The Military Siege
Glass crunched under Sienna's slippers as she backed toward the center of the ruined nursery, her glowing birthmark pulsing like a beacon. The room was flooded with cold blue light from targeting lasers, painting her like prey.
Black-clad soldiers rappelled through the shattered windows, boots thudding on the floor like war drums. Their rifles—all trained on her.
"Subject A-09," the commander barked, voice filtered through a black ops comm rig. "You're coming with us. No sudden movements."
Sienna's pulse spiked. Her eyes flicked to Silas beside her, sweat plastering his hair to his temples. His breath was shallow, his jaw clenched.
"You'll need more men," he said quietly, stepping in front of her like a human shield.
The commander's rifle twitched.
Then—
A single note split the air.
High. Haunting. Metallic, yet organic. The kind of sound that seemed to come not from an instrument, but from inside the bones themselves.
The soldiers froze.
And somewhere inside Sienna, something ancient stirred.
Flashback: 1898, Shanghai
The lab was filled with candlelight and screams. A young British man, pale and clean-shaven, stood over a table of writhing bodies. His gloved hands held a violin.
He drew the bow across the strings—one note. Just one.
The convulsing subjects stilled. Their pupils dilated. Blood vessels beneath their skin flared briefly blue, then collapsed.
"It works," he whispered.
Behind him, a man in a Lancaster coat scribbled furiously into a red-bound ledger—The Bone Codex.
Present: The Soundwave Trigger
Back in the nursery, soldiers clutched their helmets and groaned. One dropped his rifle. Another collapsed, eyes wide in terror.
The commander staggered back, face draining of color.
"That melody was erased from all records," he gasped. "It's classified... extinct..."
From the shadows, a figure emerged—limping, scorched, but very much alive.
Lin Zhao.
His violin—old and scarred—was still vibrating from the note.
"Not all records," he said softly. "Your grandfather burned the Bone Codex. I memorized it."
He raised the bow again, fingers poised for another strike. "This frequency wakes the Veritas inside you... and breaks its leash."
Sienna's birthmark flared one last time—then went dark. A cool rush swept over her skin, as if something had exhaled.
"What... just happened?" she whispered.
Silas stepped closer, brushing her cheek with cautious reverence. "You're free."
The soldiers groaned on the floor, twitching like insects in salt. The commander tried to speak, but blood bubbled at his lips.
"They installed Veritas into their own men," Lin said grimly. "But the Codex contains the override."
"How many more have it?" Sienna asked, horrified.
"Thousands," he replied. "Maybe more. It's in the water supply. In the vaccines. Lancaster wanted an army that couldn't say no."
Sienna's stomach turned.
Outside, helicopters buzzed like hornets over a dying hive.
Silas took her hand, steady as steel. "Then we end this. All of it."
"How?" she asked.
"We burn the Codex," Lin said. "But we need the original—and I know where it's buried."
A shadow passed over the nursery floor. The Dowager's legacy wasn't finished yet.
But Sienna was no longer a pawn.
She was the queen on a bloodstained board.