from her shoes to her head. Then, she stared at her face surprised, mildly horrified and a little bit confused. “Ana?”

Her brows furrowed at her expression and whatever word she just said. Huh? What did she just say? Ana? What’s up with her? Did she mean Anya?

Before Nate could question her, Damian spoke, his voice calm, deep, and smooth like polished glass. His eyes lingered on her just a little longer than necessary, it made her sweat. “Miss Forger. You’re here.”

Anya’s heart seized again. Like Demetrius, he said it like he already knew her. Like they had said it before. His eyes settled on her like a scalpel, not unkind, but precise, curious and calculating.

Rebecca Blackbell still stared at her looking a bit constipated now, her eyes flickered back and forth to her, and to her son. Seriously, what’s up with her? Why is she looking at me like that?

“I’ve heard a lot about you,” Damian continued, with a slow, almost casual cadence. “Your name’s come up quite a few times... just recently.”

Anya blinked, schooling her face into gentle surprise. “I hope it’s all good things, though.”

Damian gave a slight smile, it was polite, faintly amused, but entirely unreadable. “Depends on who you ask.”

Behind that smile, Anya could feel it, ‘this man was dangerous’. Not just powerful, not just intelligent, but aware. Aware of her presence just as aware of him to her.

And then, as if plucking a thread from thin air, he asked, “So, tell me, Miss Forger.” he said casually, but with the weight of a trap door beneath it, “how is your father doing these days?”

The words froze her for a fraction of a second. The question seemed innocent, but it wasn’t. There was no warmth in it, just an edge. And then, almost too smoothly, Damian added, “I hadn’t heard from him in years. One might’ve thought he’d… disappeared from thin air.”

It landed like a dropped blade. For a single, dangerous second, Anya’s composure faltered. Not visibly, not outwardly, but inside, her thoughts detonated.

What did he meant by that? Does he know why he disappeared? Is he referring to Twilight? To Loid Forger? Could he have known about the mission? Operation Strix? Did he know about their cover life? About the fake family? About her?

She blinked once, Anya knew that was no accident. She recovered instantly, because she had to. She let out a small chuckle, tilting her head slightly. “Still obsessed with crossword puzzles and old spy thrillers,” she said with a gentle roll of her eyes. “He insists paperbacks are superior to digital.”

Damian's brow twitched, just slightly. An expression so small, only someone trained to notice it would. It was the kind of twitch you give when someone lies to your face and you’re impressed.

Nate chuckled beside her, unaware. “That sounds like Pops, alright.”

“I see,” Damian murmured. “Good to know he’s been up to something….productive.”

There was a silence, thick and pregnant with things unsaid. Damian watched her, his brows lifted a hair, a faint flicker of... amusement? Did he see her as a challenge? A threat? Was it a warning? Then, he simply nodded and took a sip from his glass, like nothing had happened at all. Anya's heart was thudding now, not from nerves… but from the precision of his words.

That wasn’t a test, that was a message. He was watching, they have both been watching. Him and Demetrius. Worse, they were subtle about it, but it was enough to know that they wanted her to know. She didn’t know if she wanted to leave now, or get more intel. It was getting dangerous. 

Chapter Text

One Quick Motion

The soft chime of a silver bell cut through the murmur of the gala. A man in a pressed black uniform approached Nathaniel at his side, his voice low and deferential. “Master Nathaniel, your presence is requested. By the family.”

Anya watched the way Nate’s jaw tensed. “Requested by who exactly?”

The man didn’t flinch. “Your father and uncle.”

Nathaniel glanced at Anya immediately. “Let’s go.”

The staff’s gaze flicked to her, then back. “They asked for you alone, sir.”

She smiled reassuringly, touching his arm. “Go. I’ll be fine. Go do your heir duties.”

He hesitated. “You’ll be okay alone?”

Anya tilted her head. “You’re only abandoning me in the middle of the most luxurious fundraiser in the country. I’ll try to manage.”

He chuckled, brushing her hand once with his fingers. “Save me a dance.”

“Mm. Only if you don’t step on my feet.”

He smiled lightly and quickly disappeared into the sea of glimmering gowns and politicians with the man. The moment his back was turned, Anya’s expression dropped.

Time to work.

She moved with purpose through the ballroom, scanning guests, servers, exits. A flicker of memory surfaced, her father, Agent Twilight, explaining his old infiltration method during a training mission years ago.

“You don’t always need to sneak around. Sometimes, the smartest disguise is stepping into someone else’s skin.”

And just like that, her eyes locked onto a woman slipping past the main stairwell. Sharp bun, silver-lined uniform, no-nonsense stride. The estate’s matron , from the Desmond household staff.

Anya tracked her through the crowd discreetly until the woman entered a side corridor that was probably for staff only.

Anya followed, counting steps, measuring timing. Her fingers brushed the vial tucked inside her clutch, now this was one of Thorn Princess’ tricks . A barely-there gas powder slipped into the matron’s tea left on a staff table.

A few minutes later, the woman was swaying slightly near the servant’s exit. Anya caught her easily. The matron slumped without a sound , fast, clean, quiet. Minutes later, Agent Starlight was reborn as Mrs. Helena Muriz , the Desmond estate matron. Her hair tied in a similar fashion, posture stiff, her expression grave. She’d carefully secured the woman’s uniform and ID badge, the real matron would wake up later in a linen cupboard, drugged but unharmed.

Anya now walked the halls with the authority of someone who belonged. No one stopped her when she entered the private corridors not meant for guests, not even the guards.

She entered the inner estate wing. The ballroom’s distant music faded into thick silence. These halls lined with ancestral portraits and low-lit chandeliers weren’t open to the guests. This was family territory , the real Desmond legacy. Now, she was in it.

The estate was massive, it was larger than she expected from the outside. She bypassed music rooms, studies, and sitting rooms until she reached a reinforced hallway with sealed doors. She found the one that mattered, marked by a tiny engraved ‘D’ and a recessed lock panel with an iris recognition .

Anya smirked. Too easy.

From her clutch, she retrieved a facial prosthetic mask , painstakingly crafted with surveillance footage and WISE’s intel. The angular cheeks, white-streaked hairline, and faint crow’s feet of Demetrius Desmond . She slipped it on smoothly, adjusting the sensor lenses over her eyes.

One breath, one blink. The scanner pulsed blue.

ACCESS GRANTED.

The door creaked open, the room was pitch dark until the motion lights blinked on. Inside was something entirely different.

Anya froze at the first step. This was not just a study. It was a vault or more accurately, a war room. Anya’s breath caught when she saw a wall lit up. It wasn’t just a board. It was a manifesto, a map, a labyrinth.

One entire wall was plastered floor-to-ceiling in photos, documents, news clippings, coded lists, and hand-scrawled notes. But what paralyzed her in place were the faces plastered because it was familiar ones, and far too many.

Her eyes scanned the gallery of images, heart pounding. Dozens of photographs, seemingly random men. Different builds, different nationalities, different ages. But she knew every single one.

It was Twilight. It was her father.

Every disguise, every face, every alias. And beneath them, scrawled in bold capital letters:

CODE NAME: AGENT TWILIGHT—WESTALIS OPERATIVE

Next to the collage of faces was a large, hand-drawn question mark with the name Loid Forger written underneath it and is circled several times, followed by boldly written words in black ink.

WISE RECRUIT SINCE 1985 (?)
POSSIBLE COVER/FAMILY: Yor Briar

Anya’s throat tightened. They suspected, but they didn’t know at least not for certain.

She stepped closer. Below that, a smaller section, more chaotic in its placement was dedicated to The Thorn Princess . Her mother. Fewer photos, and none recent. Just shadowed shots from years ago. One image showed her mother mid-motion, blurring past a security cam in an alley somewhere in Berlint.

And underneath it, a note

Alias: "Thorn Princess" (?) An Enigma

Status: UNKNOWN.

Possible Cover: UNKNOWN. Could it be Yor Briar (?)

Anya almost smiled.

Of course she was more of a mystery. Her mother had a way of slipping through cracks like vapor. A ghost in heels. WISE analysts had once said even the shadows didn’t know where she walked.

But then, at the center of the wall was Anya herself . Her own face and a few photographs from Eden Academy . One was her smiling awkwardly next to Nathaniel Desmond , both in school uniforms. Scribbled next to it was,

Anya Forger – orphan adopted by Loid Forger.

Relation to Twilight?

Another showed her as a teenager on campus. Then a more recent one of her from two years ago , in the shadows outside a train station in Ostalis. But the one that made her stomach sink was a photo from just two weeks ago, the exact outfit she wore while covertly tailing Demetrius Desmond from a rooftop near the old parliament hall. The same scarf, the same hairpin, the timestamp was coded on the bottom.

They were watching me while I was watching them?! Fuck!

Anya’s fingers curled. Around her picture were red threads of yarn connecting her to Twilight, to the Thorn Princess, and most disturbingly to Nathaniel Desmond .

The scribbled note below:

KNOWN ASSOCIATES: Nathaniel Desmond (unaware?) / Emotional leverage?

Her blood ran cold. They knew. They always knew.

And then, above it all, the banner scrawled in dark, bold ink.

OPERATION: GRIFFIN
(Primary Objective: Restoration)

She stepped back once more, taking in the wall. This wasn’t just intel, this was obsession. This wasn’t surveillance, this was war planning.

They knew too much. And yet not enough.

Her eyes scanned the room, in the far right corner of the wall was a sealed drawer. Anya’s instinct itched to open it, but her time was running short. Anya crouched before the drawer, pulse ticking in her ears. The metallic surface was clean, seamless with no obvious keyhole but the panel beside it blinked faintly.

Biometric security. Of course.

She pulled a thin glove from her inner pocket, a mimic-glove , one of her father’s old tools, loaded with the replicated fingerprint of Demetrius Desmond. She had scanned it from a whiskey glass earlier in the night , with just enough precision, timing, calmness. She pressed her index finger to the panel.

A small click and the drawer hissed open with a slow, mechanical groan.

Inside was a thick, dense folder bound in black leather . Not a digital report. No, this was something meant to stay off-grid and away from systems that could be hacked or intercepted.

She flipped it open, careful not to smudge or crease the documents.

“PROJECT: GRIFFIN”  it said.

Her breath hitched as she quickly scanned the documents. Time travel. Theories. Calculations. Experiments.

She skimmed page after page, her fingers flying as her eyes darted from formula to redacted paragraphs. It was almost identical to the stolen WISE blueprints she had glanced through in the Director’s office weeks ago. The Desmonds had clearly stolen or reverse-engineered the same concept.

Only… this project was further ahead than WISE. 

There were blueprints of a machine, diagrams of the temporal stabilizer, test logs, failures. One successful partial prototype, but no activation. Her heart was already raising while reading. They were ahead, they were always ahead. 

Then, one page stood out. A single sheet, stained on one corner, scrawled in rushed handwriting as if the scientist barely had time to commit the thought to paper before it disappeared from their mind.

Temporal Bridge Instability: Single Use Principle

Upon collapse of the time loop created by the mechanism of the prototype, several trials showed quantum stability disintegration.

Hypothesis: The machine, once activated, creates a bridge that can only exist for a singular instance before all matter anchoring the bridge destabilizes beyond containment again. Meaning, it cannot be used twice.

Anya swallowed, fingers trembling slightly as she flipped to the next page.

She froze more.

"STABILIZATION ANCHOR: RARE GENETIC SEQUENCE"

And under that, a note scrawled in even darker ink.

Historically appearing once per generation. In myth: once per lifetime. Recent studies acquired stated that the stabilization requires a rare identifier found only in individuals with a specific bloodline—unreplicable.

Anya’s eyes narrowed.

Synthetic replication has failed. After extensive genomic tracking, it was confirmed that the necessary stabilizing trait correlates to an anomalous blood gene tied to the extinct Adler Bloodline —a noble colonial-era family believed to descend from royal stock during the early 18th century.

The Adler Genetic Sequence shows anomalous temporal stabilizing markers. Reason is yet to be identified. The last known carrier was Anastasia Adler , born 1962, deceased 1990. Anastasia had no children. The bloodline was presumed extinct.

Then a final line that nearly made her whole skin crawl. 

The gene trait re-emerged in a Westalis orphan recorded under the name Anya Forger . Subject's genetic structure is a 98.8% match to the Adler Genome. Identity confirmed. Current status: Active.

And under that, a photograph of her from one week ago. Sitting at a café, sunlight catching her pink hair. Another from when she was younger back in Eden. She’d been watched, for she didn’t know how long. Her lips parted slowly, her hands tightening around the folder as she read more and the slow dread washed over her.

The bloodline wasn’t just rare… it was impossible, presumed extinct. A living anchor to the past. A key to the And the only one left.

They didn’t just know her. They planned for her, they’d been waiting for her. They didn’t just know she was a spy, they somehow found out she was a legacy, a lock, a keystone to a machine that could bend time itself. An information she herself didn’t even know. 

Her breath slowed in a composed manner, but her mind raced. The Desmonds knew. Maybe not all of it, but they were closer than WISE thought. Suddenly, Agent Starlight wasn't just on a mission anymore. She was the mission and now, she had walked straight into enemy territory, where she was the target.

Just as Anya flipped to the next page, one that hinted at a failed trial using a blood sample of unknown origin , she noticed something odd.

The air shifted. There was no sound, no hissing, but her instincts screamed. A faint shimmer danced in the shaft of light that beamed through the upper vent. Her pupils contracted.

Colorless gas. Her mind snapped into training mode.

Lullium-4. A silent knockout agent. Developed in early WISE bioengineering labs that was later stolen and reverse-engineered by rogue Ostanian units. Odorless, tasteless, and nearly undetectable unless you were trained for it.

She was , but barely. Her mind drifted to how they found out she was here, she had been very keen. Demetrius must’ve rigged this room.

The lock. Of course! It would have triggered a silent alert when she opened it. She cursed herself for not checking closer. She was too careless, too eager, too into deep.

Already the corners of her vision pulsed with shadows. Anya instantly pressed her hand to her mouth and nose, pulling her long satin glove off with one hand and pressing the inner lining over her face as a makeshift filter. Her heart hammered in her ears.

The scent was faint, bitter. Already in her lungs. Too much of this and she’d be unconscious in less than two minutes.

Focus, Starlight. Focus.

She dropped to the floor where the gas would rise slower, tucking herself under the wide desk at the corner of the surveillance board. Her gloved fingers crawled toward the vent on the floor to suck in what clean air remained.

Her vision swam for a second. Not now. Not now. You’ve trained for this. You’ve endured worse. You’ve survived poison trials and icy lakes and the knife pits at WISE’s black sites.

But that was years ago, that was when she was invincible.

The door hissed, then it unlocked . A green light blinked above the doorframe.

They’re coming in. Quiet and precise boots thudded across the marble floor. People wearing gas masks. They came prepared.

Two—no, three shapes moved across the room. Silhouettes through her swimming vision. They carried scanning wands, sweeping slowly and methodically. She stilled her breath, curling tighter under the desk, watching from the shadows. Her muscles trembled, not from fear, but from the creeping haze curling around her thoughts.

“ Find her. ” A deep voice, muffled by a mask. “Security was tripped, someone opened the Prime’s vault.”

She could feel her pulse jumping. The air was loaded now, her thoughts heavy. The three figures in gas masks swept into the room, scanning, hunting. She silently reached under her clothes, unhooked the tiny holster on her thigh and pulled out a micro-injector.

Adrenaline compound. Her mother’s formula. If it worked, it would buy her five minutes, just enough to escape.

Click. Puncture. Burn.

The injector hit like fire. Her breath exploded in her chest but her mind sharpened. Her legs moved, but it was not fast enough because one of the masked men turned.

“There!”

She bolted for the exit but it was too late. A baton cracked across her arm. She spun, absorbing the blow, slamming her elbow into the attacker’s mask. It cracked, but he stayed upright.

Another man lunged.

She ducked and kicked the inside of his knee, spinning him off balance. His arm lashed out, catching her shoulder. Pain lanced, but she twisted and hooked her heel behind his knee, that sent him crashing down.

The third was fast , faster than the other two . She thought he was probably military-trained. He grabbed her wrist mid-punch and countered with a knee to her gut. She stumbled back, adrenaline the only thing keeping her upright.

They surrounded her now. Three against one. Her mind raced, she couldn’t lose here. Not with the information that she had just learned.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” one of them said, his voice was calm.

Anya smirked. “I do,” she said and moved . She threw a flask from her thigh garter, it was a mini flash powder . A modified version of WISE’s equipments. It exploded in white light and choking smoke .

She heard shouting, a baton swung where she’d been a second ago. Anya ducked and rolled under the table, kicked it up and over to block one attacker’s path. She leapt onto the other, wrapping her legs around his neck, twisting until he collapse unconscious .

Two left.

One rushed, swinging in high. She ducked, punched low in a pressure point below the ribs . He staggered but she didn’t wait, she punched him again on the face knocking him down.

“She's escaping!” one roared to an intercom. Then, his hand nearly caught her hair, but she spun and headbutted him . Blood smeared across the inside of his visor, then another punch until he collapsed.

The three men were down, that’s when she bursted through the door . More guards ran down the hallway where the vault had been, but she didn’t care. She activated her last trick, a body-shifting patch . Slapped it to her neck, her disguise shimmered again but this time, a young, pale servant girl.

She limped into the halls, dizzy and hurt because of the blow and the gas she inhaled. In her mind held the truth about the Adler gene information , the time machine , and the fact that the Desmonds had known exactly who she was.

And maybe… who her father and mother had been .

The grand estate was still buzzing with laughter, clinking glasses, and idle aristocratic chatter. No one noticed her slipping through the marble halls toward the servant’s exit. No one saw the slight tremble in her left hand or the weight of the inhaled gas had begun to settle into her bones like ice.

She pushed through the last door into the crisp night air. The estate lights glowed golden behind her. She was nearly out , just a few more steps. Her legs were getting heavy. The adrenaline spike was crashing , her breath ragged from holding it for so long. She blinked hard, fighting the rising fog in her head.

Almost there.

That’s when it happened. A hand , strong and gloved had snatched her wrist from behind. Before she could react, a sharp sting to her neck.

She gasped and her hand flew up, instinctively trying to tear it out, but it was too late, it was already injected. She looked down and there was the needle still embedded in her skin. She tried to fight off the induction but she quickly realized that it was a high-dose injector and not standard field use.

