Rain crashed violently against the black SUV as Kabir drove through the empty industrial highway.
The city behind them still burned with panic.
Digital systems had collapsed.
Police networks were hunting them.
And Orion had finally stopped hiding.
Inside the moving vehicle, silence felt heavier than gunfire.
Maya sat near the window, staring blankly at the rain.
Her chest still hurt from everything she had discovered inside the Dead Server.
The files.
The surveillance.
The realization that Orion had been watching her long before she ever met Arman.
Maybe even guiding her toward him.
Across from her, Arman remained completely silent.
Blood slowly dried near his collar.
His laptop screen reflected across his emotionless eyes while encrypted files continued decrypting automatically.
Like the system itself wanted him to see something.
Kabir glanced at the rear mirror.
Two black headlights appeared far behind them.
Following.
Kabir's jaw tightened.
"We've got company."
Maya immediately looked back.
Three Orion vehicles emerged through the rain like shadows.
No sirens.
No lights.
Just death moving quietly through darkness.
Arman closed the laptop softly.
"Take Exit Twelve."
Kabir instantly looked at him.
"That road leads nowhere."
"I know."
Kabir understood immediately.
His expression darkened.
"You seriously want to go there?"
Arman finally looked outside the window.
"Yes."
Lightning flashed across the highway.
For one second, Maya saw something terrifying in Arman's eyes.
Not anger.
Memory.
The SUV suddenly swerved off the main road into a broken underground tunnel covered in warning signs.
Concrete dust exploded behind them.
The Orion convoy followed instantly.
Kabir pressed harder on the accelerator.
The tunnel became narrower.
Darker.
Dangerously unstable.
Then Arman pulled a small remote device from his pocket.
Kabir cursed immediately.
"Oh no…"
Arman pressed the trigger.
BOOM.
The rear section of the tunnel collapsed instantly.
Fire and concrete swallowed the convoy path behind them.
Metal screamed violently.
One Orion vehicle disappeared beneath falling debris.
The remaining cars stopped before the collapse.
Kabir exhaled heavily.
"That'll slow them down."
Arman's voice remained cold.
"Not for long."
Twenty minutes later, the SUV finally stopped beside the ruins of an abandoned underground medical facility hidden beneath the eastern district wasteland.
The place looked dead.
Collapsed buildings.
Burned walls.
Rust-covered fences.
A forgotten grave buried beneath the city.
Maya slowly stepped out of the car.
Cold wind moved through the ruins softly.
Something about the place felt wrong immediately.
Not abandoned.
Erased.
Kabir stared silently at the broken structure ahead.
"I thought Orion destroyed this place completely."
Arman answered quietly:
"They tried."
Rainwater dripped through broken ceilings as they entered the underground entrance.
Dark corridors stretched endlessly beneath the ruins.
Emergency red lights flickered weakly across old walls.
Every step echoed unnaturally.
Like the building remembered pain.
Maya wrapped her arms around herself.
"What is this place?"
Nobody answered immediately.
Because some memories were too ugly to describe aloud.
Finally Kabir spoke quietly.
"This is where Project Ashes began."
The words hit Maya heavily.
Project Ashes.
The secret Orion program that transformed children into psychological weapons.
This was the birthplace of monsters.
Including Arman.
They moved deeper underground.
Past broken laboratory doors.
Past destroyed hospital beds.
Past walls covered with faded warnings.
NEURAL CONDITIONING.
SUBJECT CONTROL.
BEHAVIORAL RESET.
Maya felt sick reading them.
Arman walked ahead silently.
But inside him—
Old nightmares had already awakened.
Children screaming in darkness.
Metal restraints cutting skin.
Cold voices repeating numbers instead of names.
No identities.
No humanity.
Only subjects.
Only experiments.
Suddenly Arman stopped walking.
A giant steel door stood ahead partially open.
BLACK SITE A-01.
Kabir froze instantly.
"No…"
Arman slowly pushed the door wider.
