“Who?” asks Kat, and I hold my breath.
“Paragon,” he practically spits out. “That’s my theory, anyway. He appeared out of nowhere—no origin story, no background, just suddenly Vanguard’s partner.”
“You think Paragon is synthetic?” Kat asks.
“I think he’s their proof of concept. First successful integration.” He pauses, and something uncertain crosses his face. “I can’t confirm it, of course—Global Dynamix keeps him locked down tighter than Vanguard. But the timing fits. The way he moves, the way he speaks. There’s something off about him.”
He leans in, his voice lowering. “And if I’m right, then they know it works. They want more, an army they can sell to the highest bidder—soldiers who follow orders without question because their loyalty can be programmed. That’s what Kozlov is supplying minds and bodies for. That’s why a lot of those detention centers from the Dark Decade never really shut down. That’s why Kapoor had to disappear—he found the connection between the trafficking and the research, and he was going to blow the whole thing open.”
I sit back, trying to process it all. Global Dynamix isn’t just experimenting on people against their will—they’re building weapons, synthetic soldiers with human minds, created through a process that kills the original. And somewhere in that pipeline are Kozlov’s victims and who knows who else, people who thought they were escaping to a better life. Instead, they became raw material for something monstrous.
Holyfuck.
“Does Vanguard know?” I ask abruptly. “About any of this?”
“I doubt it. He’s their golden boy, their public face. They wouldn’t risk contaminating him with the ugly details.” He starts gathering his things. “That’s everything I have. The rest is up to you.”
He’s gone before I can ask anything else, slipping into the red-lit darkness like he was never there.
Time’s up.
The walk back to the subway is silent. The autumn air nips at my nose, but I barely feel it. My mind keeps circling back to the same questions: How much does Nate know? How deep does the rot go?
“Mia.” Kat’s voice cuts through the spiral. “Talk to me.”
I stop walking. We’re on a deserted stretch of sidewalk, warehouses looming on either side, the distant rumble of the subway the only sound.
“They’re building a fucking army,” I say, unable to keep the hysteria out of my voice. “Using trafficked people as test subjects. And Paragon—the hero who’s supposed to be Nate’s partner—is the first successful product. I mean, it was so obvious, wasn’t it? Of course, he’s a robot; why didn’t I see that? One programmed by Van Veen to do whatever the fuck she tells it to do.”
“Well, not technically a robot if he has human consciousness,” she says.
“He’s all machine inside,” I point out. “That makes him a machine. That makes him a robot. The consciousness part is for what? To make him a better weapon somehow? But it doesn’t make him a human.” I shake my head. “It’s fucking worse than we thought. Global Dynamix isn’t just a corporation. It’s a weapons manufacturer wearing a cape.”
She gives me a steady look. “And Vanguard is the face of it all. Complicit.”
I shake my head again. “No. He doesn’t know. I’m sure of it. The way he talks about Julia, about the company—he’s frustrated with them, yes, but he believes in the mission. He thinks he’s actually helping people, and heishelping them, average, everyday people. He believes in the greater good, a better tomorrow, all that golden boy, gee shucks bullshit because that’s who he really is deep inside.” I press the heels of my hands against my eyes. “He has no idea what’s happening in those labs. What hispartnerreally is. Fuck, if Paragon is all machine, he might be the only person in the world who can successfully kill Vanguard.”
“Other than you,” she says quietly.
“Yes. Other than me.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“About what?” I ask testily.
“That Vanguard has no idea about any of this.”
I drop my hands and stare at her. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, how well do you really know him? A few weeks of interviews. Some pillow talk. A trip to his childhood home.” Her voice isn’t cruel, but I hate it anyway. “People hide things, Mia, especially people with power.Especiallypeople with handlers.”
She’s right. I know she’s right. But something in me rebels against the idea that Nate could be complicit in this. The man who told me about his mother, about Emma, about wanting to help save the world? That man isn’t capable of knowingly profiting from human trafficking and murder.
Is he?
“I don’t know what to do,” I admit. “If I tell him what we’ve found, I blow my cover. The mission ends, and we might never get close enough to bring Global Dynamix down.”
“And if you don’t tell him?”
