Eron didn't need to check his watch. He already knew the exact moment Mika would step into the café—7:43 a.m., her bag slightly tilted, headphones on, humming the third track of her morning playlist.
He sat two tables away, blending in with a laptop and a cappuccino, glasses on, hoodie low.
7:43:17.
Mika entered. Right on schedule.
Eron's lips curled slightly. It had taken 39 separate loops just to map her path here, 18 to figure out the trigger points in her schedule, and 12 more to discover that she was a junior analyst inside Helix's financial network—one of the hidden linchpins of its money laundering operation.
And she didn't even know it.
He waited another 47 seconds before standing and "accidentally" bumping her tray at the pickup counter.
Coffee splashed, barely missing her coat.
"Ah—! I'm so sorry!" Eron apologized immediately, dabbing at the counter with a napkin.
Mika, startled, removed one earbud. "It's... it's fine."
"I owe you another drink. You're not in a hurry, are you?" he said, his tone warm, casual, confident. Like an extrovert who had done this before.
Because he had. Forty-seven times.
---
They sat across from each other.
"So, Mika... you work nearby?"
Her eyes narrowed slightly. "Have we met?"
There it was—the soft resistance. Not quite suspicion. Just awareness.
"Once or twice," he lied. "I think you were with Zachary. He works at the Trellex branch office, right?"
A flicker in her pupils. Recognition. He had nailed the name. In one try, she'd found him strange. In another, charming. This time, he was familiar—the most powerful kind of social position.
"Oh, right. Small world."
Small? No. Tight. Curated. Controlled.
---
As the conversation flowed, Eron subtly steered it—questions with invisible hooks, compliments planted like slow-growing seeds. He used techniques learned from thousands of days: mirroring posture, voice modulation, conversational pivoting.
But this wasn't about romance or connection.
This was about data.
He was building her trust to get inside her apartment—where she unknowingly stored a flash drive with Helix's quarterly covert transfers. She believed it was part of her "archival project" for her office, but Eron knew better.
Because on Try #12,484, he had broken in while she was at work and almost got caught by her neighbor.
On Try #32,200, he learned her neighbor's dog barks only at strangers—unless you carry dried liver treats.
On Try #45,902, he got in safely but discovered the drive was password-locked.
On Try #45,903, he watched her type the password in person—then looped again.
Today, he wouldn't break in.
Today, she'd invite him.
"…So, my supervisor dumped all the old files on me like I was some digital janitor," Mika said, sipping her second cup of coffee. "Most of it's junk. Stuff from like, five years ago."
Eron tilted his head, feigning interest. "You're archiving those at home?"
She nodded. "Yeah, just temporary storage. My laptop doesn't have enough space, so I'm using one of those encrypted Helix drives. They're ridiculously secure."
He already knew that. He had already bypassed it in loop #45,903.
But this time, he smiled as if it was new information. "Sounds intense. I'd probably wipe everything by accident."
She chuckled. "Trust me, I'm tempted."
Bingo. Emotional hook. Eron gently placed his coffee down and leaned in just enough to suggest camaraderie without intimacy.
"You know," he said, his voice a little lower, "I actually know a thing or two about data recovery. Used to intern with a cyber-forensics firm."
That was true—on Try #18,220, he'd faked an internship profile to get inside one.
Mika raised an eyebrow. "Really?"
He nodded. "Yeah. If anything ever crashes or glitches, I might be able to help. Just saying."
A moment of hesitation crossed her face.
Then, the spark.
"Actually," she said slowly, "one of the folders wouldn't open this morning. It's probably just corrupt, but..."
Hook set.
"Want me to take a look?" he offered casually. "I've got some time now. Or later—no pressure."
She glanced at her watch. "I have a meeting at ten… but if you're serious, maybe later today?"
He smiled. "Just say when."
---
12:17 p.m. – Mika's Apartment
The scent of vanilla and faint printer ink. Eron stepped in with measured steps, noting every detail he'd already memorized from previous loops—the uneven floorboard near the kitchen, the framed photo of her brother (deceased, he'd confirmed it in Try #30,142), the glass bowl of M&Ms she never touched.
He wasn't here for snacks.
While she fetched the flash drive, Eron glanced at the hallway—still unlocked. Good.
She returned and handed it over. "I've already backed it up on the office cloud, so if you accidentally fry it—no worries."
He plugged it into his own laptop. "I'll just run a simple diagnostic."
What she didn't notice: the script was already embedded in his system. A silent Trojan would copy the entire contents, decrypt the secure archive, and delete all traces—something he'd perfected over 122 tries.
And while the program worked in the background, Eron asked her about her favorite music.
Because part of manipulation isn't control—it's distraction.
Eron kept the conversation light as the program completed its silent extraction. On the surface, he appeared to be poking around with basic recovery tools. Mika sat across from him, sipping juice, none the wiser.
