RONAN Nguyen pointed at the pistol he had handed me back at the house earlier. It sat tight in a thigh holster that used to belong to Jackson. I reached down, unsnapped the safety strap, and pulled the pistol free. “You know how to use one of those?” Nguyen asked. “Shot a guy a couple of hours ago,” I said. The words came out flat. A bad joke about it being a lucky shot almost followed, but guilt surged up and stopped it. That guilt had weight. I knew the man would have killed both of us. I knew that. The feeling did not care. “So, no,” Nguyen muttered. “Grab it by the butt and keep your finger off the trigger.” The grip felt hard and rough against my palm, the texture biting into my skin.Nguyen kept talking, his voice steady and practiced. “Keep the muzzle pointed at the ground when you are not shooting. Wherever you look, the pistol goes the same way. Doesn’t mean a damn thing if it’s aimed right and you spot the problem on your left.” A nod was all I gave him. “Two hands,” he went on. “Left hand bracing the right. None of that one handed action movie garbage. You want to hit what you aim at, not some playground full of kids.” He grabbed my left hand and shoved it against the center of his armored chest. “You shoot here,” he said. “Center mass. Aim anywhere else and you miss. You have seven rounds total, one already in the chamber.” The gun felt heavier now. Action movies rushed through my head and pushed out the one question that mattered most. “Where’s the safety?” Nguyen shook his head. “No safety switch. Trigger is the safety. It takes force to pull, so pull it like you mean it and someone is going to have a bad day.”That settled in fast. He stepped in front of me and braced the butt of his rifle into the crook of his arm. The muzzle stayed low, angled toward the floor. “You open,” he said. “I breach right. You go left. Do not shoot me in the ass.” I shifted and set my hand on the door handle. My body froze for a second. “Shouldn’t I learn how to reload?” A smirk crossed his face. “No need. No more ammo for that gun.” The barrel of his rifle lifted slightly toward the door. My stomach tightened. We were almost dry and about to walk into something we knew nothing about. I pulled the handle. The door was heavier than expected, forcing me to brace my legs. That weight hit harder than it should have. It had never felt like this before.The reason came clear right then. In all my years coming here, I had never been the one to open the door. This place had never been mine the way it was for my father or for some of my siblings. They saw the Sanctum Complex as shelter. A place of safety and connection to the powers that ruled everything. To me, it had always been a place where who I was still earned quiet judgment. Why rush into somewhere that only accepted pieces of me? The door opened just enough. Nguyen slipped through, his rifle snapping up in one smooth motion. I followed close, pistol down like he taught me. He rolled right. I went straight, entering at an angle instead of charging in.“Clear,” Nguyen said. The antechamber of the Sanctum Complex was spotless and bitter cold. The air conditioning was pushing hard, flooding the space with artificial chill. No debris. No signs of struggle. Nothing out of place. Something was still wrong. Noise echoed from deeper down the main hall. Not just noise. Chaos. Under it all lingered a faint, rotten smell that soaked into everything. That scent stirred something dark inside me. I knew it too well. It matched the smell that clung to the bodies of the men who had tried to kill me back at Fort Meade. The only thing missing was burned powder. Nguyen glanced at me. He knew that smell too.He was probably searching for the right words. There were none. A hand motioned down the hall instead. “We should find out what’s making that noise.” He answered without speaking. The rifle swung forward and he advanced. I followed behind the army sergeant. His size stood out now. He had at least fifty pounds on me, and that was before counting the gear. Armor and equipment wrapped around a thick, powerful frame. Every step pressed into the floor. No matter how careful he was, physics won. Each step made the subfloor flex beneath the thin industrial carpet. The building answered with soft creaks as his weight shifted forward. That sound carried ahead of us. It warned whatever waited that we were coming.