Chapter 76 I just found out

Chapter 76 I just found out
I didn’t tell anyone where I was going.
I left before sunrise, when the compound was still quiet and the guards were half-awake. The pendant lay flat against my skin, warm in a way I couldn’t explain. It hadn’t done anything strange since yesterday, and that worried me more than when it acted up.
Nothing dangerous ever announces itself.
The road out of the settlement was longer than I remembered. The transport truck slowed at every checkpoint. Faces blurred past me—wolves I didn’t know, voices I didn’t trust. I kept my head down and my hands still.
When we finally stopped, the driver pointed ahead and said that was as far as he’d go.
The building stood alone. Old. Stone walls patched with metal plates. No banners. No guards in sight. Just a single door, slightly open, like someone expected me.
I hesitated.
Then the pendant pressed warm again, sharper this time.
I stepped forward.
The door creaked when I pushed it open. Inside, the air smelled like dust and oil. Shelves lined the walls, filled with books, files, and old tools. Someone had been here recently. Nothing was abandoned. Everything was arranged.
“You’re late,” a voice said.
I turned fast.
A man stood near the back table, sleeves rolled up, hands stained with ink. He looked up at me like he already knew my face.
“You shouldn’t know me,” I said.
He smiled faintly. “Your father said the same thing.”
My breath caught, but I didn’t let it show.
“You knew him?”
“I worked with him.”
That word—worked—settled wrong.
He gestured to the chair across from him. I didn’t sit.
“You shouldn’t be here,” he continued. “But I knew you’d come eventually. The pendant doesn’t let things rest.”
I touched it without thinking.
“What is this place?” I asked.
“A listening post. Once.”
“For who?”
“For people who didn’t want the truth buried.”
He reached into a drawer and pulled out a thin folder. He slid it across the table toward me.
I didn’t touch it.
“You think your father was just a researcher,” he said. “Or a loyal servant. Or a man who made one mistake and paid for it.”
“That’s enough,” I said.
He didn’t stop.
“He lied,” the man said. “Not about everything. Just the parts that mattered most.”
I stepped closer and grabbed the folder.
Inside were reports. Handwritten notes. Names crossed out. Symbols I recognized from the pendant etched into the margins.
My father’s handwriting stared back at me.
“You’re lying,” I said.
“If I were,” the man replied, “the pendant would have burned your skin by now.”
It didn’t.
I flipped another page.
Dates. Locations. Meetings that never made it into official records.
“He was part of a group,” the man said. “Not rebels. Not traitors. Watchers. They kept records of things the Alphas wanted erased.”
“Why tell me this?” I asked.
“Because you’re involved whether you want to be or not.”
A sound echoed behind me.
Footsteps.
I turned just as the door swung wider.
Three people entered. I recognized one of them immediately.
Xander.
He stopped when he saw me. His expression shifted, quick and sharp.
“So this is where you ran off to,” he said.
My grip tightened on the folder.
“You followed me.”
“Of course I did.”
The man behind the table stiffened.
“You weren’t supposed to bring him,” he said.
Xander glanced at him. “You didn’t say I couldn’t.”
The air changed.
I took a step back.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
Xander didn’t answer me. He reached into his jacket and pulled out something small and metal.
A signal device.
“You set me up,” I said.
He looked at me then. Really looked.
“I warned you not to dig.”
“You promised you were helping me.”
“I am,” he said. “Just not the way you thought.”
The pendant flared hot.
Pain shot through my chest, sudden and sharp, but I stayed standing.
The man cursed under his breath. “You sold us out.”
Xander’s jaw set. “I chose survival.”
Heavy boots thundered outside.
Orders were shouted.
I moved without thinking. Grabbed the folder. Turned toward the back door.
A hand caught my arm.
Xander.
“Don’t run,” he said. “You won’t make it far.”
I wrenched free.
“You don’t get to touch me.”
The door burst open behind us. Armed guards flooded the room.
The man raised his hands. “She doesn’t know everything.”
One guard struck him anyway.
I slipped sideways, ducked behind a shelf, and pushed through the back exit.
Cold air hit my face.
I ran.
Shots cracked behind me. Stone chipped at my feet. I didn’t look back.
The ground dipped suddenly. I stumbled, rolled, came up hard against the fence line.
The pendant burned again.
A sound tore through the air not a roar, not a howl. Something deeper.
The guards froze.
So did I.