Breaking Point: 365

The helicopter's noise represented a forceful return to a world Alex had purposefully abandoned. As he was strapped into the Spartan seat, the well-known vibrations reverberated deep inside his bones, bringing back memories he had struggled to suppress. With a stern expression, Thorne spoke quickly into a satellite phone next to him, occasionally sending Alex fragmented updates via the headset's intercom.

The UN Security Council is in chaos, charges are being made more quickly than facts, markets are plunging, and trade on the Tokyo Nikkei has been paused. Backchannels are being tried by the Pentagon, and cyber instructions are striking stronger-than-ever digital walls. Alex, he spent years developing this method. beneath our noses." Thorne squeezed his nose bridge. It's referred to as 'The Damocles Protocol'. "Fitting."

Alex gazed out the window as the thick woodlands gave place to expansive suburbia, followed by the congested roadways that were already congested hours after the broadcast. An exodus driven by instinctive terror, a torrent of red taillights swept away from the center of the city. This was no longer merely news; it was a tangible thing, a dread wave sweeping the terrain.

Within minutes, Victor's terrifying statement had destroyed the brittle façade of normalcy all throughout the world. As the hours passed and no government could provide assurance, no expert could refute the allegation, and no military could announce recovering control, the initial skepticism, the uneasy jokes, and the halfhearted dismissals all vanished. More terrible than any proclamation was the nuclear countries' silence.

As indices fell by double digits on Wall Street, the opening bell was immediately followed by a circuit breaker trip. Traders stared blankly at crimson-washed screens as the frenetic shouting in the pits gave way to startled silence. Before lunchtime, the financial epidemic wiped trillions off global markets in London, Frankfurt, and Hong Kong. It spread more quickly than any virus. Exchanges of currency were seized. Before trading platforms simply shut down, oil prices fluctuated widely. In real time, the complex network of international finance that was based on trust and predictability was tearing itself apart.

An emergency meeting at the UN headquarters in New York turned into a brawl. Ambassadors accused one another of being impotent, careless, or complicit. Smaller nations begged for solidarity against the maniac holding them all hostage, while the American embassy responded with claims of inadequate security over Soviet-era stockpiles while the Russian envoy blamed Western destabilization for the creation of monsters like Aurelius. Translators strained to keep up, microphones were disconnected, and the whole scene exuded a sense of helpless helplessness. The same horrifying conclusion emerged from urgent, behind-closed-door military briefings in Beijing, Moscow, and Washington: Aurelius wasn't playing around with his power. It was verified by their own systems.

The shockwave was strongest at street level. As employees left their jobs, the Underground in London came to a complete stop. As passengers attempted to board busses leaving the city, normally orderly lines below ground broke up into chaotic scrambles. Disciplined throngs in Tokyo rushed to Shinkansen stations in the hopes of reaching relatives in the countryside, only to discover that all trains were suspended indefinitely. Pictures from Lagos showed stalls overturned, markets exploding into turmoil, and the often lively spirit was replaced by rage and terror. Shopkeepers hurriedly lowered metal shutters in Istanbul's Grand Bazaar, and the typical crowd of tourists and residents was replaced by huddles of nervous people gathered around radios, their faces etched with shock beneath the old arches.

Panic purchasing spread over the world. Essentials such as water, canned products, batteries, and medical supplies were removed off supermarket shelves. Arguments erupted over the last bottle of antiseptic or loaf of bread. As fuel ran low, people's tempers flared and lineups at gas stations stretched for blocks. People in desperate need of prescription refills or anything that promised peace flooded pharmacies.

However, the responses varied. "Wenn die Welt untergeht, tanzen wir!" was the slogan of spontaneous raves that broke out in Berlin's public parks, driven by inexpensive booze and a nihilistic passion. (We dance if the world ends!). Congregations grew to previously unheard-of proportions in churches, mosques, synagogues, and temples, and prayers resounded in dozens of languages as people prayed for divine intervention against a very human-caused Armageddon. On the other hand, survivalist sites crashed under the traffic, gun stores in the US reported record sales, and communities all over the world started storing supplies and suspiciously observing their neighbors. Millions of people tried to continue about their daily lives despite everything, clinging to routine like a life raft, the cognitive dissonance acting as a last-ditch defense against the intolerable reality. Perhaps the most typical first reaction was denial, which showed up as an unsettling quiet before the impending storm.

