"We see what you're doing. We've been watching too."
The message blinked once and vanished.
Derik stared at the blank screen, unmoving. His breath didn't change. His eyes narrowed, calculating variables like a machine burning through lines of code.
"Watching me," he murmured, "yet didn't intervene.
That means either they couldn't… or didn't want to."
He leaned back in his chair, fingers steepled.
"Either way, I'm the control variable now. Let's see how long it takes to flip their system inside out."
⸻
Phase I: The Digital Hunt
Derik didn't just trace the message.
He rebuilt its DNA.
It came from a high-encryption relay chain bouncing through five dead servers—most were CIA-implanted in Eastern Europe. But one IP leak in the packet routing led him to something unusual:
The Panopticon Protocol – a data archive that didn't exist.
Hidden in a nuclear research site's abandoned server farm in Reykjavik.
Derik accessed it within 17 minutes.
Inside?
Files on him.
• His alias as Evan Wells? Tagged.
• His kill pattern? Charted.
• His code phrases, entry points, strategic escalations—all cataloged.
• Even Carter Briggs' file had an updated date.
Someone was building a profile on him in real time.
⸻
Phase II: The Trap
So he laid bait.
He faked an execution—a fake target in Cincinnati, complete with digital leaks, blurred security footage, and a false "signature."
Then he watched.
Three hours later, someone accessed the fake crime scene file.
From Brooklyn.
Derik traced it to a repurposed print shop—officially abandoned for five years.
Infrared scans showed two heartbeats inside.
Derik moved that night.
⸻
02:47 A.M. | Brooklyn, NY
Derik entered through the ventilation shaft.
Silent. Surgical. Precise.
Inside was a black room lined with screens. Surveillance footage. Court documents. Files on judges, agents, politicians—all still active.
In the center? A desk.
A single laptop open.
And next to it, a note.
"We knew you'd come. Just didn't think you'd be this fast."
The hairs on Derik's neck prickled.
Not fear.
Recognition.
He turned.
There stood a man in a grey coat. Calm. Bald. No visible weapon. Late 40s.
But his eyes?
Cold. Calculating. Just like Derik's.
⸻
The Conversation
"You knew I'd come?" Derik asked.
"You passed every filter," the man replied, unshaken. "We built that entire Reykjavik server for one purpose: to see who could find it and survive what it contains."
Derik didn't blink.
He was already counting exits.
"Who are you?"
"Irrelevant," the man said. "I'm just the mouthpiece. But this…" —he gestured to the walls— "this is the archive of monsters like you. Except none of them lasted."
"You lasted."
"You evolved."
"You escalated with surgical precision."
He stepped closer.
"We don't want to stop you, Derik.
We want to give you access to what's next."
⸻
The Reveal: The Candidate Program
The man handed Derik a keycard. On it: a symbol.
An eye. Split vertically.
"We test fractured systems. We observe anomalies.
But once every generation, we offer one person a conditional agreement."
"Not obedience.
Not recruitment.
Partnership."
"You are the first to pass our thresholds in twenty-one years."
Derik said nothing, but his pulse slowed.
This was no lie. This was a designed emergence.
From the beginning—Elena Fray's court leak, Simon Vance's reaction—it had all been subtly steered. Not controlled. But monitored.
⸻
Derik finally spoke:
"So you're not here to own me."
"You're here to offer me something you couldn't do yourselves."
The man nodded.
"Access to monsters you'd never find alone.
Protection. Resources. Autonomy.
In return… you help us correct the world the same way you've already begun."
⸻
The Twist – Carter Briggs Was the Bait
Before Derik could respond, the man dropped one more sentence.
"By the way… Carter Briggs?
That file wasn't real."
"He didn't die.
We planted that article…
to see what kind of god you'd become."
Silence.
Derik's fingers curled into a fist. The air grew cold.
The child whose pain fueled Derik's first justice… was a fabrication?
"We had to know if you'd go after her because of a sob story," the man said quietly, "or because she deserved it."
"You chose well.
You were… inevitable."
⸻
Chapter Ends With:
Derik stands under a bridge in silence, staring at the keycard.
His reflection stares back from a frozen puddle.
Not a monster.
Not a martyr.
Something else.
"You think you control me now," he whispers.
"But I let you give me the pieces.
I'll still build the machine."
He places the card into his jacket.
He doesn't say yes.
He just disappears into the snow.