"Stop! Please stop," he sobs, his body convulsing against the restraints. "I'll tell you what I know."
Ares pulls the blade away but keeps it in sight, just to remind him what awaits if his answers prove unsatisfactory. "Start talking."
"I didn’t hack into your system because I wanted to," Whitlock gasps between ragged breaths. "John Ashford. He's the one who made me do it."
"One of the Valiants." Ares' expression darkens, and I know they’re talking about the man in the picture. “Why does he need access?” Ares continues with the questioning.
"I don’t know. He reports to someone else," Whitlock continues, words tumbling out now that the dam has broken. "Someone higher up. I don't know who. They keep their identity hidden. I only do minor tasks for them for now."
"Why?" I demand, stepping closer. "What did you stand to gain from this?"
Whitlock laughs a little hysterically, but I can’t help but sense that he considers me a little slow for not seeing things for what they are. "Power. Access. Do you have any idea how politicsreally work in this city? In this country?" Blood drips from his chin as he speaks. "I needed their backing to secure my Senate seat. They promised me protection, influence... a place at the table where real decisions are made."
"What kind of table?" Ares asks, his voice too quiet to bring anything good.
"I don’t know," Whitlock whispers, eyes darting nervously across the room. "But they’re higher than me, higher than you. It’s like an exclusive circle you join for life. Business, politics, law enforcement, they've been operating for generations, pulling strings from the shadows without our laws applying to them."
“Like a secret society?” I ask, still not as surprised as I should be by the revelation.
"And infiltrating my game was your admission price," Ares states rather than asks.
Whitlock nods without too much strength. "I needed to prove my worth. I'm not high enough in their ranks to know everything. Just enough to complete my assignment."
"Which was what, exactly?" I press.
"To get the names of the potential players selected for the game." His eyes move to Ares. "To gather data on how Kharon operates. The weapons you use. The advantages it creates."
Ares freezes, and I recognize the stillness of a predator before it strikes. "And how deep does the digital infiltration run? Did you deliver information about Kharon, or about all my activities?"
"Everything," Whitlock admits. "My background before politics was in cybersecurity. I just needed the right access point, which wasn’t that difficult to get. I uploaded the SSL certificate onto my phone and then uploaded it into the wifi router four years ago when I first came to Elysium to register as an Observant."
"You have no idea what you've done," Ares roars so loud my blood freezes. "Or who you've tangled with."
Whitlock's bloodshot eyes fix on Ares. "No, you don't understand who you're dealing with. They're more than you think. More powerful than even you realize."
He doesn’t give us much else, mainly because we don’t think he knows much else. No one could keep quiet through that kind of torture, and since he already started talking, he wouldn’t hold back anything.
So Ares decides it’s time for us to leave. With Whitlock, of course, who we get out of the house through the back, with Ares’ men keeping watch for any prying eyes.
The drive across the city feels endless. Whitlock lies in the backseat with zip ties cutting into his wrists and a black hood covering his face. We got him dressed again, but blood seeps through the fabric of his clothes, staining the leather seats beneath him.
Ares drives with one hand on the wheel, the other resting on my thigh, his fingers tapping an impatient rhythm against my dress. Neither of us speaks. We don't need to. A plan is forming between us without words, and we both have one thing in common. We need to get to the bottom of this and find the ones responsible.
We pull into an underground garage beneath an apartment building in a neighborhood that’s just somewhere between wealthy and working-class. The kind of place where people mind their own business, and security cameras mysteriously malfunction every time it’s convenient.
Ares hauls Whitlock from the backseat without effort, carrying him into a service elevator that takes us straight to the fifteenth floor.
I walk in front of them, making sure no one is in the corridor except for two of Ares’ men positioned in front of door 1507.
The place looks like a normal apartment, except for the reinforced doors, covered windows, walls thick enough to muffle screams, and cameras positioned in each corner of the ceiling.
Ares carries Whitlock inside and throws him on the sofa, his body slumping the moment he lands.
404 rises from behind a laptop when we enter, his eyes widening at Whitlock's bloodied state. "Jesus, you really worked him over."
"He's still breathing," Ares replies, walking to the open space kitchen sink to wash his bloodied hands.
Whitlock's face now is ashen, his hair plastered to his forehead with blood and sweat.
