: Ghosts D

rthern Mali was not a place where people asked questions. Or gave answers. It was a graveyard of ideologies and forgotten revolutions. Men here didn't wear uniforms. They wore scars. And the children... the children watched like they were already older than time. Zara and Leo found shelter in an abandoned mission house near the edge of the red sands. From there, they scoped movement-caravans without lights, dirt bikes carrying masked teens with automatic rifles. Every few hours, an armed convoy passed toward the old mining tunnels-now repurposed. Zara recognized the structure. It had once been an underground shelter during civil skirmishes. Now it was something else. She zoomed in on her thermal lens. Look," she whispered. Dozens of heat signatures. Small. Young. Clustered around central fires. Children," she said. Leo frowned. "How many?" Too many." She lowered the scope. They're nesting them." That night, they moved. Zara dressed in desert black, her braids wrapped tightly, eyes marked with ash to kill shine. Leo went darker-combat webbing, knives, a silencer. No metal that could reflect moonlight. They approached the perimeter low to the earth. Two teenage guards held post near a trench. Their postures were bored, lazy kids with guns pretending to be men. Leo aimed. Zara grabbed his wrist. No." He looked at her. "Why?" They're not soldiers. Not yet." That's not how bullets work." She pushed past him. Slipped into shadow. Twenty meters deeper, she found an old tunnel entrance-just as she'd remembered from her own days in the Mamba network. Everything was built in layers: outer tunnels for training, inner chambers for conditioning. And the heart-where the ghost of the doctrine lived. She crept inside. The smell hit first. Gunpowder, sweat, rust, and something sterile-like old bleach and fear. Children's voices echoed in the dark. Not laughter. Not speech. Chants. We were chosen. We were cleansed. We were carved. And now we strike." Zara's blood ran cold. The creed was still alive. She pressed deeper into the tunnels. In one chamber, girls no older than ten cleaned weapons with surgeon precision. In another, two boys recited field codes in six languages. Zara could almost see herself there-young, stripped of innocence, thinking she was special because someone had said so with a medal and a needle. And then she saw him. Seven. Standing in the center of the training hall. A half-circle of young trainees around him. He wore all black, face bare, eyes like volcanic glass. He raised a finger. The children silenced instantly. Then he spoke. Once, there was a girl who rose from fire. She burned her enemies. She bled the system. And then she left." He looked directly at Zara's hiding spot-though he couldn't have seen her. She left us. But we remember." Zara's heart slammed against her chest. He was baiting her. She stepped out of the shadows. The children turned. No guns. Just silence. Seven smiled faintly. "You came." Zara said nothing. You're real," he said. "I wasn't sure. Some thought you were myth. I told them myths bleed like anyone else." He gestured toward her. Come." Leo stepped in behind her, weapon low. Seven raised his hand. No weapons here. We're not enemies." Then what are we?" Leo asked coldly. Seven studied him. "The man she bled for." Zara spoke for the first time. What do you want, Seven?" To show you what you built." He snapped his fingers. The lights came on. And dozens of children stood-silent, scarred, waiting. You left the house burning," Seven said. "I just rebuilt it with the flames." Zara stepped forward. The air inside the tunnel shifted-like something holy had entered, or something damned. The children didn't flinch. They simply... watched. As if studying the legend they'd been raised to fear or worship. Seven's voice was calm. "We study the way you moved. How you stole into enemy places. How you made power listen to silence." I never meant for this," Zara said. Her voice barely carried, but it was enough. Seven