The message arrived at 05:12 a.m.

  A soft ping on Sarah Kinney’s workstation—an anonymous window blooming like a ghost across her monitor. No sender. No metadata. No trace.

  It’s time.

  Get the girl.

  Do not draw attention to yourself.

  This message will erase itself.

  Sarah’s breath hitched.

  Her pulse stuttered in her neck.

  This was it—her one sliver of hope, the invisible hand she had gambled her sanity on.

  She closed the window.

  Before she could rise, before she could even push her chair back, a familiar voice cut across the b, “Dr. Kinney.”

  Zander Rice.

  Of course.

  He stood blocking the doorway, arms folded, eyes like polished bone—clinical and hungry.

  “Going somewhere?” he asked.

  Sarah swallowed, keeping her hands still. “I was going to check on X-23’s vitals. Her REM cycle has been shortening—”

  “That won’t be necessary,” Rice said, stepping into the room. “We’ll be conducting another test cycle within the hour.”

  Her blood went cold.

  Another test. Another round of brutality disguised as research.

  She forced a nod, hands clenched so tightly the nails bit her palms, “Very well, I understand.”

  Rice’s gaze lingered—suspicious, dissecting—before he turned away.

  “For your sake, Dr. Kinney,” he murmured, “don’t get too attached to that thing. It is, after all, just an experiment. So make sure not to do anything stupid.”

  Back at the Revelstoke Safehouse about thirty minutes earlier

  Mack’s voice was a gravelly whisper over the secure line.

  “The route has been confirmed. The window will stay open for forty minutes. The facility is receiving a shipment, so there should be weak spots here and there. Do not screw this up, boss dy.”

  Delih’s jaw twitched.

  Then she hung up on him.

  The others were already gearing up in the basement.

  Taskmaster finished strapping on a chest rig, a white mask that looked like a skull. Domino lounged against a crate, rolling a combat knife over her knuckles, posture zy but eyes hyper-aware. Silver Sable inspected her sidearm one st time, her Wild Pack operatives forming a precise formation behind her like silver ghosts.

  Mack stood near the top of the stairs, coat wrinkled, eyes bloodshot, clipboard in hand like a battlefield accountant.

  “This is your show,” he said as he walked down the stairs. “Don’t get these people killed. I don’t need mercenaries afraid to work with me.”

  Delih slid her pistol into its thigh holster. “Just tell them to keep up, and they won’t.”

  Taskmaster chuckled. “That’s quite the confidence you have there. I like that in a commander. Usually means the funeral is closed-casket, though.”

  She scoffed at him, “Yours or mine?”

  “Guess we’ll find out soon.”

  “Whatever. Move out.”

  Within 10 minutes of leaving the town, the forest swallowed them whole.

  Snow muted their steps. Cold air bit at their faces. The facility loomed ahead—steel, concrete, floodlights, fences humming with silent electricity. The perfect cage.

  Delih raised two fingers.

  The team fanned out.

  A guard patrol turned the corner—too early.

  Delih tensed—

  A metal cng echoed behind the guards.

  They spun toward it—

  A toolbox, perfectly toppled.

  Domino winked, blowing on her fingers like a gunslinger, “Accidents everywhere today. Lucky us.”

  Taskmaster muttered, “Mutant show-off.”

  But it worked.

  They slipped past unseen.

  Taskmaster examined the guard rotations on Delih’s tablet, “Movement pattern repeats every three minutes, thirty-two seconds,” he said. “Left guard drags his left leg, slower pace. The gap window is eight seconds. Easy.”

  Sable gave a curt nod. “Then let’s make use of it.”

  Domino triggered a micro-EMP.

  The lights stuttered, and the cameras blinked. The auto-locks attempted to engage—but jammed halfway.

  Taskmaster smirked. “God dammit. I hate how easy it is for you.”

  Domino shrugged. “Lucky, right?”

  With their window open, Sable’s team got to work. The fence cutting took twelve seconds. Crossing the open yard took nine. The wild pack, if anything were efficient at what they did best.

  Inside the first hallway, a guard turned—eyes widening—

  Two shots.

  Sable didn’t hesitate.

  Her men dragged the bodies into a maintenance alcove and changed into their uniforms with mechanical efficiency.

  “Positions secured,” one Wild Pack agent said. “We’re the new shift now.”

  “Good.” Delih turned to the others. “We’ll split up here. Team Alpha’s (Delih & Taskmaster) objective is to locate X-23’s containment chamber. Team Beta’s (Sable & Domino) objective is to capture a scientist. Extract the locations of Dr. Martin Sutter and Zander Rice and, if possible, terminate them.”

  Mack coordinated both teams from the safehouse through a scrambled comm line. “Clock’s running. You have ninety minutes until they figure out someone got inside. Soon we’ll have a full patrol reset.”

  Sable and Domino moved quietly like shadows through the west wing.

  A lone scientist stepped out of Lab C, clutching a clipboard.

  Domino stuck a pistol under his jaw. “Don’t scream. I don’t feel like buying new clothes tonight.”

  He nearly fainted.

  Sable nodded. “He’ll do, take him.”

  They dragged him into an empty storage room.

  Domino crossed her arms. “Okay, doc. We can do this fast or fun. I’m flexible. You get to choose. Fast way, you tell me where Dr. Martin Sutter and Zander Rice are. Fun way, I break quite a few bones, and you still tell me where Dr. Martin Sutter and Zander Rice are.”

  He colpsed into a stuttering mess of words.

  “D-Dr. Sutter is on Sublevel Three! Dr. Rice is—he’s in operations! Please don’t kill me!”

  Domino sighed. “Man, you scientists are all cowards. Should we go now?”

  Sable leaned in, voice smooth and icy. “No, wait. Okay, here’s the deal: we won’t kill you if you help us map the area and tell us great detail about any security measures in pce.”

