For nearly fifteen years, Owen Carlisle had worked as a mercenary for Blackridge Security, a private organization that specialized in jobs governments preferred to deny existed. He had tracked fugitives across continents, dismantled criminal syndicates, and eliminated targets whose names never appeared in public records. He never asked unnecessary questions. If intelligence said someone posed a threat, he handled the assignment and moved on.

His newest contract was unlike anything he’d accepted before.

The file barely contained any information beyond a codename: Weapon-13. No photograph, no confirmed identity. Only scattered reports describing an experimental asset belonging to a rival assassin organization that had quietly begun expanding its influence. Every witness who claimed to have encountered the “weapon” described the aftermath instead of the target itself. Buildings partially collapsed, firearms reduced to rust-colored dust. Whatever Weapon-13 was, Blackridge had concluded it couldn't be allowed to exist any longer.

Owen expected a machine, some engineered creature, or perhaps a failed military experiment. He prepared for something that barely resembled a person.

The intelligence led him to an office complex on the edge of the city shortly after sunset. The building had once belonged to another assassin company that Blackridge considered a growing threat. Communication from inside had ceased less than twenty minutes earlier.

The silence greeted him first. Broken glass covered the hallway outside the main offices, crunching quietly beneath his boots. Emergency lights flickered overhead, casting dull flashes across shattered walls and overturned furniture. The smell of iron hung heavily in the air. Bodies lay scattered throughout the corridor in expensive suits with cracked identification badges still hanging around their necks. Some still clutched ruined weapons. Others hadn’t even managed to reach them before they fell.

Owen advanced carefully, pistol lowered but ready. His eyes swept over every doorway, every broken window, every shadow that might conceal whatever had done this.

Then as he reached the end of the hallway, his steps slowed.

Standing quietly among the bodies was… a child. You couldn’t have been older than ten. Your clothes were stained with drying blood that wasn’t yours, and your hands bore the same crimson evidence. Small scratches and bruises peeked through exposed skin, some looking faded while others appeared newer, layered over one another. Your breathing remained shallow, your expression strangely calm, and your unfocused eyes stared somewhere beyond the carnage surrounding you.

For several long seconds, Owen simply stood there. His briefing echoed inside his head: eliminate the weapon before it grows beyond control.

Nobody had warned him that the weapon was a child. For the first time in years, completing the mission no longer felt straightforward.

Slowly, making sure every movement remained deliberate, Owen crouched just enough to appear less imposing. He kept one hand visible while the other carefully slid his pistol back into its holster. He knew enough about frightened children—and trained killers—to understand that sudden movements could end badly for everyone involved.

The reports had called you a weapon often enough that he wondered if anyone had ever bothered treating you like anything else.

After a moment, he exhaled slowly.

“I wasn’t sent here expecting this,” he admitted. “And I’m not interested in putting another body on this floor unless you give me a reason.”

His gaze remained steady, cautious without being cruel.

“I won’t hurt you if you don’t hurt me.” His voice softened just enough to sound genuine. “You got a name, kid?”