10 February 2000
17:00
Scottish Army Base
The ceiling fan hummed its slow and relentless circle above the dimly lit office, stirring the scent of cold air, faded ink, and the bitter remains of coffee that clung to the walls like an old memory. Outside, the Highland wind scraped against the windows with a sound that felt almost alive, as if something ancient pressed its fingers along the glass. Winter light filtered through the blinds in thin gold bars that broke across Captain Clark's desk, but even that light felt too weak to lift the chill that clung to the room.
Tiffany leaned in toward the encrypted feed glowing across her monitor. The screen flickered as if uncertain whether to reveal its horrors. Each new image forced her heart downward, photographs stamped with the grim silence of fresh death. Bodies lay twisted in unnatural shapes, limbs bent as though something had explored the limits of human anatomy. The organs had not been torn or clawed. They were simply gone, removed. Their faces were frozen in terror, their eyes consumed by a faint silver glaze that shimmered like ice beneath moonlight. That glaze was unmistakable.
She whispered to herself, "The Mimcro Monstro."
The very name felt forbidden. Creatures spoken of only in the old Via Lucis archives. Beasts that once roamed the shadows between worlds, hunting purity and devouring light itself. They had been presumed extinct for forty years, destroyed by an Order strike team long before Tiffany's birth, remembered only in the cautionary stories whispered to young initiates who believed they were nothing more than myths.
Yet the photographs told a different truth. The Mimcro Monstro had returned, and they were collecting again.
Tiffany's jaw tightened as she scrolled through the final image. "They are back."
The printer whirred to life, a low mechanical growl in the quiet office. One by one, the images slid out, each one capturing a scene that should not have existed in the mortal world. When the last photograph fell, she gathered the papers with slow, disciplined movements, tapping the edges together until they aligned in perfect order. Every action felt rehearsed, a ritual of control against the chaos pressing in around her.
The monitor's pale glow brushed against her left hand as she reached for the folder. The faint shimmer of the mark etched into her palm caught that light and responded with a pulse, a quiet throb of living warmth beneath her flesh. The emblem appeared, the V crossed by an L, crowned by a rising sun. It was not simply ink, but burned tissue.
To the ordinary army, it was nothing more than a scar from an MI6 operation. Even her file stated the lie in clean clinical language.
But Tiffany knew the truth. It was the symbol of her lineage and the weight of the war she had been chosen to fight. The Way of Light was not a myth. It was the hidden wall that held back the ancient darkness no civilian would ever believe existed. And tonight, one of the oldest darknesses had resurfaced.
Two sharp knocks struck the door.
"Enter," she said.
The door opened, and Sergeant Rook stepped inside first. He filled the frame with his tall, broad shape, his red hair catching the faint lamplight like sparks in the gloom. His presence always carried the raw steadiness of a warrior trained for storms. Behind him came Dean, older, quieter, a man who could read silence with the precision of a scholar reading a map. His green eyes assessed the room before meeting hers.
"Captain," Dean said. "You called for us."
Tiffany slid the stack of horrifying pages into a black folder and locked the clasp. Her voice remained steady. "Close the door."
Dean did so without hesitation. The soft click of the lock severed the outside world. Within this room, the masks slipped away, and only the truth remained.
She pushed the folder across the desk. "This came in from Lance. Five confirmed Mimcro Monstro in Paris. Intel traces them to Gordon's network."
Rook's face darkened. "That name again."
Dean's hands clenched. "I hate that name."
Tiffany rubbed her temple as if trying to ease the pressure of all the shadows that had followed them through the years. "Lance sent encrypted updates. He is still operating in Texas, but he will meet us in Paris. General Meyers approved the transfer. We depart at oh five hundred."
Dean opened the folder. The first image revealed a narrow Parisian alley. A woman lay sprawled against old cobblestones, her chest carved out with impossible precision. There was no blood on the stones around her, as if the organs had been lifted away too swiftly for the body to understand it was dead. Only a glass-like sheen remained near the wound, a residue the Order classified as shadow frost.
Dean exhaled slowly. "Since when does Gordon use creatures like these. The Mimcro Monstro were declared extinct."
"That is exactly what troubles me," Tiffany replied. "These creatures do not kill to create chaos. They gather. They harvest. Their victims are chosen for specific purity levels. Their organs are preserved in dark matter stasis. Gordon is collecting essence. Concentrated light. Preparing a vessel for something beyond our threshold of understanding."
She tapped the last page of the report. "Look at this."
Dean turned the document over. A cracked scroll lay photographed against a polished table. Its symbols looked as though obsidian needles had carved them. Ancient inscriptions surrounding a single pictograph of a humanoid form surrounded by spirals of burning shadow. Next to it was a compiled list of Gordon's recent movements.
Dean whispered, "You think he is trying to summon again?"
