The quiet was eerie, but Nam had learned long ago that silence was the prelude to something much worse. As the team retreated to a safehouse on the outskirts of Montreux, their minds raced. Javier was gone. His death hung over them like a heavy fog, but there was no time for mourning. They had a job to finish.
Hana scanned the perimeter, her eyes sharp and calculating. "The virus did its job. We've got the first relay node. But we've also triggered every alarm they have left."
Nam nodded grimly. "That's why we need to move fast. The next relay is just outside Geneva. If we can get there before they patch the hole we created, we might have a shot."
Alina, still reeling from Javier's death, clenched her fists. "We can't let his sacrifice be in vain. Let's finish this."
Nam looked to Hana. "Do you have the coordinates for the second node?"
"Already on it," Hana replied, tapping a few keys on her device. "They won't be expecting us to hit it this soon."
They had less than twelve hours. Black Veil's countermeasures would be up and running in no time, and the more time they wasted, the harder it would become to stop them. The clock was ticking.
But as the team prepped for their next move, an unsettling feeling settled over Nam. The facility had been far too quiet after the upload. No counterattacks. No immediate retaliation. Something was off.
He took a deep breath. "We're going in. Stick to the plan, stay close. No heroics."
Back at the central control hub, Kaas was watching every move they made. His eyes narrowed as he stared at the data flowing across the screen. They had breached the first node.
"They think they're ahead," Kaas muttered under his breath. "But they haven't seen anything yet."
He tapped a few commands, and his own counter-virus began to spread across the global network — a silent predator lying in wait.
"They're good," he said to no one in particular. "But they're not good enough."
As Nam's team boarded a small jet to head towards Geneva, a cold wind began to blow from the mountains, carrying with it the scent of something far more dangerous than they'd anticipated.
The storm was coming.