Lieutenant Commander James Reed gripped the wardroom rail as rain pounded the deck above. The table before him bore Admiral Sinclair’s rough chart: Pointe Verdure—a narrow cove along Normandy’s silver coast—and, barely a mile inland, the Freya radar station at Cap d’Épine. “Last month,” Reed intoned, “five U-boats picked up convoy signatures here. Losses: over forty merchant ships. Our mission: land at 0130, breach the pe...

The last embers of the range war still glowed in Luke Corrigan’s mind as he spurred his mount down the winding trail. Dust-clogged valleys stretched behind him, punctuated by the smoking ruins of homesteads—silent testaments to a conflict that had finally died in blood. Corrigan, tall and barrel-chested, rode like death astride a roan mare, twin Colt .44s resting in polished holsters, a Springfield ’63 carbine stowed in a...

It’s hard driving a hundred miles with you on my mind It’s difficult to keep focus and leave the road behind It’s hard driving a hundred miles with you on my mind Every song on the radio just reminds me in kind. I can’t wait to hear your laughter To see that smile break through I can’t wait for the moment When I’m finally next to you. I’ll put my words into meaning As my arms pull you near But if you try to hide your joy...

Chapter Twelve: Into the Pit June 2024 – Donetsk Region, Ukraine The military checkpoint had been evacuated the day before they arrived. No warning, no explanation—just boots, tire tracks, and one soldier’s abandoned rosary half-buried in churned mud. The villagers near the trenchline wouldn’t speak to Eleanor or her team. Not even to ask why an old blind woman, five strangers, and a heavy case of ritual tools had come to...

Chapter Eleven: The Inheritance of Ash and Blood May 2024 – Eastern Ukraine / Suffolk, UK Peter stood at the lip of the yawning sinkhole in the Donbas forest, the wind whipping his collar as if to warn him away. He’d told himself he’d returned for the story—an exclusive on the frontline’s new horrors—but every dream since he had visited Eleanor had driven him here. In sleep, roots writhed beneath his skin like living fing...

Chapter Ten: The Eyes That Remain March 2024 – St. Joseph’s Residential Care, Suffolk, UK 50 years after the Belgian Spiral The world had grown quieter for Eleanor Mercer. Not silent—never silent—but quieter in the way winter muffled sound: dull, heavy, soaked in memory. She had been blind for over four decades, her eyesight gradually fading in the years after she had battled Eitar and still, her dreams were painted in vi...

The Waiting Room Rain pounded the slate roof in jagged rhythms, each drop like a frantic plea against the cold iron of the tracks. The wind shrieked through the station’s eaves, scattering puddles into froth. Yet inside the small, rural hall—its name chalked illegibly against mossed wood—a roaring fire snapped and roared, chasing back the darkness. The hearth’s lamplight danced across polished floorboards and battered lug...

In Kingston upon Hull, where the Humber flows wide, Dockside lamps used to flicker above cobblestones slick with salt, Trawler men gathered—silhouettes against the glow, Hearts steeled for the Arctic’s hungry halt. With masts iced in frost they cast off at dawn, Hands numb but practiced, eyes fixed on the horizon’s line, With prayers on their lips for fair seas and full nets, They sailed where the polar winds intertwined....

Love At First Sight: They called it love at first sight, though neither of them believed in such things—until that bright April morning in 1981. On her porch swing, reading a well-worn paperback, Sarah watched the stranger get out of his dusty rental car. He looked lost, curious—eyes tracing the white picket fences and awnings of Maplewood’s Main Street. He paused, caught her gaze, and offered a shy wave. By lunchtime, th...

Chapter Eight: Blood Remembers October 1973 — Two Weeks After the Arras Incident Military Quarantine Zone, France The debriefing lasted seven hours. She told them everything: the descent, the chamber, the breathing earth, the thing that spoke in her father’s voice. They asked about her crew. She gave them names. They wanted remains. There were none. Just mud. Piles of it. Some of it still warm when the emergency team arri...

Chapter Seven: Her Father’s Ghost Northern France – September 1973 Forest near Arras, Site 17B – Classified British Coordinates Eleanor Mercer zipped up the tent flap and checked her watch. Day One: 06:15. Fog heavy. Humidity high. EMF baseline: unstable. They’d set up camp three miles from the original trench site, using copies of WWII-era maps and sanitized military archives—what little remained after the war department...

Chapter Six: One Man Left to Scream France, October 1944 — Two Days After Contact Loss with Mercer’s Squad The order came down simple: “Find Mercer. Recover survivors. Avoid direct engagement.” Sergeant Rupert Kendall didn’t like simple orders. Especially not ones that smelled like silence. No follow-up. No backup. No map corrections. Just coordinates, and a whisper from the adjutant: “Radio cuts out in that sector. Be ca...

Chapter Four: The Sound Beneath the Static France, October 1944 – Forest near Arras Corporal John Mercer hadn’t slept in twenty-three hours. He didn’t tell the others that, but they could see it. His eyes were cracked and red. His fingernails were dark with dirt and blood—he’d scraped at the edge of the collapsed trench until his hands bled. He kept telling himself it was to recover Rooker. But part of him knew it wasn’t....

Interlude: Letter from a Survivor March 1931 – Wiltshire, England From: Private Edwin Dawley (ret.) To: Mr. John Mercer Dear John, I am writing to you in what I am told is one of my lucid moments (they think I am a madman, but it isn’t so) because your uncle will not. He’s a proud man, and what we saw in France took something from him none of us could give back. You asked him once what happened to Edward Hale. You won’t g...

Chapter Two: That Which Watches France, November 1917 — Three Days After the Collapse They said the trench had gone quiet. Not in the way you wanted—not like peace. The guns still barked in the distance. Shells still fell. But in their little stretch of hell—Sector C8, a kink in the front line no one wanted to hold—the birds had stopped flying. The wind had stopped blowing. And no one spoke above a whisper anymore. Privat...