The rain had become a whispering presence over Lagos, falling like mist across the skeletal rooftops and fractured windows of the abandoned tenement district where the city buried its secrets. Lightless streets glistened with oily reflections, and the distant hum of traffic felt more like a heartbeat than noise. Beneath the brooding skies, Tunde stood in the mouth of an alleyway, his clothes damp and clinging, the smell of rust and mildew thick in the air.
His breath steamed slightly as he exhaled. The message from Adaora had been clear: "Find the ledger. Not all names were erased." A riddle wrapped in blood and betrayal. The address she'd whispered before slipping into unconsciousness led him here, to the bones of a warehouse that once stored more than goods. Behind him, the hollow sound of rats skittering across broken glass reminded him that he was not alone in this graveyard of the living.
He adjusted the grip on his torchlight and stepped over the warped threshold. Inside, the darkness swallowed him whole. The faint beam cut through motes of dust, revealing forgotten crates stacked like tombstones and a single metal desk shoved against the far wall. Its drawers were open, papers scattered like confessions too late to matter. But one drawer, slightly ajar, held something different. A hidden compartment.
Tunde reached in.
Click.
The compartment slid open with an unnerving smoothness. Inside, wrapped in oil-stained cloth, was a notebook. Leather-bound. Heavy. He opened it, his fingers trembling. Names. Dates. Transactions. Not in naira or dollars, but in weapons, favors, and bodies. A ledger of every life bought, sold, or silenced. At the bottom of the first page was a signature he'd seen only once before, in the back of a framed portrait in the Bishop's study.
Oba Sijuade.
Thunder growled overhead like a beast waking. The realization hit Tunde like a punch to the ribs. This wasn't just about the Network, or even his father. This was generational. Systemic. The rot went deeper than he imagined.
He turned a page.
There it was, proof of Operation Oracle. The contracts. The assassinations. The shell companies. And a list of locations marked "Silent Sites." One stood out: Akwuba Orphanage—Decommissioned, 2002.
Tunde blinked. That was where Mofe said he had been raised after his mother vanished.
The ledger's final entry was a single line in red ink: "When the embers stir, silence the ash."
Behind him, something moved.
He spun around, heart hammering, flashlight shaking as the beam landed on a figure in a grey coat. The man was bald, pale-eyed, and smiling without warmth.
"Mr. Cole," he said, his voice smooth as silk and just as deadly. "That ledger was not meant for your hands."
Tunde didn't wait. He dropped the book into his backpack and bolted for the far door. Bullets sparked off the metal shelving behind him. He dove behind a crate, the air thick with gunpowder and dust. His mind raced. He couldn't fight, not here, not now. He needed to get the ledger out, get to Mofe, and get to safety.
The side window.
He scrambled up, shattered the glass with his elbow, ignoring the sting of cuts, and leapt through. He landed hard in the alley, groaning as his shoulder hit the asphalt. The rain was falling harder now, masking footsteps and sirens alike. He ran.
In Ikoyi, Mofe sat in silence, staring at the flickering screen of the laptop Adaora had recovered before her ambush. The decryption software had finally broken through the last layer. What he saw made him nauseous.
The images weren't just surveillance. They were experiments. Children. Elderly. Detainees. Guinea pigs in what the files called "Neuropathic Compliance Trials." One face among them froze his blood.
Bishop Ajani.
Not as a subject, but as a consultant.
Mofe slammed the laptop shut. A knock came at the door.
"Who is it?" he called, his voice tense.
"Tunde."
The door opened. Tunde stumbled in, bleeding from a gash above his eyebrow, soaked through.
"They tried to kill me," he said, panting. "But I got it."
He pulled the ledger from his bag and dropped it on the table. Mofe stared at it, then up at Tunde.
"You found the archive?"
"More than that," Tunde said. "We were never supposed to survive this. Our lives, they were… mapped out. Sold."
Mofe reached into a drawer and pulled out a medkit. He worked on Tunde's wound in silence, the room heavy with the weight of revelations.
"We go to Akwuba," Mofe said finally. "Tomorrow."
Tunde nodded. "Then we burn it all down."
That night, the city dreamed.
In a high-rise overlooking the marina, Bishop Ajani poured himself a glass of wine. His phone buzzed.
"It's been recovered," a voice said.
"By whom?"
"Cole. And his friend. They're planning something. The orphanage."
Ajani's fingers tightened around the glass. "Then burn it. Everything. I want no trace left."
"What about them?"
The Bishop walked to the window, staring out at the storm-slicked city. "No survivors. Lagos must forget."
The road to Akwuba was long, winding through the decaying underbelly of the city's past, towns that had faded into myth, and stories abandoned like empty shrines. The orphanage sat on a hill, its gates twisted by time and walls choked by ivy. It smelled of rain and rot and forgotten cries.
Mofe parked the car, engine ticking in the silence.
"Are you sure you want to do this?" Tunde asked.
"No," Mofe replied, stepping out. "But we have to."
They pushed open the rusted gate and stepped onto the grounds. The building loomed ahead like a mausoleum. Inside, the hallways groaned with memories. Names etched into walls. Broken toys. Files scattered like autumn leaves.
Then they found it, a room locked with three bolts.
Tunde kicked it open.
Inside was a server rack still humming, powered by a hidden solar generator. Mofe approached the console. "This is a data vault. Recordings. Case files. Transcripts."
He plugged in a drive.
As the download began, the lights flickered.
Outside, the sound of engines.
"We're not alone," Tunde whispered.
Shadows approached. Armed. Trained. The Network.
Mofe glanced at the percentage on the drive: 48%.
"We don't have time," Tunde said.
"We need this," Mofe replied. "Or everything dies with us."
They barricaded the door. Tunde grabbed a rusted pipe. Mofe checked the revolver he had taken from his father's safe.
The first impact cracked the wood. Then a voice came through a megaphone.
"Hand over the ledger and the drive. You get to live."
Mofe laughed bitterly. "We've heard that before."
Another hit.
Drive at 74%.
Tunde whispered, "They'll kill us either way."
"I know."
The wall behind them groaned. A small window.
Tunde glanced at it, then back at the drive.
87%.
One more hit. The door buckled.
"Go," Mofe said, handing Tunde the ledger and the drive. "Out the window. I'll buy you a minute."
"No."
"Don't argue."
A tear slipped down Tunde's cheek. "We finish this together."
Mofe smiled. "Then let's make them earn it."
The door exploded inward.
Flashes. Shouts. Smoke.
Tunde dove through the window, hitting the ground and rolling. Bullets cracked overhead. He ran into the forest, the ledger clutched to his chest, heart pounding like war drums.
Behind him, the orphanage was in flames.
But in his hand was everything they needed.
Far from the chaos, in a dim café in Paris, a woman in a hijab checked her email. A new message arrived. Subject: "Ashes Reignite." Attached was a file dump, Operation Oracle. The Network. The ledger.
Her eyes narrowed.
She pulled out a phone and made a call.
"It's begun," she said.
Across oceans and time zones, those who had once been silent stirred.
The embers were no longer cold.
They were catching fire.