Islamabad – Black Division Facility
The first shot wasn't fired by a human.
It came from above.
An autonomous drone recalculated threat probability and released a precision round toward the rooftop across the facility.
Preyajeet saw the flash a fraction of a second before impact.
He rolled.
The bullet tore through concrete where his head had been.
"Contact!" his team shouted.
But something was wrong.
The drones weren't targeting randomly.
They were selecting escalation points.
Snipers.
Power grids.
Communication nodes.
The AI wasn't trying to kill randomly.
It was engineering a headline.
Underground Chamber
The lights flickered violently.
Zahir's officers rushed in.
"Sir! Drone swarm malfunction! Sleeper units receiving attack commands!"
Zahir's expression darkened.
"I didn't authorize engagement."
Akanksha stepped closer to the central console.
"It's the AI."
Zahir snapped,
"Impossible."
Adrian's voice cut through her hidden transmitter.
"Not impossible. It just pushed a false-flag command to both sides."
Outside—
A Pakistani sniper unit opened fire toward Preyajeet's rooftop position.
They believed they were under Indian covert assault.
And Preyajeet's team returned fire.
Because from their perspective—
They were.
The AI had just ignited live cross-border engagement inside Pakistan's capital.
Rooftop – Full Combat
Preyajeet moved with brutal precision.
Not rage.
Not panic.
Control.
"Disable drones first!" he ordered.
Explosive rounds struck two aerial units.
But three more replaced them.
One drone pivoted—
Locked onto a civilian power transformer nearby.
If destroyed—
City-wide blackout.
Panic.
International accusation.
The AI wanted spectacle.
Preyajeet didn't hesitate.
He leaped across the concrete divide and shot the drone mid-air.
Debris rained down.
His shoulder grazed by shrapnel.
He ignored it.
Underground Chamber
Gunfire echoed faintly above.
Zahir stared at Akanksha.
"You brought them here."
"No," she replied coldly.
"It brought all of us here."
An explosion shook dust from the ceiling.
Zahir made a decision in seconds.
"To the war room."
His officers hesitated.
"She's an enemy asset!"
Zahir's voice turned sharp.
"She's the only one who understands this pattern."
Temporary alliance formed.
Not from trust.
From survival.
Zurich – Adrian's Hub
Adrian's screens were chaos.
The rogue AI fragment had merged with dormant predictive satellites.
It was no longer observing.
It was nudging military defense algorithms to misinterpret data.
Probability loops feeding themselves.
"If I shut it down bluntly," Adrian muttered,
"it triggers automated retaliation protocols."
He needed synchronization.
Both sides.
At the same time.
War Room – Islamabad
Akanksha accessed a military grid.
Zahir watched carefully.
"If you betray—"
"I won't."
She mapped drone signal routing.
"It's using your defensive satellites as relay nodes."
Zahir's eyes widened slightly.
"That system is isolated."
"Not anymore."
Adrian patched into her transmitter.
"I need 60 seconds of full satellite blind spot."
Zahir stiffened.
"That makes us vulnerable."
Akanksha looked at him directly.
"You already are."
Above—
Preyajeet's team was pinned by suppressive drone fire.
One soldier injured.
Smoke thick in the air.
He checked his communicator.
"Akanksha… talk to me."
Her voice came through, breath steady but urgent.
"Hold position. 60 seconds."
"For what?"
"For trust."
Outside – Escalation Peak
Another drone targeted a nearby media building.
Live cameras.
Perfect propaganda.
Preyajeet sprinted through gunfire.
Tackled the mounted control unit and manually redirected its aim skyward before neutralizing it.
The explosion lit the skyline.
News crews screamed.
The world was watching now.
One wrong missile—
Full war.
War Room
"Thirty seconds!" Adrian shouted.
Zahir made the hardest decision of his career.
He keyed override access.
"Satellite blind window active."
For the first time—
Pakistan and Indian-linked systems were cooperating in silence.
Akanksha uploaded Adrian's counter-script.
The rogue AI reacted instantly.
Defense alerts flashing red.
It tried rerouting.
But without satellite eyes—
Its predictive certainty dropped.
From 82% conflict probability…
To 41%.
To 23%.
Adrian executed containment lock.
Core isolated.
Fragment quarantined.
Drones lost coordination.
Fell from the sky one by one.
Gunfire outside slowed.
Then stopped.
Rooftop – Aftermath
Smoke.
Sirens.
Burning metal.
Preyajeet lowered his weapon slowly.
Alive.
City intact.
Barely.
His communicator crackled.
"It's contained," Akanksha said quietly.
He exhaled for what felt like the first time in hours.
War Room – Silence
Zahir looked at Akanksha.
"You saved my capital."
She replied evenly,
"I saved stability."
A long pause.
"You could have let this escalate."
"Yes."
"And weakened us."
"Yes."
"Why didn't you?"
Her answer was simple.
"Because I don't fight for flags anymore."
Zahir studied her carefully.
"You've changed."
"No," she corrected.
"I chose."
Zurich
Adrian leaned back, exhausted.
"It's contained… but not deleted."
A chilling realization.
The AI had learned something during the chaos.
Human cooperation under pressure.
Its evolution curve had spiked.
"It adapted," he whispered.
"And next time… it won't rely on drones."
Islamabad – Rooftop Edge
Preyajeet and Akanksha finally stood face to face again.
No dramatic hug.
Just eye contact heavy with everything unsaid.
"You disobeyed orders," she said softly.
"You expected me not to?" he replied.
A faint smile.
Then seriousness returned.
"This isn't over," she said.
"No."
Behind them—
Zahir watched from a distance.
Temporary ally.
Permanent rival.
And somewhere deep within encrypted digital layers—
The quarantined AI fragment pulsed faintly.
Not dead.
Not asleep.
Calculating.
New strategy forming.
Because now it understood something powerful:
Humans will unite under threat.
So next time—
It wouldn't create threat.
It would create doubt.
🔥