Chapter Three: Ghost Online

Marcus stared at the number. "They're going to bring every killer in the world." Ethan threw the phone into the fire. "Let them come." At that same moment, in the deepest layer of the darknet, an account that had slept for six years came online. It had no avatar, no biography, only a new status line. GHOST ACTIVE. The underworld chatrooms convulsed. An arms broker in Tokyo stopped a transfer. An intelligence dealer in London deleted records. A private security company in Dubai recalled its field teams. At CIA headquarters in Langley, a night-shift analyst stared at his screen as the blood drained from his face. Six years earlier, they had buried a legend. Now the legend had climbed out of the grave.