the return no one expected—and the truth behind specter wing
Talia Kade—now Lieutenant Talia Quinn once more—sat in the back of a small unmarked C-23 transport aircraft, the desert fading behind her. She held no visible emotions. She rarely did.
Captain Vale sat across from her, helmet resting beside him.
“You handled that well,” he said.
“I handled it as needed,” she replied.
Vale studied her.
“You always do.”
The plane vibrated as it climbed, steady as a heartbeat. Outside, the sky turned deep cobalt.
Talia stared at nothing, her mind returning to the firing line—five perfect shots, one perfect hole. The entire scene replayed in her head not as triumph, but as assessment.
She finally said, “Rynar shouldn’t have been teaching. But arrogance isn’t the enemy.”
Vale raised an eyebrow. “No?”
“It’s a symptom,” she said. “The enemy is what it hides.”
“And what did his hide?” Vale asked.
“Insecurity,” she replied. “Fear of irrelevance. Fear of being outmatched.”
Vale nodded slowly. “Fair enough.”
But Talia’s eyes narrowed.
“And the bigger enemy,” she said, “is the culture that lets people like him teach unchecked.”
Mission Debrief
The aircraft landed at Fort Meridian, a secure joint-operations enclave. Talia and Vale walked through reinforced corridors, past guards who never asked questions, only saluted.
Inside the command suite, Colonel Elias Hartmann, director of Special Projects, awaited them.
“Talia,” he greeted with warmth rarely found in covert units, “your evaluation packet arrived. Exceptional work.”
“It wasn’t difficult,” she said.
Hartmann chuckled. “We noticed.”
He projected a recording onto the wall—the footage of Talia’s shot. The officers in the room murmured in disbelief.
Hartmann gestured to Vale. “And Master Sergeant Rynar?”
“Reassigned,” Vale said. “Effective immediately.”
“Good,” Hartmann replied. “That program needs rebuilding from the ground up.”
He turned to Talia.
“You’re not done.”
Talia waited.
Hartmann clicked a remote.
A map appeared—highlighting three other bases.
“Three training centers show the same problem,” he said. “Instructors with unchecked egos, outdated doctrine, and dangerous habits. You will audit them next.”
Talia said nothing.
Hartmann studied her silence.
“You’re thinking about Rynar.”
“I’m thinking about the students,” she corrected. “Some of them left that course believing arrogance equals expertise.”
Hartmann exhaled. “Then fix it.”
“I will.”
A Ghost Returns
Later that evening, while Talia walked across Fort Meridian’s quiet courtyard, she sensed someone approaching.
Her instincts were never wrong.
A man stepped from the shadows—tall, lean, wearing a uniform with no identifiers.
“Specter Wing,” he said softly.
Talia’s muscles tensed.
