The Current Beneath

The rain had come in the night, draping Montevideo in a thin veil of mist. Streetlights flickered against the wet pavement, their reflections stretching like phantom limbs. The industrial sector still slept, warehouses looming in the predawn quiet, their steel frames black against the dark sky.

Jessica stood at the window of the safe house, one hand resting against the cool glass. The pawn sat on the table behind her, unnervingly still—a relic, a marker. She hadn’t slept. Not really. Her thoughts kept circling the same unsettling truth: they weren’t chasing Vanguard anymore. They were being shepherded into something deeper. Older.

Leanna sat at the small dining table, flipping through the letter for the hundredth time, eyes scanning the words as if they might change under scrutiny.

“You’re never looking for Vanguard,” she murmured, tapping a fingernail against the paper. “You’re looking for us.”

Jessica didn’t turn from the window. “He wants us to follow.”

Olivia leaned against the counter, arms crossed, exhaustion clear in the set of her jaw. “And you’re just… okay with that?”

Jessica exhaled slowly, eyes tracking the movements of a solitary man walking across the docks below. “We don’t have a choice.”

Leanna set the letter down, frowning. “There’s always a choice.”

Jessica turned, voice cool but firm. “We follow him, or we lose the thread. That’s the choice.”

The room fell silent.

—

The docks smelled of rusted saltwater, diesel, and rotting wood. A haze clung to the shoreline, swirling between the abandoned crates and forgotten machinery.

Jessica led, her boots making almost no sound against the damp ground. Olivia and Leanna followed, their pace measured, eyes darting toward every shifting shadow. The world felt heavier here. The silence was too perfect. The mist was too thick. It was a controlled setting that felt more like a trap.

They reached the tide gauge station—a rusted structure half-eaten by sea spray, its railing warped by years of neglect. Jessica ran her hand along the metal, fingers catching on corrosion.

“Whatever we’re supposed to find,” she murmured, “it’s here.”

Leanna crouched near the base of the structure, brushing wet debris aside. “Help me with this.”

Jessica knelt beside her, fingers wrapping around a metal plate bolted to the side of the station. It came loose with a groan, revealing a small waterproof container wedged into the hollow space.

Leanna glanced at Jessica. “Feels staged. Like he wanted us to find it.”

Jessica flipped open the container. Inside was a single folded document, its pages crisp and dry despite the damp air. The text was printed, clinical, but handwritten notes littered the margins.

Olivia leaned in, skimming the words, her breath hitching. “This isn’t Vanguard research.”

Jessica’s eyes flicked over the header, stomach tightening. It wasn’t Vanguard. It was older. The document was dated 1954.

Leanna inhaled sharply. “What the hell is this?”

Jessica turned the page. The symbol stamped at the bottom stopped her cold. It wasn’t corporate. It was ecclesiastical—ancient. A Templar cross, faint but unmistakable. The kind she’d seen in Vatican files years ago, in Langford’s old notes, carved into the back of a hidden drawer in Eastern Europe. Her chest tightened. The Order.

Mr. Black’s message hadn’t been about Vanguard at all. They had been chasing the wrong enemy.

—

They moved fast, slipping into the shadows of a nearby alley before speaking.

Olivia scanned the document again, her voice hushed. “This is about selective genetic modification. But not in the way Vanguard was doing it. This isn’t corporate.” She flipped to a page covered in detailed sketches of preliminary human trials. “This looks like… pre-Vanguard.”

Jessica’s jaw tightened. “Because it is.”

Leanna exhaled through her nose, her mind working. “So, what are we saying? Vanguard didn’t start this?”

Jessica stared at the paper in her hands, the weight of history pressing against her chest.

“They were never the beginning.”

A gust of wind sent a flurry of rain sideways, dampening the pages in Jessica’s hands. She folded them carefully, tucking them into her coat. This changed everything. Vanguard had been a distraction. The real power had been moving behind them all along.

—

They returned to the safe house without incident, but the tension inside the room had thickened. The pawn still sat where Jessica had left it, a stark contrast to the ink-darkened pages spread across the table.

Jessica poured a glass of whiskey, watching the way the liquid caught the dim light. She took a slow sip before speaking. “This is bigger than we thought.”

Leanna nodded, running a hand through her hair. “Bigger than Vanguard. Bigger than anything we’ve dealt with.”

Olivia rubbed her temples. “Which means Mr. Black isn’t just some rogue player. He’s part of something older. More organized.”

Jessica set her glass down. “And we’re already on the board.”

Leanna looked at her, expression unreadable. “So what’s the next move?”

Jessica glanced at the pawn, turning it between her fingers. The pieces were already moving. And she was one of them. Whether she liked it or not.