This was military-grade sedation that was enough to drop an elephant . Her vision swam instantly, the world tilting on an axis. “How—” she tried to speak, but her voice dissolved.

She twisted her body, one last act of defiance, but her limbs were no longer listening. The last thing she saw was the glint of a dark silhouette’s mask , emotionless, staring down at her as if cataloguing her like a specimen.

And then , darkness.

Her body collapsed into the waiting arms of the figure. The night air swallowed the scene, and just like that… Agent Starlight was gone, compromised, and was probably about to die.

Chapter Text

Ghost Of Anastasia

Anya awoke with her limbs heavy, her thoughts sluggish but sharpening fast. The first thing she saw were straps. Both her wrists and ankles were bound, pinning her to a cold, steel reclined chair. A strip of medical tape held an IV port in place, though it looked disconnected now. Her head throbbed from the sedative given to her.

The room was sterile, cold, and too clean. One CCTV camera watched her from above, blinking red. The walls were white concrete, there was no windows, no furniture, just her seat and a table. In front of her was a two-way mirror, like the one you see in interrogation rooms.

She exhaled, quietly testing the restraints, but there was no give. Her muscles were still tingling from the last vestiges of the sedative injection that was strong enough to knock out even the best WISE agents.

The door hissed open. And there, in the center of it all, stood Demetrius Desmond who was smirking like a man who’d finally caught a ghost.

“Well, well,” he said, stepping forward with that same calculating calm since she last saw him, she didn’t know how long ago. “Hello, Miss Forger.” He paused, savoring her stillness. Then, with a tilt of the head, he added, “No. I suppose… Agent Starlight would be more accurate.”

Her stomach clenched, her blood ran cold. She was right, he knew. She didn’t speak, didn’t blink, because she knew silence was safer.

Behind him, the door opened again. Another presence entered. This time it was Damian Desmond in a sharp suit, controlled steps, expression unreadable. He said nothing at first, just stood beside his older brother like a mirror without warmth.

Demetrius spoke again, his tone dry but tinged with amusement. “You know, you really had us impressed for a moment there. The gala infiltration was nearly flawless. Manipulating my nephew, weaving between identities like smoke. I have to admit—” he chuckled, “—you’re far better than I expected.”

Still, she didn’t talk, and that made him smirk more. They weren’t here to guess, not even to confirm, they were here to mock her for even trying .

Demetrius began pacing, hands clasped behind his back as if addressing a lecture hall. ”And honestly speaking,” he paused, glancing at her with genuine curiosity, “we still don’t understand how you do it. The transformation’s too clean and fluid. We’ve been studying WISE tech for decades and nothing comes close to what we saw tonight.”

Anya remained silent, she knew better than to give them anything. Even with her pulse quickening and her skin still prickling from the sedative.

He paced slowly around the chair. “But you know, the thing that gave you away… wasn’t the disguise. It wasn’t even the manipulation.” He stopped behind her. “It was how good you were.”

She didn’t respond, but her thoughts pulsed.

The vault.

He confirmed it next.

“You see, the vault was a trap. We stopped relying on any facial and print recognition years ago, we figured it was too easy for your kind , useless really.” he said with a glance at Damian. “So we planted a hidden passcode system. Pressure-triggered, embedded beneath the floor panels. The trigger only activates when someone bypasses the biometric scan without entering the real access protocol.”

He circled again, this time coming to face her.

“You triggered it effortlessly and perfectly . Like someone trained by the best.” His eyes flickered. “You were t rained by your father I presume ?” He smirked.

Damian finally spoke, his voice lower, gruffer. “We always suspected Loid Forger was recruited by WISE. He was two years younger than me, he was a gifted kid even in Eden. He was quiet and methodical. The kind of student who didn’t stand out… unless you looked closely.” He paused, folding his arms. “We never proven it, of course. He was too good, slipped into civilian life so flawlessly it was almost boring.”

Demetrius nodded. “But then there was you.”

He pulled a remote from his jacket pocket then pressed a button. The opposite wall flickered to life.

A screen flickered a dozens surveillance photos filled with images of he r in various disguises. In civilian life, trailing targets, and even shots from years ago at the WISE border facility.

Then , Loid Forger , beside her. Unaged and unchanged.

Agent Twilight.

Damian studied her closely now, like he was still solving the puzzle aloud. “You have his tactics,” he murmured. “His habits, his posture even.”

Demetrius looked at her again, his voice almost admiring. “And what you have… is something else.” He stepped closer. “You’re his legacy. And from what we’ve discovered… perhaps the final piece .”

Anya’s eyes narrowed.

The vault. The report. The bloodline. The Adler name. They knew far more than they should, and they had been hunting her , not just Twilight. Whatever their plan was, it had just escalated and she was the center of it.

The room was quiet again, except for the quiet hum of the surveillance systems, and the occasional hiss of recycled air through the vents. Demetrius was the first to break the silence again. He leaned on the edge of the interrogation table, eyes glinting with something more dangerous than amusement.

“You might be wondering why we brought you here instead of killing you. Why we didn’t simply make you vanish like every other agent who’s gotten too close.” Then he walked to a nearby console and tapped a few commands. A digital file flickered open with a profile photo of a young woman, sepia-toned, elegant and distant.

The name displayed was Anastasia Adler.

Her hair, unmistakably pale pink. Her face… uncannily similar to Anya’s. Elegant features, eyes full of quiet fire. The only difference between them is the expressions, this woman looked posed, quiet, and noble in a way she didn’t come close to.

What the fuck? Why does that woman…. Look exactly like me?

“That,” Demetrius said, “is why.”

Damian stood to the side, arms crossed, his eyes locked on the image too but he said nothing.

“That is Anastasia Adler, born in 1962,” Demetrius said. “The last known descendant of the Adler bloodline. A family that, during the colonial period, was considered nearly royalty. Their blood was genetically pristine, politically neutral, and unusually gifted in long-term strategic thought. She was meant to be the keystone of everything.”

“She was in my year.” Damian murmured. “She was quiet, reserved, brilliant in the sciences but never showed it off. Always kept her head down. Always had this… strange grace. And she didn’t care much for politics. She hated the spotlight.”

“Don’t forget the face,” Demetrius added, with a smirk, “that you couldn’t stop watching, even when you were engaged to her best friend.”

Anya’s eyes snapped toward him. “Seriously?” she muttered, visibly disgusted.

Damian blinked, pulled from his reverie, then glanced at her just a second too long. The discomfort twisted in her chest.  “That’s disgusting,” she muttered.

Demetrius grinned wider. “He was always sentimental. It’s what makes him so dangerous.”

Damian’s jaw tightened, but he didn’t look away. “Anastasia was different,” he said finally. “She never played the games the rest of us were playing.”

Demetrius grinned, then added with a low chuckle, “She married the Blackbell heir out of obligation. A political arrangement, but she despised him. They had no children. Rumors even say that Anastasia might have loved someone else.”

He turned slightly, not bothering to disguise the way he flicked his gaze sideways at his brother. The implication hung in the air like a dagger. Anya stared at Damian, her frown deepening, but his expression didn’t change.

“She died in 1990,” Demetrius continued. “Car crash. But that was just the beginning of our loss. After her death, a file was sent to our headquarters, we thought it was fake at first because it hypothesized that the Adler DNA sequence held the final key to what we were building. Our scientists then tested a few things in her last blood samples, then it confirmed it, it was indeed the stabilizer we had been missing.”

“But Anastasia was dead, without her or any living descendant… it was lost. The project was shelved for decades.” He paced slowly, like telling a bedtime story with knives. “Then you came along, a pink-haired girl in Eden Academy.” He chuckled, then smiled, “And you know, it’s a funny story, since it all began with a tantrum” he said.

Anya’s eyes flicked to him. She said nothing.

“Nathaniel was about twelve when he came storming into my office, ranting about a girl—his ‘first crush,’ he called you. He was furious because you outscored him, outsmarted him, and apparently stole his heart.” Demetrius chuckled darkly. “Of course, we ignored him at first. Kids are dramatic. But then he showed me a photo of you.”

He tapped a console and the wall flickered to younger Anya’s Eden photo. Wide-eyed, pink hair in a braid. Her signature smile, emerald glowing eyes. “I saw that photo and felt something twist in my gut. So I showed it to him.” Demetrius glanced at Damian.

Damian didn’t respond right away. His gaze was still locked on the photograph. “At first, we thought it was coincidence,” Damian finally said. “Striking, sure. But coincidences happen all the time. I even believed it was a rare mutation, so we let it slide.”

“But then, you grew older,” Demetrius continued, pacing now, his voice thoughtful. “And with each year you grew up more and more of Anastasia Adler’s image. The same face, the same hair and build, the same eyes when she was calculating something in her head.”

Damian’s lips twitched with something like old discomfort. “And the same expression when she didn’t like a question.”

“We waited until graduation to test anything,” Demetrius said. “Monitored your progress. Watched how you moved, how you learned. You were intelligent even as a child. But then…”

“You vanished,” Damian finished. “Before we could get close.”

Demetrius turned back to her, that eerie calm settling into his face once more. “We didn’t see you up close again, just photos of you stalking Damian, apparently. But then like faith, Nathaniel started talking of your return just days ago, he even added you to the guest list as his date, that’s when we knew it wasn’t a coincidence. So we got ready, we restarted the machines.”

Anya’s heart pounded behind her still expression. They had pieced together far more than WISE had ever assumed.

“You see,” Demetrius said, walking back toward her, “Adler bloodline carries something in the genome, particularly the blood. Something we still don’t fully understand, but it stabilizes the quantum fold. Our scientists now believe it’s not just a component. It’s the component . The genetic lock that prevents collapse after the machine is used.”

He leaned in. “And you, Agent Starlight… carry it.”

Her throat tightened, but she gave nothing.

He snapped his fingers. A staffer entered with a sterile medical tray. “We’ve taken a sample of your blood, of course,” Demetrius said with a shrug. “Not that you had much choice. You were unconscious when we drew it.”

The guard walked toward a wall scanner, inserted a vial, and moments later, a holographic DNA strand bloomed into the air.

Demetrius turned, smiling in triumph. “And there it is. The Adler marker. A gene sequence so rare it’s only been recorded once in medical archives in over two decades. You, Agent Starlight , are the first known living carrier since Anastasia.”

Anya felt ice creep into her spine. Her mind spun not with fear, but calculation.

Demetrius was no longer just a man chasing political power. He was chasing time itself. “You’ll help us stabilize the machine,” Demetrius said. “Willingly or not. But make no mistake, your bloodline is the price history demands.”

Anya narrowed her eyes. “And what exactly do you plan to change in the past?”

Damian finally looked at her, his voice cool but cryptic. “Everything we lost. Everything that should’ve been.”

“You know,” he began conversationally, “the world doesn’t end in fire or war. It ends in stagnation. In systems refusing to evolve, history repeating because no one dares to rewrite it.”

Damian stayed quiet beside him, his arms crossed, his eyes fixed on Anya like she were both an answer and a memory.

Demetrius continued, “That’s why the time project mattered. To change the future… we’d have to reshape the past. We didn’t want to erase everything, just reroute it. Clean the mess, restart the power structures that got muddied over decades of war, division, and false peace.”

Anya narrowed her eyes. “So you play gods with time?”

Demetrius chuckled. “Gods don’t build machines. We do.” Demetrius gave one final smile and turned to leave. “We’ll begin the trials soon,” he said. “Rest while you can. History is waiting.”

And with that, the door hissed shut once more, leaving her alone with ghosts and bloodlines, and with fate.

The room was cold again.

Anya’s breathing came ragged as she struggled against the restraints biting into her wrists. The scent of antiseptic clung to everything. Her arms ached, her veins tender as fresh puncture marks trailed down both arms where the scientist had been collecting samples.

Blood, skin cells, tissue swabs. It hadn’t stopped. She fought them, she always fought. But the sterile white lab was built for people like her, people who could kill with a pen or slip into another identity with a blink. So they had the countermeasures. Four of them held her down last time, and even then, she broke a technician’s nose before someone barked through the speakers overhead.

“Don’t fight, Starlight. You’ll only get hurt.” Demetrius’ voice. Calm and bored, even. But with an edge that made her blood chill. She had growled something under her breath, eyes wild, heart hammering, but the needle came again. This one deeper and colder.

Darkness swallowed her whole. When she woke, her head felt like lead, her tongue dry. Her body was upright, strapped to a heavy steel chair bolted into the ground. She blinked the haze away, the harsh white lights humming overhead. Her eyes adjusted slowly, and then she saw him.

Damian.

He sat across from her in a sleek black chair, one leg crossed over the other, a clipboard resting on his knee. He wore simple grey slacks, a black turtleneck, and slim glasses perched low on his nose. A pencil moved calmly across the page in his hand.

He wasn’t writing notes, he was drawing her. A quiet, careful sketch of her face. Hair parted in the middle. Tension around the jaw and even the faint bruise forming near her temple from the scuffle.

Anya's breath stilled, though she didn’t show it. She already knew, she had seen it. In the way Demetrius had mocked the past a few hours ago, the way he tossed barbed teases about a girl named Anastasia . A girl Damian once couldn’t stop looking at. The girl who, if what they say were right, now lived on in her .

Even now, Anya could see it. The way his gaze hovered just slightly too long on her face. Not lust, no, it was longing remorse and nostalgia all in one.

“What do you want, old man?” she asked, voice hoarse.

He didn’t stop sketching. “Nothing, I just came to look at you.”

Anya’s eyes narrowed. “I’m not her.”

“I know,” he said. “But you’re not not her either.”

She softened her voice, as calculated as a scalpel. “You knew her well, didn’t you?”

Damian didn’t glance up. Just replied, tone cool. “No. Not really.”

But Anya didn’t buy it. His pencil slowed, betraying the pause he hadn’t meant to give. So she pressed carefully and gently, not like an interrogation but like curiosity. “What was she like?”

He sighed, but didn’t stop sketching. “Quiet. A bit... unknowable. She preferred books over people. Always sat in the back during assemblies. Didn’t speak unless it mattered.”

“And you knew that how?” Anya asked, tilting her head slightly.

Damian finally looked at her. Just briefly and said, “I noticed it.”

That was something. She pushed a little further, softening her tone. “I bet she noticed you, too.”

He didn’t answer, but she watched the shadow flicker through his gaze. Anya was careful, she didn’t try to mimic Anastasia. That would be too obvious. Instead, she asked questions that sounded harmless, light, softly spun with curiosity and nothing more. But Damian was too sharp not to see what she was doing.

“You’re not even trying to be subtle about it,” he said suddenly, voice quiet.

She blinked, feigning innocence. “I’m just trying to make conversation.”

His eyes narrowed but not out of anger. “You want to know if I cared for her. If I care for you . You’re not the first spy to use nostalgia as a weapon.”

Anya held his gaze, carefully unreadable. “And is it working?”

He gave a small, humorless laugh, pencil still hovering over the sketch. “No.”

But the lie sat brittle on his tongue. They both knew it.

“Ask your questions. It won’t matter. You’re not walking out of here alive.”

Anya swallowed that quietly. If it was a threat, it didn’t land the way he wanted it to. It sounded more like a truth he hadn’t wanted to say aloud. “I just want to know,” she said slowly, “what she was to you. The whole story.”

Damian didn’t speak for a long moment. Then, “Eden used to have separate classrooms,” Damian said, still scribbling absently on his clipboard, his voice detached like he was reciting trivia. “Boys in one building, girls in another. Same campus, but they didn’t mix except for joint subjects. Dance class. Lunch. Debate, sometimes.”

Anya watched him carefully, letting him talk. “So you met her at Eden?” she asked softly.

His pencil paused for a moment before continuing. “Yes. She was friends with Rebecca.” A flicker in his eyes. His hand stopped moving. “Or at least, that’s what they called it.”

“You didn’t think they were friends?”

“I think Rebecca liked having someone quieter next to her to look louder. And Anastasia… she tolerated Rebecca. They came from the same world. Same class. Same expectations.” He set the clipboard down. “They were expected to be allies, but she hated the Blackbells.”

“She hated the Blackbells?”

“She loathed them,” Damian said, standing up now, his back to her. “She used to say their wealth reeked of old blood and rotted loyalties. That Rebecca was a pretty smile with a dagger for a spine.”

Anya’s eyes narrowed. “Then why did she stay friends with her?”

“She didn’t,” Damian said. “Not really. After Eden, Anastasia vanished from that circle.”

“And you married Rebecca after she disappeared.”

He gave a small, humorless laugh. “You’re quick.”

She smirked. “I figured. But, Nathaniel told me you hated each other.”

Damian turned his gaze to her slowly. “We did.”

“So why?”

He shrugged like it didn’t matter anymore. “Politics. The Desmond name needed the Blackbell connections. And vice versa. Our families were aligned in public. Not necessarily in private.”

“How about the Adlers?”

“They weren’t friendly with the Desmonds,” Damian admitted. “But we weren’t enemies either. The Adlers were… ancient. Old blood, old power. The kind that preferred to stay hidden and Desmonds weren’t exactly subtle, even then. Our family didn’t like making enemies, so we were civil but the Adlers didn’t like us either way. Especially my father.”

Anya tilted her head. “Oh, so why did you care about Anastasia?”

Damian glanced at her, the pencil now still in his hand. “I didn’t say that, you just assumed I did.”

“You know awfully a lot about her,” Anya said calmly, carefully watching his face. “And you keep looking at me like you’re waiting for her to speak through me.”

Silence hung thick in the air.

Damian turned his face slightly away, but his voice was steady when he finally spoke. “We weren’t exactly close, she didn’t like me or anyone in fact. She kept her distance, didn’t talk unless I spoke to her. And we only ever talk during shared classes.” He said.

“That still doesn’t answer why you cared for her.” Anya poked.

Damian looked at her again. His eyes were hard, but not entirely cold. He said nothing, but Anya knew better. He might not have said it, but it was in the way he lingered on Anastasia’s name. The way he spoke of Eden like it was a memory that haunted him, not just a past chapter. It was in the way his voice lowered every time he mentioned her, like something sacred that had been buried and was now stirring beneath his skin.

