The forest was burning behind them.
The fire burnt every part of the forest, devouring what was left of the convoy. Rain hissed as it met the flames, the air thick with smoke and the taste of ash. Dimitri did not slow down until the roar of the explosion faded into a distant growl, until even the rain seemed to hold its breath.
Natalia stumbled after him, soaked, trembling, her lungs aching. "Where are we going?"
He didn't answer. His eyes scanned the dark ridge ahead, sharp, and calculating as he planned an escape. The world had shrunk to mud, shadows, and survival.
Finally, through the veil of mist, she saw it, stone ruins half-buried beneath ivy, a crumbling monastery hidden in the folds of the forest. The place looked abandoned, swallowed by time.
"This will do," he muttered.
He pushed open the warped wooden door. The hinges screamed in protest, echoing through the hollow hall. Inside, the air was cold and smelled of dust and rain. Moonlight spilled through holes in the roof, silvering the cracked altar at the far end.
Natalia followed, her boots dragging against the broken tiles. "It looks like a grave."
"Then no one will look for us here."
He dropped his duffel and checked the corners, every movement precise. She watched him, his soaked shirt clinging to the scars along his back, the blood still seeping from a reopened wound near his shoulder. He moved like a man who refused to admit pain existed.
"Sit down," she said.
"I'm fine."
"You are not." She stepped in front of him, blocking his path. "You have been bleeding since the ravine."
His jaw tightened. For a heartbeat, she thought he would argue again. Then the strength drained from him as if her voice had pulled it out. He sank onto a stone bench, his breath shallow.
Natalia found the small medical kit from his bag, her hands shaking slightly as she cleaned the wound. The cut ran deep, she tried not to look at the red running down her fingers.
"You should not have taken that bullet for me," she whispered.
His eyes lifted to hers, gray and steady. "Don't say that."
"You keep saving me."
"Because you matter."
The words fell between them like thunder. For a second, neither moved. The rain outside softened to a steady whisper.
He looked away first. "We do not have enough time for this."
"Maybe we should make time," she said quietly.
Dimitri exhaled, the sound half laughter, half-defeat. "If we survive Specter, you can yell at me all you want."
She tied off the bandage, too tight on purpose. "That is a promise."
A faint smile ghosted his mouth before fading again. He reached for his gun, checking the magazine. "We need to secure the perimeter."
Natalia hesitated. "Can I ask you something first?"
He nodded once.
"When Specter said I was the key… You looked like you already knew what he meant."
His fingers froze on the gun's safety. A muscle jumped in his jaw. "I don't know, at least not completely."
"But you suspect."
"I suspect my father left something buried in you, memories, code, blood. I do not know which, but he was obsessed with immortality. Maybe you were part of that obsession."
She stared at him. "I am not an experiment."
"No," he said. "You are the result."
The silence after that felt alive. She could hear their heartbeats, the slow drip of rain through the roof, the storm retreating like a wounded animal.
Natalia stood abruptly, pacing toward the cracked altar. "Your father worked with mine."
"He did. They started with data augmentation, creating soldiers who could think faster, move faster, remember everything. But the process failed. Every test subject died, their greed for immortality was the beginning of their download."
"So why am I still alive?"
"I'm trying to find out."
She turned toward him. "And if the answer is something you can not live with?"
"Then I will still protect you."
Her throat tightened. "Even if I am the reason all this started?"
"Especially then."
The words broke something open in her chest. She walked to him, the distance between them closing like the space before a storm. He didn't move. The tension hung heavy between them with his breath shallow, and hers uneven.
"Dimitri," she whispered.
He looked at her, eyes unreadable. "Don't."
But she stepped closer anyway. "You think too much. Feel nothing. That's how you survive. But it's killing you."
His hand rose slowly, brushing a strand of wet hair from her face. "If I let myself feel, I won't stop."
The air snapped between them, heat, fear, and want.
Then a sound shattered it, a low mechanical hum from somewhere above.
Dimitri's head jerked upward. "Drone."
He grabbed her wrist, pulling her toward the back hall. "They are scanning for heat signatures."
They ran through the narrow corridor, past broken statues and collapsed beams, until they reached a stairwell descending underground. The steps led to a crypt, the air thick with earth and damp stone.
He pulled a small device from his pocket, flicked a switch. The LED flickered green. "Signal jammer. It will hide us for a few minutes."
Natalia pressed against the wall, breathing hard. "They tracked us this far?"
"They never stopped."
She glanced around, the crypt was lined with coffins and faded murals of saints. A strange peace hung here, fragile and wrong. "Why do I feel like we are already buried?"
He looked at her, expression softening. "Because we are, for now."
The hum above faded slowly, swallowed by the rain.
Minutes passed. The tension eased just enough for them to breathe again. Dimitri sat on the steps, his shoulders slumped for the first time since the ambush.
"You should rest," she said.
"Can't."
"You will collapse."
He glanced up at her, a wry spark in his tired eyes. "You like giving orders."
"Only when you ignore sense."
He gave a faint chuckle and leaned back against the wall. "Tell me something normal. Something that is not fire and blood."
She blinked, caught off guard. "Normal?"
"Yes. I've forgotten what that sounds like."
Natalia thought for a moment. "When I was little, I wanted to be a dancer. My father used to play old records after dinner. I would stand on his feet while he danced."
Dimitri's gaze softened. "He must have loved you."
"I thought he did. Now I don't know if any of it was real."
He looked away, voice quiet. "It was real to you and that's enough."
She studied him, his face half in shadow, the scar across his jaw, the exhaustion carving deeper lines around his eyes. "What about you? What did you want to be?"
He smiled without humor. "Free."
The single word hung in the silence like a prayer.
Above them, thunder rolled again, distant this time. The drone had moved on. Dimitri stood, retrieving his bag.
"Time to go," he said. "If we stay here, they will circle back."
Natalia nodded, following him up the stairs. The monastery's main hall was darker now, the rain easing to a mist. Through a gap in the wall, she saw the first light of dawn bleeding into the sky, a dull silver against the smoke.
"Where will we go?" she asked.
"North," he said. "Across the border. There's someone who can help us decrypt what's left of the data. He used to work for my father before he disappeared."
"Can you trust him?"
"No," Dimitri said. "But we need his help."
They stepped out into the clearing. The forest smelled of wet earth and ashes, the world was quiet again, almost too quiet.
Natalia glanced back at the ruins. "Do you think Specter ever sleeps?"
"No," Dimitri said, eyes on the horizon. "He waits."
And somewhere beyond the smoke, Specter did wait, watching through another set of eyes, through another drone, smiling faintly as his screen flickered with two heat signatures moving north.
His voice was a whisper through the static.
"Run, Volkov. Let's see how long your race lasts."