They entered a room that Ryan decided must serve as an office. The space was filled with boxes of files and newspaper clippings. Hawkins sat down in the swivel chair in front of a large desk, dominated by a desktop computer. Inserting a USB key, she pulled up a video file: the recording from the alpha team feed. She moved forward through the video, up to the moment that the team entered the room where Martin had been hiding, then she hit play. Ryan watched, for the second time, as Martin dropped to his knees and raised his hands. Now that he knew what to look for, it was clear that Martin never lowered his hands, not even for an instant. But that wasn’t surprising, it was clear now that the bomb had really been placed and detonated by Parabellum, not Andre Martin. Martin was simply a pawn, a loose end that needed to be snipped. He heard Hawkins’s voice though the speakers, calling for the team to get out of the room; he looked over and saw her wince momentarily. Then she stopped the video.

“Did you see it?” she asked.

“Yes, you were right, Martin certainly didn’t detonate that explosive; I doubt he even knew it was there.”

“You’re probably right, but that isn’t what I meant.”

“What else is there?” Ryan asked, confused.

Hawkins backed up the image to where the team made entry again,

“Watch carefully,” she whispered.

Ryan squinted, leaning closer to the screen, as they burst through the door, then Hawkins paused the image.

“Ok, look there,” she pointed to the corner of the screen, where the cabinet held the explosive. “Do you see it?”

“I don’t see anything,” he replied.

“Exactly,” Hawkins smiled grimly. “Keep watching that spot.”

She pressed play on the video again, and this time, Ryan kept his eyes riveted on the cabinet. It took only an instant before the red light blinked on.

“Oh my God,” he breathed.

She let the tape keep playing, he saw them make the arrest. Then, he noticed something else, the final agent had finally moved into the room. Sam Connor had been in the hallway, watching the perimeter, but near the end, he moved inside, past the doorframe. Hawkins shouted her warning and within a heartbeat the bomb exploded.

Hawkins stopped the tape again.

“Oh my god,” Ryan muttered again, the implication of that observation hitting home.

“You saw it that time, didn’t you?” Hawkins asked gravely. “He armed that explosive the instant the agents entered the room. Not a moment before, not a moment after. He was waiting for them to enter, before he armed it. And he waited until they were all in the room to detonate it.”

“Yeah, I saw it,” he felt a little bit sick watching a cold-blooded murder unfold like that, in slow motion. “But it doesn’t really change anything, does it? I mean we already knew that Parabellum targets and purposely kills NIA agents. He did it to get to you.”

“Yes, he did. And it worked, didn’t it?” she clenched her fists momentarily, then forcibly relaxed them. “But you’re wrong, too. It changes everything. You are still missing the most important part.”

“I didn’t miss anything this time, there is nothing else to see,” Ryan was feeling a bit defensive at this point.

“It isn’t about the seeing,” Hawkins responded. “Rather it is about interpreting what you saw.”

“Then tell me, what do you interpret?” Ryan snapped.

“How did he know when all the agents had entered the room?” she answered him with a question.

“What?” Ryan’s eyes widened as the implication sunk in.

How could Parabellum have known the very instant the 3 agents entered the room? The warehouse was boarded up, no one could see inside, and the thermal imaging showed no one else in the warehouse. Hell, even another person with a thermal camera wouldn’t be able to get enough detail to determine when the last agent actually passed the doorframe.”

Hawkins regarded him silently as he thought it through,

“Could there have been some sort of recording device in the room, something he planted with the bomb?” Ryan asked.

“No,” Hawkins replied. “The bomb techs combed every inch of that room for pieces of the device. I was there. They didn’t find anything that could have functioned as a recording or transmitting device, other than the detonator on the bomb, and that was not designed to send any sort of audio or visual signal.”

“Well, they had to have known somehow. The timing is too good, too precise for it to be a coincidence,” Ryan reasoned.

“Well, there was one camera in that room,” Hawkins chose her words carefully, speaking slowly, hesitantly. “The one for this video feed.”

“So, someone hacked the NIA feed, then?” Ryan asked, trying to remain calm.

“No,” Hawkins’s face was expressionless, impossible to read. She had obviously already thought all of this through already. “I checked with the security division last night…”

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

“Wait, last night!?” Ryan couldn’t help interrupting. Things were moving too fast, and he was struggling to keep up.

“Yeah, before I left. I was suspicious, even then. I was never convinced that Martin could have detonated the bomb. Though, I was obviously not expecting Parabellum, I still suspected a 3rd person. I was just covering my bases. Anyways, for obvious reasons, that feed is highly secured and everyone who accesses it is recorded. There was no unauthorized access. They assured me that there was no breach, yesterday. I thought I must be wrong. That I had made a mistake. But now I am sure I didn’t.”

“So, what exactly are you saying?” Ryan was afraid he already knew.

“I’m saying,” Hawkins took a deep breath, “that the only people logged onto that feed were at official NIA computers. And the only people with access to those computers are NIA agents. I think that you know what that means.”

Ryan felt the ground fall out from under him,

“You think this is an inside job?!” he was going to be sick. “My god, you think Parabellum is a NIA agent?!”