He loved and cared her and maybe he still did. She didn’t know why, but she knew he did. She leaned back in the chair, as far as her restraints would let her. “Why are you really here, old man? Why are you watching me? Drawing me?”

Damian stopped staring at her. Silence expanded between them like a crack in glass. Then, he stood up, “Because I once loved a woman,” Damian said quietly. “And I killed her, now she’s sitting in front of me thirty years later.” He turned toward the door.

He loved her…. And he killed her?! What….

The door closed behind him and Anya was alone with her thoughts. Suddenly she realized, she wasn’t the only one tied up, Damian Desmond still carried a ghost in his heart. And maybe she could use that, maybe there was something human left inside him that hadn’t died with Anastasia Adler. She didn’t know much, but one thing she knew was that, she still haunted him.

I could use that…

Chapter Text

Tick, Tock, Truth

It had been four days since the gala. Four days since the last time he saw her. Four days since she smiled at him, told him it was okay and said she'd find him later. Four days of silence, no texts, no calls, not even a sarcastic “Are you dead?” from her usual way of checking in.

Nathaniel Desmond was officially losing it. He stared at the door to her apartment like it would open itself if he just wanted it hard enough. He’d been pacing the hallway for ten minutes now, trying to come up with the right thing to say when she opened it.

Finally, he knocked.

No answer.

He knocked again, louder this time around.

“Anya?” he called, trying to sound casual. “It’s me, Nate. Open up. You’ve got me looking like a lost puppy out here.”

Still nothing.

He sighed and took a step back, rubbing his face. Maybe she wasn’t home. Or maybe she was ignoring him. Or maybe—

Click.

The door opened. And Nathaniel nearly fainted. Standing there was a man, tall, with sharp features, aging gracefully, but still entirely formidable. The faint silver in his blond hair did nothing to soften the piercing blue eyes that landed directly on him.

Loid Forger.

Nate’s heart stopped. Then started again racing. “Sir—! I—I’m so sorry—!” he stammered, nearly doubling into a bow. “I didn’t mean to intrude—I was just—uh—checking in on Anya, I mean, Miss Forger, your daughter, I—”

He finally managed to stop talking. Loid just stared at him, but Nate noticed something. There was a tiny shift in his expression. Something behind the composed exterior. A flicker in his eyes, like he knew exactly why Nathaniel was here. Like he’d been waiting and not in a good way.

“I… um. Is she home?” Nate asked, straightening up, forcing his voice to sound normal.

Loid’s answer was low, almost too calm. “Weren’t you supposed to bring her home?”

Nate blinked. “What—?”

Then it hit him. He wasn’t here to visit. He wasn’t late to check in. He was here because she hadn’t come back. He hadn’t heard from her because no one had.

“She's not—? You mean…” he trailed off, his voice growing hoarse.

Loid didn’t say another word. He didn’t have to, everything was in his eyes. The anger , the worry , the barely concealed fear that something had gone terribly wrong.

Nathaniel stood frozen.

Loid’s expression closed off again. Then, without another word, he gently but firmly shut the door.

Click.

Nathaniel remained outside, staring at the grain of the wooden door, cold air settling into his bones. He’d gone to her apartment to look for answers, but he walked away with just one, ringing louder than any alarm.

Anya Forger was missing. And the only thing worse than silence in their world was silence with Loid Forger's face behind it.

For the next few days, Nathaniel barely slept. He retraced every step he could remember from that night. The gala, the way her hand had briefly touched his arm when she said she’d wait for him. The soft “It’s okay” as the uniformed staff pulled him away.

He'd expected to come back and see her laughing with the guests. Or sneaking out with a glass of champagne. Or giving him that look when things got too stiff and she needed to breathe but she wasn’t there and she never was again.

The Desmond estate was a fortress. Everything was recorded, filed, monitored, and tightly locked behind a web of permissions. Officially, he couldn't just request to see the security footage from the night of the gala without drawing suspicion.

If his uncle or father caught wind of it, they’d ask questions. Uncomfortable ones like why he cared, why it mattered and whether he was getting attached to something, or someone he shouldn't.

So he did what any desperate man would do. He bribed the staff. It wasn’t even that hard. Money worked, status worked better, and a whispered promise of protection sealed the deal.

One of the internal tech supervisors owed him a favor. Another just wanted to keep his head down.

“Just a copy of the tapes of the whole night,” Nathaniel told them, lying through his teeth. “Family paranoia. I lost my cufflink that night. I just want to know where I dropped it.”

Three days of endless footage. Thousands of frames. No Anya.

She was there smiling, talking, sipping something fizzy until the moment he was summoned. After that, nothing. No sign of her leaving through the front gate, no rear exit footage, no car logs. Nothing.

She never left the estate. The realization hit him like ice in his lungs. The longer he stared at the screens, the more it didn’t make sense. There had to be a mistake, a blind spot, a missing angle. He rewound the footage again and again for hours.

She was right there dressed in red, hair pinned, her voice brushing against his as they whispered about the weirdness of his family. And then… gone. Like smoke.

By the third  day , his hands were trembling as he fast-forwarded through footage he already knew too well. The guards in the room looked increasingly uncomfortable. They weren’t used to a Desmond lingering around, much less one who wasn’t barking orders.

He could feel something in him crawl. A cold, heavy dread tightening inside his chest like a vice. She was smart, witty and capable. He didn’t know everything about her, hell—he probably didn’t know half but he knew that much.

And if someone like her vanished… It wasn’t an accident. Something was very wrong.

He stepped out of his room and leaned against the cold wall of the hallway, pressing his palms to his eyes. The world felt distorted, like his ears were full of static and his thoughts were sprinting in all directions. There were too many secrets in this place. Too many hidden rooms, hidden truths. And something told him , she hadn’t disappeared. She’d been taken a nd he had a sick, gnawing feeling his family had something to do with it.

Anya didn’t know how many days had passed. Three? Four? A week? Two?

Time stretched into a blur of fluorescent lights, cold metal restraints, and the relentless sting of needles . Her arms ached, her veins bruised. The back of her neck throbbed from where the sedatives had been injected too many times.

She was fed regularly sterile, tasteless food but she didn’t eat unless Damian Desmond was there. That was her only condition.  A small act of control. At first, they didn’t care, but eventually, after not eating for days, even Damian gave in. Maybe out of curiosity, maybe amusement, maybe nostalgia.

Today, he was seated across from her again, glasses perched low on his nose, scribbling notes while she chewed carefully under the silent watch of security cameras. The silence was broken by the click of the heavy metal door.

Demetrius Desmond stepped in. Slick as always and dressed like the devil in a suit, he walked with a lazy swagger and a smirk that screamed victory before the battle was even over. He came right up to the table, eyes flicking between his brother and Anya as if reading a private novel only he understood.

“Well, isn’t this cozy,” he said. His voice dripped with amusement. “Careful, brother. You might start to care.”

Damian didn’t respond. Anya didn’t stop chewing, though her green eyes narrowed just slightly, studying him.

Demetrius leaned against the wall, arms folded. “I’ll give you points for effort, Agent Starlight. This little routine, waiting for him to show up just to eat, it’s cute. Strategic, I suppose. But let’s not pretend you’re winning, he won’t crack. And don’t you think you’re a little too young for him?” He teased.

Anya barely held back vomit. He tilted his head with that same smirk. “Trust me, I know my brother. He's as cold as they come.”

Anya swallowed, wiped the corner of her mouth with the back of her hand. Calmly, confidently, she looked up at him. “Are you sure about that?”

The smirk on Demetrius' face twitched . He opened his mouth to say something but paused just a beat too long and then chuckled instead. “You’re quite confident for someone tied up. Let’s face the truth Starlight, you are not winning.”

She smiled, not warmly not coyly either. It was the smile of someone who knew she was bleeding but still planned to win the war. “Maybe, but so are you,” she said. “Because I’m still here. Alive.” she pressed softly. “Your little machine isn’t working, is it? Still unstable, still wrong. You’re here and stalling, which means something doesn’t quite fit.”

Demetrius’ jaw flexed. Damian’s pencil scratched across the clipboard without pause. Then Demetrius straightened, brushing imaginary dust off his sleeve. “Eat while you can, Starlight,” he said. “Because once testing begins, you won’t have much appetite left.”

He left the room without another word.

Anya glanced at Damian, whose eyes were still focused on the page. “I liked that part,” she said, nodding at his drawing. “The shading. Makes me look almost... gentle.”

He looked up for the first time. “You’re not,” he replied flatly.

Anya shrugged. “Neither are you.”

Another two days had passed, Nathaniel was really losing his damn mind. He had searched every possible place she could have gone. Her apartment, her favorite cafe and even her workplace. Nothing.

It was like Anya had vanished off the face of the earth, but he refused to believe it. So he retraced her steps again and again. Until frustration led him back to the estate, to the place they were last seen together.

He wasn't sure what he was hoping to find, but his instincts screamed there was something there. Something wrong, something hidden. He had spent the afternoon weaving through the estate's quieter wings, pretending to be inspecting routine renovations. His family’s estate was large and there were parts of it even he barely knew.

That’s when he found the incineration chamber. It was an old wing, supposedly out of use. But the red blinking light above the small incinerator chute said otherwise. The place was active.

Curious, he opened the nearby cupboard marked for disposal where he saw a narrow steel bin used for temporary storage before incineration. Inside it, he saw fabric. Sheer red, with familiar stitchings

His breath stopped. It was Anya’s shawl.

He pulled it out, hands shaking. He knew that shawl. She wore it at the gala, he had teased her about how dramatic it made her look. Next to it, tucked in the corner of the bin, were a pair of heels. Elegant, black, custom-made. Hers. He gave her that pair to wear for the night.

He staggered back like he had been punched. His stomach turned. He was right, she didn’t leave, she didn’t disappear. She had been taken by his family. And worse, they had tried to erase her. Something inside him snapped.

Ten minutes later, he kicked open the door to his uncle's private office. “WHERE IS SHE?!”

Demetrius Desmond looked up from his desk, calm as always, as if the sudden entrance of his nephew wasn’t out of the ordinary. “Nathaniel,” he said mildly, “What is the meaning of this—”

“DON’T PLAY DUMB WITH ME, UNCLE!” Nate shouted, clutching her shawl and heels he just saw. “Where is Anya?! Don’t tell me you don’t know, don’t give me one of your PR bullshit because I saw her things in the damn incineration chute! ”

Demetrius stared at the shawl without blinking, then sighed. “I told them to dispose of everything— not yet, apparently.”

“Dispose?!” Nate's voice cracked. “What the hell are you talking about, Uncle? She’s not trash, she’s not a file to delete! You’re hiding something. You—you took her, didn’t you?!”

Demetrius raised his hand in a gesture of calm. “Nathaniel, breathe. I understand you’re upset, but there are things you don’t—”

“Don’t patronize me!”

The room fell into tension so thick, it crackled. Nate was trembling, fists clenched at his sides.

Then, the door opened again.

Damian  walked in, slow and deliberate. The weight of his presence quieted the room instantly. He looked between the two of them, then to the shawl on his son’s hand.

His jaw tightened. “What's going on?” he asked quietly.

“He found her things,” Demetrius said, not looking away from Nate.

Nathaniel turned toward his father, fury radiating off him. “Tell me where she is, father. Right now.”

“She left, Nathaniel. She disappeared again just like she did back in Eden.” Demetrius said lying through his teeth.

“You’re lying.” Nathaniel’s voice was lower now but shaking with something more dangerous than anger.  

He stood between his father and uncle, his fists clenched so tightly his nails bit into his palms. His eyes darted between the shawl on his hand and the two men who had always been shadows in his life, puppeteers of empire and silence.

“You think I’m that easy to fool?” he said through gritted teeth. “I know she didn’t just walk away, I have watched the whole CCTV footages! She never left the estate. What are you doing to her?”

Damian who was silent until now, finally raised his voice. “ Calm yourself, Nathaniel. ”

“Calm— calm myself? ” His voice broke. “Her shawl was in the incineration room! You said she left the gala! She never left!”

“She did leave,” Demetrius said coolly. “Just not in the way you think.”

Damian stood by the fireplace, arms crossed and eyes dark. Demetrius folded his hands. “She took the money and left, Nathaniel. We gave her a generous offer—more than fair—to walk away. To disappear. And she did. What you found were leftovers. She must have been in a rush.”

Nathaniel stared at him. His expression didn’t shift. Then he laughed. One, bitter bark of disbelief. “That’s the best you’ve got?”

He dropped the heels on the floor with a clatter. “She’s successful. She’s not some gold-digger clinging to a Desmond for status. She has money, a career . Probably more than me. Her family’s connected and she didn’t even love me. ”

No one said anything. Demetrius’ composure was breaking, Damian’s jaw was seething.

He shook his head, fury re-igniting. “You think I’m an idiot? That she just left behind her signature shawl and the custom heels —the ones I gave her—and disappeared into the wind with a bribe?”

Damian finally turned from the fire, his jaw tight. “Nathaniel, stop.”

But he wouldn’t. “I know this family,” he hissed. “I know what we do to people we can’t control.”

Demetrius stepped in, voice calm and oiled like a knife sliding into flesh. “She’s not who you think she is, Nathaniel,” he said. “She never was. We’ve suspected it for a long time. Since Eden. ”

Nathaniel’s breath caught. “What are you talking about?”

Damian leaned on the desk now, eyes fixed on his son. “She was placed there. Carefully. Deliberately. She’s not just some girl you met by chance. She’s a spy, she has been for years. Probably since the beginning.”

Nathaniel felt his chest crack. “...No.”

“She used you,” Demetrius said smoothly. “She manipulated you into inviting her to the gala. Into trusting her. It was all part of her infiltration.”

He staggered back like he’d been slapped. The walls tilted and the words rang louder than the buzzing in his skull. The shawl had fallen to the floor, and he picked it up slowly, fingers brushing the edge.

Spy. Used you. Manipulated.

Nathaniel just stared at his father and uncle. The words hit and sunk in. His brain understood, but his heart rejected every syllable. He sat down, slowly, like his knees might give out. His heart pounded, but not in disbelief.

In betrayal. Not of her. Of them. Of his family.

Because he knew her. He knew her quiet laugh, the way her eyes softened when he talked about his childhood. How she always noticed when he skipped meals. How she gave him that shy look when she teased him back in Eden.

That wasn’t a mission. That was real. “I don’t care,” he said suddenly, quietly.

Damian blinked. “What?”

“I said—I don’t care.” Nathaniel looked up, and there were tears in his eyes, but his voice was steel. “If she used me. If she lied. If she manipulated every second we had together.” He stood again. “I still want to see her.”

Demetrius’ eyes narrowed. “That’s not wise, nephew.”

“I don’t give a damn about wise,” Nathaniel hissed. “I don’t believe she’s safe. I know this family. I know what we do to people who get in the way.”

Neither man responded. The silence was confirmation enough.

“You’re bleeding her, aren’t you?” he said quietly. “Hurting her? Are you torturing her?”

Damian’s mouth tightened. “You don’t understand what’s at stake—”

“I don’t care what’s at stake,” he shouted. “I care about her! ”

The room was tense. A war between generations. Between loyalty and love. “Let me see her,” Nathaniel said, voice low again. “Or I swear to god, I will burn this entire estate to the ground looking for her.”

The silence after Nathaniel’s demand was heavy, fractured only by the ticking of the grandfather clock in the corner of the room.

“I want to see her,” Nathaniel said again, voice like steel wrapped in grief.

Demetrius and Damian exchanged a look. It wasn’t just a pause, it was a silent conversation, a flicker of intent, a quiet decision, and Nathaniel saw it.

He straightened, his breath catching. “That’s a no,” he said flatly.

They didn’t respond.

“Right,” he whispered, fury curling behind his ribs like a firestorm. “Very well.”

He turned without another word and strode out of the office, slamming the door behind him with enough force to shake the paintings on the wall.

He wasn’t giving up, not now. He had to find her, at all costs. The estate was vast, he knew that better than anyone. It had hallways no one used, wings kept locked under “restoration,” old wine cellars that hadn’t stored a bottle in decades. Nathaniel moved with purpose, ignoring the confused glances of servants as he stalked down the corridors.

He tapped behind walls, pulled at loose sconces, checked for air vents that led to nowhere. He was going to find her. He had to find her.

He was halfway down the hall that bordered the western wing when he noticed something, a panel near the baseboard that looked newer than the rest of the wall. He dropped to one knee, inspecting it. His fingers brushed over a faint seam.

Click. A mechanism inside shifted.

He froze, heart hammering, hope flaring in his chest. Before he could do more, a voice barked behind him. “Master Desmond.”

He turned too late. Three armed guards stood at the end of the hall, dressed in tactical black. The one in front raised a strange gun and fired.

He barely had time to say, “ Wait— ”

A sharp sting in his neck. Then coldness. Then nothing. The world blurred, and his legs gave out. He hit the marble floor hard, vision swimming as the guards approached. The edges of his world turned gray. And the last thought in Nathaniel’s fading mind was of Anya.

The metallic clink of the spoon in the bowl was the only sound in the sterile white room, aside from the soft scratch of Damian’s pencil moving across his clipboard.

Anya chewed slowly. The food was warm, bland, and nutrient-rich like everything else they fed her here. She was still restrained, wrists locked to the table, but at least she could move her arms enough to eat. A small mercy.

Damian sat across from her as always, glasses perched on his nose, sketching without glancing up. A sketch of her, she realized again. He hadn’t stopped. She watched him for a moment, then tilted her head, feigning casual interest. “So,” she said, voice light, “why do you think the machine isn’t working?”

No response. His pencil never paused and his expression remained unreadable.

She tried again. “You’ve been draining my blood, taking samples constantly. And yet…” She leaned forward slightly, watching his hand. “Still not enough?”

Still nothing but then the door opened with a faint hiss.

Demetrius entered, impeccably dressed as usual, but his face—

She noticed it immediately.

Gone was the smug confidence he usually wore like a second skin. In its place was frustration. A storm behind his eyes. He didn’t say anything at first, just moved to sit beside Damian at the table.

Anya swallowed her bite slowly, then leaned back in her chair with a smirk. “Back so soon?” she asked. “You miss me or is your pet project falling apart?”

Demetrius’ jaw twitched. Then, he snapped, “What did you do to Nathaniel?”

The smile froze on her lips. She blinked. “What?”