Cold air escaped from inside.
The room beyond looked frozen in time.
Rows of glass containment chambers stood silently in darkness.
Observation rooms.
Medical equipment.
Rust-covered restraints attached to metal chairs.
Dust covered everything.
But the fear inside the room still felt alive.
Maya whispered weakly:
"They kept children here…"
Kabir looked away.
"Yes."
Arman stepped deeper inside slowly.
Then suddenly—
He froze.
A strange symbol had been painted across the far wall using black paint.
A phoenix.
Half burned.
Half alive.
Below it, words were scratched violently into the concrete.
SUBJECT 001 LIVES.
Silence swallowed the room instantly.
Maya frowned.
"Who is Subject 001?"
Kabir's face changed immediately.
Arman kept staring at the wall without blinking.
Because inside Project Ashes…
Subject 001 was a legend.
The first successful experiment.
The child Orion could never fully control.
Officially dead.
Officially erased.
Officially impossible.
Kabir spoke carefully.
"Every kid inside Ashes heard stories about him."
Maya looked disturbed.
"What kind of stories?"
Arman answered quietly.
"That he survived everything."
His voice sounded distant now.
Like he was speaking from another lifetime.
"The conditioning."
"The isolation."
"The neural torture."
Kabir added softly:
"They said he eventually became too dangerous even for Orion."
Maya slowly looked toward the containment chambers again.
Fear crept into her chest.
Then suddenly—
CLICK.
Everyone froze.
A metallic sound echoed somewhere deeper inside the room.
Kabir instantly raised his rifle.
"What was that?"
Another sound followed.
Dragging footsteps.
Slow.
Heavy.
The emergency lights flickered violently.
One containment chamber suddenly powered on.
Blue light illuminated the dust-covered glass.
Maya stepped backward instantly.
Inside the chamber…
Someone was sitting there.
Motionless.
Human-shaped.
Kabir aimed immediately.
"Don't move!"
The figure didn't react.
Arman slowly stepped forward.
Every instinct inside him screamed danger.
But something else pulled him closer.
Recognition.
The glass chamber was cracked heavily.
Inside sat a thin man wearing torn patient clothing stained with old blood.
Long dark hair covered part of his face.
His head remained lowered silently.
Like a corpse sitting upright.
Then the lights flickered again.
The man slowly opened his eyes.
Cold gray eyes.
Dead eyes.
But alive.
Maya's breathing stopped.
Kabir tightened his grip on the rifle.
"No way…"
The man slowly lifted his head toward Arman.
Studying him silently.
Like he already knew him.
Then finally—
He spoke.
One broken sentence.
Hoarse.
Almost inhuman.
"…Subject 002."
Arman's blood froze instantly.
Because nobody alive should know that name.
WARNING ALERT suddenly flashed across every monitor.
CONTAINMENT FAILURE DETECTED.
The chamber door unlocked automatically with a loud metallic hiss.
Kabir shouted instantly:
"Arman, move!"
But Arman couldn't.
Because his nightmares were standing directly in front of him now.
The man stepped out slowly.
Barefoot.
Weak-looking.
Yet something about him felt terrifyingly wrong.
Not human anymore.
Like years of suffering had hollowed him into something darker.
Maya whispered fearfully:
"That's Subject 001…?"
The man looked toward her briefly.
Then back toward Arman.
His empty eyes showed something horrifying.
Recognition.
Like he saw himself inside Arman.
Suddenly every monitor inside the facility activated at once.
Static flooded the underground room.
Then a distorted mechanical voice echoed through the darkness.
Calm.
Watching.
"Recovery team dispatched."
"Do not engage Subject 001."
"Repeat."
"Do not engage."
Kabir's face darkened instantly.
"Orion's coming."
But Subject 001 slowly turned toward the speakers.
For the first time—
Emotion appeared in his dead eyes.
Hatred.
Pure hatred.
Then he looked directly at Arman.
And softly whispered:
"They never let us leave alive."