Shadow of Honour

The sunlight over Fort Wexler was bright, sharp, and blinding—just like the eyes of the men who stood at attention in rows that seemed like they were carved from iron. Sergeant Kain Daniels stood motionless, his jaw clenched and his uniform spotless, the new insignia on his chest still foreign to his skin. "By the authority vested in me and the Republic of Emeran," General Harlow declared, his voice booming over the parade grounds, "I hereby promote Major Kain Daniels to the rank of Sergeant General." A roar of applause followed, salutes cracking like gunshots. Photographers clicked furiously, capturing history in the making. The youngest Sergeant General in over two decades. But Kain didn’t smile. Not even a flicker. He should have been proud. After all, no one had risen through the ranks so fast since the Civil Reunification. But something in his gut twitched. No doubt. Something deeper. A quiet tension hums just beneath the surface. As the medal was pinned to his chest, his eyes flicked toward the distant barracks. His old room. Building 5C. Three nights ago, he had walked past it during night patrol. The lights were off and the room was quiet. Too quiet. Like the air itself had been holding its breath. He blinked. The ceremony snapped back into focus: cheers, hands shaking his, cameras flashing. He nodded, bowed and saluted. He felt like he was being buried alive in applause. The celebration went into the officers' lounge, where champagne flutes clinked and laughter echoed like hollow bells. Kain moved through it like a shadow. He didn't even want to engage in any after-party drinking and laughter. There was too much on his mind for that. "You made history today, Daniels," said General Harlow, slapping him on the back. "How does it feel to be a legend in the making?" "Like a man walking through fog," Kain replied, his voice calm. Harlow laughed. "Still poetic as ever. Enjoy tonight, son. You’ve earned it." Kain gave a stiff smile and walked away. The weight of the medal seemed to grow heavier with every step. He needed air. Outside, the evening wind was sharp, carrying the scent of gun oil and smoke from the range. He leaned against the railing of the observation deck, watching recruits march below. He considered them efficient, obedient and naive recruits and knew that they'd soon adjust to their normal selves for the real work to begin. That was how he was when he was newly recruited, too, anyway. His phone vibrated. A message lit up the screen: [CLASSIFIED MESSAGE: Surveillance anomaly reported near Barracks 5C.] He stared at it for a long moment before pressing delete. That night, sleep didn’t come. He sat at the edge of his bed, staring at a folder on his desk. "Op. Crimson Veil". The document was sealed, restricted, and filled with redacted pages. A mission that had cost lives, buried secrets, and left him with scars no promotion could cover. He kept having flashbacks of the things that happened. The ambush and the death of a good number of good soldiers who shouldn't have died in an operation that was considered relatively routine and not that serious. He had never felt good about the mission from the onset, but he didn't have a choice since he wasn't the one giving the commands back then. Hands were meant to be pointed. "But to whom? His boss back then? No one would even take him seriously because after all, his boss too was following orders from the higher-ups", he thought. Because everyone just acted like it was kind of expected or normal. A behaviour that seemed to annoy him. He thought of Hess, Lang, and Ebo. Good men and good friends. The kind who followed orders and trusted the chain of command. He hadn't seen them since the operation ended. Until... until his memories brought him back to 5C. Lights off. Quiet. Something was wrong. He could feel it. He opened the drawer and pulled out his sidearm. Checked it. Loaded. Routine. Comforting. Outside, the base slept peacefully. And something in the dark watched. He rose before dawn and wandered through the base, following the perimeter like a soldier haunted by invisible sentries. Every clang of the fence gate, every whir of the security camera, scratched at the back of his skull. The promotion hadn’t lifted him; it had pinned him down. Too many things didn’t sit right. Not the ceremony. Not the message. Not the silence in 5C. As the morning drills began, he stood behind a glass partition, watching recruits go through formations. Their boots struck in perfect sync, dust rising from the gravel like steam from boiling water. A young man tripped on the left flank, drawing the bark of an officer and the laughter of his peers. The soldier reset and resumed, face red, posture locked in. Kain remembered being that fresh. Before his first real mission. Before death became a smell he could identify in his sleep. Later that morning, he attended his first strategy briefing as Sergeant General. He walked into the room filled with top brass colonels, advisors, and intelligence heads who all watched him like he had landed from orbit. His reputation preceded him. War hero. Tactical genius. And now, someone elevated beyond rank and age. He delivered his situational report with clarity, confidence, and mechanical ease, but inside, he was unravelling thread by thread. Not exactly as he expected to feel for a position he had always dreamed of and a briefing he once longed to give. Afterwards, he lingered in the hallway outside the war room, his hand pressed into the stone wall like he was steadying himself against a storm only he could feel. A junior officer walked past and saluted sharply. Kain nodded but didn’t speak. He made his way to the chapel: an old stone building tucked behind the officer quarters, seldom used except for memorials. Inside, it was dark, musty. A shaft of morning light filtered through stained-glass depicting the Republic’s seal. Kain sat in the last pew. Silence surrounded him. He closed his eyes. Visions swam behind them: boots in blood, faces screaming, a shadow looming in fire. Crimson Veil. The mission had started as a routine covert extraction. It ended with bodies buried in nameless graves and orders never spoken of again. He had followed commands. But some commands change a man. And he had found himself part of those men. Some missions carve silence into the soul. His comm buzzed again. He ignored it. He walked to the altar, where the old leather-bound soldier's book sat. He wasn’t religious. Not anymore. But ritual still had meaning. He placed a hand on the cover. “I didn’t ask for this,” he whispered. “I did what they told me to. I didn’t…” The door creaked behind him. A janitor. Just a man with a mop, startled to see anyone here. Kain nodded once and walked out, footsteps echoing on stone. By the time he returned to his quarters, the folder was gone. No signs of forced entry. No surveillance footage. Just a single strip of red cloth where the file had been. Red. Like the veil. At this point, he felt uneasy and really tense. His breath caught in his throat. Someone knew. Someone was playing a game. He sat on the edge of the bed again, just like earlier, the red cloth resting between his fingertips. He didn’t recognize the texture—it was smooth, thinner than the combat issue bandanas, yet darker. Blood-dark. He turned it over, looking for writing. None. Just the colour. Then, three knocks on his door. He stiffened. That was not a guard knock. Not even a military pattern either. Just... three. Even. Hollow. He stood silently and waited. Nothing followed. After a full minute, he approached the door and flung it open, ready for whatever or whoever he might see behind it. No one. Nothing. The hallway was empty. Except... A single photograph was taped to the wall across from his door. Yellowed at the edges. A group shot. Squad Five. His old unit. And in red ink, a circle was drawn around him. He stepped forward slowly and peeled the photo from the wall. As he turned it over, he saw a word scrawled on the back. “TRAITOR.” His hands clenched up. Whoever this was, they were inside the base. Inside his past. And they wanted him to know it. This wasn’t just a smear. This was a trap. And it had only just begun.