He leaned in slightly. “He broke into the restricted corridors. Almost found your room. Screamed at us, had to be sedated. He’s not like you, he doesn’t have training but he might as well be. So, tell me, what did you do to him?”

Anya stared at him, caught off guard. Her stomach twisted. Nathaniel—he was here? Was he looking for her? She schooled her expression quickly, playing it cool, but her voice caught the faintest tremor.

“Is… is he alright?”

Demetrius narrowed his eyes. “You tell me.”

She looked away. “I didn’t do anything. I never lied to him.”

“You never told him the truth either,” Damian said without looking up, his voice quiet but cutting.

Demetrius exhaled hard, running a hand through his silvering hair. “Whatever your plan was, whatever you thought you were manipulating, we were two steps ahead. But Nathaniel? We didn’t expect that reaction from him.”

Anya looked up again, her voice sharper now. “What did you do to him?”

Demetrius offered her a sharp smile, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “We didn’t do anything. He’s only been sedated.”

Anya’s fists clenched slightly in her restraints under the table.

She met Demetrius’ gaze with burning defiance. “You’re the one who dragged me here. Hurt me. Locked me up. And you’re blaming me for how he reacted?”

He didn’t respond. Damian’s pencil paused. He finally looked up and met her eyes. For a moment, there was something there, something that flickered too fast to grasp. Guilt? Anger? Or fear?

But then, it was gone. And the silence returned, thick and dangerous.

Time had begun to blur.

Anya didn’t know how many days had passed since she was taken. Two weeks? Three? Longer? The ache in her limbs had long settled into a constant throb. The routine was cruel in its precision, restraint, samples, more restraint, food, Damian sketching or silent, and the ever-present cold hum of machines monitoring her every breath.

Today, she woke up with an IV in her arm and the unmistakable stickiness on her skin from the bandages where blood had been drawn again. She felt weak, dizzy, her muscles trembling even while still.

They were draining her, systematically. She kept count in her head, at least twelve times in the past week alone.

She pretended to sleep when the scientists came in to speak. Laying still, keeping her breath shallow and slow like a trained operative. It worked, they didn’t lower their voices. They never assumed she could understand.

But she did.

“The stabilizer is showing unstable sequences again,” one of them murmured, rustling papers. “We’re still getting degradation after the tenth energy spike. It’s inconsistent.”

“Try another set tomorrow. We need to extract more plasma and run it through the resonance cycle. Maybe it’s the molecular binding.”

“No, it’s not the blood composition, I’m telling you. The sequence degrades after twenty minutes regardless of how fresh it is.”

Anya furrowed her brow slightly. She knew enough to know that didn’t sound like a blood issue. Something in her memory stirred. But before she could chase the thought, they left.

Later, during mealtime, the routine changed.

Damian didn’t appear. Instead, Demetrius entered the room alone and he was tense more than usual. His tie was crooked, his shoulders stiff.

Anya didn’t touch her tray.

He sat across from her with a thud, fixing her with a smile that was far too thin. “You’re looking pale, Agent Starlight,” he said. “Not eating?”

Anya tilted her head, a flicker of her smirk returning. “What’s the matter? The machine still broken?”

Demetrius’ eye twitched. “Progress takes time.”

“Hmm,” she hummed, feigning boredom. “Except it’s been what, weeks? And here I am, still strapped down like a lab rat while you clowns can’t figure out how to make your time toy work.”

His lips thinned.

Anya leaned forward slightly, her tone light but barbed. “What’s the matter, Prime Minister? Realized you were bleeding the wrong part of me dry?”

He said nothing, but the answer was there.

And then, like a puzzle piece falling into place, the dream.

A strange memory from a few days ago—or was it a dream? She remembered standing in a white void, her hair glowing like threads of light. Someone whispered, “It’s not what you bleed… it’s what you grow.”

The suspicion crawling at the back of her mind. Something the scientists had said… about degradation, instability. About fresh samples not solving the issue. She had thought it nonsense.

But her hair, that was what they first noted when she was a child. That strange, unmissable pink. The one thing that probably tied her to the so-called Adler gene. Blood can mutate, blood can degrade, but keratin —hair—carried the cleanest form of stable DNA through time. A follicle could survive even centuries.

Her hair.

Could it be—

She didn’t finish the thought. She buried it, whatever she had just realized, she couldn’t let them know. Instead, she blinked up at Demetrius, playing the tired captive role just well enough to seem worn, but not broken.

He leaned forward finally, eyes studying her face. “Tell me about your childhood.”

The question caught her off guard. She narrowed her eyes. “What?”

“You heard me.” His tone was level, calm in that unsettling politician’s way. “Your childhood. Where you grew up. Your earliest memories. Who gave birth to you.”

Anya stiffened, but didn’t answer.

Demetrius folded his hands. “You don’t remember anything before the Forgers, do you?”

She didn’t respond.

He chuckled dryly. “Thought so. We looked. There’s no record of you before you appeared with Loid and Yor Forger. Not even in adoption registries. No medical records. No hospital birth. Just... a little girl with pink hair and big eyes showing up one day.”

Anya stayed still, her silence was starting to annoy him. And in all fairness, she didn’t know anything either.

His jaw tensed, and his eyes darkened.

She smiled faintly. “You seem upset.”

He didn’t return the smile. “I’m irritated, Agent Starlight. Because for all your manipulation and infiltration and clever little tricks, you don’t know anything either. Do you?”

Anya didn’t reply because he was right. She didn’t not really. She was only four when she was adopted, and even that was a little blurry in her memories. So how would she even remember what happened before that?

Demetrius stood, brushing imaginary dust from his sleeve. “Think hard about your past, Agent. Think about how a girl like you—who shouldn’t exist—ended up in the center of a war no one remembers starting.”

And with that, he left the room. Leaving Anya with nothing but silence… and questions that were finally beginning to terrify her.

Anya knew she was running out of time. She didn’t know how many days it had been, maybe weeks but the exhaustion had sunk into her bones, her muscles, her blood. They kept draining her, probing her, feeding her just enough to keep her breathing.

It couldn’t go on like this. She had to make a move. That morning, as another needle withdrew a vial of her blood, she stared at the mirrored glass of the lab wall and made a quiet decision, she would help them . Not really.

But just enough to keep them close, just enough to mislead them. She’d buy herself time. Twist their confidence into delay. And maybe, just maybe, slip through the cracks they didn’t know she was carving.

When Demetrius entered the room again later that day alone, shoulders stiff, frustration simmering beneath his expression she was ready.

No Damian today. Good. He was wiser than Demetrius. She could play more freely without his eyes watching so closely.

Demetrius sat across from her, silence stretching in the sterile lab air. Her plate of food sat untouched. The only sound was the faint hum of the fluorescent lights.

She broke the silence first, her voice light. “Let me guess. Still not working?”

His eyes flickered but he said nothing.

She leaned back, feigning casual curiosity. “You’re looking at it wrong.”

He let out a low chuckle, one without humor. “Cute,” he muttered. “Trying to play the helpful prisoner now?”

Anya smiled faintly. “Trying? I am helping.”

“Oh, you’re helping, alright.” He shook his head, tone thick with sarcasm. “You’ve been lying through your teeth since the day we pulled you out of that vault. Every answer you give smells like perfume and poison. And that’s the thing with you, Agent Starlight, you’re smart. Smarter than you look. Smarter than most.”

He stepped closer. “And that’s what makes it a problem. Because when someone that smart tells me I’m looking at it wrong, I don’t know if you’re handing me a thread... or setting a trap.”

Anya’s smile didn’t falter. “If you’re so sure I’m lying, why listen at all?”

“Because,” he leaned in slightly, his voice lowering, “ you figured something out. You understand the machine, or at least enough of it. That much you’ve proven. You’re a liar, but you’re not useless.”

She tilted her head, voice playful. “That’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.”

“Don’t get used to it,” he muttered. “I don’t know whether to trust what you say or cut out your tongue and see if silence tells more.”

Anya kept her tone breezy. “I mean, you’re working off a faulty assumption. Everyone is. I’d say it’s funny, but it’s more sad, really. For a bunch of scientists and geniuses, you’re surprisingly linear thinkers.”

Demetrius said nothing but his jaw clenched.

Anya kept going, voice smooth. “You assume I’m the key because of the blood. I get it. Obvious choice. Rare bloodline, rare traits, rare everything. Makes sense. But maybe,” she glanced up through her lashes, “it’s not about what runs through me. Maybe it’s about what my body rejects .”

He frowned slightly. Still no response, but he was listening now.

“I’ve always been… reactive to certain tech. You didn’t notice?” she asked, lying so smoothly even she nearly believed it. “Medical scanners glitch. Neural interfaces flicker. It’s like my brain doesn’t let anything sync unless I want it to. Maybe the machine’s not rejecting me. Maybe I’m rejecting it .”

A pause.

Then she grinned wider. “It’s funny. I figured that out days ago.”

Demetrius didn’t respond immediately, but the tick in his brow betrayed him.

She laughed softly. “You’re annoyed. I can see it. All this time, all this equipment, and the lab-rat in the chair figures it out before your team of PhDs.”

He didn’t bite but his silence confirmed her suspicion. They were hitting walls and they were getting desperate.

She leaned forward slightly. “Oh, don’t worry. I won’t tell you how to fix it. You’re so close, though. Just... sideways. So very sideways.”

He finally spoke. “You think I believe that crap? You’re lying through your teeth.”

She tilted her head. “Maybe. But what if I’m not? Can you afford to ignore it?”

Demetrius stood abruptly, tension radiating off of him. He didn’t say another word, he just left.

Anya sat alone in the silence again. Her smile faded. She wasn’t just playing him, she was buying time. She didn’t know how much of it she had left, but she was sure of one thing now.

It isn’t the blood. It is definitely the hair. And they’d never know that… not until it was too late.

Chapter Text

Keep Lying, You’ll See

Nathaniel woke up gasping. His head pounded like it had been caved in from the inside. His mouth was dry, thick with the taste of metal. His arms were bound to the sides of a bed with leather restraints. Panic shot through him before his rational mind could take over.

Where the hell was he?

The room was dim. Familiar wallpaper, ornate molding. Still the estate, he was still in the Desmond estate.

A door creaked open and a servant stepped in carrying a tray froze when their eyes met. Nathaniel's voice came out cracked, barely above a whisper. “What… day is it?”

The servant hesitated. “Thursday, sir.”

Thursday.

His blood turned to ice.

It had been three days since he found her shawl in the incineration cupboard. Since he kicked open the door to his uncle’s office. Since the sick realization set in that she hadn’t left him, hadn’t ghosted his texts, hadn’t run off with money like they tried to claim.

It had been three days since he tried to force his way into the basement, where he knew something was hidden. Now, almost two weeks of her disappearance since the gala. What had they done to her? Was she still alive?

The last clear memory he had has been shouting, tearing through the corridors near the wine cellar, yelling at the long corridors, opening rooms like a madman, and finding an unmarked door he suspected is where they were keeping her.

Then pain. A needle. Darkness. And now this.

He clenched his fists hard enough to leave crescent marks in his palms. “Get these off of me,” he rasped.

The servant shook his head. “I… I’m not allowed to, sir.”

“I said —” he lurched forward, straining against the leather. “ Get these off! ”

The servant backed out quickly, murmuring, “I’ll… I’ll inform the master,” before fleeing.

Nathaniel slumped back, breath ragged. They had done this. They had locked him away because they knew he was right. They’d taken Anya or Agent Starlight , they had called her.

His thoughts were a snarl of confusion and clarity. They said she’d used him, lied to him, manipulated him for an invitation, for access. They said she was a spy planted years ago. And maybe she was, maybe every smile had been part of the job. Maybe every touch, every word— all of it —was a lie.

But his heart didn’t care. It didn’t matter if she had betrayed him. He would save her not because she was innocent, not because he still believed in whatever they had, and not because he was some tragic romantic idiot, but because the idea of her hurting somewhere beneath in this house made it hard to breathe.

Because he couldn’t live with himself if he did nothing. And because, deep down, despite the betrayal, the truth, the lies, he loves her still. Even if it destroyed him, even in the wreckage of everything he’d believed. Even if she had betrayed him, he wouldn’t betray her .

He would find her, and he would gladly tear the estate apart, brick by brick, if that’s what it took.

Nathaniel stared at the ceiling, every second ticking past like a hammer against his skull. The restraints bit into his wrists, but he no longer fought them blindly. He had stopped struggling hours ago, maybe even yesterday. Time blurred in this locked wing of the estate. But his mind was clearer and more focused now. He was going to escape and he was going to get her out.

They had made a mistake by locking him up, underestimating him, thinking he’d break like a spoiled heir trapped without his toys. But Nathaniel had been raised among snakes, had learned young how to move through the shadows without alerting the monsters around him, and now, he was one of them. But not quite like them, he could still choose something better.

He tested the straps again. The right one was looser now, because the leather was worn. He’d been subtly working it, moving his wrist just so, stretching it without letting the guards notice on their brief check-ins. He needed more information, more leverage.

So he listened, he stayed still, closing his eyes whenever the door opened. Pretending to still be sedated. In that haze, he heard the servants mutter. The guards shifts. Scientists passing by the hall just outside his room, whispering updates about blood levels, stabilizers, "failed test again," and "timing misaligned with neural data."

They were doing something to her. Something that involved her body, her blood . He bit the inside of his cheek.

Later that night, when no footsteps echoed through the corridor, he made his move. With a sharp yank and a twist, he dislocated his thumb with a muffled groan, slipping the leather cuff off his swollen hand. By the time he was free, sweat coated his brow, one dislocated thumb but he was standing.

He tore the IV from his arm, grabbed the nearest thing he could use as a weapon, a silver tray and crept toward the door. It was unlocked. Sloppy.

They had assumed sedation would keep him quiet longer. The hallway outside was quiet, but the lights were dimmed. Security was looser this deep in the estate. Probably because the real danger was kept even deeper.

He knew he couldn’t go directly to the basement yet. He had no code, no map. He needed access, and someone who wouldn’t shoot him on sight.

The east wing, where his father’s personal archive and office stood. Damian kept records of everything and Nathaniel was sure, if they were experimenting on her, it would be documented. Hidden, yes, encrypted probably, but it would be there.

The office was unlocked, like always. At first it seemed like a normal office, but Nathaniel knew it wasn’t, he knew his father is hiding something here.

The office was shrouded in low shadows, the heavy drapes swallowing what little moonlight touched the windows. Nathaniel’s steps were measured, soft over the rug, his heart thudding in rhythm with each glance around the room. He had been here dozens of times before, but never like this, never to snoop . Never as a traitor to his own blood.

He moved behind the polished desk, searching through drawers that mostly held only ledgers, ink pens, and reports about public policies. Nothing personal and nothing useful. But then, he stepped wrong.

The carpet beneath his foot gave a soft, distinctive creak . It was unnatural, probably hollow. He froze, crouched low, running his fingers over the floor. The pattern was subtle, but there was a faint rectangular cut in the floorboards. A trapdoor. It blended perfectly with the aged wood and the fine weave of the rug. Hidden in plain sight.

He pulled the rug back fully and examined the seam. Locked. Of course it was.

He leaned in closer. Near the edge of the floorboard, his fingers found a barely-there groove that had tiny buttons, worn smooth, hidden under a panel. A passcode system.

Nathaniel stared at it, breath tight in his chest. Then he remembered a night a year ago, his father had borrowed his phone to check an electronic mail. When he was scrolling through the application, Nathaniel caught a glimpse of a passcode he typed in ‘ 011362 ’.

He remembered because it wasn’t familiar, it was not a birthday, not an anniversary. He had thought it strange at the time but he knew that his father wasn’t the kind of man to use random numbers for a passcode.

Nathaniel hovered his hand over the pad now, heart thudding. He’s old. He probably uses the same password for everything, right?

With a steady hand, he tried and entered 0-1-1-3-6-2 .

Click.

The lock released. Holy shit it worked.

His breath caught in his throat as the floorboard shifted. Slowly, he lifted the hidden panel. Inside, was a single matte-black lockbox and a thick file, bound with a red string.

Nathaniel pulled them both out, his fingers trembling. His hands trembled as he flipped through the thick file first, page after page of tightly packed reports and handwritten annotations. He hadn’t known what they were doing to her, he thought maybe interrogation, torture, some twisted political leverage. But this...this was something else.

He read the words once. Then again. Then a third time, as if they would make more sense the longer he stared at them.

“Prototype 1: Time-Stabilization Engine.”
“Test failures suggest lack of stabilizer agent in current subjects.”
“Subject A. Forger—Genetic Compatibility: 99.87% with Subject A. Adler (Deceased).”
“Time Regression Viability: High if stabilized.”

His fingers curled tightly around the paper. What the fuck? A time machine? His thoughts reeled. They’re building a goddamn time machine?

He nearly laughed, breathless with disbelief. It sounded insane, impossible, like something ripped out of a science fiction movie. But here it was, documents with calculations, diagrams, and transcripts of scientific meetings.

How was this all tied to her?

He rifled faster now, like a man possessed, until a photo slipped out and fluttered onto the desk. He froze. It was Anya.

No—at first glance, it was Anya , but as his eyes adjusted, he saw the slight differences. The style, the grain of the photo. It was aged, sepia-toned, and the edges curled.

And on the back, in faded ink it said.

"Anastasia Adler (1978)"

His throat tightened. The woman in the photo looked exactly like Anya. What the fuck is this? A cold shiver ran down his spine. He dropped into the floor, suddenly unsteady, staring at the image.

Nathaniel sat in front of the files, and lockbox, the secret floor board yawning open like the gaping mouth of a secret too long buried. His pulse was pounding, his breath uneven as he flipped through the thick file labeled

“SUBJECT A–ANASTASIA ADLER”

The biodata on the first page was clinical, scientific. But Nathaniel’s eyes scanned it hungrily, like a man chasing ghosts.

Name : Anastasia Isla Adler

Born : January 13, 1962

Died : November 9, 1990

Affiliation : None confirmed, presumed neutral

Education : Eden Academy, Class of 1980

Known Relations : Maximo Adler (Deceased – Father), Emilia Adler (Deceased – Mother)

Marital Status : Married to Benedict Blackbell (1985 – until her death)

Children : None recorded

Medical History : Genetically rare neuro-connective signature (Type-A stabilizer candidate)

Behavioral Notes : Reserved, highly intelligent, introverted tendencies. Recorded in several observations as "distant but perceptive."