  Fifteen seconds ter, they had the yout.

  Sable didn’t even look at him when she shot him with a tranquilizer dart. “Let’s go.”

  “Wow, you’re really letting him go?” asked Domino

  “Yes, I promised, and besides, he still has to make it out by himself if he wants to live. I simply promised that we wouldn’t kill him, and we didn’t,” answered Sable.

  Back with Team Alpha, Delih and Taskmaster descended metal stairs spiraling deep underground, past reinforced bst doors and humidity-controlled airlocks.

  The deeper they went, the colder it became.

  Taskmaster flicked on his tactical scanner. “Biometric suppression fields. Someone down here doesn’t want to be found.”

  “Laura,” Delih murmured.

  The corridor narrowed. Lights flickered dimly.

  Then they saw it—a heavy sliding vault door beled:

  SUBJECT X-23

  RESTRICTED

  Taskmaster raised an eyebrow. “Well. That’s subtle.”

  Delih pced her ear to the door.

  Nothing.

  Just—stillness.

  She gnced at Taskmaster. “Help me with this.”

  He cracked his knuckles. “Sure, but I’m not the lucky girl; whatever I do will make a loud noise, and the enemy will know we’re here. Do you still want me to do it?”

  Delih nodded, and Taskmaster pced charges on different points on the door.

  3… 2… 1—

  The bst tore open the door with a loud boom as the two hid in the back. Soon, red arms started bring as cold air rushed out from the bst hole.

  And sitting in the far corner of the room… was a girl.

  Small. Thin. Bare feet against the steel floor. Hair dark and unwashed. Wrist bleeding—

  —then knitting itself back together in seconds.

  Her cws—two extending from each hand, one from each foot—glinted beneath the red arm lights.

  She looked up at them with eyes far too old for her age.

  Green, sharp, feral.

  Haunted.

  Delih took a single step forward.

  “Laura? X-23?”

  The girl didn’t answer.

  She didn’t need to.

  The fear in her eyes wasn’t for the strangers at the door.

  It was for everything behind them.

  Taskmaster muttered, “Intel says the kid’s a weapon. Should we tranq her and figure out the rest ter?”

  Delih’s jaw clenched. “No. She’s a child, besides she’d heal from it in seconds.”

  Laura blinked.

  Slowly.

  Like someone trying to decide whether to watch—or kill.

  Taskmaster takes half a step forward—instinct, testing distance, and Laura moves.

  She doesn’t attack, doesn’t sh out.

  She repositions.

  Silent. Precise. Deadly.

  A single shift of weight that puts her in kill-range of everyone in the room.

  Taskmaster freezes, “Yeah,” he mutters. “Definitely not tranqing that.”

  Back in the Upper Facility. Sarah Kinney moved faster than she ever had in her life, navigating the hallways with forced calm. Every hair on her body stood on end, her instincts screaming at her to reach her daughter.

  A whisper of footsteps behind her.

  “Dr. Kinney.”

  Rice again.

  Her stomach dropped.

  “You seem anxious, Dr. Kinney.”

  “Just tired,” she managed. “It’s been a long night.”

  Rice tilted his head, studying her like a puzzle. “Perhaps I should accompany you to X-23’s chamber. Check on her condition before we schedule the next test.”

  Her heart nearly stopped.

  But before she could answer, arms began to bre through the entire facility.

  UNAUTHORIZED BREACH – SUBLEVEL ACCESS

  CONTAINMENT THREAT DETECTED

  Chaos.

  Guards ran. Lights fshed red. Rice swore and sprinted toward Operations.

  Sarah inhaled sharply.

  She ran in the opposite direction.

  Toward her daughter.

  Taskmaster assessed Laura as if she were an enemy.

  “She’s evaluating threat vectors,” he murmured. “It looks like she pns to go for the jugur first. I suggest we take her down quickly.”

  “I said she’s a child,” Delih snapped.

  Laura flexed her fingers.

  Her cws snikted out with a metallic whisper.

  Taskmaster reached for his sword.

  Delih raised a hand. “Stand down.”

  She crouched slowly, lowering herself to Laura’s height.

  “I’m here to take you out of here.”

  Laura tilted her head.

  Her nostrils fred.

  She smelled blood, gun oil, metal, and—She froze.

  Sarah, her mother’s scent.

  The girl whispered, voice barely audible, cracked with disuse, “…Mother?”

  Delih’s chest tightened as she remembered her own past, “We’re getting her next.”

  Laura stood.

  Silent.

  Terrifying.

  Taskmaster exhaled. “Well. That was easier than I expected.”

  Delih gred. “Shut up.”

  Sarah kept running as she rounded the corner—and nearly colpsed when she saw Laura standing outside the containment chamber with two armed mercenaries.

  Laura’s face broke slightly, “Mother.”

  Sarah ran to her, dropped to her knees, holding her daughter’s face like a prayer. “I’m here. I’m here. I’m here.”

  Delih stepped back, giving them space.

  Taskmaster muttered, “Heartwarming. We don’t have time for this, let’s move.”

  Sarah looked up, eyes shining with terror, “Are you the ones who sent the message?”

  Delih extended a hand, “Yes, we’re your extraction team.”

  Sarah took it without hesitation.

  The arms intensified overhead.

  Sutter and Rice were on the move.

  Security teams flooded the sublevels.

  Domino’s voice crackled over the comms, “Beta Team ready. Targets located. Sable says we have ten minutes max until full lockdown. What’s your status?”

  Delih looked at Laura, then at Sarah—breathing hard, holding on with every scrap of strength left.

  She clicked her comm, “Alpha Team has the two targets. Extraction begins now.”

  Taskmaster smirked behind his mask, “Time to earn our paycheck.”