74% copied.
Decryption in progress.
"So, your brother," Eron said, glancing at the dusty frame on her shelf. "You two close?"
Mika's smile faltered. "We were. He passed away a couple of years ago."
He nodded respectfully. "Sorry. That must've been rough."
She shrugged with a practiced expression. "You learn to live with it. He always told me to trust my instincts. That's... part of the reason I'm in Helix, actually."
82%.
That caught Eron's attention—but he didn't show it.
"Instincts are underrated," he said, pretending to reboot the drive.
Decryption complete. File list generated.
He minimized the script window and subtly scrolled through the decrypted documents. At first glance, it was what he expected: numbers, aliases, routing data, offshore branches. And then—
[CONTACT – TIER 5 CLEARANCE: DAREN VELTIS]
Eron froze.
Only for a moment.
Then he blinked, scrolled casually past it, and looped back again as if reviewing something insignificant.
Daren Veltis.
He had heard that name once. A long time ago.
Try #812.
A man who was supposedly killed during a high-profile corruption trial involving a government official. Every record erased. Every witness silenced.
Eron hadn't thought much of it at the time—it had been too early in the loop process, and he had been focused on survival. But now?
Now Veltis's name was buried inside one of Helix's Tier 5 files—restricted to only a handful of inner-circle leaders.
Mika was humming to herself again. Completely unaware that Eron's entire mental map of the organization had just tilted on its axis.
---
12:34 p.m.
Eron unplugged the flash drive. "All fixed. Folder had an indexing issue. Should work fine now."
Mika smiled. "You really are good at this."
He offered a lopsided grin. "Told you. Digital janitor."
She laughed. "I owe you lunch next time."
He packed up, thanked her, and walked out the door.
But inside, Eron was already planning.
If Daren Veltis was alive, it meant Helix's reach was far deeper than he'd suspected. It meant the people he thought were dead might still be pulling strings.
And more importantly...
It meant he wasn't the only ghost playing this game.
Eron walked with measured pace down the apartment stairs, but his mind was already five steps ahead.
Daren Veltis is alive.
Or at least, Helix thinks he is.
Eron had combed through thousands of loops, hundreds of dead ends, dozens of covers—and not once had Tier 5 even come up. That level of clearance wasn't just protected—it was myth. And now he had touched it.
He couldn't afford mistakes now.
---
1:02 p.m. – Safehouse 3
In a dusty, abandoned electronics repair shop on 6th Avenue, Eron opened the hidden back room he'd secured in Loop #61,342. The room was lined with scrap components, whiteboards, and ten pre-configured laptops. One of them was always online, always scanning internal chatter from compromised Helix communications.
He powered it on and fed the decrypted file into a deeper analysis tool. The name Daren Veltis lit up with red markers.
CROSS-REFERENCED
ACCESS: RESTRICTED – Tier 5 Encryption Detected
LEVEL 2 ALERT – SYSTEM FLAGGED
"Sh*t."
He shut it down instantly.
That wasn't just a passive file—it was a trap. A breadcrumb laced with Helix's tracking signature. By accessing it, Eron had just triggered a silent beacon. Anyone below Tier 5 who opened that file would be noticed.
Not by security guards.
By cleaners.
Elite Helix operatives trained to erase leaks. Quietly. Permanently.
But luckily… this wasn't his first time triggering a kill switch.
---
He moved fast.
Looped code into a dummy signal to simulate a corrupted log trail.
Re-routed Helix's alert to a server in Argentina he'd burned on Try #58,221.
Then deleted everything and physically melted the laptop's processor.
If they were tracing, they'd find nothing but a false ping in Buenos Aires.
Damage control: complete.
Still, his next steps had to be precise.
---
Eron leaned back, eyes scanning the room.
He needed information.
But not from files, not from data caches.
From people.
Veltis may have been buried behind layers of security, but someone had to have seen him. Worked with him. Whispered his name.
There was only one man Eron knew who had once hinted at Tier 5 without saying it outright.
A paranoid, twitchy accountant who'd been erased in Loop #19,873.
A man named Harper Redd.
---
Eron reached into a drawer, pulling out a yellow-stained file he'd saved for years. A dossier on Harper. Work locations. Known habits. Family he visited only on Wednesdays. The kind of man who kept secrets until you broke the right pressure point.
He pulled out a burner phone and dialed the number he already knew wouldn't connect.
Disconnected.
Naturally.
So he'd have to do this the hard way.
---
The loop resets at 12:00 a.m. sharp.
He had less than 11 hours to track down Harper Redd, extract the truth about Tier 5, and possibly find out if Daren Veltis was really alive—or worse, still leading Helix from the shadows.
Eron slipped on his coat.
"Time to meet a dead man."