Linn did not hesitate.
She turned on her heel at once, forcing herself to keep her pace measured despite the sudden spike in adrenaline.
Running would only draw attention.
She had barely taken three steps when the suite door behind her swung open.
Voices.
Firm.
Controlled.
More than one.
Without looking back, she continued down the corridor, resisting every instinct telling her to check whether they were following.
She needed the service elevator.
Every passing doorway and every security camera she slipped beneath suddenly felt heavier than before.
The service elevator doors parted the moment she reached them.
She stepped inside, pressed the button for the ground floor, and the doors slid shut.
Only then did Niel speak again.
“I have eyes on the building.” His keyboard clattered rapidly through the comms.
“Do not continue to the lobby. Too many personnel covering the exits.”
More keystrokes echoed through the line.
“The moment the device was detected, they shifted to containment.”
A beat.
“They anticipated this.”
A chill crept down Linn’s spine.
“Three unidentified personnel just entered the service network.” His voice remained controlled, but every word came faster than the last.
“One is waiting near Floor Fourteen. Another just exited onto Floor Nine.”
A brief pause.
“The third…” More keystrokes.
“…I lost him.”
Linn looked at the floor indicator as the elevator descended.
Another burst of typing echoed through the comms before Niel spoke again.
“Get off at Floor Twelve. There is an unoccupied housekeeping station two corridors east of the elevator. CCTV coverage drops to forty percent after the service junction. It is your safest exit.”
The elevator chimed softly.
Floor Twelve.
The doors slid open.
Linn stepped out immediately, disappearing into the maintenance corridor just as the elevator doors closed behind her and continued downward.
The corridor stretched ahead beneath harsh fluorescent lights, every maintenance door looking exactly the same.
She needed to disappear before anyone realized she had ever been there.
Niel’s voice cut through the earpiece.
“Movement on Floor Twelve. Entered through the east stairwell. Camera caught him for less than two seconds before he disappeared into a blind spot.” A brief pause followed, accompanied by rapid keystrokes.
“He is checking maintenance access points.”
A knot tightened in Linn’s stomach, but she forced herself to keep moving.
An unattended cleaning cart waited inside the housekeeping station.
She quickly slipped off the designer blazer she had bought using Jion’s card and carefully removed the tiny camera concealed beneath its lapel, securing it beneath the housekeeping coat instead.
She tucked the blazer beneath a stack of towels, pouted at it for the briefest moment, and sighed.
“I will miss you.”
Then she pulled on the oversized housekeeping coat.
After tying back her hair, she lowered her head and pushed the cart into the guest hallway.
For one fragile moment, it worked.
Business travelers passed without a glance, families drifted toward the elevators, and conversations filled the corridor.
She blended into the background so naturally that she almost believed she had escaped.
“He changed direction,” Niel said suddenly.
“Toward your hallway.”
Her grip tightened around the cart before she abandoned it altogether, disappearing into the nearest side corridor.
One turn became another until the elegant hotel began to feel less like a building and more like a maze designed to swallow people whole.
She rounded the next corner and stopped.
A dead end.
She spun around, her pulse hammering against her ribs as she searched for anything—another hallway, another exit, anything.
Nothing.
The footsteps grew louder and closer.
Then—
A hand suddenly seized her wrist.
Before she could cry out, she was pulled sharply around the corner she had just passed.
A gloved hand covered her mouth.
“Don’t.”
The voice was low, calm, and unfamiliar.
She froze.
Even in the dim corridor, she recognized the uniform immediately.
This man was one of the escorts earlier—the one who had remained beside Mercer while the other confronted her outside the suite.
The footsteps stopped only a few meters away.
Another figure appeared around the corner.
The escort holding Linn stepped out first.
“Found her?”
The pursuer clicked his tongue.
“Checked already. Nothing here.”
“She must have doubled back before the elevators locked down,” the escort replied without hesitation.
“Search the west wing. I’ll check the other floors.”
The pursuer gave a curt nod before turning away, disappearing down the opposite corridor.
The footsteps gradually faded.
Only then did the escort turn back to Linn, his gaze sharp.
“Move.”
Before she could ask a single question, he was already walking away.
