Code Name: Ember

The silence is louder than the war.

Fluorescent lights hum overhead. White, sterile, surgical. The kind of light that exposes everything—blood, dirt, fractures. The kind that makes you feel like a specimen.

I'm seated in a chair bolted to the floor. My wrists are clean. My mask is gone. I'm dressed in a slate-gray thermal suit. Nothing sharp. No belt. No laces.

The girl is gone.

They took her from my arms the second the doors opened. No questions. No thanks. No names.

Just gloved hands and a gurney.

I haven't seen her since.

The room I'm in now is soundproof. I know this because I screamed once—just to test it. My voice bounced back hollow. Lifeless. Like it didn't belong to me.

A camera watches from the corner. Its lens occasionally ticks—subtle movements, adjustments. It's not just filming.

It's studying.

The door opens without warning.

A woman walks in. No name tag. No file in hand. Just authority, bone-deep and quiet. She shuts the door behind her and sits across from me like this is a routine check-up, like I haven't just killed for them.

She looks over me for a long time before she speaks.

"You didn't kill the asset."

I hold her gaze.

"No."

"That was a deviation."

"I know."

She tilts her head. "You were authorized."

"Authorization isn't obligation."

A flicker of amusement touches her mouth, but it doesn't last.

"You know what that child was, don't you?"

"I know she was scared. I know she was alone. And I know your trial was never about survival."

"No," she says, calmly. "It was about obedience."

She stands, walks slowly to the corner of the room, and pulls a file from a concealed panel in the wall. Thick, unmarked, with a crimson wax seal snapped and curling. She tosses it onto the table between us.

"Congratulations, Min Seo Wolfe," she says, voice flat. "You passed."

I don't move. Not right away. My body's still processing everything I just survived. The blood, the screaming, the weight of that child in my arms. My hands twitch, phantom tremors from adrenaline withdrawal.

"You showed restraint, adaptability, situational awareness, and—despite your disobedience—a level of self-preservation that suggests tactical brilliance rather than rebellion."

"So I broke the rules and passed anyway?"

She smiles—thin and poisonous.

"No, you exposed the rules. And you chose the game you wanted to play. We don't promote drones. We promote weapons that think."

Her fingers tap the file. "You're being reassigned. Manhattan, New York. Five months embedded under civilian cover for advanced asset conditioning. The training will be unconventional—non-regulated, non-observed. Off-book."

My eyes narrow. "So I'm going dark?"

"You're going private. Temporarily."

"And the man running it?"

"You'll meet him."

"No file?"

"You'll figure it out."

I exhale slowly. "And after?"

"Your first mission. Field conditions. Full anonymity. No safety net. Real stakes."

She slides a folded sheet across the table.

"Plane leaves in eight hours. Civilian clothing only. You'll receive your living arrangements upon arrival."

I pick up the paper. It smells sterile, like it's never been touched by a real hand. Printed in small, neat type are my next instructions, a burner number, and one name:

JIN.