American comic book: I, with my abundant martial virtue, love to do good to others.

"clear."

They spent nearly an hour traversing the rooftop, the back alley of the bar, the evacuation route in the parking lot, and the manhole cover. The wind on the rooftop was strong, stiffening their clothes. Near a trash can in the back alley of the bar, they found half a motorcycle tire's muddy imprint and a flattened filter. Near the manhole cover, there were two obvious points of hesitation, indicating that the pursuers had made at least one assessment before deciding not to pursue further down the tunnel. Every trace pieced together the team's operational logic: some scouted ahead, some blocked building entrances, some provided long-range suppression, some engaged in close-quarters pursuit, and others were specifically responsible for retrieval and clearing the area.

This is not something an ordinary street gang would do.

By the time they finally returned to the FBI's Manhattan branch, it was nearly midnight. The buildings in Federal Square appeared even colder and more rigid in the night. The security gates and guard lights were on, and everything inside was orderly, clear, and carried a sense of order that was completely different from the city outside.

Carmela and Matteo were placed in two adjacent rooms at the innermost part of the dormitory area. They weren't prison cells, but more like simple single rooms: narrow beds, desks and chairs, private bathrooms, spotless walls, and bulletproof windows offering only a partial view of the city lights below. There were agents on duty outside, but it wasn't deliberately made to resemble detention.

Lynn went to the monitoring room first and looked at the footage from the dormitory corridor. Carmela was indeed awake; she was sitting on the bench outside Matteo's door, her hair half-dry, wearing a grey tracksuit temporarily provided by the branch, holding a hot drink in both hands, her back ramrod straight, as if she would immediately stand up at the slightest sound from inside. Matteo paced back and forth twice at first, then quieted down, probably finally lying down.

Jason, standing next to him, glanced at the screen as well: "She really isn't planning on leaving."

"That's normal," Lynn said.

"Are you going over there?"

Lynn was silent for a few seconds, then shook her head: "Let her sit down first."

"And what about you?"

"Technical Department".

The technical department was brightly lit. The samples had been separated into two sealed boxes, and technicians in protective suits were busy behind the isolation station. Access cards were placed separately on a reader, and a series of spoofed codes scrolled across the screen. Seeing Lynn enter, the analyst on duty immediately waved.

"Detective, we have preliminary results."

"explain."

"The purity of the purified tablets is far higher than that of amethyst-type stabilizer samples we've previously seized on the street, with fewer impurities, indicating that the source is closer to the core experimental stage. There's a lattice recombination chain inside that we've never seen before, which may be the basis of the 'key seed' that Matteo mentioned." The analyst pointed to a complex structure diagram on the screen that resembled the growth of snowflakes. "Simply put, this isn't used to suppress symptoms, it's used to change direction."

Lynn's eyes darkened: "Which direction?"

"More controllable, but also more irreversible." The analyst hesitated for a moment. "If they are really working on an adaptation medium, then this thing is very dangerous."

"Where's the access card?"

"It's wrapped in a logistics warehouse access code, but the core underlying permissions redirect to a temporary site, with the address registered under the name of an abandoned cold chain warehouse by the Donghe River. Strangely, that place was demolished and deregistered three months ago."

"A shell address," Jason said, standing beside him.

The analyst nodded: "But the card is still valid, which means the actual location may still be in use, just the label has been changed."

Lynn looked at the address and slowly said, "It's an abandoned cold chain warehouse by the East River, suitable for short-term storage and transportation concealment, and it also has underground drainage directly connected to the river."

Jason immediately realized: "It's the underground network again."

"They like having a backup plan," Lynn said.

The analyst added, "There's one more thing. A trace amount of blood-derived protein was detected in the sample's sealing layer. It wasn't enough to produce a complete DNA sample, but it confirmed that it was of human origin. In other words, this substance wasn't a purely chemical formulation; it may have been processed through a living medium."

The room fell silent for a moment.

Jason frowned and muttered a curse under his breath. Lynn's face remained expressionless, but her eyes were as cold as ice.

"Keep going," he said. "Drag out all the similar residual cases from three years ago, two years ago, and the last six months for comparison. In particular, check if there are any overlaps in the legacy chains of the 'seed' project in Nevada."

"clear."

When Lynn came out of the technical section, the corridor was already quiet. The night shift detectives spoke in hushed tones, their footsteps barely audible on the ground. Lynn walked along the dormitory area and saw Carmela still sitting there across the corner, her hot drink mostly empty. She was probably exhausted; her shoulders were slumped, but her eyes were still open.