They moved quickly through the maintenance corridors, turning whenever the escort did, Linn barely keeping pace as he navigated the labyrinth of service hallways without hesitation.
Neither of them spoke.
The silence finally broke when they passed a row of industrial dumpsters tucked inside a loading bay.
The escort stopped.
Without a word, he reached behind his ear.
Linn frowned, her confusion deepening as his fingers caught the edge of his skin—
—and peeled.
The face came away in one smooth motion.
A thin layer of silicone folded back from his jaw before the entire disguise slipped free, revealing an entirely different face beneath.
Linn’s eyes widened.
The fake face landed inside the nearest dumpster with a dull thud.
He had already begun removing the wig and the contact lenses before pressing a finger against the earpiece.
“Kid.”
A brief silence followed.
Then a quiet laugh escaped through the comms.
“I knew it was you,” Niel said, sounding far more amused than surprised.
“I was wondering when you would finally stop pretending.”
Linn stared at the man beside her.
Recognition struck almost instantly.
Sean’s warning resurfaced in her mind.
The tactical commander who was almost never around.
The man Enphire called “Paradox.”
Helix.
“Status.”
Rapid keystrokes echoed through the comms.
“They locked down the executive elevators. Stairwell teams are moving. Two squads approaching from the north corridor. Three more from the loading entrance.”
Linn instinctively looked toward the exit ahead.
Almost immediately, dark silhouettes appeared beyond the glass doors.
“South corridor blocked,” Niel continued.
“West corridor too. They have sealed almost every route.”
For the first time since they met, Linn saw Helix glance around the corridor.
Not nervously.
Calculating.
Helix’s gaze settled briefly on the overhead fire suppression pipes before drifting toward a maintenance control panel mounted against the wall.
“…You have a plan?” Niel asked.
Helix stepped toward the maintenance control panel.
“I see it.”
Without another explanation, he drew a compact pistol fitted with a suppressor and fired once.
The round shattered the emergency sprinkler valve mounted above the corridor.
Water exploded from the ruptured pipe, flooding the maintenance passage within seconds.
Red warning lights flashed overhead as the building’s fire suppression system immediately registered a sudden pressure loss.
A sharp alarm echoed through the corridor.
Niel’s fingers flew across the keyboard.
“Control room received the alert. They are treating it as an active fire event.”
A brief pause.
“They have initiated an emergency protocol.”
Almost instantly, emergency announcements echoed faintly throughout the building.
Hotel staff began directing guests toward evacuation routes while security traffic erupted across every radio channel.
“They are redirecting security teams to support the evacuation,” Niel continued.
“They are cycling through emergency camera priorities. Visual coverage along your route is degrading. Several feeds inside the service network are obscured by the sprinkler discharge.”
Helix holstered the pistol.
“Route.”
A fresh blueprint appeared across Niel’s monitor.
“Engineering access. Twelve o’clock. Thirty-five meters. Camera coverage along that route will be unreliable for approximately four minutes.”
“More than enough.”
Helix caught Linn’s wrist and pulled her toward the nearest fire door.
His hand stopped just short of the handle.
Instead of opening it, he rested two fingers lightly against the cold metal.
Silence.
Then footsteps.
Fast.
Several pairs.
“They are funneling us into the emergency stairwell,” Helix said quietly.
Niel’s fingers flew across the keyboard.
“Confirmed. Three response teams just entered the emergency stairs from Floors Fifteen, Nine, and Ground. They are collapsing inward.”
Helix immediately turned away from the fire door.
“Alternative.”
Another blueprint replaced the first.
“Continue straight. Engineering access ahead. Once inside, take the freight stairwell. It bypasses the emergency stair network and leads directly to the service level.”
Helix pulled Linn deeper into the maintenance corridor.
The polished interior of the hotel quickly disappeared behind concrete walls, exposed pipes, and humming machinery.
They ran through the engineering passage until an unmarked steel door came into view.
Helix pushed it open.
Beyond it stretched a narrow freight stairwell.
Bare concrete.
Steel railings.
No decorative finishes.
Unlike the emergency stairwells, this shaft remained untouched by the evacuation.
It existed solely for maintenance crews transporting equipment between service floors—a route rarely used during guest emergencies.
“Response teams committed to the emergency stairwells. Freight access is still uncontested.”
