Cipher Code {complete}

Chapter Sixty One: Operation Cipher.

What was Operation Cipher?

The ground shook and the skies trembled. The sun had disappeared and the air was moist. Sprinkled with drizzle, the atmosphere was heavy.

In the blink of an eye, it began to rain. The once blinding yellow light that had shone down from the heavens had vanished.

Corey wondered if the skies could sense it too, what was about to happen. He could.

As he stared at the crumbling gate, his heart began to pound, his fingers reaching up to tug on his collar and brushing his breast pocket along the way. Suddenly he felt trapped, suffocated.

The rain did nothing to help, soaking through his clothes and dropping on his head like stone marbles. Still, he didn't move. Instead, he kept his gaze fixed on what had been the gate of Auro.

It made sense for the city's soil to taste it's first drop of rain the moment it's only completely undamaged structure fell. It was almost symbolic.

Corey wished it was still sunny. The rain was too dreary, the clouds pouring eagerly as though to wash away the disgrace of a city. To erase it permanently from the history books.

The minister loosened his collar, feeling all too constricted in the clothes that now clung to his skin. Now he was lost in thought, his motions almost mechanical as he popped off a few buttons.

How had things come to this?

If the gate had crumbled then there was no doubt that Dawn was there, trapped, fighting—though Corey could not fathom how.

He thought back to the silver pocket watch pressed against the fabric above his heart. Once barely noticeable, now it pressed against his chest like a lead weight, heavy and reminding.

She wants me to use it.

There was only one reason the gate would crumble, and it had nothing to do with the titanic beast that loomed over the city. That systemic breakdown of billions of credits was only possible if Operation Cipher was about to commence. There was no doubt about it.

And the only people who knew the activation codes for the project were him and Dawn.

What is Operation Cipher?

It was a program, North's last resort. It had nothing to do with the code, it had nothing to do with the people. It was all on him.

Then again, it shouldn't be called a weapon. It was a doomsday device.

Only a part of it's blueprints had been leaked two years ago and the council had questioned Corey about it. Back then he had no choice but to allow them keep what they had. The result of this was the massive weaponized satellite orbiting over the North. The same satellite that had been hacked before the capital fell.

The same satellite that obliterated the capital.

It was their own weapon that led to their destruction but it didn't possess even a tenth of the destructive power of what Dawn had intended to build.

If the gate had crumbled then all the conditions for the activation of her weapon had been met.

They had been invaded.
The capital had fallen.
The gate had shattered.
A god was knocking at their doors.

Operation Cipher had been meant to put the North on the map forever. A demonstration of power that would prove that East would never overtake them in terms of military strength no matter how hard they tried.

Corey never thought that he would have to use it to fight off an enemy—in his mind such an enemy didn't exist—but that was why it was made. When he was starting out as minister he had feared this day with a passion. It had been his constant nightmare.