As Lynn walked over, she looked up, clearly startled for a moment, then immediately stood up: "You're back?"

"Um."

"How's it going on site?"

"We found some things." Lynn looked at the barely concealed weariness in her eyes. "Gun positions, escape routes, feigned reconnaissance, and markings left by the enemy. For now, we can confirm that the people chasing you weren't just a hastily assembled mob."

Carmela tightened her grip on the paper cup: "Where's Matteo?"

"It's quiet inside, they're probably asleep." Lynn glanced at the door. "Why don't you go in and rest?"

"I'm afraid he'll try to run away again when he wakes up." Carmela gave a wry smile. "Besides... now every time I close my eyes, I remember the sound of the window shattering."

Lynn was silent for a moment, then sat down in the chair next to her. His breath hitched noticeably when the movement reached his chest. Carmela immediately frowned: "You're up to your old tricks again, aren't you?"

"Inspecting the scene is not considered reckless."

"It applies to the injured person," she said softly, then, as if realizing her tone was too hasty, softened her voice slightly. "What did the doctor say?"

"The doctor isn't here, so he can't yell at me right now."

Carmela looked at him, clearly wanting to be angry, but ultimately choked by his words. The lights at the end of the corridor were quiet, and the central air conditioning hummed intermittently at night, like distant ocean waves. She placed the empty paper cup at her feet and whispered, "Can he... really be brought back?"

Lynn knew who she was asking.

"The probability is higher after tonight than yesterday," he said.

Carmela paused, then asked, "Why?"

"Because he saw with his own eyes that the other party wasn't protecting him." Lynn looked at the door. "Many people can't turn back not because they're inherently bad, but because they still cling to a misunderstanding—the misunderstanding that they have value, the misunderstanding that they can negotiate, the misunderstanding that taking one more step forward might allow them to escape. Tonight's shot shattered at least two or three of those misunderstandings."

Carmela lowered her head and let out a long breath. Her eyelashes cast faint shadows under the light, and her voice was so soft it almost seemed to dissipate: "I always thought that if I were just a little more patient and a little smarter, I could notice things were wrong before him. But when things really went wrong, I realized I couldn't hold onto anything at all."

"It's not your fault," Lynn said.

"I know you're just trying to comfort me."

"It's not about comforting you." Lynn turned to look at her. "You're a nurse, not a prophet."

Carmela looked at him for a long while, then suddenly smiled. The smile was faint and weary, as if she had been struck somewhere by his blunt and somewhat overly direct words.

"You really don't know how to say nice things," she said.

"That's why I said earlier that I'm not good at comforting people."

"But you always hit the nail on the head," she replied softly.

There was a moment of silence between them. The lack of movement from inside the dormitory suggested that Matteo was probably truly exhausted. A detective on duty passed by at the other end of the corridor, nodded to Lynn, and then quietly left.

"Are you going to rest tonight?" Carmela asked.

"Yes," Lynn said, "after we finish distributing the first round of assignments for tomorrow."

"You're lying to me."

"Not this time."

Carmela looked at him, as if assessing how much of his words could be believed. Finally, she simply sighed softly: "Then at least don't run down the sewers anymore."

"As much as possible."

"You said 'as much as possible' again."

"Because I don't like to make absolute statements."

"Then at least promise me that before you see Matteo tomorrow, you'll have a doctor take another look at your chest."

Lynn paused for a moment, then nodded: "Okay."

Carmela seemed to finally relax a little. She stood up, hesitated for a second, then looked down at him: "What about you? Do you want to sit down for a while? You look more like the one who should be sleeping than me."

"I've already sat here," Lynn said.

"That doesn't count." She looked at him. "You just came back from a sniping scene, and you still have dust from the parking lot on you."

Lynn glanced down at the cuff of his jacket; sure enough, there was still cement powder left to brush off. Uncharacteristically, he didn't immediately retort, but instead rubbed his temples. "I'll go wash it off and come back."

"Okay," Carmela said, then added, "I'll be here."

After Carmela finished speaking, Lynn glanced at her, as if to confirm that she wasn't just saying it casually, before slowly standing up. As he stood, his fingers pressed against the back of the chair for an extra half-second; the dull pain under his chest brace hadn't completely subsided. Carmela immediately noticed, and her brows furrowed again.

"See, you're still not better."