In Seattle, one of the Agency's many clandestine boltholes, the helicopter eventually touched down on the top of an unremarkable office building. Tension permeated the air, with unanswered phones and the anxious chatter of analysts transfixed to flickering screens that were transmitting global disaster feeds. Thorne led Alex through the low-level mayhem to a small, locked office. It had a desk, a safe terminal, and a coffee maker that was already putting in extra hours.

According to Thorne, "this is it for now," as he pointed around the room. "Only secure communications, off network. To get the old files to you, I'm doing everything I can. The majority of the early psychological profiles of Aurelius, Khartoum, and Chimera are hidden deep and marked as Level Omega until you've departed.

Flexing his fingers, Alex took a seat at the terminal. Like slipping back into ill-fitting skin, it seemed eerily familiar. He saw as Thorne bypassed digital locks that first lit red before turning green in order to confirm credentials. The screen started to fill with badly censored and fragmented files. Advanced Biometrics & Neural Interface Research, Project Chimera, Zurich facility. After Action Report on the Bombing of the Aurelius Compound in Khartoum. Victor Aurelius: Initial Psychological Evaluation (Prior to the Incident).

He began by scanning through intricate technical jargon, schematics, and progress reports in Chimera. It was mostly blacked out. He looked through personnel lists, comparing names he vaguely knew. Next is Khartoum. He made himself look at the clinical account of the aftermath, the casualty counts, and the blurry satellite photos. He was often identified as Lead Agent A. Reed. Despite the gut-wrenching shame and the terror he remembered, his reports were professional and succinct. "Subject exhibits signs of acute traumatic stress... emotional blunting... potential for prolonged dissociation..." was the first psychological evaluation he discovered, which was filed soon after the explosion. Although a follow-up recommendation was made, later files were either unaccounted for or classified outside Thorne's present scope.

Alex said as she looked over financial documents that revealed Aurelius selling off assets before going missing, "He dropped off the map for nearly two years after Khartoum." then made a comeback and established the new Conglomerate. A completely different man. concentrated. brutal. No obvious fractures.

Thorne offered, "He channeled the grief," while pouring two cups of coffee that looked suspicious. "Or buried it under a mountain of work and ambition."

"Or," Alex shot back, his eyes gloomy as he looked up from the television, "it festered." turned into this. He made an ambiguous motion toward the outer world that the hectic newsfeeds suggested.

Over the course of the following few hours, he started contact procedures and sent encrypted messages to former assets' dormant accounts. An embittered tech analyst from Zurich's past. A former mercenary who worked in Khartoum's security. A reporter who attempted to do a profile on Aurelius years ago but was unsuccessful. If there were any responses, they would be slow. And there was now a great deal of risk in trusting them.

The weight and coldness of the task's sheer difficulty started to sink in. Victor was more than simply a renegade billionaire; he was possibly the most dangerous and powerful person in human history. He had spent years strategizing, building up fortifications, and foreseeing dangers. No matter where it was, his stronghold would be invincible. He has an unbreakable digital network. Buried beneath decades of trauma and obsession was his motivation.

And time was running out. The imminent countdown to social breakdown, in addition to the 365 days associated with Victor's life. Already, law and order was eroding. International collaboration was breaking down. As each hour went by, it became more difficult to obtain intelligence and less likely that Victor would be reached.

Alex gazed at the wall of redactions, the broken files, and the dead ends. The weight of billions of lives was bearing down on him. He was referred to as a ghost by Thorne. He felt like one at the moment—intangible, unable to comprehend the threat's tangible truth, chasing shadows as the world burned. As Day One came to an end, a globe was left reeling in shock and on the verge of anarchy. And there stood Victor Aurelius, waiting, his dying heart counting down.