FADE IN: INT. CIA PARKING GARAGE, LANGLEY, VIRGINIA, 6:14 AM January. A sedan pulls into the underground structure and rolls to a stop in an empty row. The engine dies. The dashboard clock glows 6:14 in pale blue. JAMES WARD (38) sits behind the wheel with both hands at ten and two. His breath clouds the interior of the cold car. He is lean, composed, the kind of man whose stillness reads as competence rather than vacancy. His overcoat is dark wool. His shoes are polished. Nothing about him has been left to accident. Three seconds. He opens the door. His footsteps strike concrete. Fluorescent tubes line the ceiling in parallel rows, throwing long shadows across the painted floor. Ward walks through his own shadow. It stretches ahead of him, arriving everywhere before he does. He reaches the elevator bank. Presses the call button. His reflection appears in the polished metal doors, bisected by the seam where they will open. He adjusts his watch. A micro rotation of the crown, barely visible, performed with the precision of someone who has done it ten thousand times. The elevator arrives. He steps inside. INT. CIA HEADQUARTERS, SECURITY CHECKPOINT, MORNING Ward badges through the first checkpoint. Metal detector. Badge scan. He greets the officer by name. WARD Morning, Phil. PHIL nods. Second checkpoint: retinal scan and a second badge swipe at a reinforced door. Third checkpoint: Ward surrenders his cell phone, placing it in a numbered