Genetic Viability : 99.87% synchronization rate with the stabilization matrix.

Nathaniel turned the page and saw scribbled notes along the margins in his father's distinctive, precise handwriting. Some of it was barely legible, just fragmented thoughts and technical musings.

“If it’s true… blood samples matched. Neural patterns inconclusive.”

“Find the thread. She’s the key, I know it.”

“Maybe the universe isn’t linear after all.”

“She hated me at the end. Or maybe she knew.”

Who the hell was he talking about? Then something clicked.

The passcode. 011362

He flipped through the bio report in the file again Anastasia Adler : Born January 13, 1962 .

That’s what the passcode was. Not some random number, not even his father's or mother’s birthday. It was hers.

That creepy feeling inside him deepened into something darker, something he didn’t have a word for. He kept turning the pages until he found another photograph, grainy, black-and-white. Two teenagers mid-argument outside an old Eden Academy building. He recognized one instantly.

His father. The other was her—Anastasia. Even in anger, she looked heartbreakingly like Anya. A wave of nausea hit him. He leaned forward, gripping his hair.

What the hell is happening? What the actual fuck is happening?!

Anya could feel it now, in her bones, in her skin, behind her eyes. The toll of the endless blood draws, the relentless sedation, the quiet hours strapped to a chair, eyes watching her behind tinted glass. Her veins ached, her limbs felt heavier every day. Even her mind, once razor-sharp, was beginning to fray around the edges.

But she wasn’t going to break, she wouldn’t give them that. If anything, the pain only crystallized her resolve. She needed to get out and fast. Not just for herself but because every day she stayed, they got closer to unlocking something they had no right to touch.

The machine. The past. Whatever they thought they could fix, they would only destroy more. And now... now she had something they didn’t , doubt. She had planted it in Demetrius during their last conversation, feeding him misdirection wrapped in faux cooperation. A few false technicalities, just enough of the truth to bait the line. Enough to shift their perspective away from the real answer, and if she could keep playing that game… she might just buy herself the time she needed.

The heavy door hissed open. Footsteps echoed the room. She didn’t need to look to know who it was, it was Damian.

“Eat,” he said simply, placing the same steel tray down in front of her bland food, neatly divided. She didn’t move. He didn’t sit immediately, instead hovering behind her as if studying a painting, watching her too long, too hard.

“Demetrius told me what you said,” he said at last, walking around her and sitting down across the table. His expression was unreadable, save for the tightness in his jaw.

Anya didn’t respond. She slowly turned her head, blinking at him as if half-asleep.

He continued, his voice flatter this time. "You told him the machine might not work because you reject it neurally .” He paused. “Interesting theory.”

Still, she said nothing.

He narrowed his eyes. "You’re not just trying to stall, are you?”

Her lips twitched into a faint smile. “Would you blame me if I were?”

Damian leaned forward. “You’re not stupid. In fact… I know you’re lying. But you’re lying too well for it not to be worth listening to.”

Anya tilted her head. “So what is it then? You want to interrogate me… or recruit me?”

“I want to know what you know,” he said evenly. “The things you haven’t said. Because I don’t believe for a second someone like you could look at that machine and not figure out something.”

She let the silence stretch. Then, with a careful shrug, she said, “I told you everything I know, yet you’re all still there trying too hard.”

He didn’t answer.

“I mean,” she added, eyes half-lidded as she picked up the spoon, “if a machine like that relies on biomatter… maybe it’s not just about compatibility. Maybe it’s about memory.”

Damian’s eyes flickered.

“Neural rejection is real,” she continued, lying with incredible ease. “If the body doesn’t accept what it was never meant to be part of, it fails. Which makes sense. If I were… say… a genetic mimic of someone else? My brain would reject the rewrite. The machine would fail. Maybe it’s not my blood that’s the problem. Maybe it’s my brain. Or my body’s instinct to survive.”

She stirred the bland soup idly, not taking a bite. “Or,” she said, feigning nonchalance, “maybe I’m just buying time. Who knows?” She smiled at him sweetly, defiant. Damian stared at her with no reaction or any emotion. Just… studying.

Then he leaned back in his chair and said, “You’re a great liar.”

She didn’t deny it.

“So was she,” he added, almost as a whisper.

Anya blinked, caught off-guard by the weight of that sentence. He stood, gathering the tray back in his hands.

As he turned to leave, he stopped at the door. “Don’t get clever, Starlight,” he warned. “They’ll tear your mind apart if they have to.” Then he was gone and Anya was left, spoon still untouched, calculating with a racing heart and a dull ache in her chest.

She was running out of time, but she wasn’t out yet.

The deeper Nathaniel went, the tighter the knot in his chest became. As if he thought it couldn’t get worse, something slipped loose from the back of the folder, it was a folded piece of aged paper, handwritten in familiar ink.

He unfolded it. It wasn’t a report. It was a letter. His father’s handwriting was unmistakable, neat and strict, but shaken at the edges. And at the top, it read

“November 17, 1990

To Anastasia—wherever you are.

You always hated when I wrote you letters instead of saying what I meant. You said I liked to hide behind paper because paper couldn’t look me in the eye and tell me I was being stupid.

You were right. You were always right. I never said the things I should have. I thought there’d be more time. Time to make you understand, to explain why I did the things I did. Why I married Rebecca. Why I let myself become the man you said I’d regret being. I thought time was mine to control. That it was something I could outrun.

But now you’re gone and all I can do is write. I don’t know what comes after this life. I don’t even believe in much anymore. But I believe in you. And if this world is as broken as it feels, then maybe—just maybe—I can find the pieces of you in another one.

If there’s any justice in this twisted universe, then I promise I will find you again, one way or another. Maybe in the next lifetime or in another universe. Or maybe… if I’m lucky… I’ll find a way to rewrite the past. I’ll make it right, Ana.

You told me I’d waste my life trying to fix the unfixable. Well… You were always right. But I’m going to try anyway.

Until then, I’ll remain yours.

— Damian.”

Nathaniel’s hand trembled as he lowered the paper. He sat frozen in the center of the office, the letter still open in his hands, as everything began to make horrific, painful sense.

This was his father’s love? His obsession? Is that why he could never truly love his own wife? Is that why he never loved his own son? Why he always seemed haunted, distracted, regretful?

The implications spread like poison in his mind. His father didn’t just want power. He didn’t just want to alter history. He wanted her back . This wasn’t about politics. It wasn’t even about science.

It was about love , however twisted, unresolved, and buried beneath decades of silence . And if Anya is a genetic match… if she looks exactly like Anastasia…

What if his father looked at her and saw the ghost of the girl he could never have? The girl who died and the girl who might be the key to bringing her back.

His hands clenched around the letter, rage mixing with dread. His father hadn’t just seen a spy. He had seen her as the one he lost. And now, he would do anything to reclaim the past. Even if it meant destroying the future.

Nathaniel finally stood in the cold office, the letter from his father still burning in his pocket like a brand on his soul. He had just unearthed something impossible, unreal. And yet, something still didn’t sit right.

Not with his Uncle Demetrius. What was his uncle getting out of this? The time machine. The facility. The experiments. The obsession.

Demetrius hadn’t been involved with Anastasia Adler, not in the files, not in the photos, not in anything he had read. He wasn’t in the school photos. There were no letters,  o scribbled confessions. He wasn’t a thread in Anastasia’s story at all.

So then why? Why was he just as desperate? Why was he willing to kidnap, imprison, torture, and push human limits?

Then Nathaniel remembered something. A passing memory, one of those late, wine-heavy conversations he’d once had with his uncle during a summer gathering in the garden, when Demetrius had been unusually talkative.

"The problem with the world, Nate," Demetrius had said, "isn’t that it forgets the past. It’s that it repeats it. Over and over again. The powerful let it happen. We were too weak to stop it then. We won't be weak again."

At the time, Nathaniel had thought it was about politics. But now… He realized something darker. Maybe his Uncle didn’t know. Maybe he had no idea what his father’s real goal was.

Maybe he thought the machine would change history in their favor, undo political losses, shift alliances, erase betrayals. He always talked about "course correction" like history had personally wronged him.

But his father never talked about politics in the past, not once. Never dwelled on his uncle’s regrets. Never even mentioned Eden or Anastasia—not aloud, at least. Because maybe, deep down, Damian didn’t care about changing the world.

Maybe all he wanted was her . To go back, to see her again, to undo the moment she walked away. Or worse... to undo the moment she died .

Demetrius was building a political weapon. A way to rewrite wars and shape regimes. But Damian, he was building a lifeboat. A way back to the moment where he’d lost everything. The machine wasn’t about power for him, it was about grief.

Nathaniel’s throat tightened as the weight of it all crashed down on him. His uncle didn’t know the truth. He was being used as a puppet helping build a monument to a ghost.

And if his father succeeded… if the machine worked… Then Anya would be nothing more than a vessel. A shell to carry out a dead woman’s memory.

And no one would stop them except Nathaniel.

He turned away from the office, his jaw clenched, his fists shaking with purpose. Time was running out and so was Anya’s.

Chapter Text

Operation Starlight

Anya had been alone for hours. Something about the silence felt wrong, it was too long, too empty, too… expectant. She sat there eyes darting to every corner of the sterile room. The tray had been cleared, Damian hadn’t returned. She’d been handcuffed to the cold wall for hours. Ankles raw, wrists burning.

The shadows from the overhead lights were shifting as the day dragged on. The silence in the lab was unnatural, too still, too deliberate, like something was being prepared. Her breathing was calm, measured, but her pulse was hunting. Something was coming, she could feel it in her bones.

Then, without warning, the steel door unlatched and stormed open . Heavy boots thundered in. Six guards, three scientists. Too many for a "normal checkup."

One of them stepped forward with a key. She flinched on instinct, but the two closest to her reached fast, one grabbing her left arm, the other her right.

No needle. No sedative. They were keeping her awake .

“Get off me!” she snarled, wrenching hard to the side, slamming her shoulder into the chest of the nearest man. His grip faltered just enough for her to twist her arm free.

She yanked her hand free and swung the loose chain with brutal force. The nearest scientist didn’t even get a sound out, the metal slammed across his skull with a sickening crack. He hit the floor, blood blooming beneath him.

A guard raised his weapon, too slowly, s he launched forward, her heel connecting with his knee. A sharp snap and he went down screaming, before he can stand again, she was already on him, jamming the edge of the broken cuff into his throat. There was blood and gurgling. Done, dead.

Another guard charged, baton raised. She caught his wrist mid-swing, twisted hard until she heard it snap. The baton clattered, she grabbed it, spun, slammed it into the temple of the third man coming from her flank.

One. Two. Three. Down.

Her hands, though bruised and aching, still knew how to kill. Another scientist ran for the panic button. Anya didn’t let him, she swept the tranquilizer gun off the floor, aimed, and fired—Thk. The dart buried into his neck, before he could scream, he slumped. She stood, chest heaving, vision swimming from blood loss, but standing.

“GET HER UNDER CONTROL!” someone barked panic now in the air.

They weren’t expecting this much fight from her. Not after everything they’d drained from her, Agent Starlight still had fire.

Two more guards grabbed her arms. A third slammed his fist into her stomach. Her knees buckled. She didn’t scream but black danced at the edge of her vision. More punches came, controlled, tactical and enough to disable. She gasped through the blood in her mouth, muscles twitching from the trauma. She jumped and did a flip to get out, punched him through the neck. One she spun to the other as they scrambled unconscious.

But then they came, three brute soldiers. Bigger, heavier, no hesitation. Oh come on! More?! She braced, spit out the blood in her mouth and settled into position the of hand-to-hand combat. Arms up, one leg balancing her, one bracing for a kick. The first came at her with fist the size of her face, she dodged and struck back, heel to shin, knee to ribs, palm to throat. He staggered, but didn’t fall.

The second slammed into her like a wall. She hit the ground hard, breath gone, ribs screaming. She kicked up and caught him in the groin. He folded but the third was already on her, grabbing her hair and slamming her back against the wall.

She spit blood, tried to swing but her arm faltered. Another punch from the man. Then another. Her knees gave.

Damn it.

If she were at full strength, this would’ve been easy. She’d fought better, faster, deadlier Agents than them. She would have crushed them but days of sedation, blood drains, and starvation had taken their toll.

Still, she wouldn’t stop, not until she blacked out. She broke the nose of one, elbowed one so hard he screamed, kicked one down again. But three against one and she could barely stand. They finally forced her down, grunting, panting, bloodied themselves and dragged her across the floor. Cuffs clicked shut around her wrists. A black blindfold yanked over her eyes.

She didn’t scream. Just laughed, weakly, bitterly, with a little bit of mocking. “You boys hit like amateurs,” she spat, blood dripping from her lip. No one responded, just grunts and barely hidden restraints. Footsteps echoed down the corridor. They needed her awake, t hey needed her alive . Even now, half-conscious, battered and bleeding , Agent Starlight was still planning her escape.

And the moment she could stand again , she’d make them regret letting her live.

The corridor echoed with the scrape of her boots dragging against the floor. Her arms were shackled behind her, body bruised, blood dried along her temple. The blindfold suffocated her world to blackness.

Until there was light, t he cloth was ripped from her face, and she blinked hard, first against the brightness, then against the sheer scope of the room before her.

It wasn’t a lab. It was a fortress. The space stretched wider than any underground facility she’d seen. Cold metal floors, walls lined with servers and arc reactors pulsing with a blue hum. Wires snaked across the ceiling and coiled into a machine the size of a jet engine, it was suspended over a metallic pool of translucent liquid, faintly glowing. A catwalk surrounded it. Panels, screens, control stations.

And in the center, a metal chair, bolted to the ground, arms bound with hydraulic clamps. It looked like a throne for torture. She didn’t have to guess what it was for. “Wow,” she muttered, lips cracked. “What is this, a villain discount rack?” Her voice echoed.

From the far side of the room, Demetrius turned slowly and smiling. He clapped once, then twice. “Wow, Agent Starlight lives,” he drawled. “You really are something else. Killed two of our best med-techs and three guards, crippled three, if I may add. Even these idiots look like they went a round with a bear.”

He walked closer, adjusting the cuff of his immaculate coat. “Pity you didn’t leave enough of them conscious to beg for mercy.”

Anya rolled her eyes. “Sorry, I didn’t get the dress code memo. Should I have worn black leather for the interrogation?”

Demetrius’ grin sharpened as he motioned to the guards. They dragged her across the floor, cold steel biting into her knees as they strapped her wrists and ankles into the metal chair.

The restraints hissed, locking. Across the chamber, Damian stood , arms crossed, saying nothing. His eyes flickered up from the control panel as she was bound in place. He didn’t look proud. He looked... tired.

“You’ve certainly caused trouble,” Demetrius went on, circling her like a vulture. “I’ll hand it to you, Starlight. You’re a better fighter than your file suggested.”

Anya smirked through her split lip. “Your file’s outdated. Might want to cross-reference with the body count.”

Behind Demetrius, a few scientists pretended not to be terrified of her. One was visibly shaking, another kept glancing at the exit.

“Now, now,” Demetrius mused. “Don’t be so smug. You're here. Strapped down. In my machine room. And I’m sure my dear brother,” he tilted his head toward Damian, “has plenty of words for you.”

Anya leaned her head back, clanging the chair with a hollow thud. “Oh, please . You’re trying so hard to look in control, but I’ve seen cleaner operations run by high school robotics clubs.”

Demetrius laughed. “You mock. But you’re in the belly of the beast now. And your sarcasm won’t save you.”

She grinned, even as blood dripped from her temple. “It might not. But it makes me feel better knowing it’s frustrating you.”

Demetrius stepped back, giving Damian the floor. The whir of machines grew louder, turbines warming, coils vibrating with latent energy. The air around the massive room tingled faintly, like the moment before a lightning strike.

Damian stepped forward. He didn’t raise his voice, didn’t posture like his brother. He didn’t even look angry. He looked… methodical and distant like a man dissecting something fragile. “You know why you’re here,” he said quietly.

Anya didn’t answer.

He stepped closer, the metal chair groaned as she shifted to follow him with her eyes. Damian's hands slid behind his back as he studied the monitors lining the walls, brain scans, neural maps, biochemical charts. Her vitals blinked in the corner of one screen.

“We’ve calibrated the device. This time, we’ll be… watching your brain more closely,” he said. “Specifically your resistance centers, the areas responsible for memory defense, neurological rejection, subconscious shielding.”

Anya blinked slowly, her smirk crept back. “In other words,” she drawled, “you’re gonna fry me ‘til I’m a little more cooperative.”

He didn’t confirm it but he didn’t deny it either. “Our aim,” he said, still calm, “is not pain. It’s understanding. Maybe you’re right, submission to the machine is impossible if the subject’s neural architecture resists it. You’ve been... unhelpful.”

Anya laughed, low, dry, almost a cough.,“So you're gonna cook my brain into obedience,” she said. “Classic Desmond diplomacy.”

Damian didn’t flinch, but she saw it, the faint hesitation in his shoulders. The guilt he buried behind science and necessity.

“I’m not surprised,” she added, softer now, “that this was your solution.”

“We’ve tried everything else,” he said finally. “You’re too strong-willed. Even your blood resists integration. So now we test the rest of you.”

Anya looked away, breathing shallowly through her nose. “And if I die?” she asked.

“You won’t, not until it works.”

Silence.

Then she turned her head and grinned up at him, bruised and bleeding, but eyes still sharp as razors. “Well,” she said, voice venom-laced sugar, “hate to break it to you, old man, but I’m willing to die just to see you fail. You think frying my brain will change my mind?” She leaned forward as much as the chair allowed, the glow from the reactor reflecting in her eyes like embers. “You could break every bone, burn every nerve and I’ll still spit in your face.”

She chuckled. “You already lost. The moment you strapped me in here, you won’t get anything out of me.”

Damian stared at her for a moment, unreadable. Maybe trying to decide if she was bluffing. Maybe wondering if he even wanted to go through with it. But the machines were ready now. The reactor behind her began to pulse. The energy buzzed like a swarm of angry hornets. And she knew, this was just the beginning.

