The Requiem Protocol
Chapter 25 – The Requiem Protocol
Damon’s POV
The silence before a storm has a specific taste. Like metal on the tongue. Like the pause before a heartbeat stops.
I stood at the edge of the safehouse balcony, watching the horizon crack with light. A storm wasn’t coming.
It was already here.
Ava emerged behind me, boots crunching lightly against gravel. She hadn’t slept. None of us had. Her face was pale but hard, eyes blistered with something like vengeance.
"She’s not hiding," Ava said.
I turned. "You think Solace wants us to come for her?"
She nodded. "She left us breadcrumbs. Not just the USB. Not just the buyer leaks. She wants an audience."
"She’s planning a finale."
"More like a requiem."
Jackson strode out, a file in one hand, phone in the other. "Got something. Facial recognition from a stolen cam feed near the Verity Labs on Hudson. She was there. Two hours ago."
Ava stiffened. "That lab was decommissioned."
"No. It was moved underground. Verity was Vanmoor's fallback location. And according to this, they’re activating the Requiem Protocol."
My stomach turned. "That’s not a containment system. That’s a cleansing one."
Ava's eyes narrowed. "They’re wiping it. Everyone inside."
Jackson threw the file on the table. It splayed open, pages littered with black ops schematics and sensor heat maps. A countdown blinked red.
"Twenty-three hours until full detonation," he said. "But they’re accelerating it."
Ava snapped the blade back into her holster. "Then we go now."
---
Verity Labs – Manhattan Underground Grid – 10:43 PM
We entered through a storm drain beneath an abandoned maintenance tunnel. The deeper we went, the more the air changed—charged, dry, and humming with electrical tension. The walls pulsed faintly.
The whole place was alive.
Ava led, scanning doors and hallways with swift precision. Jackson watched our flank. I moved center, weapon drawn.
Alarms hadn’t triggered yet.
That wasn’t a good sign.
The deeper levels opened into a hexagonal corridor lined with containment pods. Inside them—people. Hooked to machines. Some were unconscious. Some watched us with haunted eyes.
"Subject ID matches Solace's original batch," Ava whispered. "Clones. Weapons."
Jackson cursed. "They’re not just selling prototypes. They’re scaling production."
A light blinked ahead. A camera eye rotated and whirred, then clicked off.
She was watching.
"Keep moving," I said.
We reached the main terminal chamber—a circular atrium, glass dome above, walls laced with cables and monitors.
Then she stepped into view.
Solace.
No disguise. No shadows.
Just her. Blood-black coat. Gloves. A pistol holstered at her thigh.
And a smile that belonged to Ava’s darkest thoughts.
"You found me again," she said. "Cute."
"This ends now," Ava said, gun raised.
Solace tilted her head. "No. This begins now."
The lights cut.
The dome shattered.
And all hell broke loose.
---
Chaos Unleashed
From the ceiling dropped a dozen enhanced guards. Neural-linked. Combat-amped. Their eyes glowed faint blue, synced to some hive directive.
Jackson fired first. Three down.
I swung low, taking out knees, snapping tracheas.
Ava moved like lightning—every strike precise, fast, lethal. She wasn’t just fighting enemies. She was fighting her mirror.
Solace vanished in the chaos, blending into smoke and static. I saw her heading toward the central core.
"She’s going for the trigger," I shouted.
Ava didn’t hesitate. She broke from the fight, sprinting across debris toward the heart of the lab.
I followed.
Jackson lobbed a charge behind us, sealing the guards in with a controlled explosion.
---
Requiem Core – 11:09 PM
The room was circular, lined with glass servers and cryo pods. A countdown blinked across every screen.
00:43:17
Solace stood at the central console, hands moving too fast across the keys.
Ava burst through first, weapon raised.
"Step away."
"You still think you’re different from me," Solace said, not turning. "But you’re here, with a gun, in a lab built to erase people like us."
"I'm here to end it. Not join it."
Solace turned, finally. In her hand, a small capsule.
"This is the seed. The next phase. Not just programmable humans. Programmable memories. Wipe. Rewrite. Reload. Want your father back, Ava? One press, and I can make him think he raised you in a white-picket suburb."
Ava didn’t move. But something in her eyes cracked.
"You won’t control anyone else," I said.
"Control?" Solace laughed. "Control is what your governments do with less sophisticated tech. I’m just giving choice."
"Then let them choose," Ava said, and fired.
The capsule flew from Solace's hand, shattered against the floor.
A hiss. A screech.
The system shorted.
And Solace lunged.
---
The Final Clash
They collided with fury.
Blade against blade.
Fist against bone.
Ava fought without hesitation, her every move laced with memory, pain, and purpose. Solace countered like a shadow, always two steps ahead.
"I am you!" she screamed.
"No," Ava growled, slamming her into the wall. "You're what I overcame."
Solace kicked her back. Ava hit the ground, rolled, and threw a knife.
Straight into Solace’s shoulder.
She staggered.
Jackson's voice crackled in our comms. "Detonation deactivated. Backup inbound. Three minutes."
Solace slumped against the server.
"You can kill me," she hissed. "But you won’t kill the idea."
Ava walked forward, bleeding, trembling, breathing like every inhale burned.
"No," she said, pulling the knife free. "But I’ll kill your access."
She stabbed the core console.
Sparks flew.
Data fried.
Solace screamed, reaching forward—and collapsed.
We didn’t wait.
---
Safehouse – Three Hours Later
Ava sat in the corner, her father beside her. Conscious. Awake. Remembering.
"You saved me," he whispered.
"We saved each other," she said.
I watched from the hallway as Jackson poured himself something dark and bitter.
"She'll come back, you know," he muttered.
"Maybe," I said.
He lit a cigarette. "But next time?"
"We'll be ready."
Behind us, the sunrise cracked through storm clouds.
And the requiem began to fade.
---
To Be Continued...