"I heard you," Lynn said. "It's already been put on the tab."

Who keeps your books?

"you."

Carmela was taken aback by his words. Her lips twitched as if she wanted to reply, but in the end she simply raised her hand and pointed to the end of the corridor: "Go take a shower. Hurry up. You still smell of sewage."

"You're starting to sound more and more like Jason."

"That proves that neither of us was wrong."

Lynn didn't answer the call and turned to walk towards the rest room next to the dormitory area. The lights in the corridor weren't very bright. At night, the Federal branch resembled a closed ship. All the doors were quietly closed, with only occasional agents on duty passing through intersections, their shoes making a crisp and restrained sound on the ground.

He walked around the corner, his somewhat weary reflection shimmering in the glass window. His jacket was freshly changed, but his hair still bore the tangled marks left by the previous moisture drying, and the compression bandage on his left arm stretched an unnatural, stiff line beneath the sleeve. Further inside, the door to the treatment room was ajar, the light inside pale and carrying a faint smell of disinfectant and hot water steam.

As soon as Lynn went inside, Jason was already leaning against the automatic coffee machine, holding a paper cup in his hand, as if he had known he would come.

"I knew you wouldn't go straight back to your office."

"I guessed you hadn't left," Lynn said.

"We just received the report, and someone from the technical department has already pushed the preliminary results to the night shift supervisor's email." Jason tossed him another empty cup. "Coffee or hot water?"

"Hot water."

"Your patient habits are getting worse and worse."

"I'm just too lazy to drink coffee at 1 a.m. and then stay up all night."

Jason poured him a cup of hot water and glanced at him as he handed it over: "You still look terrible. I was afraid you'd collapse in the wind in the parking lot just now."

Lynn unscrewed the lid of his water glass, and a rush of steam blurred half of his vision: "Then why did you let me come upstairs just now?"

"Because if you don't go up there, it'll be even worse later than it is now." Jason took a sip of his drink. "And honestly, you'd be more useful in that gun position tonight than anyone else."

Lynn lowered her head and took a sip of hot water. The warmth soothed her throat, and her voice wasn't so hoarse anymore: "Have you arranged the address for the access card?"

"It's arranged. Before 3 a.m., have two field teams along the East River scout the perimeter without alerting anyone. The real personnel will be deployed just before dawn." Jason put down his paper cup, walked to a nearby locker, and tossed a thin folder onto the table. "Take a look."

Lynn put down his cup and opened the folder. Inside were newly printed sketches and a preliminary summary. The abandoned cold chain warehouse was located in a semi-demolition area by the East River, with two floors above ground and possibly old storage areas underground. It was adjacent to a closed dock and an old, disused logistics ramp. The view wasn't very open, but there were many escape routes.

"This place isn't clean," Lynn said.

"Nonsense." Jason pointed to a red-marked area on the right side of the map. "Three months ago, this area was officially deregistered for demolition, but the municipal power outage records only showed the visible lines being cut off. The underground backup circuit has been intermittently overloaded. Who's using it, nobody knows. Also, there's an old drainage outlet on the riverbank that's not on the public maps, which leads directly to a lower level."

Lynn looked up at him.

Jason shrugged. "Isn't this the kind of 'not on the blueprints' you like best?"

I wouldn't say I like it.

"Let me put it another way, you're the most familiar with it."

Lynn ignored that question and flipped through the images even faster. In one of the surveillance footage composites, there was a faint, old serial number on the warehouse's outer wall, half-obscured by rain and dust. He pointed to it: "Can you zoom in on this mark?"

"The tech team is working on enhancements," Jason said, stepping closer. "What do you suspect?"

"It looks like a logistics zone number, not just remnants from demolition. If it's still in use, this location is likely more than just a temporary stop. It might actually have storage capabilities."

Jason scoffed. "So you're going again?"

Lynn closed the folder: "Wait for feedback from the perimeter before dawn."

"What you said is as good as saying nothing at all." Jason glanced at the hot water he hadn't touched much. "Go clean yourself up first. If the higher-ups come down in the middle of the night and see you sitting here covered in injuries and parking lot dust, going through case files, they'll think I'm abusing injured workers."

"Haven't you been abusing me all along?"

"That's because the work was allocated reasonably."

Lynn finally smiled, a faint smile, then slammed the folder on the table: "I'll go to the monitoring room in ten minutes. You keep an eye on the perimeter." (End of Chapter)