Location: Al-Hasakah, Syria
Mission: Kill/Capture — Bombmaker Codename "CROW"
Time to Objective: 11 Hours
Zane stood in an open-air market in Northern Syria, dressed in local clothes, beard grown out, rifle hidden in a crate under a stall of fruit.
No comms. No backup in sight.
This was deep cover — ghost mission status.
Crow wasn't just another bomb maker. He was a genius — a chemical engineer turned militant mastermind. His IEDs had ripped through convoy routes across Iraq and Syria for years.
But this mission felt off from the start.
Intel came late.
Insertion was sloppy.
Target pattern was shaky.
Zane's instincts screamed:
This is a setup.
Day 1 – Surveillance
Zane trailed the target through the old quarter. Crow moved cautiously. Never alone. Changed routes.
But Zane was better. Smarter. He didn't use GPS. Didn't rely on signals.
He used shadows, crowd flow, reflections.
By nightfall, he had the safehouse location and the timing dialed in. Crow would be isolated during nightly prayer.
He prepped a breach.
Silent entry.
One suppressed shot.
No mess.
He sent the message up the chain through encoded channels:
"Target locked. Ready to engage."
The reply came three hours later:
"STAND DOWN. HOLD POSITION."
Zane frowned. This wasn't procedure. Not on a kill order. Not when the target was exposed.
Day 2 – Complication
Zane observed from a rooftop.
To his shock, a blacked-out SUV pulled up outside Crow's safehouse — two men in American suits stepped out.
CIA.
Zane focused his scope, catching a glimpse of one man's badge as the wind shifted his jacket.
Langley.
The CIA was meeting with Crow.
Midnight
Zane sent a secure report:
"Target compromised. US intel asset. Confirm extraction."
No response.
0300 Hours – Orders Come In
Finally, a new message came.
"Proceed with objective. Eliminate CROW. Use discretion. No trace."
Zane stared at the message.
It was vague. Too vague.
They wanted him to clean up a mistake.
To kill someone that maybe wasn't just a target… but a deal gone bad.
No backup. No fallout plan.
If he failed — they'd say he went rogue.
If he succeeded — he'd erase the evidence of a covert deal with a known terrorist.
The Decision
At 0415, Zane breached the safehouse.
Crow was asleep. No guards. No defenses.
Zane stood over him, pistol raised.
He hesitated — not out of mercy, but clarity.
This kill wasn't about justice.
It was about silence.
He pulled the trigger anyway.
Pft.
One to the head.
One to the chest.
Zane burned the files, scrubbed the scene, and vanished before the first call to prayer rang out.
48 Hours Later – Germany
Zane sat alone in a dark hangar in Ramstein Air Base. A handler entered — not military.
"You made the right call," the man said.
Zane stared. "Was it right? Or was it clean?"
The man grinned faintly. "Sometimes those are the same thing."
Zane stood up. "Not to me."
Aftermath
Back at Delta HQ, Zane found a sealed envelope on his bunk.
No name. Just a phrase written in red ink:
"There's a war behind the war. Choose your side soon."
Inside: a photo of Vandal-1 — his team leader — speaking with the same CIA officer who met with Crow.
Zane's pulse slowed.
He wasn't just being sent on missions.
He was being maneuvered.