Under the flicker of the console light, Dallas turns the courier tag over in his hand. The thing is colder than it should be, its surface pitted, its seam too precise for any ordinary badge.

The faint hum sharpens when his thumb crosses the edge. The masked man on the floor goes rigid, as if some invisible collar has just tightened around his spine.

Dallas clicks the side panel loose. Inside is a compact override board, wires soldered into a ciphered transmitter, the kind of hidden leash a handler uses when he wants obedience without witnesses. Not a logistical identifier, a remote control for a man dressed up as a courier.

The realization drains the room. Bishop is not just directing operations, he is steering people like equipment, opening locks, snapping routes, making bodies behave from a distance. The masked man stares at the tag, hollow and beaten, like he has finally seen the hand around his own throat.

Dallas pries the controller open. The casing gives with a dry snap, and a ribbon of wires spills into his palm, each line routed to a hidden splice point under the badge plate.

He follows the bundle with careful fingers, mapping the solder seams to a second contact hidden beneath the courier tag. The circuit is not for tracking location, it is for authorizing commands from a remote handler.

The amber light on the console flickers once, then steadies. On the floor beside the blood smear, the discarded Harbor Unit badge catches the glow like proof laid out in court.

Dallas pulls the last wire free, and the tiny board gives up one final paper-thin strip of tape marked with a handler stamp. The cut costs him, a hot nick across his thumb, but it leaves the control path visible at last.

The room seems to shrink around that fact, because the leash runs back through the office system, into the building below. The open shutters shudder as voices and movement press closer from the hall, forcing Dallas to act on what he has just learned.