“This is why you needed to see it for yourself,” Hawkins said quietly. “You wouldn’t have believed me, otherwise. I didn’t mention it before because, though I suspected, even I wasn’t certain that it had to be an inside job. Before I knew that this was Parabellum, I thought there was an off chance that this was a coincidence, that the bomb was planted to kill Martin and the agents were just collateral damage. Last night, I wasn’t sure of anything. Actually, that’s not true, I was sure I was wrong about everything. But now… as you said, the timing is too perfect. Not to mention this is Parabellum, which means that the agents were certainly the real targets, not just Martin. This was no coincidence. So, there is only one other thing it could be.”

“This isn’t possible,” Ryan shook his head in disbelief. “One of our own people? How could no one have even suspected that, for all these years? It can’t be.”

“No one knew anything about Parabellum for all these years, nothing but what he wanted us to know, anyways. And what better way to make sure of that than to manipulate the investigation from the inside? If you think about it, a lot of things start to make more sense that way.”

Ryan did think about it. He had been an agent during the last Parabellum incident, as they were called. Though he was not directly involved in the case, he had certainly heard things. It was the talk of the agency. The evidence that was contaminated or vanished altogether from secure evidence lockers, the mysteriously missing security tapes, and other events that had been attributed to simple human error or bad luck. In fact, some people even claimed that the case itself was cursed. But, looking at it as Hawkins suggested, it did start to paint a picture. It was a horrifying prospect. Could someone have been sabotaging the case from the inside the whole time? Using their access to the case to eliminate any evidence that might lead back to them?

“Ok, Hawkins, I admit it isn’t out of the question,” he conceded at last.

She snorted derisively,

“It’s the most likely scenario, Stone.”

“Fine,” he allowed, “But even if I believe it, that still doesn’t change the fact that we have to tell everyone about this. About all of it.”

“That is the one thing we can’t do,” Hawkins replied fiercely. “Think, Stone. He could be anyone, and even if we don’t end up reporting back to Parabellum directly, there is no telling who does report back to him, no telling what he sees, what he hears. And he will certainly be watching and listening, waiting for me to get back and begin his game. We have to basically assume that, in that building, there is no place safe from him. There is no one we can trust. And even if we go back there and tell everyone that he is a NIA agent, all that will accomplish is us losing our only advantage. It would just drive him underground and we’d lose his trail.”

“So, we hold that piece of information back, keep it to ourselves,” Ryan reasoned.

“Still not enough. He can’t know that we know he is even involved in this. We can’t say anything about getting this message,” she said firmly.

“That’s impossible, Hawkins. We can’t just keep this to ourselves. It’s too dangerous.”

“I don’t see any other choice,” Hawkins chewed her lip; it was clear that this decision was weighing heavily on her. “You know how Parabellum operates, don’t you?”

Ryan nodded.

“Then you also know why we have to conceal this. The instant I walk in there and say that Parabellum is back, it means I am accepting his challenge. And that means it is open season. If I accept, he starts killing people to break me. There is no way around it. A lot of people would die before we make any progress. Too many people.”

“Then we just have to find him before that, that’s all. Beat him at his own game.”

“You’d think,” she replied. “But I’ve been thinking about this moment for a lot of years now, and you know what I’ve realized? The people who do what we do, they have a tendency to believe that no criminal could ever possibly best them. It is a necessary conceit, to think that they’re more intelligent and more dedicated than any criminal could ever be, and so they can’t possibly lose. But the truth is, that’s kind of bullshit. There are brilliant, talented people on both sides of the line, unfortunately. And as for dedication, well, guys like Parabellum, predators and serial killers, they often win that contest hands down. Don’t get me wrong, some investigators are passionate and committed, but they can only go so far, if they want to stay sane. For the predators, well the sanity ship sailed long ago, didn’t it? The kill is everything to them, it’s their work, their lover, their hobby, their reason for living, all rolled into one neat package. It’s hardly a contest, who is more dedicated. The real, harsh truth is, sometimes, we aren’t better. Sometimes they are.”

“You don’t think we can beat him?” Ryan was surprised.

“That’s… not exactly what I mean,” Hawkins struggled for the right words. “What I mean is that all that bravado tends to blind people to reality. They are so busy planning how to win his game that they miss the obvious truth.”

“Which is?”

“That the game is rigged. This isn’t some sort of romanticized battle of wills like in a Hollywood movie. This is gambling in Vegas, and Parabellum is the house.”

“And the house always wins.”

“Exactly. And that’s because the odds are all skewed in his favour. Think about it, he always knows who’s after him. He watches them, feeding them false clues and sending them down the wrong track. The whole time they have absolutely no idea who he is, where he is. Even their evidence is controlled and manipulated by him. Who do you think has the advantage? But we overlook that. We’re like gambling addicts, we think we have a system, that we’ll be the ones to beat the house, we miss the fact that the fix is in. That’s what I’m trying to say.”

Ryan nodded,

“But even if that is true, what do you want us to do, throw in the towel?”

“Of course not,” she rolled her eyes, as if amazed that the thought had even occurred to him. “I’m saying we should stop playing by his rules. Change the game itself, to stretch a metaphor.”

“You mean cheat?” he asked sardonically.

“Cheat, play dirty, whatever you want to call it. Do you have some sort of moral objection to cheating, here?” she asked.

“Not at all,” Ryan replied. “But how do you propose to do that? Do you have a plan?”

“Yeah, I have a plan, but you aren’t going to like it.”

“I haven’t liked a single thing I’ve heard this morning. Why should that change now?” Ryan muttered. “Lay it on me.”