American comics: I am full of martial virtues and I love to be kind to others.

After finishing their meal and paying, they stood at the restaurant entrance for a while. Pedestrians strolled leisurely along Phillips Avenue, several pickup trucks and SUVs drove past, and a middle-aged man in jeans and a plaid shirt walked across the sidewalk with a golden retriever, nodding to them in a friendly manner.

There were no black SUVs. No strangers in black jackets. There was no omnipresent, suffocating feeling of being watched.

“Let’s go,” Lynn said, “to find the library.”

The Sioux Falls Public Library is about ten blocks from the restaurant, situated on a quiet street in the city center. The building is typical Midwestern municipal architecture—red brick walls, square lines, two thick stone pillars at the entrance, and the bronze lettering "Sioux Falls Public Library" adorning the lintel, oxidized to a dark green by time. Two stone lions crouch on the steps in front, their mouths agape, their expressions shifting between solemnity and absurdity.

The interior was much more spacious than the exterior. Several brass chandeliers hung from the high ceiling, casting a soft light on the rows of dark oak bookshelves. Dark red carpets were laid between the shelves, making almost no sound underfoot. The air was filled with the unique scent of old books—a mixture of paper, ink, and wood, which inexplicably brought a sense of peace.

The public computer area is on the second floor of the library. Eight desktop computers are arranged in two rows, facing a large window. Outside the window, you can see a small park across the street, where there are several tall sugar maple trees, their branches shedding their last few golden leaves in the autumn wind.

Lynn sat down at one of the computers. The other two were unused. Diana stood a few steps behind him, pretending to flip through a picture book about South Dakota's history, but her gaze would occasionally dart towards the stairwell and the window. Kevin was given a seat in the reading room on the first floor, reading a local newspaper while keeping an eye on the entrance.

Lynn opened his browser. His fingers hovered over the keyboard for a second, then began to type.

He didn't log into the encrypted communication platform he'd used at Reynolds—that platform was likely flagged. Instead, he logged into a public portal to the FBI's internal document management system, a repository accessible to any agent with valid credentials. He entered his employee number and a backup password and gained access.

He didn't search for any sensitive documents. He simply opened a standard administrative form—a travel expense reimbursement template for fiscal year 2024—downloaded a PDF, then closed his browser and cleared all cache, cookies, and history.

The entire process took one minute and forty-three seconds.

He stood up and nodded slightly to Diana.

The two went downstairs and found Kevin, and the three of them walked out of the library together.

“What do we do now?” Diana asked.

"Find a safe place to stay for six hours."

They found a small motel called "Prairie Breeze" in a residential area about two miles from the library. It was much better than Reno's—the room was clean and tidy, the curtains were thick, there was plenty of hot water, and there was even a television that didn't look too old. The receptionist was a plump middle-aged woman with cat-eye glasses and an almost exaggeratedly friendly smile. She didn't question them at all about why they were checking in during the day.

Lynn booked a room with cash. After the three of them went inside, Diana's first action was to check the window latches and the bathroom vents to make sure there were no signs of tampering.

“Six hours,” she said. “I’ll cover the first half; you two can take turns sleeping.”

“No need.” Lynn took off her bulletproof vest and hung it on the back of the chair, stretching her shoulders where the vest had left red marks. “I can’t sleep.”

"You haven't had a proper night's sleep in almost forty hours."

"I know, but my mind just won't stop."

"Then at least lie down and close your eyes. Even if you don't sleep, letting your body rest is helpful."

Lynn glanced at her, knowing there was no point in arguing. He lay down on the bed against the wall, crossed his arms over his chest, and stared at a thin crack in the ceiling.

Faint sounds drifted in from outside the hotel window—a lawnmower humming in someone's front yard, the laughter of children riding bicycles in the street, a dog barking intermittently in the distance. These sounds formed an absurd contrast with everything he had experienced over the past few days—gunshots, the roar of engines, the distorted screams of mutants, the cold voice of the bald man at the checkpoint—as if two parallel worlds had been forcibly superimposed.