Helix started down immediately.
One flight.
Then another.
Neither of them slowed.
The muffled chaos above gradually faded behind the steady rhythm of their footsteps.
Each landing looked nearly identical, marked only by painted floor numbers illuminated beneath dim emergency lighting.
They descended from the twelfth floor to the service level without slowing once.
Helix pushed through the final steel door.
They emerged onto the service level.
The corridor beyond was lined with storage rooms, maintenance workshops, and supply bays.
Without breaking stride, Helix led Linn toward a pair of large loading doors at the far end.
He pushed one open.
Beyond it lay the hotel’s loading dock.
Unlike the guest floors, the service area remained operational despite the emergency.
Delivery trucks continued idling at their bays while warehouse staff hurried between pallets under a constant stream of radio chatter.
Most security personnel had already been redirected toward the guest floors, leaving the loading dock occupied by employees focused on logistics rather than hotel guests.
Near the exit, an unattended maintenance cart stood beside a stack of equipment cases.
Two fluorescent maintenance jackets hung carelessly from its handle.
Helix grabbed both.
He tossed one toward Linn.
“Wear it.”
She caught it instinctively, staring at him in disbelief.
“Wear it,” he repeated.
She slipped the oversized jacket over her clothes.
Without another word, Helix adjusted the brim of a discarded maintenance cap, lowered his head, and continued walking.
Linn fell into step beside him.
Neither of them hurried.
They fell in behind a departing delivery truck just as the security checkpoint lifted its barrier to let the vehicle exit.
The guard spared them only the briefest glance before waving the truck through.
By the time the barrier lowered again, Helix and Linn were already on the other side of the gate.
Only after they had crossed the street did Niel’s voice return through the comms.
“Cameras are fully back online.”
A few streets from the hotel, the van blended naturally into the flow of traffic.
No driver sat behind the wheel.
The steering wheel turned on its own as the vehicle followed a calculated route through the city’s streets.
One of Jayden’s inventions.
An autonomous emergency extraction system—designed for moments when every operative was committed elsewhere, leaving no one available for retrieval.
Niel never once took his eyes off the wall of monitors surrounding him.
Streams of surveillance footage, intercepted communications, and shifting signal maps continued to dance across the screens as his fingers flew over the keyboard.
“Vehicle inbound. ETA—twenty-three seconds.”
Helix simply waited.
Exactly twenty-three seconds later, the van rolled silently to a stop beside the curb.
The side door slid open automatically.
The moment both of them were inside, the door sealed shut and the vehicle pulled away from the curb under its own control, slipping effortlessly into the evening traffic.
Niel never looked away from his monitors.
“Autonomous navigation engaged.”
The van continued for another two intersections before Helix slid into the driver’s seat and wrapped one hand around the steering wheel.
The dashboard chimed once as the system disengaged.
“Manual override detected.”
Helix guided the van into the next street.
“Engineer Jayjay still has not solved the power issue. Autonomous mode consumes too much energy.”
Niel gave a small hum of agreement, fingers finally slowing across the keyboard.
“Emergency use only.”
Without another word, Helix took over completely while the autonomous system powered down behind the dashboard.
After a moment of silence, Linn leaned slightly toward Niel and lowered her voice.
“Who is Engineer Jayjay?”
Niel leaned back, finally relaxing.
“Who else?”
She frowned.
“But why ‘Engineer Jayjay’?”
Niel shrugged with the resignation of someone who had long since stopped questioning reality.
“Beats me.”
“And you are Kid?”
Niel finally looked over at her as he stretched his arms.
“Yes.”
Then he added quietly, “Unfortunately.”
Linn became even more curious.
“Why? What about the others? What does he call them?”
Niel groaned.
“I don’t appreciate being reminded of.”
Linn slowly turned her head toward the driver’s seat.
“Your tactical commander is weird.”
Helix did not even glance at her.
“I heard that.”
“You’re welcome.”
1.
Helix disguised as one of the Zeropoint escorts YES and 2. the random electrician in the previous chapter was ALSO Helix I BADLY want to explain HOW Helix did both but the entire explanation contains major spoilers so not now XD but I’ll try to explain the logic behind it little by little as the story progresses.
That’s all <3