Chapter 63: The Variable 2

Obsidian Peak – Late January, 1:00 AM.

Obsidian Peak usually went quiet after midnight.

Not silent but subdued. The kind of stillness that hangs over powerful places when grief has settled into the walls.

For days, the security room had felt less like a command center and more like a mourning hall. Conversations were whispers. Coffee went cold, untouched. Men who were trained to anticipate threats stared at blank screens like they were staring at loss.

Then the alarms detonated.

A sharp, metallic shriek cut through the air.

LED panels flared alive in violent blues and reds. Consoles blinked. A private encrypted channel forced its way to the top of the display.

Ares’ private line.

Every head snapped up.

On the central screen, a short message burned against black:

Mount Ourea. Escaped rebel stronghold. Safe for now. – LR

For half a second, nobody moved.

Then Linux—Head of Security at Obsidian—slammed both palms on the desk.

“Finally! We have a lead!”

His voice cracked with something rawer than excitement.

Hope!

“Who is this LR, Larissa Reyes?” Linux asked.

The room went still.

Everyone saw her chase the truck on a motorcycle.

“It looks like her.” Jack confirmed calmly.

Whoever had masterminded the kidnapping has calculated everything. Unfortunately, there was a variable in the game — a seemingly fragile woman.

…

Up in the penthouse lounge, Ares had been sitting in the dark, city lights bleeding through floor-to-ceiling glass behind him. He hadn’t slept. He hadn’t really rested. He was simply still.

His phone vibrated once against the glass side table.

That was all it took.

He stood abruptly and grabbed the phone.

He read the message.

The shift in his expression was immediate—grief sharpening into focus, into intent. He was on his feet and entered the elevator within a minute.

By the time he strode into the security room, the atmosphere had transformed. Screens pulsed. Digital maps spun. Signal traces attempted to claw back a disappearing satellite ping.

The best of his men were already assembled.

Xander, his top hacker—lean, calculating, eyes never missing detail.

Linux, the head of security—serious, volatile, fingers flying across keyboards.

Jack, his personal assistant—smooth talker, the kind of man who could dismantle a problem without raising his voice.

“Did you get the coordinates,” Ares demanded. No greeting. No wasted breath.

Linux didn’t look up. “Boss… the signal dropped seconds after transmission. It piggybacked on a satellite burst. One-way communication.”

“Damn it!”

Ares’s hand came down on the table so hard the impact rattled Xander’s coffee mug. The dark liquid rippled dangerously close to spilling.

He turned away before his anger could fully surface. Rage without direction was useless.

He pulled out his phone and dialed a number he rarely used casually, but had called many times in the last two days.

Two rings.

“Yeah?”

It wasn’t Liam.

“Ares, this is Logan.”

Ares didn’t waste time looking for Liam.

“I received a satellite message on my private number. Already forwarded to you. Mount Ourea.” His jaw flexed. “I remembered, there’s a military base in the area.”

On the other end, brief silence. The kind of silence that meant someone was processing multiple streams of intel at once.

“We tracked a boat that left Praya two nights ago,” Logan replied. “It cruised along the Ourea River. We lost it where the jungle canopy thickens. Couldn’t pinpoint where it unloaded passengers. It could be them.”

So they could indeed be in Ourea.

Smart move.

Harder to trace.

Ares stared at the digital terrain map glowing across the security wall. Dense forest. Rugged elevation. Rebel territory carved into natural fortresses.

“Dad, Logan and I, ” another voice came through—Liam this time, cutting in. “are flying to Fort Ourea at first light. We’ll coordinate with the base.”

Ares’ eyes darkened, but his voice was controlled. “I’m coming.”

There was no room for argument.

Across the room, his men were already moving—pulling flight plans, requesting clearances, marking probable rebel routes along the river and mountain slopes.

The mourning hall was gone.

In its place stood a war room.

And somewhere beyond the mountains and the jungle canopy, Lara, with the children, had found their safe haven.

…

Meanwhile, at the heart of Lanura’s glittering skyline, in a penthouse carved from glass and arrogance, a man stood barefoot on a private balcony forty stories above the city.

Broad shoulders. Lean waist. Power worn like a second skin.

A silk robe hung loosely from his frame, expensive but careless, as if money had long ago stopped meaning anything to him.

The city below pulsed in neon—traffic sliding like veins of light, music drifting up from rooftop bars, sirens wailing somewhere far beneath.

Between his fingers, a cigarette burned down slowly.

Pressed to his ear was a phone worth more than most people’s yearly salary.

From the bedroom behind him, a woman’s voice floated out—soft, coaxing, half-asleep.

“Are you coming back to bed?”

He didn’t answer.

Didn’t even turn.

His attention narrowed to the voice on the other end of the line. With each word he heard, the air around him seemed to sharpen.

“What do you mean they escaped?” His tone dropped low—dangerously controlled. “How could they escape? The plan was foolproof.”

Silence while he listened.

His jaw flexed. The muscle there jumped once.

The cigarette trembled slightly between his fingers, ash falling unnoticed to the marble floor.

He inhaled slowly.

“The Wolverine saved them?” His voice hardened, disbelief bleeding into fury. “You said the jungle was sealed. You said no one could trace that route.”

Another pause.

The glow of the cigarette flared brighter as he dragged from it—too hard.

“Didn’t you wipe your tracks? Boats, signals—everything?” His eyes scanned the skyline like he could see betrayal written in the lights below. “How could you have been followed?”

More silence.

His fingers tightened.

The cigarette crumpled in his fist, ember smearing against his palm. He didn’t react to the burn.

“Are you sure,” he said slowly, each word deliberate, “there is no traitor among your men?”

Inside the bedroom, the woman shifted again, sensing the shift in atmosphere now. The air had changed. It no longer felt indulgent.

It felt lethal.

He turned slightly, the city lights catching the sharp cut of his cheekbones. Whatever answer he heard next made his eyes go flat.

“What?”

The word came out almost inaudible.

Then sharper.

“What did you say?”

A beat.

“Agila is dead?”

For the first time since the call began, silence swallowed him instead of the other way around.

Lanura glittered beneath him, unaware that somewhere far from its polished towers, a war had just escalated—

and one of his strongest pieces had been taken off the board.

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