Chapter 154: Carver

To anyone else, the culprit was obvious, after all, he was the only one alive out of the two but to Ethan, being dead didn’t remove you from his list.Besides, he knew better.

He wouldn’t conclude that anyone was dead, not until he was a hundred percent sure.

"Focus on Carver," he said. "The death certificate?"

{Forged,} Athena confirmed immediately. {Cross-referencing biometrics from the Libyan site shows a mismatch. The corpse’s dental pattern belonged to a man named Ilian Petrov. Carver used it to disappear.}

Ethan’s eyes narrowed. "So he’s still alive."

{Yes. And the tattoo matches a unit emblem used by a splinter group of Helix Global Corp. The three slashes through the circle—designation ’Trident Squad.’} Athena explained, {he was part of that team before his ’death’.}

"I see," Ethan nodded looking through the data Athena had pulled up on Reid Carver.

Helix Global was quite a popular name in the future.

They were known for being one of the best mercenaries in the future without a failed job to their name... if it was illegal, profitable, or morally questionable, Helix Global had probably dabbled in it.

They were unofficially known as ’The cleaners’ for those who had fat enough pockets.

But what Ethan didn’t know was that they dated this far back. They hadn’t come to light till late 2022, in his timeline so how was he involved with them right now..

He sent that question to the back of one of his minds as he refocused on finding Lillian.

"What was Carver’s most recent location?" Ethan asked.

{Reid Carver now goes by the name Henry Lith and his last known location was Los Angeles County, California,} Athena replied. {Last verifiable sighting was two days before Lillian’s kidnapping. He checked into a storage facility under an alias — ’H. Lith’ — in the outskirts of Glendale. Payment was made in untraceable crypto, but the timestamp aligns with his movements from an unregistered airfield north of the city.}

Ethan’s gaze darkened. "So he was already in California before the Caldwell meeting."

{Yes,} she simply responded.

Ethan silently placed both hand, clasped together, a bit above his upper lip and under his nose as he thought about it.

If they had kidnapped Lillian, that meant they wanted his identity and they’d do anything to get it.

He didn’t know why they were targeting him and neither did he care, all he cared about was that they touched one of his and they were going to regret.

Someone was going to get murdered, and it wasn’t Lillian.

"Pull up all known affiliates of Helix operating within the States," he ordered.

{Already done,} Athena replied. {Cross-referencing company proxies, contractor networks, and shell corporations. Approximately forty-seven entities tied to Helix operate in North America — mostly private security, shipping, and data encryption fronts. But only five show anomalous transaction spikes in the last seventy-two hours.}

"List them."

{One stands out. Longfield Logistics, LLC. Based in San Francisco. Registered to an individual named Mr. Jian Long.}

Ethan’s brows furrowed. "Longfield Logistics..."

{Yes. It’s a Helix proxy — operational for two years, mostly dormant. However, the account received a recent transfer of 1.2 million USD in Monero, originating from an offshore Chinese account under the name Hua Trade Imports.}

"China?" Ethan muttered, leaning forward. "Athena, who’s behind Hua Trade?"

There was a short pause — data streams flickering across the holo-display.

{That’s the strange part. The ownership is masked behind seven shell layers across Singapore, Macau, and mainland China. But the routing pattern seems it’s familiar.}

"Familiar how?"

{It matches a variety of accounts once flagged by the Chinese Ministry of State Security during an internal leak suppression operation by the Elderwoods, with the designation ’Xu-8’.}

Ethan’s eyes hardened. "Xu."

{Yes, but the name is too common to isolate without more—}

"Don’t bother," Ethan interrupted. "You said the payment went from Hua Trade to Longfield, which ties back to Helix, which ties back to Carver. That’s enough for now."

With that, he stood up and walked towards his phone which was back in the living room,

"Call, Isabela."

Athena complied and the phone only let out a single ring before it was answered. Isabela was silent on the other end for a few minutes before she spoke up,

"My men are searching for her."

This wasn’t being done because of Ethan, not because she stood to gain anything from it.

She was doing this because she had genuinely developed a liking for Lillian and an attempt at harming her was as much her concern as it was Ethan’s.


