Chapter 45 - The Phantom of Silicon Valley
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We drove through the night, abandoning the first car near a truck stop and switching to a stolen utility van to avoid the Architect’s satellite tracking. By dawn, we had crossed into California.
"Where are we going?" Marcus asked from the passenger seat, his eyes bloodshot from exhaustion. "We can't just keep driving. Whoever built that drive has eyes everywhere."
"We're going to see Jax," I replied, keeping my eyes fixed on the winding highway.
Elena groaned from the back seat, where she was bandaging a graze on her arm. "Jax? Are you serious? The guy is a paranoid schizophrenic who thinks the government put microchips in his cereal."
"He's also the best black-market cryptographer in Silicon Valley," I reminded her. "If anyone can build an air-gapped terminal to analyze quantum-lattice memory, it’s him."
We pulled into a derelict industrial park in Oakland just as the sun began to rise. Jax’s "office" was hidden inside an abandoned meatpacking plant. I knocked on the rusted metal door using a specific rhythm.
A heavy deadbolt clacked, and the door cracked open. Jax—a scrawny man in his thirties with wild, unkempt hair and thick glasses—peeked out.
"Audrey?" Jax blinked, looking around frantically. "You're supposed to be dead. Or retired. Same thing in our line of work."
"I need your help, Jax," I said, pushing past him into the warehouse. The interior was a chaotic mess of server racks, tangled wires, and empty energy drink cans.
"I don't do favors anymore," Jax muttered, locking the door behind us. "The Vanguard heat is still too hot."
I reached into my jacket and placed the crystal drive on his metal workbench. The glowing red numbers read: 63:12:45.
Jax stopped dead in his tracks. He slowly took off his glasses, his face turning entirely pale. "Holy mother of god... is that an Aegis Core?"
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"You know what this is?" Marcus asked, stepping forward.
"Know what it is?" Jax laughed, a nervous, terrified sound. "It's the holy grail of cyber-warfare. And you just brought a ticking nuclear bomb into my living room."
