Scott Kerble drives Langdon and Katherine Solomon north along the river away from Folimanka Park as rescue vehicles head toward the crater left by the destroyed Threshold facility. Kerble is baffled by the “cold” nature of the blast and weighs the escalating power struggle between Ambassador Nagel and CIA Director Gregory Judd, especially after Judd ordered searches of Nagel’s suite and staff.

Langdon presses Kerble to help them avoid the CIA, warning that Nagel is in grave danger if Judd has detained her. Langdon insists the only remaining way to protect Nagel is to find a specific person: Sasha Vesna, whose implanted evidence could conclusively prove Threshold existed and that the CIA exploited her as a test subject.

Katherine privately agrees the stakes have worsened now that Threshold is buried and the CIA will likely move to erase “loose ends,” including Langdon, Katherine, Sasha, and Dmitri Sysevich. Katherine suspects Sysevich is the clay-smeared figure who called himself Sasha’s protector and may have destroyed the facility, driven by trauma and mental illness.

Langdon says he has deduced where Sasha must be but needs access to her apartment first. Kerble reveals he found Harris’s body there and that Sasha was already gone, but Langdon still insists something inside the apartment can help. When Langdon asks about the key (once held by Dana Daněk on a Krazy Kitten key ring), Kerble surprises him by tossing the key to the backseat—Langdon already has it.

In New York, Jonas Faukman sees news of the Prague explosion and anxiously calls Langdon’s hotel after receiving no further word. Elsewhere underground, the Golěm struggles up onto the Crucifix Bastion tram platform, sheds his cape and platform boots, and spots an illuminated elevator button in the darkness—an apparent route to escape and continue protecting Sasha.