He closed his eyes.

I don't know how much time passed, but he really fell asleep.

When Diana woke him, the light filtering through the curtains had changed from the white of midday to the warm yellow of late afternoon. He sat up and checked his phone—4:38 PM. He had slept for almost four and a half hours.

"Why didn't you call me?" he asked, rubbing his eyes.

“You need those few hours.” Diana sat in a chair by the window, a SIG P320 in her hand, muzzle down, resting on her knees. “Six hours have passed. Nothing unusual.”

Lynn got up and went to the window, peeking out through the curtains. Five or six cars were parked in the hotel parking lot—a white Toyota Camry, two pickup trucks, a red minivan, and their own black Ford Taurus. There were no suspicious vehicles. The streets were sparsely populated; a postman was stuffing mail into a mailbox, and a young mother pushing a stroller walked along the sidewalk, looking down at her phone.

Everything was so calm it was almost boring.

Are you sure there wasn't anything noteworthy happening throughout the entire process?

"A squirrel tried to climb in through the windowsill, but I chased it away with a magazine. Other than that, nothing happened."

Lynn turned around. Kevin was sitting on another bed, a local newspaper he'd brought from the library spread out on his lap, but he'd only flipped to the sports section and hadn't touched it.

"Kevin, did you notice anything just now—"

“Nothing,” Kevin answered first. “I’ve been watching out the window the whole time, even when I was dozing off, my ears were perked up. It was as quiet as a vacuum.”

Lynn took a deep breath and slowly exhaled.

In the past six hours, the FBI's system recorded a login from an IP address belonging to the Sioux Falls Public Library—an agent named "Lynn Carter" accessed the document management system and downloaded a travel expense template. If the Fraternity's network surveillance system were still operational, they should have intercepted this information by now. Based on their past experience, the time from interception to analysis to dispatching agents to Sioux Falls should have been at most three to four hours.

Six hours passed, and nothing happened.

There are only two explanations: one, they didn't monitor the login; two, they did monitor it but couldn't find any available personnel in South Dakota.

Regardless of which one, the conclusion is the same—it is feasible to contact Manhattan from Sue Falls.

“I’m going to make a phone call,” Lynn said.

"What are we going to use? Your phone isn't safe. My phone has been switched off since Renault." "Let's buy a prepaid phone. Cash, the kind that doesn't require identification. We'll throw it away after we've made this call."

The three left the hotel and bought a feature phone for $29 and a prepaid phone card at a nearby Walmart. Lynn paid in cash the entire time, without even using his Walmart membership card.

They returned to their hotel room. Lynn took the new phone out of its box, inserted the SIM card, and turned it on. The small, colorful screen lit up, showing full signal strength.

He took a deep breath and then dialed a number.

He hadn't written this number down anywhere, nor stored it on any device; it existed only in his own memory. This was Jason Rodriguez's private number—not a work phone registered with the FBI, but a personal phone that Jason had bought himself, known to no more than five people.

The phone rang three times.

"Who is it?" a deep, alert baritone voice came from the receiver.

"Jason, it's me."

There was a full five seconds of silence on the other end of the phone.

Then Jason Rodriguez's voice came again, carrying a suppressed excitement.

"Lynn? God, where are you? Are you still alive?"

"Alive. Safe for now. Are you free to talk now?"

"Wait a minute." Footsteps and the sound of a door closing came through the phone—Jason had probably moved from the office area to a private space. "Okay, go ahead. Is this line secure?"

"Prepaid phones, purchased with cash, for one-time use. What about yours?"

"Personal cell phone, monthly plan, doesn't go through the department's system. Do you know what the situation is at headquarters right now? Brooks sent an internal memo two days ago saying that you encountered an unexpected incident while conducting an independent investigation in San Francisco—he used the word 'unexpected incident'—and your whereabouts are unknown. He instructed all branches to report any information about you to his office immediately."

