Chapter Text
Chapter One - Jules
New York never really slept. It groaned, hissed, argued with itself through thin apartment walls and rattling subway tracks, but it never slept.
Juliet Montgomery sat hunched over a cluttered desk on the third floor of the Whitmore Legal Aid, rubbing tired eyes behind wire-framed glasses as rain tapped against the windows. Case files towered around her in uneven stacks, highlighted notes bleeding neon pink and yellow beneath the flickering desk lamp.
Three people missing in six months.
No connections. No witnesses. No bodies.
Which usually meant nobody important enough for the city to care.
Jules frowned at the photograph paperclipped to the top file. A college student. Twenty-one. Gone after applying for a research internship at a biotech company called Helix Dynamics.
The second victim had interviewed there too.
The third worked there briefly before disappearing completely.
“Coincidence,” her supervising attorney had called it earlier.
Jules didn’t believe in coincidences anymore.
Especially not in New York.
She glanced toward the old office clock.
7:47 PM.
Jules had only been officially licensed for six months, and already most of her paycheck disappeared into rent, subway fares, and instant coffee. Whitmore Legal Aid paid barely enough to survive on, but the work mattered. Which was exactly why she couldn’t let this case go.
Even if it got her into situations like tonight.
Her fake resume sat folded neatly inside her bag beside a burner phone and a USB drive no bigger than her thumb.
Definitely not approved by the American Bar Association.
She stood, slipped on her coat, and headed out into the rain.
---
Helix Dynamics occupied a sleek glass building downtown, all polished steel and minimalist design. The kind of place that smelled expensive the second you walked inside.
Jules approached the front desk with practiced confidence.
“Late interview,” she said smoothly. “Research assistant position?”
The receptionist barely looked up. “Ninth floor.”
Too easy.
That alone made her nervous.
The elevator ride felt endless. Jules adjusted the strap of her bag while her pulse hammered steadily in her throat.
You’re just gathering information.
Not breaking and entering.
Probably.
The ninth floor was eerily quiet. Dim overhead lights reflected off spotless white floors. Laboratories lined the hallway behind glass walls, filled with equipment she couldn’t begin to identify.
A man in a gray lab coat greeted her near the back offices.
“Miss Contraire?” he asked.
“That’s me.”
“Apologies for the late hour. We’ve had… staffing issues recently.”
I bet you have.
He led her through the facility while explaining research grants and experimental development projects in a rehearsed corporate monotone. Jules nodded politely, pretending to listen while mentally mapping exits, cameras, and keycard locks.
Then she saw it.
An unattended workstation glowing softly inside a side office.
Her chance.
The lab-coated man paused when another employee called for him down the hall.
“One moment.”
Jules offered a pleasant smile. “Of course.”
The second he disappeared, she moved.
Fast.
She slipped into the office, pulled the USB drive from her coat pocket, and jammed it into the computer tower beneath the desk.
The monitor blinked awake.
Encrypted files.
Employee records.
Research logs.
Video archives.
Jackpot.
“Hurry up, hurry up…” she muttered under her breath as folders copied over one by one.
Footsteps echoed faintly somewhere outside.
Her stomach tightened.
92%.
97%.
100%.
She yanked the drive free just as voices grew louder in the hallway.
Then every alarm in the building exploded at once.
Red lights flashed violently across the office.
“Security breach detected.”
“Oh, you have got to be kidding me.”
Jules bolted.
Shouts erupted behind her almost immediately.
“Stop her!”
She sprinted down the corridor, shoulder-checking through emergency doors before slamming into the stairwell. Her flats pounded against concrete steps as she flew downward two at a time.
Somewhere above her, footsteps followed.
Heavy.
Fast.
Too fast.
She burst out into the rain-soaked street, gasping as cold water hit her face. Neon signs blurred together while traffic horns screamed somewhere nearby.
Don’t look back.
She ran anyway.
Through crowded sidewalks.
Across intersections.
Into narrow alleys slick with rain and garbage.
The city became a maze around her.
She caught glimpses behind her only once or twice—dark figures moving across rooftops and fire escapes.
All black.
Silent.
Not police.
Her lungs burned. Her back ached from slamming into dumpsters and brick walls trying to turn corners fast enough to lose them.
Then suddenly—
The ground vanished beneath her.
Jules barely had time to scream before she crashed downward through open air.
BOOM.
Pain exploded through her spine as she slammed onto concrete below. The impact knocked every bit of air from her lungs.
For several horrible seconds, she couldn’t breathe.
Couldn’t think.
Rainwater dripped faintly from the open manhole high above while her vision swam violently.
A construction barrier.
The manhole must’ve been under maintenance.
“Holy shit...” she wheezed.
Every muscle screamed as she rolled painfully onto her side and dragged herself away from the shaft of light overhead, deeper into darkness.
Her back throbbed with every movement.
Then she heard voices above.
Running footsteps.
Flashlights swept briefly across the opening.
Jules clamped a hand over her mouth, forcing herself silent despite her ragged breathing.
Please keep going.
Please keep going.
The footsteps paused.
Then slowly faded into the distance.
Relief hit so hard it almost made her dizzy.
For a long moment she just sat there in the dark sewer tunnel, soaked to the bone, trying not to cry from the pain shooting up her spine.
Finally, with shaking hands, she reached into her coat pocket.
The USB drive was still there.
Jules stared at it in the dim light filtering from above.
Whatever was on this thing had terrified Helix Dynamics enough to send armed men after her.
Which probably meant she’d just stumbled into something enormous.
A faint sound echoed somewhere to her left.
Not water.
Movement.
Slow.
Deliberate.
Jules froze.
The darkness deeper in the tunnel shifted slightly.
And suddenly she realized—
She wasn’t alone.