The Archive

The next morning, the house was silent.

Elara waited for an hour. No breakfast tray. No summons.

She tried the door. Open.

She walked out into the living area. It was empty. A note sat on the kitchen island.

* Supplies run. Don't leave the house. The alarm is armed. S.*

Elara crumpled the note. He was gone.

She went straight to the office.

She sat at Silas’s desk—the black stone monolith. She tapped the monitor. Locked. Password required.

She stared at the prompt. *Enter Password.*

She thought about Silas. Tech mogul. Disgraced. What would a man like that use? A date? A name?

No. He was paranoid. He was complex.

Her fingers hovered over the keyboard. Her mind went blank, letting the instinct take over again. The same instinct that had spun the pen.

She typed a sequence of numbers and letters. It wasn't a guess. It was a memory she didn't know she had. A standard encryption key used by high-level corporate security.

* Access Granted.*

Elara’s breath hitched. She navigated the folders. *Financials. Legal. Personnel.*

She clicked on *Personnel*.

There was only one active file. *Secretary: Sarah Jenkins.*

She clicked it.

A photo loaded on the screen.

It was a woman. Blonde. Smiling. Soft features.

It wasn't Elara.

Elara touched her own face—her sharp cheekbones, her dark hair.

"Who am I?" she whispered.

She scrolled down. *Start Date: Six months ago. Status: Terminated.*

Terminated.

She closed the window and searched the drive for her own name. *Elara.*

* No results found.*

She wasn't an employee. She wasn't a secretary. She was a ghost.

She needed to know more. She needed physical proof.

She remembered the Archive Room. Silas had mentioned it on the first day. *The archive boxes... you fell carrying them.*

The archives were in the basement.

Elara ran from the office. She found the stairwell leading down—a narrow, spiraling throat of concrete. She descended into the dark.

The basement was cold. Rows of metal shelves stood like silent soldiers, filled with white boxes. But Elara ignored them. She was drawn to the back of the room.

There was a heavy steel door. A reinforced secure room.

On the door was a keypad.

Elara didn't hesitate. *8-4-2-1-9.*

The light turned green. The lock disengaged with a heavy *thunk*.

She pushed the door open.

It wasn't a storage room. It was an armory.

Or, a panic room converted into one. There were racks of hard drives, stacks of cash, and a gun safe.

The safe was open.

Elara walked toward it. Inside, there were two handguns and a thick manila folder.

She picked up the folder. It didn't have a label.

She opened it.

The first page was a photograph of Silas Vane. Taken from a distance, through a telephoto lens. He was on the deck of this house. There were crosshairs drawn over his chest in red marker.

The next page was a profile. *Target: Silas Vane. Bounty: $2,000,000. Client: Helix Corp.*

Elara flipped the page.

There was a profile of the "Asset" assigned to the job.

A photo of a woman. Dark hair. Sharp eyes. Cold expression.

* Asset: Elara Vance. Call Sign: Wraith. Status: Active.*

It was her.

She wasn't a secretary. She was a cleaner. A hitwoman.

"I wondered how long it would take you," a voice said from the doorway.

Elara spun around.

Silas was standing there. He was leaning against the doorframe, his hands in his pockets. He didn't look grumpy. He looked tired. Resigned.

"You're an assassin, Elara," he said softly. "You came here three weeks ago to kill me."