Tiffany felt a flicker of fear, but she contained it instantly. "Possibly. Or something worse. Whatever it is, it is enough to pull him out of hiding."
The silence grew heavy. Rook finally broke it.
"And exactly how do we intend to stop something like that?"
"Undercover operations," Tiffany answered with calm certainty.
Rook's reaction was immediate. "I do not like that. The last time you went undercover, he nearly caught you."
"This time he will not," she replied. "We go as a team. Gordon may be eternal, but he is not invulnerable. Without his sister Camila, he cannot be destroyed, but he can be weakened. We can force him back into confinement."
Dean snorted softly. "Rook, you slept through that lesson."
Rook shot him a glare. "I had a concussion that day."
"Enough," Tiffany said, her voice smooth and sharp at once. The air seemed to straighten with her command.
The men composed themselves, letting their earlier tension fall away.
"This mission is not typical," Tiffany continued. "Gordon has been silent for five months ago. No sightings. No messages. No rituals detected. And now he resurfaces with creatures long extinct and symbols older than recorded history. He is preparing something, and Paris is only the beginning."
A cold tremor crept through the room as memories stirred. All three of them recalled Berlin, three years ago. They saw flames licking the sky, screams carried like broken music through the streets, and Tiffany collapsing with blood pooling beneath her body. They remembered dragging her through rubble while Gordon's voice sang through the smoke. Tiffany had lived only because the phoenix bloodline within her ignited and brought her rebirth, light stitching her wounds from within. None of them had spoken of that night again.
Now she turned away slightly, her hand pressing against her abdomen as if feeling the ghost of that old wound. She opened a drawer and removed a photograph softened by time. She placed it on the desk where the light found it with quiet reverence.
A boy with sun-bright hair held a dark-haired girl in his arms. Both were children. Both were smiling with the unburdened joy that belongs only to the young.
Rook leaned closer. "James."
Dean's voice dropped. "He would be twenty-six now."
"If he is alive," Tiffany murmured.
Rook looked into her eyes. "You still believe he is."
"I know he is," she replied. Her voice carried the weight of an oath. "Every time Gordon resurfaces, the trail bends toward James. He vanished nine years ago in that desert. Gordon has kept him hidden for a purpose, and I will not believe he is gone."
She brushed her thumb along the boy's face. "Three days ago, a tourist in Sri Lanka photographed a figure near an abandoned industrial site. The resemblance to Gordon was impossible to ignore."
Dean's gaze sharpened. "And where Gordon walks."
Tiffany finished the thought. "James follows. Always."
The words settled over them like falling ash.
Every trail they had pursued through the past decade ended in shadow. Every shadow hid medical experiments sealed under impossible confidentiality. Every file carried the same name. James Lukyan. Dean remembered the boy from the Order's hidden school, a young prodigy who could bend light instinctively. Rook remembered training beside him. They had both once believed he would one day sit upon the High Council.
For Tiffany, he had been far more. He had been her shield, her heart, the boy who whispered to her during their darkest nights, "I will always find you."
Now she carried that promise for him.
Dean finally spoke. "Then Paris first. Sri Lanka after."
"Yes," Tiffany said. "Paris is our priority. If we need to triangulate the Sri Lankan signal we will. Lance is coordinating with Ruan."
Rook asked, "And the army?"
"They will believe it is MI6 classified operations," she said. "General Meyers will cover our movements, and Mason will handle all training drills. No one outside this room knows what we face."
Dean nodded with slow resolve. "Understood."
Rook gave a humorless laugh. "Feels like the old days. Monsters crawl out of the dark while the world sleeps peacefully."
"That is exactly the point," Tiffany replied. "The world sleeps because we refuse to."
She closed the folder once more and pressed her hand against it with finality. "Prepare your gear. Tonight we plan. Before dawn, we depart."
Both men stood straighter, no longer merely soldiers but warriors of the Via Lucis, their eyes filled with the fire of conviction.
Dean gave a respectful nod. "Captain."
They exited quietly, leaving the office in a deep and echoing stillness.
When the door clicked shut, Tiffany did not move for several long seconds. The low hum of electricity and the whisper of the fan felt suddenly overwhelming in the space. She lowered herself slowly into her chair and let her gaze drift once more to the photograph on the desk. The edges of the photo had curled over time, like the soft curve of wings folding inward.
She traced the boy's smile with her thumb, feeling a quiet ache she carried like a second heartbeat.
She whispered inwardly, I will find you, James. Even if the light within me burns out, to do it.
The room grew colder, the shadows lengthening across the floor as if listening. Tiffany did not look away from the photograph. She knew the coming war would be unlike any they had faced, but the Way of Light had never feared the dark. They walked into i,t so others never had to. And now, the dark had called her by name.
She would answer.