He looked down at the flag in his lap, then up at the dog, and his mouth moved like he was saying something I couldn't hear.

The recording clicked off.

Silence settled over the bunker, heavy as a collapsed mine shaft. I looked down at my hands. The same long, scarred fingers as Thomas. The same square jawline. The same low, gravelly timbre in my voice that had always made people turn around in diners, thinking my father had walked into the room.

Suddenly, the green emergency lights pulsed red.

A klaxon began to wail—a rhythmic, deafening scream that shook dust from the ceiling ventilation ducts. On the master CRT bank, six security cameras flickered to life, showing the subterranean staging area directly outside the facility's outer blast gate.

Dozens of black-clad tactical operators—Campbell’s private PMCs—had breached the hangar above. They were descending the shaft on tactical ropes, armed with suppressed carbines and carrying portable acoustic microwave arrays designed to disorient and herds.

Behind them, held by steel cable leashes, were twenty of the Chimera hounds, their jaws fitted with carbon-fiber muzzles, their eyes wild and foaming under chemical stimulants.

"They're not trying to contain the dogs," I said, cold realization washing over me. "They're using the dogs to clear the bunker."

A loudspeaker above the monitors clicked on, Campbell’s voice cutting smoothly through the blaring siren:

*“Donald. I know you're in the integration office. Turn off the master override switch on the terminal, step out with your hands behind your head, and you live. Your father’s contract was with the Department of Defense, not your family. The Chimera assets are private property.”*

Rex stood beside me, his lips curling back over white teeth, his growl vibrating at the exact same ultrasonic hum as the whistle in my pocket.

"He's wrong, Rex," I whispered, reaching out to stroke the thick fur along his neck. "You're not property."

I picked up the vintage acoustic microphone plugged into the master console—the one Thomas had used to broadcast orders through the facility’s internal public-address network during the testing phases.