Ahead, through the smoke, headlights cut through the haze—the evac truck. River stood on the roof, waving his arm, shouting something I couldn’t hear over the roar. Oliver and Gage were covering both flanks, their muzzles flashing in bright, controlled bursts.
We were thirty yards out when the ground split. A fissure ripped through the dock, dropping steel plates into the black water below. The air filled with the sound of tearing metal.
“Jump!” Beckett yelled.
We leapt. The dock behind us collapsed in a chain reaction of explosions, each one closer, hotter, louder. My boots hit the edge of the pier, slipped on wet steel—and Beckett caught me, pulling me up as another blast hurled fire into the sky.
River grabbed Beckett’s other arm, hauling both of us into the truck. The door slammed.
“Go!” I shouted.
The driver hit the gas. Tires screamed against asphalt, and the truck tore down the pier just as the last detonation ripped through the port. The shockwave hit us like a hammer, throwing debris across the windshield. For a moment, daylight burned where night had been.
Then silence—only the crackle of distant flames and the hiss of the sea swallowing what was left.
I pressed a hand to my chest, trying to find my breath. Beckett’s arm came around me, holding tight. His face was streaked with ash, eyes fierce and alive.
“Everyone in one piece?” River asked from the front seat.
“Mostly,” Gage said, coughing. “But if anyone’s keeping score, that was one hell of an exit.”
Cyclone’s voice came through the comm, faint and shaky. “Port’s gone. No more Hydra signals. Viktor’s dead.”
Beckett leaned his head back against the seat, exhaling hard. “Then it’s over.”
For a moment, it almost felt true. The truck rumbled over cracked pavement, flames fading in the rearview mirror. I turned to look one last time—at the city, the smoke, the burning reflection on the water.
Maybe Hydra would rise again. Maybe not. But tonight, we’d survived.
And for the first time in a long time, survival felt like victory.
86
Beckett
The morning was quiet in a way I hadn’t heard in years.
No alarms. No gunfire. No shouted orders cut through the static.
Just sunlight spilling through the cracked blinds and the soft sound of Elara breathing beside me.
The safehouse was still, the others asleep or pretending to be. Cyclone’s gear hummed faintly from the next room, a low, steady reminder that the world hadn’t stopped—but the fight had. At least for now.
I lay there for a while, watching her. Her hair was loose, tangled from the night before, her skin still marked faintly with smoke and shadow. We’d crawled into this bed somewhere between exhaustion and disbelief, half expecting another explosion to wake us. It hadn’t come.
When she stirred, her eyes opened slowly, that soft blue that could cut through any chaos. She blinked once, saw me watching, and smiled—tired but real.
“It’s morning,” she whispered.
“Feels strange, doesn’t it?”
“Yeah.” She turned toward me, the blanket sliding low across her shoulder. “We made it.”
I reached out, brushed my fingers along her jaw. “We did more than that. We ended it.”
Her hand covered mine. “For now.”
“‘For now’ is good enough.”