The briefing room at WISE headquarters was humming with tension.

A holographic projection of the Desmond estate flickered on the table, all three levels, underground chambers, security patrol paths, and known access points mapped in red and blue lines. The estate looked more like a military fortress than a home.

“Her last confirmed ping was two weeks ago,” the director said, his tone clipped, eyes sweeping across the room. “Agent Starlight is being held inside the estate. Location: sublevel three, possibly beneath the east wing lab complex. She hasn’t made contact, that ends tonight.”

Around the room stood the top minds and agents of WISE.

And at the front, standing beside the director, was Agent Dawn, lean, sharp-eyed, dressed in infiltration black. A newer name in the agency, but already with a reputation that had people comparing her precision to a younger Twilight.

“Extraction protocol is Shadow Tier,” the director continued. “This mission is off-book. If any of you are caught, you're disavowed. But we all know what’s at stake.”

Beside the director was the aging but unmistakable figures of the legendary Agent Twilight and Thorn Princess , they didn’t wear combat gear anymore, just clean suits and communication earpieces. But the look in their eyes was steel.

“She’s still alive,” Twilight said quietly, his arms crossed, analyzing every movement on the hologram like a surgeon reading a heartbeat monitor. “If she weren’t, the Desmonds wouldn’t keep the estate this heavily locked down. They’re not just holding her. They need her.”

“We trained her too well,” Thorn Princess added grimly. “But she’s not invincible.”

The director turned to Agent Dawn , flanked by the three infiltration teams.

“You’re running point. Alpha hits the south perimeter for a distraction. Bravo infiltrates through the service tunnels. Charlie, you’re going in quiet and deep through the cliffside breach. Eyes on the target at all times.”

Agent Dawn nodded. “And the moment we find her?”

“Get her out,” Loid said. “No hesitation.”

Thorn Princess leaned toward the comm controls. “If things go wrong, call out the phrase ‘Second Sun.’ That’ll activate the secondary extraction plan. But let’s not get there.”

The room went quiet for a moment, filled only by the low hum of computers and breathing.

Then the director gave the order , “Initiate Operation Starlight.”

Outside, black vans rolled out into the night. Drones lifted into the sky, shadows moved with purpose.

Back inside the war room, Twilight’s fingers tapped a rhythm on the console, scanning for movement patterns. “She was born to be one of us,” he murmured. “And she always hated cages.”

“We’ll break this one,” his wife whispered. “No matter what it takes.”

The restraints bit into her wrists and ankles as the current surged again. Anya’s back arched involuntarily, a cry ripping out of her throat before she forced it down, swallowing the sound like poison. Her muscles spasmed, her vision stuttered black, white, red then back to clarity.

She had lost count how many times they had shocked her.

Her hair clung to her face in sweat-soaked clumps. The taste of blood was in her mouth from biting down on her cheek too hard. But what scared her more than the pain was the rhythm, they were doing it in patterns, carefully controlled bursts.

Everything was being monitored. Brainwaves, pulse, synaptic feedback loops.

She caught glimpses of the screens as the scientists muttered in alarm. Even her data didn’t look normal. Everything was spiking, rejecting, collapsing, like a system actively fighting back.

Her plan had been simple, feed them false science, lead them down the wrong trail. She had said the machine failed because of neural rejection, and now, as the readings confirmed rejection after rejection, she found herself wondering.

What are the odds of it being true? Was she really rejecting the machine? 

She hadn’t meant it to be. But part of her, the scientist part, the WISE-trained analyst part, began questioning if maybe her theory had landed closer to the truth than she intended. Maybe it wasn’t just her blood or hair. Maybe something in her, her mind, her biology couldn’t be tamed.

The next wave of current hit harder than before. Her limbs jerked, the metal chair rattled. And yet, through the haze, she heard the soft scratch of pencil on paper.

She turned her head slowly.

There, seated on a high stool in the corner, was Damian, a sketchpad in hand again, pencil dancing in slow, careful strokes. He wasn’t looking at her, but she knew he was drawing her again. He had done that like it calmed him, like watching her suffer was too much but memorializing it made it distant.

He hadn’t said a word since she was electrocuted, Demetrius wasn’t in the room, thank god, but the scientists worked nervously under the knowledge that he’d return, and he’d want progress.

She hissed a breath between her teeth and laughed weakly. “You’re really drawing me while I’m being fried alive, huh?”

No response.

Her voice cracked. “Didn’t think I’d ever be your muse like this, Desmond.”

His pencil paused but still didn’t look up. Something about his silence was worse than his words.

She let her head fall back against the metal. She too a sharp breath, her voice was a rasp, “I hope it’s an ugly drawing.”

Silence again.

And then, from him, soft, almost like a whisper. “It’s not.” That was all he said.

Anya, despite the pain coursing through her, felt the chill of something stranger than fear crawl up her spine.

The forest canopy gave way to the long, sloping terrain of the Desmond estate. Shadows flickered across the undergrowth as six WISE agents advanced silently through the night, clad in black infiltration gear, visors lit faintly with data and movement sensors. Agent Dawn led the vanguard, her hand raised in a quick stop signal. The estate was massive like a sovereign city unto itself.

From the mobile command van kilometers away, voices crackled over the agents’ earpieces “Maintain stealth. Sector 3’s perimeter camera loop holding. Proceed to insertion point,” came the calm, unflinching voice of the WISE Director .

“Agent Dawn, we’re reading thermal activity on sub-level 2. She’s in there,” came another voice of Twilight, seasoned, precise.

Back in the mobile ops hub, Twilight leaned over the tactical screen, beside him, sat Thorn Princess , her arms crossed, watching the biometric readouts of her daughter with icy focus.

“She’s being electrocuted,” Yor said tightly, voice low. “You can see the cardiac spikes here. Repeated trauma.”

Twilight’s jaw tensed. “We move now. If we wait, she won’t survive another round.”

Dawn moved into the compound's service tunnel, hand signals coordinating the team as they breached through an auxiliary vent. They were halfway through the sublevel’s west wing corridor when a shadow moved down the adjacent hallway, it was fast, deliberate, armed.

She raised her tranquilizer gun instantly, but before she fired, Twilight’s voice boomed through every earpiece.

“Don’t shoot!”

Everyone froze.

“That's Nathaniel Desmond ,” Twilight continued. “He’s not a threat, not to her. He’ll help us.”

There was a pause.

Agent Dawn frowned. “Sir… he has a gun. He’s in a restricted wing. He might compromise the operation.”

Twilight’s voice was sharper this time. “You don’t know him. I do. He’s her only way out if we’re pinned. Secure him . Do not sedate. Get what he knows.”

Dawn trusted Twilight more than she trusted gravity. She nodded to her second, and within seconds, Nathaniel was pinned and disarmed, his back slammed into the cold wall of the corridor.

“Who the hell—” Nathaniel barely had time to curse before a hand clamped over his mouth.

“You’re lucky,” Dawn hissed. “Anyone else would’ve put you down.”

He was dragged silently into a side chamber. The agents sealed the door.

Nathaniel glared, panting. “Are you with—with WISE? Are you—are you here for her?”

“Yes,” Dawn snapped. “You have ten seconds. What do you know about the sublevels and how to reach her without triggering alarms?”

Nathaniel didn’t hesitate. He dropped everything. Locations, guard rotations, backup generators, lab schedules. Which corridors were faked with false walls. Which codes opened what. Which scientists were loyal and which were forced. Even the recent location of Demetrius.

When he paused to breathe, he looked up at Midnight and said, dead serious, “I don’t care what she is to you. I don’t care if she’s a spy or enemy or ghost. Just save her. Please.”

Dawn stared at him for a beat longer… then turned on her earpiece. “Twilight,” she said. “He’s in.”

The pain had become white noise. Searing volts arced through Anya’s skull, her jaw clenched, her fingers spasming where they were restrained against cold metal. Her breaths were shallow, body slick with sweat. Electrodes still pulsed at her temples, her vision spotted with black and white bursts.

One of the scientists was muttering in a panic. "Her synaptic resistance is increasing again! She’s rejecting everything—this isn’t even—this isn't human—"

Anya managed a dry laugh, “Told you,” she whispered. “Your machine doesn’t like dictators.”

Damian stood in the observation corner of the lab, sketchbook still in his hand, though he hadn’t looked up once in hours. His expression was unreadable. Maybe even… lost.

Then, there was a scream. A shrill alarm blared through the facility, echoing down the steel corridors in urgent, flashing red pulses. Warning lights danced across the walls. A scientist dropped their clipboard. Another one shouted, “We have a breach—eastern wing! Security—!”

Anya blinked, brain still reeling, then looked directly at Damian. Her lips curled into a smirk. “Looks like your time’s up.”

Damian’s head jerked toward the exit. He didn’t even look at her, but barked out orders with sudden clarity. “Secure the core server. Move the research backups. If they’re here for her, they’ll be aiming for sub levels three. Lock down sections B through D, now.”

He turned on his heel and vanished through the door. The lab exploded into panic. Guards flooded in, yelling over each other, rifles raised, several heading toward her chair. One of the scientists moved to detach the cables.

Big mistake.

Anya’s eyes flared. With the little strength she had left, she lashed out , her leg kicking the chair back just enough to unbalance the scientist, he stumbled, and she jerked her arm free, yanking an electrode and jamming it straight into his neck. He dropped screaming.

“Sedate her!” a guard roared.

She took down another with a headbutt, blood bursting from his nose. She rolled off the chair, her body slamming to the floor, but she didn't stop clawing, swinging, knees buckling, but still fighting .

A guard lunged to cuff her again but she twisted his wrist until it snapped. Another tried to shoot, but she hurled a loose table tray , smacking the barrel off-angle just in time.

“Damn it! contain her !”

Then came the bigger guards, o ne of them tackled her mid-lunge, knocking the air from her lungs. Her body hit the tiles hard, elbow cracking painfully. She kicked, bit, drove her knee into another’s throat but they were too many.

Too heavy, too fast, too well-fed. And she was... Tired, bleeding, breaking. The last thing she saw before they dragged her was the control panel exploding in sparks from a distant, internal blast because somewhere and someone was getting through.

Her final thought before darkness teased the edge of her vision was simple, “Nathaniel..”

The air was thick with smoke and shouting. Nathaniel ducked low behind a scorched pillar, the heat of a nearby explosion still singing his skin. His ears rang from the shockwave, but he didn’t stop. He couldn’t.

They told him to stay out of sight.

“You’re not trained. This is our op. Don’t compromise it.”

But they didn’t know the Desmond estate like he did, not like he did. Not like a son. He’d grown up in these halls. Knew the layouts, watched where the guards changed shifts, where the lights flickered at precisely 3:12 a.m., where the floor creaked in the library’s second panel near the globe stand. He knew how his family planned for intrusions, coldly, thoroughly, years in advance.

And he knew that his father never played fair. So when WISE agents swept through the northern wing, Nathaniel took the southern fort system where the emergency shutdown panels his father thought no one else knew about. The ones that controlled surveillance routes, gate locks, and redirected alert systems.

It took him three minutes. Three minutes to destabilize an entire section of the Desmond’s personal security system.

Then came the screams. He didn’t look back. Bodies littered the corridors, Desmond guards, a few WISE agents, one still twitching. He leaned down, shaking, and pulled the earpieces from the men’s skull, blood still warm.

“Push forward, sector four breached had been breached, cut the escape routes. Don’t let them reach the surface, eliminate on sight.” His father's voice, calm, icy, and totally in control.

And that’s when he realized, WISE was going to lose. They didn’t plan for this, not for a man like Damian Desmond. The estate wasn’t just guarded. It was engineered for war, for siege. Every escape  route had a countermeasure, every blind spot a counter-sniper. WISE agents were elite, yes. But Damian wasn’t just prepared, he was waiting .

And now they were walking into his design. Nathaniel yanked the earpiece out, chest tight with panic. He’d tried to stay out of it. They’d told him to stay back. But this, he couldn't watch this unravel. Not when she was still in there, not when Anya was still in his father’s hands.

He grabbed the discarded pistol, reloaded it, and started moving.

If WISE was going to lose this fight, then he’d end it another way.

He moved with calculated speed through the underground levels, triggering alarms where he could, sabotaging junction boxes, planting diversions in the estate’s inner defenses. He’d grown up in this fortress. He knew its arteries, studied where it bled.

And then, when the chaos peaked and explosions echoed through the upper halls, he took the descent down to the basements.

Nathaniel’s boots pounded through the metallic halls of the sublevel, each step an echo swallowed by the chaos erupting above. The estate rumbled, faint explosions shaking the steel beams and glass conduits embedded in the walls like veins. Alarms wailed in discordant tones, red lights flashing with relentless urgency.

He was underground now. Deeper than he’d ever dared go.

He didn’t know how long he had before his father noticed he’d disappeared from lockdown. But it didn’t matter. He’d already burned that bridge. There was no going back now, not after what he saw in the files. Not after learning what they were doing to her. Not after realizing what she was and who she wasn’t.

The security doors ahead groaned open with a hiss. He darted through them and ducked behind a control console. Two Desmond guards passed by, too focused on the main breach to notice him. He slipped into a side corridor, his shoulder brushing against coolant pipes that hissed from recent damage. The air was cold here, clinical, sterile, artificial like a lab.

He kept moving. The halls twisted, this part of the estate was like a maze, and he was half-running on instinct now. A soft hum vibrated through the walls, electricity, consoles, and power.

Then he saw a trail of blood. Small smears, not a lot but enough. And it looked fresh. There were also a heel scuff, a small smudged handprint along the wall. And a dark lock of hair.

He froze. He knew that color, that unmistakable pink hue dulled under the flickering lights and probably soaked by blood. He picked it up carefully, his chest tightening. “I’m close,” he whispered.

He moved faster now, more reckless. Adrenaline surged, overriding fear. He passed empty containment chambers, reinforced glass doors, and desks that had been cleared in a hurry. The deeper he went, the more the lab transformed. Less hospital, more bunker. More like the villain’s lair from a comic book, only this was real. 

A final hallway appeared. Two heavy reinforced doors sealed shut, or tried to. One of them was bent from a blast, dented inward. Someone had tried to get out or in.

Nathaniel stepped over a corpse, a scientist, with his throat crushed. He ignored it and stepped around the body as he forced the door open with a grunt.

What lay beyond stole his breath. The room was small, just a box-like room with two-way mirrors around, a bed, and there she was.

Anya.

Strapped to the walls near the bed. Blood streaked her arms and wrists where the cuffs dug into her skin. Her eyes were barely open, her body slumped forward in exhaustion but she was alive.

His breath caught and his body froze. Then everything in him snapped. “Anya!”

He sprinted to her, skidding to a stop beside the bed, his shaking hands reaching to undo the restraints. Her head turned slightly. Her voice was ragged. “N-Nate…?”

He looked like he was on the verge of breaking. “I’ve got you,” he whispered, rushing to take off the cuffs.“I’m getting you out.”

She looked up at him, dazed. “You… You aren’t supposed to be here.”

“I’m sorry I’m late, I had to take the long way,” he choked, wiping blood from her forehead. “God, what did they—”

His words caught when he saw the fresh burns on her arms, the bruises blooming down her neck, the trembling in her limbs. He unclasped the final restraint with a loud snap, and her body slumped into his arms.

“I got you,” he said again, firmer this time. “You’re not staying here. I don’t care who I have to kill.”

Anya coughed, but a spark flickered behind her bruised lids. “They’re… not going to let us walk out.”

“I didn’t come to walk,” Nathaniel growled, grabbing a discarded pistol from the floor. “I came to burn it all.”

Another explosion rocked the lab.

“You idiot,” she whispered.

He smiled faintly through the pain, brushing hair from her battered face. “Yeah. I am. And I’m your idiot now.”

Another alarm blared, this one louder, closer. Emergency override. Sector lockdown initiated.

“Shit.” Nathaniel adjusted his grip, tucking her against his chest. She was too weak to walk, but he didn’t care. “Come on, we have to go. I’ll carry you come on” he told her, voice steel.

“I can walk, it’s okay. Preserve your strength, Nate.”

He nodded and moved quickly helping her up and toward the exit.

But then they paused. Guns fired, screams echoed the walls, a WISE voice in his stolen earpiece, garbled by static.

“Agent Waraxe is down, north wing compromised. They’re closing in—there’s no way out—”

And then his father again. “Wipe them all. Prioritize her. Do not let Anastasia leave the premises.”

Nathaniel clenched his jaw, clutching Anya tighter. Anastasia, he called her Anastasia. That bastard.

“This is Nathaniel Desmond,” he said into the WISE comm, voice clear and cold. “I have Agent Starlight. I know a way out. Feed me a team or you’ll lose her for good.”

The line crackled. Then Twilight’s voice, calm and sharp as ever went through. “Copy that. Eyes on you, Nathaniel. Get her out.”

That was his signal, they ran, he didn’t care who he had to shoot. He didn’t care what he’d have to burn, b ut he swore to himself that if this place went down in flames, he’d be the one lighting the match.

Chapter Text

Catch Me If You Can

The walls were bleeding. Gunfire echoed down the marble halls, sharp and endless. Smoke clung to the air like death itself. Agent Dawn ducked behind a shattered pillar, blood trickling down her temple. Her chest rose and fell in heaving gasps as another volley of bullets tore through what was left of their cover.

“Status?” she barked into her comm. Frustration boiling over because all she could hear was static.

And then, “...Team Charlie is down. Agent Blue is gone.”

“Agent Waraxe is down north wing compromised. They’re closing in—there’s no way out—“

Her throat tightened. They were thinning fast, too fast. This wasn’t just a fortress, this was a trap . She peeked around the column, saw three of her team trying to push through the west corridor before one of them was cut down by a sniper shot from above .

The Desmond estate wasn’t sprawling, it was layered , tiered like a spider’s web with death lurking in every beam and shadow. Dawn dropped another smoke bomb and motioned her last two squadmates to shift. “Fall back! We regroup—”

That’s when the voice broke through the comms. “This is Nathaniel Desmond. I have Agent Starlight. I know a way out. Feed me a team or you’ll lose her for good.”

The name hit her like a rifle butt to the spine. Nathaniel Desmond? What the hell is he doing? Was it a trick?

She hesitated until another voice responded, firm and cutting through all doubt.

