Taboo Online

The abandoned central exchange no longer carried working telephone lines, but someone had kept power running through the building.

Black cables entered through the roof beneath layers of ordinary insulation. From the street, the place looked empty. Its windows had been covered from within, weeds filled the employee parking lot, and a heavy chain still hung across the loading entrance.

The thermal scan continued to show six people below ground.

Before the task group left the Bureau warehouse, the liaison at North Basin displayed the pale mask, the central-exchange location, and the established symbols for target and capture.

Aelira’s response returned as four pictograms.

ALIVE.

MASK.

NEEDLES.

RETURN.

Thalen pressed one fist against his chest.

Shaw completed another review before allowing the injured specialists to leave. Luke’s scans showed no new neurological change or additional energy pattern around the old residue. He was cleared to observe from the field chair at a secured threshold, but he could not leave the protected route.

The medical team also reviewed Rhea’s shoulder and authorized one more brief manifestation of her panel. If the scar widened or the shield began losing stability, she had to dismiss it immediately.

Lauren received clearance for one short use of Unveiled Weakness after Shaw confirmed that her earlier scan had not worsened the strain.

The first Bureau team entered through the roof shortly after midnight.

No alarm sounded. The outer offices were empty, and the stairwells contained only dead cables and thread traps ending at inactive needles. The masked woman had abandoned the expendable sections of the building and drawn everything into the old switching hall below ground.

Luke watched the body-camera feeds from a narrow field chair inside the armored command vehicle. His right arm remained in its sling, and the clear ceramic sleeve from the decoy test still protected his wrist.

Lauren sat beside him with the black blindfold in place. She would enter only after the outer route was secured.

Rhea waited near the rear doors with her shoulder braced and her panel unmanifested.

The team leader’s voice came through the channel. "Basement access secure. We have a direct view into the switching hall."

The feed changed.

Five people stood beneath the remains of an enormous relay frame.

Four wore maintenance uniforms. Thin black threads entered their forearms, shoulders, and the backs of their necks, holding them upright despite the fear on their faces. A fifth man waited at the main console with one hand near a recessed switch.

The woman in the pale mask stood on an elevated platform behind them. Her dark coat fell almost to the floor, and threads extended from every finger into the captives, the ceiling, and the machinery around her.

"Four hostages, one collaborator, one target," Red Hound said. "Nobody assumes the workers control their own hands."

Once the outer team secured a protected route, two responders guided Luke’s chair to a reinforced threshold overlooking the switching hall. Lauren followed behind the first shield carrier, with Rhea and Thalen close beside her.

Luke could now see the five people directly.

He focused on them one at a time with Truth Behind Motion.

The four maintenance workers resisted each forced movement by fractions of an inch. Their shoulders tightened before the threads pulled, and their hands fought every command they could.

The man at the console was different. His fear was genuine, but the intention beneath his right arm belonged to him. He planned to press the recessed switch as soon as Red Hound crossed the line.

"The console operator is working with her," Luke said. "Watch his right hand. He’ll press the switch when you enter."

Red Hound signaled the left team.

A padded ceramic bolt struck the operator’s wrist before he moved. His hand flew away from the switch, and a responder dragged him behind a portable barrier while another locked both arms inside a suppression frame.

The masked woman tilted her head.

"So the broken string still knows how to point."

Cold touched Luke’s wrist.

He reported it immediately. "The residue reacted to her or the active threads. There’s no pull."

The pale mask turned toward Lauren.

"And the Oracle still hides behind other people."

Lauren ignored the insult. "I need a direct scan."

"You have five seconds," the medic said.

Violet light appeared beneath her blindfold.

Unveiled Weakness spread across the switching room and stripped away the distracting lines. Hundreds of visible strands carried tension, but only six knots controlled the hall.

Four sat inside needles beside the captives’ shoulder joints. A fifth controlled the western worker’s firearm. The last rested beneath the masked woman’s left heel and connected to an escape sigil under the platform.

Lauren closed the skill before the timer ended.

"Four body anchors, one weapon line, and an escape plate beneath her left foot. Cut the gun first."

Red Hound relayed the sequence through hand signals and the task-group channel.

Thalen moved with the right assault team.

The masked woman flexed two fingers.

The western worker raised the gun toward Lauren.

Rhea summoned her scarred panel.

She did not wait for the shot. The shield slid between the worker’s wrist and the thread pulling it, turning his forearm upward just before the weapon fired. The bullet entered the ceiling.

At the same moment, a ceramic cutter closed around the weapon line.

The black strand snapped, and the gun dropped from the worker’s hand.

Thalen reached the first body anchor. He could not reassure the terrified woman in her own language, so he showed her the pictogram for still and waited until her eyes found the display.

Then he cut the needle beside her shoulder.

Her right arm dropped free, and two responders caught her before the remaining threads could throw her against the relay frame.

The other teams followed Lauren’s order. One anchor separated, then another, and the maintenance workers collapsed into waiting arms as the control lines died around them.

The masked woman remained on the platform.

Her fingers turned toward Luke.

Cold sharpened inside his wrist.

"Fresh connection," he warned.

A black thread slipped beneath the platform, crossed the floor, and passed between two shield carriers before either noticed it. The strand struck the outer ceramic sleeve around Luke’s forearm and spread across the surface in branching lines.

His right fingers curled inside the sling.

The dead residue beneath his skin remained lifeless, but the new thread pulled against it from outside, searching for somewhere to fasten.

The medic reached for the emergency release on the sleeve.

"Don’t open it," Lauren said. "You’ll give the line his skin."

Luke kept his arm still. "It’s tugging at the old fragment, but it hasn’t reached my mana."

The masked woman slowly closed her hand.

The pull strained Luke’s forearm against the sling, while the foreign cold remained confined to his wrist. His back pressed into the field chair. Every instinct urged him to get up and deal with the needle himself, but he stayed behind the barrier and trusted the team already moving.

Rhea shifted her panel away from the freed civilians and pressed its edge against the active thread, pinning the strand to the floor without striking Luke’s sleeve.

The scar across the shield brightened under the strain.

"I can hold it," she said through clenched teeth. "Find the knot."

Lauren did not reopen Unveiled Weakness. The earlier scan had already shown them how the central lines were arranged.

With Rhea pinning the strand in place, Luke followed the visible black line across the tiles. It vanished beneath the second metal plate from the threshold.

"Second plate," he called. "That needle controls the line."

Red Hound converted the warning into a point and the danger signal.

Thalen saw it.

The masked woman sent three threads toward him, swinging loose relay frames across his path. He ducked beneath the first, stepped around the second, and let a ceramic shield carrier absorb the third.

His living blade had been lost at the glasshouse, so he drew the short Bureau-issued ceramic cutter from his belt.

The masked woman tightened her fingers.

The line around Luke’s sleeve pulled hard enough to jerk his right arm against the sling.

Thalen reached the second floor plate and raised the cutter over the black needle.