General Marcus Thorne had died a hero, or so the official reports claimed. In reality, he had merely ceased to exist. One frigid night, under the cloak of a manufactured blizzard, he shed his rank, his medals, his very name. He walked away from the fortress-like command center, leaving behind a life of strategic maneuvers, impossible decisions, and the heavy mantle of leadership that had consumed two decades. Marcus Thorne, the legend, was a ghost. Elias Vance, a man with calloused hands, a neatly trimmed beard, and a quiet demeanor, was born.
His destination was a small coastal town, a place whispered about in his rare, stolen moments of peace—a place his wife, Clara, had always dreamed of. He hadn't dared visit, not during the wars, not during the long years of his absence. Now, he came as a shadow, drawn by an ache he could no longer ignore: the ache for a family he'd left behind, a family he had believed he was protecting by his absence.
He found a dilapidated cottage on the outskirts of town, nestled amongst gnarled pine trees, smelling of salt and damp earth. It was far from any main road, a perfect hideout. He paid in cash, a substantial sum from a hidden cache, enough to raise no questions but enough to secure his new anonymity. The first few weeks were a blur of manual labor. He fixed the roof, mended the fence, cleared the overgrown garden. Each swing of the hammer, each pull of a stubborn root, was a deliberate act of shedding his old self, a penance for the life he could not share.
He was still General Thorne in his head, his thoughts a constant strategic analysis of the surrounding landscape, the routines of the few neighbors, the best escape routes should the past come calling. But as the cottage began to breathe new life under his hands, so too did a different kind of peace settle within him. A peace he hadn't known since before the uniforms, before the weight of command.
His only contact with the outside world was a battered, non-smart phone for emergencies, and a cheap laptop used solely for news aggregation, sifting through global events for any hint of a trail leading back to him. He found nothing, only the occasional, heroic mention of the late General Thorne, a ghost forever enshrined in history. It was a bizarre kind of freedom, to be dead to the world, alive only to himself.
Yet, his true purpose remained unspoken, a burning ember in his chest. His family. Clara. His children, Anya and Leo, who would now be adults, or nearly so. He hadn't seen them since Anya was ten and Leo was eight. He knew nothing of their lives, save for vague, heavily censored updates sent through secure channels in his former life. He had chosen their safety over his presence. Now, he wondered if that choice had been a cruel one.