Chapter 192 Vortan On The Run

Chapter 192 Vortan On The Run
After Thomas death we spent sleepless nights ransackinv and going through his personal belongings accounts,mobile phones,laptop anything we could get our hands on. The evidence finally became impossible to ignore we finally had Proof.

Cold, precise, devastating proof.

The war room beneath headquarters no longer looked like a command center.

It looked like obsession.

Files covered every available surface. Digital maps glowed across multiple screens while blood-red connection lines linked shell corporations, transport routes, research facilities, military contracts, and Council funding channels into a web so massive it became difficult to tell where corruption ended and government began.

No one slept much anymore.

Not really.

The deeper we dug, the uglier the truth became.

I stood near the central strategy table staring at rows of financial records while rain battered the headquarters windows outside.

Home should have felt warmer after Siberia.

Instead it felt suffocating.

Fred worked across from me beside Vincent and Tessa, running decrypted financial transfers through three separate tracing systems simultaneously while Darius stood near the back wall speaking sharply into a secure comm line with one of the Council enforcement divisions.

His voice sounded dangerous.

Controlled.

Which honestly worried me more than yelling ever did.

“This better not leak before I authorize it,” he said coldly into the phone. “Because if Vortan disappears before we arrest him, I’ll assume someone warned him personally.”

Silence.

Then:

“Good.”

The call ended hard.

He turned immediately toward the strategy table.

“Status.”

Fred pushed another set of files across the digital display.

“We confirmed seven shell corporations linked directly to Calder’s research sites.” He tapped one highlighted line sharply. “Four route back to offshore medical development grants.”

“And the other three?” Darius asked.

Fred’s expression hardened.

“Council discretionary funding.”

The room went still.

Even though we already suspected it

Hearing it confirmed hit differently.

Official money.

Official protection.

The Council wasn’t merely infiltrated.

Parts of it were actively financing hybrid experimentation.

I stared down at the financial chain scrolling across the screen.

Dozens of fake humanitarian initiatives.

Emergency containment allocations.

Biological threat response contracts.

Every path eventually converged at the same name.

Eric Vortan.

Faruk’s father-in-law.

Amina’s father.

And apparently the master mind behind the entire nightmare unfolding beneath civilization.

My jaw tightened.

“He signed everything.”

Fred nodded grimly.

“Not directly. He buried his involvement under proxies and shell companies.” Another file appeared across the screen. “But every transaction eventually routes through his discretionary authority.”

Tessa leaned back in her chair slowly.

“He funded Calder for decades.”

Not silence this time.

Something heavier.

Betrayal.

Because Eric Vortan wasn’t some fringe extremist hidden outside the system.

He was the system.

One of the Council members .

Respected.

Influential.

Untouchable.

Or at least he used to be.

Darius looked at the evidence for a long moment without speaking.

Gold flickered briefly beneath his eyes.

Anger.

Cold controlled anger.

“He authorized containment research votes thirty years ago,” he said quietly. “Then redirected funding after the Council supposedly shut the projects down.”

Fred nodded once.

“He never stopped.”

The realization settled over the room like poison.

All those years.

All those “terminated” programs.

The disappearing wolves.

The underground facilities.

Someone kept it alive intentionally.

Not for science.

For weaponization.

I thought about the turned humans beneath the lake.

The woman smashing her head repeatedly against containment glass.

The V-Canis smiling at me before it attacked.

And suddenly rage burned hot enough to make my hands shake.

Darius noticed immediately.

His gaze flicked toward me once.

Grounding.

Always grounding.

“We move tonight,” he said finally.

Vincent looked up sharply.

“You think he knows we found the financials?”

“Yes.”

The room sharpened instantly.

Darius stepped toward the table.

“Vortan has survived this long because he anticipates threats early. The second our audit requests triggered deeper Council security flags, he would’ve known.”

Tessa  swore softly.

“How long do we have?”

Darius looked toward the wall clock.

“Maybe hours.”

Everything accelerated after that.

Blood Guards mobilized immediately.

Council enforcement teams pulled from loyal divisions only. Encrypted warrants prepared under emergency authority.

Vehicle routes coordinated.

Every step handled quietly enough to avoid tipping off the remaining compromised Council members.

But even through the urgency

I felt something wrong building beneath the surface. I watched Darius issue operational commands across the war room while officers moved rapidly around him.

He looked terrifying like this.

Not because he raised his voice.

Because he didn’t need to.

Everyone moved the second he spoke.

I crossed toward him while another tactical map projected across the wall.

“He’s already running.”

Darius looked down at me instantly.“Someone like Vortan wouldn’t wait for proof.” My chest tightened uneasily. “He’s had contingency plans for years.”

Darius’s jaw flexed sharply.

“I know.”

But the look in his eyes said something worse:

He already thought we were too late.

The first confirmation arrived twenty-seven minutes later.

One of the enforcement officers near the communications station swore loudly.

“Sir.”

The entire room snapped toward him.

The officer looked pale.

“Councilor Vortan’s primary residence is empty.”

Silence crashed down instantly.

Darius went very still.

“How long?”

“We don’t know yet.”

Another officer stepped forward quickly.

“Private security teams missing too. Surveillance archives wiped approximately ninety minutes ago.”

Too late.

Goddammit.

The room erupted immediately.

Voices.

Orders.

Movement.

But beneath all of it

Failure settled heavy in my chest.

Not complete failure.

But enough.

Vortan knew.

And now he was moving.

Darius strode toward the communications station fast enough people scattered out of his way automatically.

“Transport logs.”

“Already checking.”

“Border activity?”

“Nothing official yet.”

“Then look unofficially.”

His voice sharpened hard enough to cut through the entire room.

“Every private airstrip. Every maritime route. Every secured transport corridor tied to Council assets in the last twelve hours.”

Blood Guards moved instantly.

Fred cursed under his breath beside me while rapidly reopening financial movement records.

“He drained accounts.”

I looked sharply toward him.

“What?”

Fred enlarged another screen.

“Major transfers. Encrypted accounts emptied progressively over the last week.”

Not panic then.

Preparation.

Vortan already knew this day was coming.

Tessa’s expression darkened.

“He was planning an exit.”

“No,” I said quietly.

Everyone looked toward me.

I stared at the disappearing transaction chains across the screen.

“Not an exit.”

Cold settled into my stomach.

“A relocation.”

Because men like Eric Vortan didn’t run to survive.

They ran to continue operations somewhere else.

Darius understood immediately.

His face hardened violently.

“He’s going to Calder.”

The realization electrified the room.

Of course.

If Vortan fled now, he’d move toward protected infrastructure.

Toward hidden laboratories.

Toward the only people dangerous enough to still shield him.

Calder.

The thought made my beast stir viciously beneath my skin.

Somewhere out there

The man who funded decades of suffering was disappearing into the shadows with full knowledge we were finally close enough to expose everything.

One of the officers who is head blood guard looked up from the tracking systems suddenly.

“We found movement.”

Every head turned.

The officer enlarged a transport log across the main display.

Private aircraft.

Filed under medical emergency authorization.

Departed less than an hour ago.

No listed destination.

But the route—

My pulse spiked instantly.

Eastern corridor.

Toward the abandoned military territories near Calder’s last confirmed operations.

Darius’s expression turned lethal.

“Prepare deployment teams.”

The room exploded into motion again.