Ethan didn’t respond to her words just yet, there was silence on both ends for a moment before he finally spoke up, "I want someone kidnapped."

"Who?" Was the only question Isabela asked.

"A dead man."

***

Reid Carver and his two underlings reached the indicated meeting place before he ordered the to take out the crate in which Isabela was placed.

This was the exchange point arranged with their boss, whoever was paying them, so they just put it down and waited for a while.

The higher ups at Helix had refused to reveal who their employer was and Reid had no intention of asking.

The fact that him and his team were keeping a hundred percent of the pay from this job was the only thing that mattered to him.

Helix had already gotten their share.

He and his two underlings set the crate on the cracked concrete and stepped back, keeping their faces hidden beneath black ski masks.

The crate thudded hollowly as they did the final checks—locks, seals, the small internal porthole through which they’d checked the unconscious woman.

Lillian Hayes’s eyes were locked as she looked to be in the most comfortable sleep ever.

A huge contrast to the actual situation she was really in.

A few minutes passed before a black SUV pulled into the meeting place, stopping a short distance from them.

The window rolled down, revealing two Asian looking men and one of them glanced at the crate, then at Carver, then at the exchange point they’d arranged.

Carver’s man offered a curt nod. "You Jia? You got the payment?"

Without responding, the driver exited the SUV and opened the door, allowing the two to step out.

The approached with a suit case in hand before tossing it to Carver who immediately caught it.

"Pleasure doing business with you," Carver said with a smile, "don’t forget to recommend us, the next time you want a hire from Helix."

The men still said nothing as the just signalled for the driver to check the crate.

"Ah, the key, here you g—" before Carver’s words could be completed, the driver had completely ripped off the locks on the trunk and pulled it open.

".....okay."

He picked Lillian up from within, put her in the car and turned back, waiting for the two, who Carver assumed were his bosses, to enter.

"I’d lay low for now, if I were you," the one who he had referred to as Jia earlier, finally said before he turned back with the other man and they walked back into the car.

The driver closed the door and walked into the driver’s seat before starting the SUV and driving away.

Carver flipped the case and opened it with a click revealing a stack of delicious looking, crispy clean green bills.

At the top of the stack was a wallet that held the confirmation of a completed job, one that would be submitted to Helix and would go in their records.

This was only given by clients who were completely satisfied with the mercenary’s work.

"I guess we really did impress our employer."

Carver Stated before shutting the case and locking the clips again.

He let himself smile. "Good boys," he said to his underlings without looking at them. "We got everything, right. Back to the van, we move to the airfield and lay low until the plane gets us out."

The two men moved obediently, faces still masked, hauling the crate and the case back toward the waiting van.

Carver followed them and hopped in the van before they started it and left. He didn’t know their employer or why they kidnapped the COO of OmniTech Corp but whatever happened to her wasn’t his business anymore.... Or so he thought.

Bang!

"The hell?" He let out as a vehicle crashed into them.

They had been driving for over thirty minutes now to get to the airfield when this car came from nowhere and crashed into them.

"We’re being attacked," one of his underlings said.

"No shit Sherlock," the second in command responded

"Just keep driving," Carver commanded.

They swerved the car just in time to avoid being hit again, but that was a mistake.

Honk!

They immediately turned to the side only to be faced with an incoming truck.

Crash.

Without getting the chance to drive out of its way, the truck crashed into them, sending their car flying.

The impact was violent, as shown by the van spun twice before slamming into a guard rail.

Carver’s body was thrown sideways, his shoulder hit itself against the window frame, the briefcase flying out of his grip and slamming into the dashboard before bursting open, scattering crisp dollar bills through the cabin like confetti.

"Shit—!" one of his men screamed before suddenly,

Bang!

The airbag exploded in Carver’s face, white fabric filling his vision for an instant before everything went dark.

***

Carver let out a groan as his eyes slowly opened, it took a minute but the finally adjusted to the low light of... wherever he was.

He noticed the dark silhouette of someone sitting right in front of him, with blue glowing eyes locked on him.

"Hello Carver," the person said, "I’m guessing you have a moment for a quick chat?"