“Copy that. Eyes on you, Nathaniel. Get her out.” It was Agent Twilight. If he believed him, she had to. She might not trust Nathaniel Desmond, but she did Twilight.

“Lock on his signal!” she yelled to the remaining tech. “We get him and Agent Starlight out. That's the new objective!”

“We’re not going to make it,” Agent Shadow muttered, bleeding heavily as he reloaded. “We’re six left. They’ve got—what—fifty, a hundred left?”

Dawn didn’t flinch, she rose slightly from her crouch, eyes burning with fury. “Then we make them pay for every single one of ours.”

The walls shook again with more grenades, more counterfire. She saw WISE bodies in the rubble. She saw Desmond guards swarming like insects relentlessly, but she also saw her mission.

Agent Starlight , her colleague who never stopped fighting, never stopped pushing, a colleague she looked up to, who dragged corpses to the debriefing table like trophies. The woman who carried fire in her soul and scars on her back. Dawn knew they were never going to win the war without her, she knew she had the information that could destroy the Desmonds. And if Nathaniel Desmond could get her out, then it was their job to clear the path.

“Cover me, we get Starlight back at all cost.” she said, voice shaking as she stepped into the fire.

One by one, they lit the corridors with bullets and bodies, blazing a trail through hell, not because they thought they’d survive, but because Starlight had to. Not a single one of them was going to let Agent Starlight die in that place without a fight .

The air was thick with smoke, blood, static. Anya leaned hard on Nathaniel, every step like dragging stone. Her legs were numb, her head pounding from every volt they had put through her skull. Her wrists still stung from the restraints, the blood crusted there as fresh as her guilt.

He didn’t let go, Nathaniel’s arm was locked around her waist, holding her upright, dragging her if he had to. He wasn’t even supposed to be there. He was supposed to be mad at her for using and betraying him. But here he was getting her out.

Her lips parted, about to speak, when the intercom heard through out the halls sparked to life.

“Nathaniel.”

Her body tensed because of the sheer weight of that voice.

“I am commanding you to let her go.”

The voice crackled with that cold, surgical control only Damian Desmond had, his voice carried disappointment and menace laced into one velvet thread.

“Give her to me. Now.”

Nathaniel’s jaw clenched so tight she could hear the grind of his teeth. His grip on her waist tightened, just a little, like his bones were saying no even before he did. “Keep moving,” he said under his breath.

They did, half-running, half-stumbling past shattered lab glass and flickering lights, past dying men with the WISE insignia carved into their vests, faces Anya couldn’t look at.

“You’re not going to make it,” Damian’s voice crackled again. “WISE is falling. You’re going to lose. Let. Her. Go.”

Nathaniel didn’t respond. He reached for the earpiece he’d taken off a fallen Desmond guard and snarled into it . “Go to hell.”

He tossed it aside with a shaking hand, and kept pulling her forward, toward whatever scrap of light was left at the end of this metal graveyard.

But then, Anya stopped. Her knees locked, her body refusing to move. Guilt suddenly too hard to carry now.

Nathaniel faltered and turned back, panic flashing in his eyes. “What? What’s wrong?”

She couldn’t speak at first because she was shaking, barely upright and every bone in her body screamed. To make it worse, the intercom stuttered again.

“Stop them. Get the girl, kill Nathaniel if you have to.” Damian’s words rang like a curse.

“No, no, No—“ Anya’s hands trembled as she pushed away from Nathaniel. Her heart beating too fast, her head scrambling to keep sane with all that has happened. “Fuck. I can’t—I can’t do this.”

He grabbed her arms. “Anya, what are you saying?”

Her eyes were glassy and wild. “They’re dying because of me. Because of me. You’re gonna die because of me. ”

Nathaniel shook his head. “No—”

“Yes,” she cut in. “You… you became a traitor to your blood for me. And they’re all dying in there. Dawn. Shadow. The others. All of them. And your father—your own father —just said he’d let you die.”

Nathaniel’s face contorted, pain flashing behind his rage.

“I never meant for this,” she whispered. “Nate. I was the mission. I was the bait. Now they’re all going to die because I couldn’t stop it. Because I let them take me. Because I was too weak to die before they—”

“Stop,” he growled.

She did, but her thoughts still remained screaming.

Nathaniel stepped closer, hands gripping her shoulders, firm but shaking. “I don’t care about any of that. I’m not saving you because I think you’re innocent, or because it makes sense.”

His voice broke. “I’m saving you because I can’t live with the thought of you dying.”

Anya stared up at him, her head bloody, her heart broken, and her eyes wide with unshed tears.

“I’m a Desmond,” he said, like it tasted like ash. “I was born into war and monsters. But I’m not one of them. Not if I can save you. ”

She still shook her head, guilt smothering her chest like a knife, but Nathaniel wasn’t asking anymore. He took her hand, tugged it gently, and slowly, she followed. Behind them, the intercom shrieked again, it was Demetrius this time, fury in every syllable, barking for lockdowns, executions, fire.

The estate shook from the violence, but ahead, there was a glimmer of light through the broken walls. Anya squeezed Nathaniel’s hand tighter. Maybe she didn’t deserve saving, but she’d fight for it anyway.

Their footsteps echoed in the dim corridors, weaving through the chaos of smoke and screams. Emergency lights flashed red across the walls, alarms still wailing like the cries of dying ghosts.

Anya's breaths were ragged, but her steps became steady. Nathaniel kept pace beside her, gun tight in his hand, eyes scanning every corner.

But then, “Agent Dawn is down,” crackled a voice over a WISE comms frequency. “I repeat, Agent Dawn is down!”

Anya froze. Agent Dawn. Gone.

She staggered mid-step, forcing Nathaniel to halt. Her eyes were glassy, hollow and raw as she stared into nothing.

“They’re gone,” she murmured. “We lost.”

Nathaniel turned to her, already shaking his head. “Anya, no—”

“We lost,” she repeated, louder this time. “Even if we make it out, even if we run... they’re gone. Dawn, my team, all of them. And if we leave the machine, they’ll just try again. They will hunt me down, they’re not gonna stop until I’m dead.”

He knew what she was thinking and he hated it. Nathaniel reached for her again, but she pulled away. “Anya, we are leaving. Right now!”

Her hands clenched into fists. “No. We can’t leave. Not now.”

He blinked. “What are you talking about?”

“We need to go back. To the machine.”

“No. No, we are not going back there.”

But Anya had already turned, ready to go back to whatever hellhole she went through.

He pulled her back slightly, careful not to hurt her. “Anya, listen to me!” he snapped. “We will lose completely if we go back there.”

She turned to face him, eyes glassy but burning with resolve. “Nate, they’ll just keep going,” she said. “As long as it exists, they’ll keep trying. They’ll make it again. Refine it. Maybe it won’t be me next time. Maybe it’ll be some girl who looks like me. But they’ll try.”

Nathaniel’s jaw tightened. He knew she was right. He hated that she was right. “No, you’re hurt,” he said, voice strained. “Barely standing.”

Anya stepped closer. Her hand reached up to touch his cheek. Her thumb brushed away the streak of ash on his face. “Nate, you have to escape. You have to leave me here. I need to finish this alone.”

Nate stared at her like she was going insane, his tears threatening to fall. “No, Anya. I’m not leaving you. I came here for you, remember? If you’re doing this, then I am too.”

Her throat clenched, her eyes burning, her heart pounding too fast. With her hands still cupping his cheek, she tried so hard not to falter, “Nathaniel, I’m sorry,” she whispered, lips trembling. “I am sorry for using you. For lying to you. For breaking whatever it was we had.”

His throat clenched, eyes locking to hers. “I forgive you, Anya,” he said hoarsely. “I forgive you, because I love you. Even if you used, I still do.”

She gave him a trembling smile. “And I never deserved it.”

She leaned in and kissed his cheek. The gentlest thing in a world collapsing around them. “Thank you for coming back for me.”

Nathaniel caught her hand and pulled her into his chest. His arms locked around her like he could keep the world out. “And I’d do it again,” he murmured. “Even if it kills me.”

He pressed a kiss into her temple, and when he pulled back, his voice cracked. “Let’s burn it to the ground.”

As they turned back, their earpieces crackled.

“Starlight.”

“Starlight, fall back.”

“This is an order.”

“Retreat. Regroup. Survive.”

The voice was hoarse but familiar. It was her father begging her to retreat, then, it was followed by another, quieter voice.

“Please, baby… come home. You have to survive. That’s what matters.” That was her mother.

Anya didn’t flinch, didn’t reach up to respond. Her lips only parted slightly, eyes glassy, as she whispered , “I’m sorry, Papa. Mama.” Then she tore the earpiece from her ear and let it fall.

Nathaniel saw the tears welling in her eyes, but she didn’t cry. She just turned toward the machine corridor, and he followed her making sure she didn’t fall.

The intercom blared to life again. “Do not let them reach the machine,” said Demetrius , his voice cold and final. “Secure the girl at all costs. Keep my nephew alive. I want him to see what he’s destroyed.”

Anya straightened beside him. Despite her pain, despite the tears threatening to fall, she stood tall. “They won’t win,” she said.

“No,” Nathaniel agreed, raising his gun. “Not while we’re still breathing.”

And together, they walked toward the machine—toward the end.

The corridors blurred, her heart pounded like war drums, while her blood felt like fire. Her body, moments ago a shivering mess of exhaustion and pain, now thrummed with violent energy because of adrenaline.

Anya had swiped two syringes from fallen WISE agents they passed by. She had plunged them both into each thigh before she and Nathaniel turned back for the machine room.

It was kicking in hard now. Beside her, Nathaniel cocked the pistol he’d taken off a Desmond guard. His jaw was locked, eyes scanning, breathing sharp and steady.

Because ahead of them was a wall of guards standing like a barrier. All of them were armed to the teeth, backs to the doors of the machine room. Two dozen at least. There was no easy way through, but that wasn’t going to stop her.

Anya cracked her neck, the bones in her spine clicking like loaded triggers. She spoke without looking at Nathaniel.

"Nate, you run the flank."

He hesitated. “Anya—”

“I’m not asking. Just shoot.”

Then she ran , like a bullet. A blur of motion in the flickering red light. The first guard barely raised his rifle before she drove her elbow into his throat, crushing his windpipe. He dropped like dead weight.

The next went for a taser, but he was too slow. She spun, heel slamming into his knee with a sickening pop. He screamed as she ripped his own weapon from his grip and drove it into his ribs.

Two down.

More shouting now, more movement, muzzle flashes—

BANG.

Nathaniel’s shot split the air, taking a guard clean between the eyes. Anya rolled low under the spray of bullets, grabbed a fallen pistol, and fired three shots, dead-accurate. Two to the chest, one to the leg. A man dropped howling.

A brute lunged from the side. She ducked under his arms, drove her fist into his kidney, then jabbed his throat twice in rapid succession. He staggered, she flipped him over her shoulder into the path of more gunfire.

CRACK.

Her arm screamed, something must’ve tore. It didn’t matter, because she kept going. She wasn’t gonna stop until all of them are dead.

The, a baton cracked across her back, she turned and bit the wielder’s ear off before jamming the heel of her palm into his nose. The bones shattered, the blood spattered.

Nathaniel flanked wide, moving fast. Three guards closed in, he dropped one with a shot to the gut, ducked behind a column, then burst out and pistol whipped the next to the floor.

Anya kneed a man in the face so hard his helmet cracked in half.

She was an animal now. An animal fueled by rage, pain and the unrelenting drive to end this madness. Another came at her with a blade, she caught his wrist, twisted, and drove the knife into his thigh. Then into his chest. Then into another who lunged from behind.

The air smelled like sweat, metal, and blood.

Nathaniel shouted, “Right side, Anya!”

She turned just in time as four more coming in. One fired a gun and the bullet grazed her arm but she didn’t feel it. She moved , faster than thought, and buried a stolen dagger into his collarbone.

They kept falling. One by one. Until there were only two left, and they ran. Anya stood heaving in the aftermath, blood dripping from her temple, face battered, limbs trembling. Her body was screaming in pain but the adrenaline wouldn’t let her listen.

The hallway was littered with broken bodies, and her vision swam with motion and heat. Anya’s breath came in ragged gasps, but she was still standing, barely. The door to the machine room was finally within reach. Just a few more steps left.

But then, a sound.

Click.

Behind her was a guard, one of the last. She turned too late, because the man had already raised his rifle and angled for her shoulder, a kill shot.

She didn’t have time to dodge.

“ANYA!”

A blur moved in front of her. A body . Nathaniel.

He threw himself in the way.

The shot rang out.

BANG.

The bullet hit him clean in the back, the impact like thunder. His body jolted, breath caught in his throat, and then he collapsed into her.

Anya screamed. “Nate—NO!”

She caught him as he staggered, but he slid out of her arms and crumpled to the ground. Tears immediately stung her eyes. She dropped to her knees beside him, shaking her head in disbelief. “No… no no no no—”

His eyes blinked up at her, wide and wet. His hands trembled as they reached for hers. “I’m okay,” he choked out, voice faint. Blood pooled beneath him, soaking into the cold floor. “I’m okay, it’s not bad—”

But it was , it was so bad . The bullet had gone straight through. She could see it clear as day. He wasn’t going to make it.

"No, no. Please, you're going to be fine," she whispered desperately, clutching his shirt. "You're going to be fine, Nathaniel—I'll fix this, I promise, I’ll—” kill them all.

Another shout, there were more guards. She turned, eyes burning with rage, heat rising from his side. She would kill them all. She left him for a minute, as she lunged, rage taking over, grief weaponizing her limbs.

Two came from the left, she ran through them like a blade through paper. She took a gun and used it on the rest. Silent, mechanical, lethal. One by one, they dropped. She didn't scream, she didn't cry, not until the last body hit the floor.

When they were all gone, she ran back to him. Nathaniel was barely conscious now. His blood covered his lips, his hands started to get cold. Anya knelt down, lifted his head to her lap, her tears falling onto his face.

His mouth opened as if to speak but no words came.

“You didn’t—why did you do that?!” she sobbed. “You idiot! Why…why would you—You should have let me die! Why—?!”

He gave a faint smile. “Because it’s you.”

Her tears poured freely now, dripping onto his face, his shirt, the blood-soaked floor. His hand trembled as it lifted to her cheek. “You’re crying,” he whispered.

“Because you're DYING!” she snapped, choking. “You're bleeding out and I—I can’t stop it, Nathaniel, I can’t—”

“Anya,” he said gently, interrupting her spiral. “Shhh… I’m still here. I’m okay… for now.”

“It’s my fault! All of this is my fault! I should—I should have just let myself die! I shouldn’t have dragged you down with me.” She sobbed clutching his shoulder.

“Don’t—don’t say that,” he said, barely audible now. “I’d do it again. Don’t blame yourself. This is not your fault. I’d take a hundred bullets if it meant you lived, Anya.”

Anya sobbed harder. He gave her the faintest smile, one eye already closing. “You’re beautiful, Anya…” He inhaled like it hurt. “You’re… everything. You’re amazing.  You're the most impossible person I've ever met,” he said slowly. “And the most extraordinary.”

“Stop it,” she whispered, shaking her head. “You're not dying, not yet. You’re not leaving me. I’ll get you help—”

He smiled again, slower this time. “You always did lie better than I did.”

Anya gave a broken laugh through her sobs.

Nathaniel blinked slowly. “There’s something I wanted to do... but I thought I had more time.”

She looked down at him, tears streaking down her face. “What is it?”

“I always wondered... what it would feel like to kiss you.” A tear escaped from the corner of his eye. “Been dreaming about it. Since before I even understood why.”

Her heart shattered but she didn’t wait. Anya leaned down and pressed her lips to his, a slow and trembling kiss, as if trying to memorize the feeling.

His lips were still warm, soft. Alive but barely. She pulled back only when he gasped softly, eyes fluttering open.

“That was...” he murmured, “worth the wait.”

She kissed his forehead, his temple, his cheek, then held his face like she could keep him tethered. “Don’t go, Nate” she whispered. “Not yet. Please, just a few more minutes. Don’t leave me, yet.”

“I wish… I wish we had a lifetime,” he said, voice faint now, fading. “But if this is all I get… it’s enough. You were enough.”

His chest rose once. Then again, slower. Then… still.

Anya didn’t scream, she didn’t sob anymore. She just held him, rocking slightly, forehead pressed to his. “I'm sorry,” she whispered. “I am sorry for everything. For lying. For hurting you. For not being enough.”

But his eyes were already closed and his hand limp in hers. He didn’t get to say he forgave her again. He didn’t get to tell her she was enough. Anya wept silently, the grief a physical weight in her chest. In the distance, the machine hummed.

Anya pressed one last kiss to Nathaniel’s lifeless hand. Her trembling fingers brushed the back of it, committing the warmth to memory even as it already began to fade. “I’ll end this,” she whispered against his knuckles, her voice raw and low. “I swear it on my life. I’ll end this for you.”

She stood slowly, every part of her screaming to fall back to her knees. But grief was a dull burn now, only second to purpose. She picked up his gun, his blood still slick on the grip. With tears drying on her face, she turned from him and walked the final stretch to the machine room.

Chapter Text

What The Hell Just Happened?

The corridor was eerily quiet, either the battle was already lost, or the estate was emptying for one final offensive line. She didn’t care, all that mattered was behind that reinforced steel door.

She reached the panel and swiped the security card she'd pulled from one of the fallen guards. It beeped.

ACCESS GRANTED.

She slipped inside and slammed it shut behind her, fingers flying across the console to manually override the lock . Metal seals hissed, bolts shot into place. She was alone now with it, but with a clock ticking like a time bomb.

The room still smelled like scorched metal and sterilized wires. The arc reactors pulsed like a giant heartbeat in the dark. The machines sat like a beast in slumber.

Her fingers danced over the primary terminal, sweat dripping from her brow as she bypassed layer after layer of encrypted controls. This wasn’t new to her. WISE trained her for tech warfare, and if there was one thing she did learn from them, it was how to kill a machine.

But as her eyes scanned the control code, her blood went cold.

“Destruction Protocol: Locked. Authorized Users Only.”

And beneath that, an automated system with a password.

[Authorization: Damian Desmond] [Enter Password]
[Authorization: Demetrius Desmond] [Enter Password]

“Fuck,” she hissed.