"Don't report this to Brooks."

“I know. You think I would?” Jason’s voice held a hint of sarcasm. “Lynn, you’ve been gone for five days, and all sorts of rumors are circulating. Some say you defected, some say you’re dead, some say you ran off with what you shouldn’t have. Brooks’s face has grown uglier each day. This morning he called everyone in the Anti-Organized Crime Unit into a closed-door meeting and asked a ton of questions about you—your work habits, your social circle, which informants you’ve been in contact with in the last six months.”

"He's looking for vulnerabilities."

"Obviously. He wants to know if you've given anything to anyone."

Lynn's grip on his phone tightened slightly. Brooks. Deputy Director. He had long suspected the Fraternity was involved at the highest levels of federal law enforcement, but had never had concrete evidence pointing to specific names. Brooks's behavior was becoming increasingly suspicious—he was the one who signed the authorization for the San Francisco operation, he was the one who designated the partners for the Chinatown operation, and now he was the one who issued the initial notification to search for Lynn.

“Jason, listen to me. I have a USB drive with enough data to uproot the Brotherhood. Accounts, communications records, operational orders, lists of infiltrators—everything. This evidence must go to the director, but not through Brooks or any channels he can control.”

Jason was silent for a moment. "You mean Brooks is—"

“I can’t draw any conclusions right now, but his behavior is highly suspicious. That’s why I can’t go back to headquarters through normal channels. If I report through official channels, Brooks will be the first to know, and then the USB drive will be ‘accidentally lost’ before it reaches the director’s office.”

"So what do you plan to do?"

"I need you to bring people to pick me up. Not through the bureau's dispatch system, not in an official vehicle, and not through any channels that will leave federal records. You come personally, with two or three people you trust completely, in a private vehicle."

Where are you coming from?

"Sioux Falls, South Dakota."

Another brief silence followed. Lynn could imagine Jason's expression—thick black eyebrows furrowed together, dark eyes flashing with calculation and assessment.

“Sue Falls,” Jason repeated the name, “it takes about twenty-six or twenty-seven hours to drive there from Manhattan. If I leave tonight, I should be there before late tomorrow night.”

"Don't use any equipment related to the bureau on the way. Don't tell anyone where you're going. You need to personally select those two or three people; choose those who have absolutely no connection with Brooks."

“I have people in mind. Mike Chen—you know him, from the Asian Crime Unit. He was just transferred here from Los Angeles last year. He doesn't know anyone in New York, but he's extremely reliable. Another one is Pedro Sanchez, a veteran from the narcotics division. He had a falling out with Brooks; Brooks once rejected a funding request for one of his cases, and Pedro almost overturned his table on the spot.”

"Pedro Sánchez? That Puerto Rican who talks like a machine gun?"

"It's him. Don't worry, you can bet your life on these two men."

"Okay. Three people are enough. Bring enough ammunition and at least one piece of heavy equipment—a bulletproof shield, a shotgun, and preferably a rifle."

"What happened?" Jason's tone suddenly tightened.

"A mutant. At least one. Shapeshifting abilities plus slow regeneration. My companions and I severely wounded him in Colorado, but didn't kill him. He might reappear."

Jason was silent for three seconds on the other end of the phone.

“I will bring what I need.” His voice was half a tone lower than before, but as steady as a rock.

“There’s one more thing. Once you arrive in Suefors, don’t come directly to me. Wait in a public place first, and I’ll contact you. Use this number—no, this number will be invalid after this call. I’ll call you with a new disposable number.”

"Understood. Give me a reference point for our meeting."

Lynn thought for a moment. “There’s a Great Falls Park in Sioux Falls—the waterfall the city gets its name from. There’s a viewing platform in the park, on the north side of the falls. Meet me at that platform tomorrow night at 11:00. If I’m not there by 11:30, leave and come back at the same time the next day.” (End of Chapter)