The abandoned subway tunnel smelled like rust, oil, and history.
It was Red's idea — a forgotten spur line beneath Lower Manhattan, decommissioned since the '80s, now nothing more than a skeleton beneath the city's feet. The perfect place to spring a trap.
Hale crouched behind a collapsed support beam, eyes fixed on the narrow path ahead. Red was patched up, pale and sluggish, but alive — and wired into the surveillance grid he'd cobbled together from scavenged parts and stolen Blackstar tech.
"This better work," Red muttered through a clenched jaw. "If they send the Cleaner again, you're gonna need more than a gun and attitude."
Hale loaded the last round into his sidearm. "Good thing I've got both."
They'd planted the bait two hours earlier: a falsified leak of classified Emberlight documents, traced through burner accounts and encrypted breadcrumbs — all pointing to this tunnel, at this time.
If the Cleaner was half as precise as rumors claimed, he'd come to erase it himself.
The trap was simple: a false sense of control.
Time passed.
Dust swirled. A distant train rumbled on an active line far above.
Then… movement.
A silhouette stepped into the tunnel, slow and deliberate.
Tall. Coat fluttering just slightly. No wasted motion.
Red's voice crackled in Hale's earpiece. "It's him. That's the Cleaner."
Hale's grip tightened.
He waited — watched — heart hammering.
The Cleaner moved closer… and then stopped. He turned his head slightly, as if listening.
Then said, softly:
"You're not the only ones who know how to set a trap."
A second figure dropped behind Hale from the shadows.
Too late.
The impact slammed him to the ground. A fist to the jaw. His gun skittered away. Hale rolled, elbowed the attacker, scrambled to his feet.
Another punch. This one from a woman — short, fast, eyes burning like coals.
Not the Cleaner.
Someone else.
Then a sharp voice:
"Stop! Don't kill him!"
Hale froze.
From the far end of the tunnel came a third figure — female, late 20s, hair pulled back in a tight braid. Familiar eyes. Familiar face.
"Charlie?" Hale rasped.
The woman stopped just short of the light. "No. I'm her sister."
"You said that before." Hale spat blood. "Still haven't proved it."
She glanced at the woman who'd attacked him. Gave a slight nod. The fighter stepped back.
"I didn't come to kill you," Charlie's "sister" said. "I came to warn you. The Cleaner wasn't coming tonight. He was never coming."
Hale narrowed his eyes. "Then why send the decoy?"
"Because I sent him. I leaked your leak."
"What the hell are you talking about?"
She stepped into full view now — and the lie crumbled just a little.
She wasn't afraid.
She wasn't confused.
She was trained.
And suddenly, Hale realized — she wasn't just caught between sides. She was playing both.
"I was Blackstar," she admitted. "They recruited me. Promised me purpose. Structure. But I didn't know what I was helping them build. I didn't know about Emberlight."
"Then why lie?"
"Because they're watching me. I had to keep the act going. If they suspect I've turned, I'm dead. And so is anyone I talk to."
"Why warn me?"
"Because what's coming is bigger than both of us."
She pulled something from her coat — a flash drive.
"This is the rest of Drexler's testimony. The real one. He smuggled it out before they caught him. It mentions the Marionette File… and you."
Hale took it, watching her carefully.
"What's your angle?"
She looked away.
"Redemption. Maybe."
Then she vanished back into the shadows — gone as suddenly as she arrived.
Later that night, Red watched the footage back in silence. "She's playing a dangerous game."
"So are we," Hale replied.
He loaded the flash drive into the encrypted laptop.
One file. One video. Timestamped two days before Drexler disappeared.
Hale hit play.
Drexler appeared — beaten, but alive. Whispering into the lens.
"They're not converting assets anymore. They're creating them. Marionette is more than a file. It's a prototype. Mind control. Total overwrite. Test subject one… is someone named Hale."
The screen went black.