The tunnel stretched endlessly, a black artery carved beneath the bones of the city. Every step echoed, swallowed by the damp air and replaced by the steady drip of unseen water. The smell was a heavy mix of rust, oil, and something older — decay that clung to the walls like a memory no one wanted to revisit.
Emily led the way, flashlight cutting a narrow path through the dark. The beam caught flashes of metal and damp stone, revealing pipes that twisted like veins overhead. Behind her, Daniel walked in silence, his footsteps perfectly measured, too deliberate. Ana and Marcus followed at the rear, shepherding the hostages through the uneven ground.
For fifteen minutes, no one spoke. The only sounds were breath and water and the occasional clink of a chain still wrapped loosely around someone's wrists. It wasn't until they reached a wider chamber — a circular junction where three tunnels met — that Emily finally stopped.
She turned, the light landing directly on Daniel's face.
"Talk," she said.
His eyes narrowed slightly against the glare. "Now?"
"Yes, now. We don't know if Kane's men are on our tail. We don't know if the exits are safe. And I sure as hell don't know if I can trust you to have my back once we get there."
The hostages shifted uneasily, their eyes darting between them. Marcus gave Ana a look — the kind that said, keep them moving if this gets bad.
Daniel's shoulders rose and fell in a slow breath. "I told you why I did it."
"You gave me an excuse," Emily snapped. "That's not the same thing."
His gaze held hers, and she could see the exhaustion etched into the lines around his eyes. "What do you want, Emily? A confession? You already think I betrayed you. You've already decided I'm the enemy."
"I want the truth." Her voice was low now, but every word hit like a hammer. "Not the version you've been feeding yourself to make it feel noble. The real truth."
He looked away, the beam of her flashlight sliding across his jaw, catching the faint bruise at his temple. "The truth is… I made a deal with the devil to keep people alive. And I kept it for too long."
Emily took a step closer. "How long?"
"Since Prague."
Her stomach turned. That was nearly two years. Two years of missions compromised, two years of looking over their shoulders without knowing why certain operations always ended with near-misses or lucky breaks that, in hindsight, weren't luck at all.
"You could have come to me," she said, her voice breaking just enough to betray the hurt under the anger.
Daniel's laugh was humorless. "Come to you? And what then? You would've cut me off, reported me, and every person Kane had leverage over would have been dead before nightfall. You think I didn't want to? Every time I saw you walking into another trap, every time I had to let you get close enough for it to look real — do you know how many nights I stayed awake thinking maybe I should just let Kane kill me and be done with it?"
Emily's jaw tightened. "And yet you didn't."
"No," he said, voice quieter now, "because if I died, there'd be no one left on the inside to stop him from burning everything down. I'm not asking you to forgive me. I'm asking you to understand why I stayed."
Silence swelled between them, broken only by the sound of water dripping into a shallow pool somewhere in the dark.
Ana's voice cut in, cautious. "We should keep moving."
Emily didn't look away from Daniel. "We will."
But she didn't move either.
"You think this ends with Kane dead?" Daniel asked suddenly. "It doesn't. There are three more like him, all fighting for the same ground. Kill one, the others move in. The streets turn red for months. We're not walking toward an ending, Emily. We're walking into a war."
"Then we fight the war," she said, flat.
His eyes searched hers, and for a brief second, she thought she saw something crack — not weakness, but the kind of vulnerability that only showed itself when a person stopped holding their breath.
"You always make it sound so simple," he murmured.
"It's not simple," she said. "It's necessary."
They moved again, the tunnel sloping downward into colder air. At one point, they passed a collapsed section where the ceiling had caved in, forcing them to crawl through a narrow gap between jagged stone and twisted rebar. The sound of boots scraping against rock filled the silence, each movement a reminder that above them, Kane was likely regrouping.
Eventually, they reached a rusted steel door at the end of the tunnel. Daniel stepped forward, running his fingers over the corroded handle. "This leads to the drainage canals. From there, we can get to the safehouse."
Marcus frowned. "You're sure?"
Daniel didn't answer right away. "I've used it before."
Emily watched him closely. "Used it for who?"
A pause. "Does it matter?"
"It does to me."
Daniel met her gaze, but didn't respond. Instead, he pushed the door open, the hinges screaming in protest. Cold night air rushed in, carrying with it the scent of rain-soaked concrete and distant smoke.
They emerged into the canals, the city lights far above casting broken reflections on the dark water. The walls rose high on either side, graffiti curling like scars along the stone. The place was empty, silent but for the faint hum of traffic somewhere beyond.
Emily glanced up at the sky. Clouds rolled over the moon, heavy and low, promising more rain before dawn.
"Move," she said, and the group began the slow climb along the narrow walkway.
Daniel fell into step beside her, close enough that she could feel the heat radiating from him even in the cool air. "You're not going to forgive me," he said quietly.
"No," she replied. "I'm not."
He nodded once, as if he'd expected it. "But you'll still need me before this is over."
Emily didn't answer.
Somewhere in the darkness ahead, a faint splash echoed against the walls of the canal — too deliberate to be an accident. She froze, raising a hand for the others to stop.
Daniel's hand drifted toward his sidearm.
Emily's eyes scanned the shadows.
And then, from the black mouth of the next tunnel, a voice rang out.
"Going somewhere, love?"
The sound of it hit her like a punch. She knew that voice. She'd buried it years ago, along with the man who owned it.
But he was here.
Alive.