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Mirage

Mirage and Grace left their forbidden relationship on the thirty-eighth floor and brought their war-ready minds into the strategy room.

The hub was a high-tech playground.

The air was thick with the scent of coffee and stale air from too many electronics.

Monitors of all sizes lined the walls, displaying a dizzying array of data and images.

Files and maps were stacked high on the tables, and in the center was a holographic projection of a three-dimensional high-rise building.

Leaders from intel, ballistics, and shadow teams stood staring with grim faces as they discussed the latest intelligence reports.

To Mirage’s surprise, Ex and Meridian’s handler, Corvo, was in the midst of it all.

He and Grace knew of the quick-thinking genius and had seen him around once or twice, but they’d never needed to converse or interact with him.

Instead of allowing his mind to stray, Mirage stood beside Spectre and stared at a map he was focused on while Grace leaned against the wall, glaring at the complexity of the structure they were about to infiltrate.

There were candid photos of a man with a permanent frown, bushy eyebrows, and a thick five-o’clock shadow around his chin standing on a dock that looked unregulated.

Other images showed him monitoring a large shipment of cargo being unloaded by men wearing black fatigues and machine guns strapped to their backs.

“Browns, this is a two-target elimination,” Spectre started. “Lee Woyashi, leader of the Kenjuka Clan. And Zelmir Benton.”

Mirage recognized Woyashi’s name from the CIA’s and FBI’s most wanted lists, but Zelmir Benton was new.

Anthony from intel elaborated.

“Twenty-four-year-old chemist and explosives engineer Zelmir Benton is wanted for two acts of treason and a multitude of international crimes. Targeted for acts of espionage and providing weapons of mass destruction to enemies of the United States. He’s almost as fuckin’ brilliant as you, Mirage.”

I doubt that.

“He’s Latin American, born in Pennsylvania, but he’s traveled abroad most of his life for school and research. Both parents are nuclear physicists for the government, with PhDs in solid-state physics.”

Mirage glanced at Grace to see him staring at the scrolling images on the large screen.

“Zelmir is a world-renowned scholar of the Chinese Academy of Sciences Institute of Physics. He’s the only scientist to successfully design a portable thermonuclear weapon with a two-hundred-megaton destruction range.”

Okay, now I’m intrigued.

“That bomb would have an explosive radius of eighty square miles.” Mirage gaped.

“Exactly.” Anthony nodded. “It has more than enough energy to wipe Washington, DC, off the map.”