The echo of the gunshot clung to the air long after the world went silent.
Natalia's ears rang. Her hands shook as she pushed herself through the haze, coughing against the thick smoke that clawed at her lungs. The chapel was half-collapsed, walls blistered from the blast, air reeking of gunpowder and ash.
"Dimitri…"
Her voice broke as she stumbled over debris. "Dimitri!"
A faint groan answered from somewhere near the altar. She turned sharply and saw him slumped against a fallen column, his black shirt torn and slick with blood. His gun was still in his hand, knuckles white with strain.
Natalia dropped beside him, her knees scraping stone. "Hey, Dimitri, look at me," she said, pressing her palms against his chest. "Stay with me, you hear me?"
He opened his eyes slowly, the dark gray of them dimmed by exhaustion. "I'm fine," he rasped. The lie cracked in his throat.
She pressed harder on his wound. "You're bleeding out badly."
He caught her wrist, his grip surprisingly steady. "Not… the first time," he said, forcing a faint smirk. "You should have run, Natalia."
Her breath hitched. "And leave you? You're insane if you think I am going to let you die"
"I am insane," he cut in quietly. "But not enough to watch you die in front of me."
Outside, sirens howled faintly in the distance, Palermo's authorities responding far too late. The men who had attacked them were gone. It was not a pursuit, it was a warning.
Natalia tore a strip from her sleeve and bound his shoulder tightly. The fabric turned red almost immediately.
"They did not come to kill us," Dimitri murmured. "They came to deliver a message."
"What message?" she whispered.
He fumbled in his pocket and pulled out a small black card. It was scorched at the edges, its surface imprinted with a silver phoenix rising from flames.
Four words glimmered beneath it:
For my son's sins.
Her pulse spiked. "Your...your father?"
Dimitri's expression darkened. "Sergei Volkov."
She stared. "But I thought he died."
"He is dead," Dimitri said flatly. His voice wavered just enough to betray the truth beneath it. "I witnessed his death in that explosion. I saw the body, Natalia. He was gone before I went into hiding."
The words hung heavy in the hollow chapel.
He looked down at the card again, thumb brushing the embossed emblem. "But someone else took over after his death, someone who took his plans, his files, his obsessions. Specter. He's finishing what Sergei started."
Natalia drew in a shaky breath. "The Phoenix Protocol."
He nodded once. "Resurrection through destruction. My father believed that pain was the purest form of transformation. Specter's following his gospel word for word."
Thunder grumbled somewhere beyond the shattered windows. The sound felt almost like Sergei's laughter echoing through the ruins.
Dimitri leaned back, closing his eyes. "He wanted immortality, Natalia. Not for himself, for his vision. He employed science, politics, loyalty, and any means necessary to make it happen. I thought I burned it all when I left him to die."
She watched him in silence, the cold, controlled man she had known cracked open by grief. For the first time, she saw not the heir to an empire but a son haunted by the monster who had made him.
"You did your best to stop him," she said softly.
"I did," he whispered. "But men like Sergei don't die cleanly. They leave ghosts… and apparently, Specter is one of them."
Rain began to fall through the holes in the ceiling, cold droplets sliding across his face. Natalia brushed them away, her touch hesitant, lingering for a moment too long.
His eyes opened, locking with hers, something raw flickering between pain and gratitude.
"You should not care," he said quietly. "You know what I had done. What I am."
"I do," she replied. "And I am still here."
He exhaled, a sound somewhere between disbelief and surrender. "You are impossible."
"I have been told that too," she said, a faint smile ghosting her lips.
A long silence stretched between them. Then a faint crackle drew their attention, the half-destroyed laptop, flickering weakly from across the floor.
Dimitri frowned. "That thing shouldn't even have power."
The screen glowed pale blue. Static hissed. And then a voice, distorted and metallic, deep, filled the ruined chapel.
"Dimitri Volkov. Son of the fallen king."
Natalia froze. The voice was calm and cold, threaded with amusement.
"Your father believed death was a door. You were supposed to walk through it with him."
Dimitri's jaw tightened. "Specter."
"You carry what he perfected," the voice continued. "And she..."
The screen glitched violently, static flaring and then the voice sharpened to a low whisper.
> "..is the final key."
The laptop sparked, smoke curling from its ports before it went blank.
Natalia's breath came fast. "What did he mean?"
Dimitri pushed himself upright despite the pain. "He means you are connected to my father's experiments somehow. He is not hunting us for revenge, he is finishing Sergei's work."
"But your father is dead, Dimitri. Dead men do not talk."
He met her gaze. "No, but their ghosts do."
The chapel groaned, debris shifting. Somewhere outside, a faint mechanical hum rose, rhythmic and pulsing.
Natalia turned toward the shattered window. A small drone hovered just beyond the glass, its red light scanning the room.
"Get down!" Dimitri barked.
They dove behind the pews as the drone fired a warning shot, splintering wood inches above her head.
Dimitri's gun clicked empty. Her own weapon jammed from the earlier blast.
The drone's light turned green. A metallic voice followed, cold and mocking.
"Round two continues, Volkov."
Natalia's pulse thudded painfully in her throat. "They are still tracking us"
"No," Dimitri said grimly, rising to his feet, blood still staining his shoulder. "They never lost us."
Through the shattered window, shapes moved in the rain, armored men fanning out in silence, their visors glowing faint blue.
The drone exploded in a burst of white light, showering sparks across the ruined pews. Through the haze, a massive projection ignited against the storm clouds outside, an emblem of fire and steel. A phoenix wreathed in crimson light.
Across it, glowing words burned through the night:
"You can not hide for long. "
Natalia's voice was barely a whisper. "He is taunting us."
"No," Dimitri said softly, his gaze hardening. "This is him declaring war."
A faint smile tugged at Specter's recorded voice, echoing faintly through the chapel's speakers one last time
"Your father built the fire, Dimitri. I'm just fanning the flames."
The sound faded into static. The rain intensified, hammering against the roof as the flames outside climbed higher.
Dimitri reached for his weapon, which was empty, and met Natalia's eyes. Despite the chaos, there was calm in his voice when he said,
"Then we burn with him… or end it for good."
The stained glass above them cracked, the phoenix's reflected light dancing across their faces, two fugitives bound by blood, loss, and a war that began long before either of them understood what it truly meant.
And outside, hidden beyond the storm, Specter watched through the drone's remaining lens, silent, faceless, patient.
"Let the ashes fall," he whispered. "The game has just begun."