Chapter 36 - The Wrath of Ghost-Six
From the deep blackness between two towering white pines, a tall, lean figure stepped onto the gravel.
Viper had discarded his rifle. He held only a long, serrated combat blade in his right hand, his hands held low in a relaxed, deadly combat stance. His NVG goggles hung around his neck, revealing a face lined with scars, a broken nose that had healed crooked, and cold, pale blue eyes that looked upon the carnage around him with utter indifference.
"Still the fastest butcher in the division," Viper said, his voice raspy, British-accented, completely devoid of fear. "Kowalski was a fool. He thought you were soft because you spent seven years fixing sinks for soccer moms."
Damon let the HK416 hang from its two-point sling. He didn't raise it. He didn't draw a pistol.
"You took a contract on a child, Arthur," Damon said, calling the man by his true name. Arthur Cross. Former Special Boat Service, former Apex field commander. A man who had stood beside Damon in the blood-soaked valleys of the Helmand province twelve years ago.
"A contract is a contract, Ghost. When Apex says an asset needs erasing, you don't negotiate. You execute. You knew the rules when you walked away."
"I walked away because the war was over," Damon replied, stepping forward slowly, closing the distance between them stride by deliberate stride.
"The war is never over for men like us," Viper hissed.
With blinding speed that defied his heavy tactical gear, Viper lunged. The combat knife cut a lethal arc through the air, aimed directly at Damon's subclavian artery. It was a strike refined through hundreds of kills—silent, efficient, completely unblockable for ninety-nine percent of human beings.
Damon was the other one percent.
Damon didn't step back. He stepped *inside* the arc.
His left forearm caught Viper’s wrist, deflecting the blade by an eighth of an inch past his shoulder. In the same microscopic fraction of a second, Damon’s right palm struck Viper’s chin with the kinetic force of a sledgehammer. The strike snapped Viper’s head backward, teeth shattering beneath the impact.
Viper stumbled, but his training took over instantly. He spun with a vicious back-elbow aimed at Damon's temple.
Damon ducked beneath the strike, his hips dropping, his center of gravity locking into the earth like reinforced concrete. He caught Viper's extended arm, locked his shoulder beneath the joint, and wrenched downward.
*CRACK.*
The sound of Viper’s elbow dislocating echoed across the lake like a dry branch snapping in winter. The knife fell from his limp fingers.
Before Viper could scream, Damon’s hand locked around his throat, lifting the two-hundred-pound mercenary completely off the ground and slamming him against the hood of the steaming, ruined Suburban. The metal buckled beneath the impact.
Damon leaned in, his face inches from Viper’s shattered, bloodied features. His eyes were not angry. They were completely empty—the terrifying, abyss-like stare that had earned him the callsign Ghost-Six.
"Who ordered the hit on Toby?" Damon asked.
Viper coughed, dark arterial blood bubbling on his lips. He laughed—a wet, rattling sound. "You think... you think Kowalski had the codes to a satellite link? You think I took this contract for money?"
"Who, Arthur?"
"The director... he’s in the county, Damon. He didn't send us to kill your boy. He sent us to see... if the Ghost was still inside you."
Damon's hand tightened on Viper's throat. "Where is he?"
"Look up..." Viper whispered, his eyes rolling back as his consciousness slipped away. "Look at the water..."
Damon twisted his head.
May you like
Across the mirror-smooth, mist-covered surface of Clearwater Lake, two miles out, a set of powerful halogen searchlights suddenly ignited from the deck of a massive, black-hulled vessel anchored near the abandoned industrial docks.
***