It made sense. Of course the final fail-safe would be in their hands too. If she tried to brute-force it, the failsafe could activate the machine instead of killing it. She couldn’t risk that. She could destroy this place, but not without potentially opening a tear in time itself. Whatever they’d done to this tech... it wasn’t stable.

Then the door behind her shuddered . A loud clang erupted the room. Then another. And another.

They were coming, she was running out of time.

The intercom crackled to life above her head. “Give it up, Agent Starlight,” Demetrius Desmond’s voice rang with cruel amusement. “You’ve lost. You can’t destroy it. Only I can. And I assure you, I won’t.”

Anya froze for half a second, her hands balled into fists.

And then... she smiled. The realization struck her hard. She couldn’t end the machine, but maybe she could outplay them with it.

“Then maybe I don’t destroy it,” she said aloud, staring at the console. “Maybe I use it.”

Without another word, she quickly yanked another cord into the auxiliary port, overriding the main interface to access the machine's destination history and input logs . What she found made her chest tighten.

They had coordinates. Dates. They had already been testing it.

Anya worked with precision, like a surgeon digging into corrupted flesh. She cracked through the first two layers of encryption, then the third. The interface opened. Wow, if an amateur could do that, then maybe the scientists weren’t as smart as they seem.

Destination Coordinates: 10.13.1998
Location: Ostanian Parliament—Unity Accords

Her hands froze over the console.

1998.

That was the year the unification started to take shape. Her heart thudded in her chest. That was the moment Ostania and Westalis were beginning to talk about peace treaties. The moment when the war started to boil down. The beginning of fragile peace.

They wanted to rewrite it, WISE had been right all along. Demetrius and Damian weren’t trying to rewrite personal history. They were trying to annihilate the world’s present. Undo the peace that held everything together.

“You Ostanian bastards,” she whispered. “You were never interested in saving anyone. You really wanted war.”

The machine had already been programmed for power . A second chance to dominate history. To revert back to the old ways when Ostalis never existed.

The pounding at the door grew louder. Something slammed against it with brutal force. Steel groaned under the weight. They were getting closer.

She yanked open another panel and dug into the malfunction logs, desperate to find a weakness, literally anything that would let her shut it down before it activated. Time was slipping. Her hands burned against the keys, but she pushed through, scanning lines of corrupted code.

She made her decision , she wouldn’t destroy the machine. She would use it. Her fists clenched over the keyboard. She no longer cared about preserving the timeline. She didn’t care about her original mission, the world was already bleeding outside. Dawn was dead, WISE is gone, Nathaniel was gone.

She had to go back, and the only way to stop it… was to end it at the source. She input new coordinates.

She inputed her destination, September 13, 2025. Just a day after her mission was given. She would go back, inform WISE of the plan, then retrace her steps so that she wouldn’t make the same mistakes again. Three weeks, she’d go back just three weeks before everything happened.

The machine whined to life. A high-pitched hum filled the room, the core spinning faster now, the arc reactor glowing with volatile heat.

Then the intercom flared, Demetrius’ voice gloating over the speakers again. “You won’t win, Starlight. Give it up. You can’t destroy it. You’re too late.”

Anya stared at the spinning core and whispered under her breath. “I’m not here to destroy it.” The light reflected in her eyes. “I’m going to use it to kill you.”

Anya stared at the interface, every breath ragged, chest heaving. Her blood smeared the console, drying around the edges of the screen in rust-colored streaks. The core suddenly stopped, then a warning sign came up the monitors.

"Authentication: Incomplete."

“What?!” She whispered, then tried restarting it again. It did the same like last time, but it wasn’t working at all. It spins, but then stops. “Ugh! What is wrong?!”

She slammed her palm against the control panel. “No! No, damn it—work!”

The machine just blinked back at her, steady and cold. Like it was waiting, like it was listening. She’d done everything she could. She cracked into the encrypted schematics, inputted the coordinates correctly , but the machine refused.

“Authentication: Incomplete.”

Anya staggered back, blood still dripping from her cut palm. Her eyes scanned the room wildly, searching for anything that could give her a clue. What was missing ? What more do you want from me?

Her hands trembled and her knees buckled, she slumped against the steel wall, staring at the flickering screen as if it were mocking her. Something primal and dark began curling in her chest.

She wanted to scream. “What am I missing?!” Her vision blurred and her blood roared in her ears.

Just then , the world fell away. Not in reality, but inside her mind. The silence was sudden. She stood, barefoot, in a vast white space, it was almost as if she was standing on water, her reflection staring back at her. Her wounds were gone, and the pain was gone.

When she turned, and there it was. The pool , still, silent, and almost sacred. The liquid shimmered like mercury, as if it held the reflection of something ancient. Wires slithered into the water like serpents. When she looked up, there was nothing. Just endless white light.

And then came the vision, she saw herself—no. She saw someone that looked like her floating in the pool. Her body, calm, lifeless, glowing. Her hair, fanned out in golden-pink tendrils around her like a halo, drifted and danced in slow motion. Her eyes were closed, her lips parted, serene. And her arms were bloody.

The wires wrapped around her limbs, pulsing like veins. A soft hum thrummed through the water, like a heartbeat syncing with the machine. And then—her double opened her eyes. Glowing green met hers, then she whispered with her voice, from the water.

“You know what you have to do.”

Anya gasped and snapped back to reality. Her heart raced as she searched for the woman she saw floating at the pool.

Then, her eyes flickered to the pool inside the room. It looked eerily similar with the vision she just saw. Then came the realization, it was eerily familiar because it was the vision.

The pool was the machine. It wasn’t the console, or the arc reactor, it was never them.

She staggered to her feet, scrambling to get to the pool. The door was cracking, metal groaned as crowbars wedged into the seams. She heard guards shouting, heard Demetrius’ cold voice through the intercom.

“You lost, Agent Starlight. Stand down. You won’t destroy it.”

She didn’t reply. Instead, she ran. Her feet pounded the metal floors. She rounded the corner and skidded to a halt before the pool. Six feet deep, still, wired and breathing.  It hummed louder when she approached.

She stood at the edge, staring down at it. Her reflection looked back, wild-eyed, bruised, blood-soaked, haunted. Her hair stuck to her face with sweat and dirt. She knew it wanted all of her. Not just her blood, or her hair, everything.

The lab doors finally screeched open, metal bending under the pressure of crowbars and brute force. Anya stood alone by the edge of the pool.

The moment the reinforced door gave way, armed Desmond guards stormed in with guns drawn, steps precise, flanking like wolves around a dying star. The blue-white glow from the pool behind her bathed the room in something ghostly.

When she looked back at the guards, Demetrius Desmond stood at the front of the horde. His suit was immaculate, not a stain on him despite the bloodshed his orders had spilled. He stepped inside with the casual arrogance of a man who believed he had already won. Behind him, Damian followed his face pale, his eyes locked on Anya.

The guards began to spread out, raising rifles with precision. But then , Anya raised a knife , she held it steady, poised just above her wrist.

Every muscle in the room tensed.

“Wait.” Demetrius lifted a hand. His voice was sharp, commanding, urgent. “Everyone stand down.”

The guards froze instantly.

“She’s not allowed to die.” He stepped forward slowly, eyeing the blade. “You’re smarter than that, Agent Starlight. Don’t be dramatic. You think ending your life will stop us?”

Anya didn’t respond, her eyes flickered to the pool, then back to him. Behind Demetrius, Damian took a step forward.

“You don’t have to do this,” Damian said, stepping forward. His voice lowered, softening. “Anastasia… please. Don’t throw your life away.”

She looked at him with disgust and anger fused into one dangerous expression . Then she smiled , “Fuck both of you. I am not Anastasia. I am Agent Starlight, and it is my mission to stop you. So don’t you worry, Desmond. I am not here to kill myself.” she whispered. “Not until I kill both of you.”

Demetrius chuckled, amused, almost impressed. “Still holding on to that righteous fury, even now?”

Anya didn’t answer him. Instead, she took the small knife and with a sharp, practiced motion, sliced her wrist open. Blood spilled freely, dripping onto the pool’s surface.

The machine responded. It shimmered and it hummed as if it was awake.

Demetrius staggered back. “What…?” he muttered, blinking.

The humming intensified.

“What is that—what the hell is it doing?”

The cables sparked, then a surge of light burst from the center of the pool. From the look on their faces, she could tell that it never done that before.

“The machine—why is it reacting like that?” he barked at the scientists nearby, but no one had an answer. Everyone was backing away, shielding their eyes from the sudden brilliance. The machine, for the first time since its construction, looked… alive.

Damian’s voice cut through the chaos. “Anastasia, STOP!” he shouted, trying to push forward. But Anya, bleeding and bright, had already stepped to the edge. Her body was trembling, but her face was calm and certain.

“You built it for power. You built it for control,” she said, voice steady even as the light surrounded her. “But you forgot one thing, machines don’t pick sides—people do.”

And then, she let herself fall. Her wrist bleeding, her eyes blazing, her body arched back , I’ll see you in the past. Catch me if you can.

“NO!” Damian lunged, his fingers just grazing the air where she had stood. Her body plunged into the pool. The surface exploded with light. A sonic boom cracked through the chamber.

Guards were flung across the walls. Consoles shorted, sparks rained like fire. Demetrius stumbled, caught himself against a rail. He stared in disbelief. Damian crawled to the edge of the pool, shaking, staring into the blinding glow, but she was gone.

There was a splash, but there was no trace of her, just the soft, low pulse of a machine now activated. And time, roaring back to life.

Water.

It consumed everything. Dark, suffocating, cold. It coiled around her like iron chains, dragging her down into an endless abyss. Her limbs flailed, but they felt foreign, sluggish, like they belonged to someone else. Her lungs screamed for air, but the glowing blue liquid only slithered in, thick and unnatural, drowning the scream before it could escape.

Her vision blurred, colors bleeding at the edges, the world narrowing to flickering shadows. The pressure crushed her chest. Her heartbeat thundered in her ears, frantic and fading.

She was slipping into darkness, into silence.

No... not yet. Not yet—

A sudden light exploded behind her eyes. Blinding, searing. Her body jerked.

Then, there was air. She broke the surface with a guttural gasp, choking and retching as water forced itself from her lungs. Her back arched violently. Every breath was a blade, stabbing her ribs as life crashed into her like a defibrillator. She convulsed, half-submerged, clinging to a world she wasn’t sure was real.

The hands gripping her were warm and steady.

“ Anastasia! Anastasia, look at me! Are you alright?! ”

She blinked, disoriented. Her vision swam, everything a blur of light and water and pain. Her lungs burned. Her throat was raw. She coughed again, harder, her body shuddering with the force.

The face above that was staring back at her made her entire being frozen in disbelief. For a brief, glorious second, her heart sang because staring right at her was Nathaniel.

No… it couldn’t be. Could it? Her heart seized.

Nathaniel?! Her first instinct was to ask. Was she hallucinating? Was she dreaming? Was she dead? Maybe this was the afterlife, gentle, cruel, and kind all at once. Maybe none of this was real. Maybe she never made it out of that glowing abyss. Maybe she never existed at all.

She tried to say his name, but her voice cracked and broke into a sob. She reached for him, trembling, and wrapped her arms around him, burying her face into the crisp white of his shirt. His scent was clean, he smelled like fresh soap and the faintest trace of aftershave, that hit her senses like a freight train.

She gripped his body tighter. 

“Nate…? Is that really you?” she choked.

But then, something was wrong. The body in her arms didn’t relax into her hold the way Nate’s would. It stiffened, like it was confused. The hands on her shoulders didn’t curl instinctively around her the way they always would. They hovered, uncertain, like she was something fragile and foreign. Like he didn’t know her.

Her breath caught. No… no, no.

She slowly peeled herself back, her hands shaking as she lifted her head. Her gaze dropped to the blazer he wore, Eden Academy’s uniforms. The spring uniform, trimmed and pressed, a small crest gleaming on his chest. She blinked, hard.

She looked down at herself. She was also in uniform , not the one she wore in the lab.
She was dressed like a student. The skirt was a little too big, the shirt clung soaked and wrinkled to her body. Her tie stuck to her skin, and strands of wet hair framed her face, dripping steadily into her lap.

What the hell is happening?

When she looked back up to Nathaniel, she saw that his features were just slightly off. The eyes were the same color, but his brow had a faint scar. His jaw was sharper, and didn’t have the mole it used to have. His shoulders were broader, his lashes were too long and his lips were thinner.

Her mind screamed to make sense of it. Five seconds passed. Then ten. A full minute. Then two. She just stared, trembled, heart pounding and pulse spiking. Her body felt detached, as if it were floating underwater again.

Was she dead? Her eyes darted wildly. Gone was the Desmond Machines. Gone was the humming steel, the warping energy, the blue vortex of light.

Now there were tiles, steam and the smell of chlorine. There was a pool—a school pool. Eden’s crest glared down at her from the walls. Logos on every banner. She was in Eden Academy. Somehow. Somewhere.

What is this? Why am I here? Was that all a dream? Is this the dream?

She turned to him again, this not-quite-Nathaniel. Her voice was barely a whisper.

“What? Where are we, Nathaniel?” she whispered.

He tilted his head, confused. Then gave a small, nervous smile. “Huh? Who’s Nathaniel?” he said, cocking a brow. “It’s me. Damian. Damian Desmond.”

Everything shattered. Her heart caved in on itself. She jerked back like she’d been struck across the face. The back of her legs scraped painfully against the rough tile as she scrambled away, hands behind her like she was warding off a ghost. Her chest heaved, breath coming in short, shallow gasps.

No. No. Not again. She couldn’t breathe. Her vision blurred again, not from water this time, but from raw, unfiltered panic. She searched wildly around the pool, hoping and praying that this was some hallucination. That she was caught in a side effect from the jump. But it was all real.

Students were beginning to gather. Eden Academy uniforms in every direction, neatly pressed blazers, pressed slacks and skirts, polished shoes. Girls whispered, boys pointed. Some were intrigued, while others were already calling for teachers.

She was the center of attention, disheveled and soaked. And the boy in front of her, the one she couldn’t stop staring at with utter heartbreak, was Damian Desmond. Her enemy, her target, and her past—no, her present? She didn’t know what was the past anymore.

He looked at her like she was no one, like he’d never seen her before. She stared at him again, heart clenched and crumbling. Was this really Damian? Was this the same man who tried to kill her? How? How could this be happening? How could it all be real ?

“Anastasia?” he said again, slower this time. “Are you hurt? How did you even fall in the pool like that?”

Anastasia? What the hell? Her soaked shoes squeaked against the tile as she reeled away from him, legs nearly giving out beneath her. Her balance faltered, hands flailing midair before she caught herself against the edge of the pool. Her breath hitched and her eyes darted wildly between him and the crowd forming around them.

“Anastasia…”

He’d called her that, that wasn’t possible. Anastasia Adler was dead. If this was 2025, Anastasia Adler is dead. So why…. Wait.

Her heart pounded so violently it drowned out the rest of the world. The laughter, the whispers, even the splash of the nearby pool seemed to fade under the sound of her panic.

Why had he called her Anastasia? And why did he look like Nate ? Too much like Nate. She knows there must have been some resemblance between them since he was his father but this was some next level look-alike. If anything, he looked the exact same, a carbon copy, a doppelgänger.

Her hands gripped the concrete ledge behind her like it was the only thing keeping her from falling into the sky. Her mind raced, his jawline, the curve of his eyes, the tilt of his smile, it was all wrong but so painfully close. Nate’s ghost in a younger shell.

She could barely breathe. Her eyes locked on his face again, searching, hunting for a clue or some divine explanation. Why? Why did the man she had jumped through time to kill now look like the man who had died trying to save her?

“Are you okay?” he asked again, stepping forward slowly, palms slightly raised. Like she was something wild, something fragile. His voice was calmer now.

“Anastasia… do you—do you need to go to the infirmary?”

She flinched again. That name. That cursed name.

"Stop calling me that," she whispered, more to herself than him.

He blinked, confused. “But that’s your name.”

“No—” She shook her head, her vision clouding. “No it’s not.”

Her eyes darted to the students gathering nearby. Their faces blurred. Their mouths moved, but she couldn’t hear them. Her breath came in ragged stabs of air. She clutched the soaked fabric of her uniform, fingers digging into it like she could tear herself out of this moment—out of this body—out of this wrongness.

She was shaking. No, she was unraveling. Her mouth opened and the question fell out in a cracked whisper, “What… what day is it?”

Damian blinked, confused, glancing back toward the group of boys behind him who watched with the kind of silent fascination reserved for train wrecks and public meltdowns.

Then, carefully, he turned back to her. “Thursday. The 14th.”

She swallowed, but her throat was sandpaper. Her skin felt too tight, her heart was climbing up her ribs like it wanted out. She forced her mouth open again.

“…What year?”

He frowned. “What?”

Her head snapped up, her voice sharp now, rising with panic.

“ What year is it? ”

There was a pause, a silence so long it made her want to scream.

And then softly, uncertainly, he answered “…it’s 1979.”

The world collapsed, the air left her lungs in one violent, audible gasp so forceful it bent her forward, her body folding in on itself. Her knees gave way, slamming hard against the wet tile. Somewhere, someone in the crowd gasped, but it might as well have been miles away. She didn’t hear them.

1979. Not 2025. Not a few weeks before the mission. Not before she got kidnapped. She was four decades too far and she wasn’t just in the past, she was before the war. Before the unification, before her parents ever met and before she even existed.

“No,” she whispered, pressing her hands to her face. “No, no, no—this isn’t right. This isn’t what I meant to do.”

Her thoughts spiraled. The jump must have malfunctioned. The machine… Something must’ve gone wrong. She’d calibrated it herself, she set the target date carefully. She was supposed to be weeks back. Not… this.

She heard her name again, that name.

Damian Desmond (apparently ) reached out gently. “Anastasia—”

“Stop calling me that!” she shrieked, swatting his hand away. “Stop calling me that, you’re not—”

You’re not Nathaniel. She didn’t say it because he looked just enough like him to make her want to scream. And somehow, this world thought she was someone else, too. She was Anastasia .

She looked at him one last time. Nathaniel’s face in another timeline , but it was Damian Desmond.  Her enemy, her ghost, her tether to the future she’d lost. And he didn’t even know her.