Chapter 1 — The Bullet at Midnight
It was night. A very cold night.
The clock had just passed 12:30 AM, and Oakfire was silent. The town, nestled deep in the northern wilderness, seemed to slumber under the weight of the darkness. The occasional hum of a lone car whispered across the small road, breaking the silence only briefly before fading into nothingness again.
Oakfire was no grand city. It wasn't a hub of flashing lights or ceaseless noise. It was a small, quiet place with only a few hundred people scattered across its wooded streets. It was chosen by those who had fled from the chaos of the world, people who had traded ambition and noise for something quieter. Safer. More human.
At the far end of this town sat a bar. Small. Modest. A single door led inside, and inside was warmth, orange light, and the faint haze of alcohol in the air. On most nights it was filled with tired workers seeking comfort, voices rising and falling as they drank their stress away. But tonight—tonight was different.
The bar was empty.
The faint orange glow painted every bottle and glass in soft light. Behind the counter, a man worked quietly, humming to the tune of the calm music that floated through the air. He wiped a glass, set it down, reached for another. His motions were steady, practiced, almost meditative.
This was Jack. The owner. The man who had built this bar with his own hands after arriving in Oakfire years ago.
He was older now—perhaps in his fifties—with hair streaked in grey and black. His face was unremarkable at first glance, yet his presence was striking in ways that words couldn't describe. To stand near him was to feel a strange calm, as though your body surrendered tension you didn't know you carried. His smile was welcoming, his voice smooth and soothing. It made you drop your guard without meaning to.
But his eyes were what stood out most. One ocean blue. The other a pale grey that looked like the eye of a blind man… except it wasn't. Both were sharp, alive, and watchful.
This was Jack's world. His sanctuary. The place where he had escaped to, far away from whatever trouble had chased him before.
As he hummed along with the music, his thoughts wandered. 'I should be closing soon. It's going to rain tonight.'
He was just about to set the final glass away when the faint jingle of the bell rang through the quiet. The door had opened.
Jack didn't look up. He didn't need to. He had felt the presence long before the man had walked in. "We're about to close, sir," he said evenly.
No answer.
Instead, footsteps carried the man across the room until he sat down at the counter, directly in front of Jack.
"Can I get some Absinthe?" the man asked.
Jack's hand stilled for the briefest second before resuming. His expression, however, shifted. The warm serenity drained from his face, leaving behind something colder. Harder.
"I haven't had anyone order Absinthe here in a long time," Jack said quietly.
"It's a particular taste of mine," the man replied.
Jack turned at last, reaching for a bottle on the shelf. "You don't live here, do you?"
"No. I'm a traveler. Came here to meet someone."
"And who might that be?" Jack asked, his voice calm, though the warmth had vanished from it entirely.
The man didn't answer. Silence stretched between them as Jack poured the drink and slid the glass across the counter. The tension in the room was thick now, the kind that settled into your chest and told you instinctively that something was wrong.
The man picked up the glass, took a sip, and let out a satisfied breath. "Mmm. Just like I remember. The good old days."
Jack's eyes narrowed. "What are you doing here, Z?"
The man smiled. For the first time, the name was given shape. Z.
"I came to see you again, Jack. It's been… what? Twenty years?" He chuckled as if the thought amused him. "You've been on the move all this time. Do you know how hard it was to track you down? You forced me to use every ounce of my experience. Hah! You really are a tenacious bastard as ever."
Jack studied him silently. "I'm surprised you found me at all."
"You're rusty," Z said with a grin. "The Jack I knew never left a trace. But now? You're slipping."
Jack exhaled slowly, his gaze steady, his posture calm. "How can I help you then?"
Z reached into his pocket. For a moment, the tension spiked, but when his hand emerged, he wasn't holding a weapon. Instead, he placed a single bullet on the counter. Silver.
Jack's gaze lingered on it. His expression didn't break. He closed his eyes briefly, then allowed a faint smile to tug at his lips.
"You never left, huh?" Jack said softly. "I always knew you'd stay the longest in that pit."
Z shrugged. "Not exactly easy to find a new purpose at our age. I'm too far in to walk away now."
Jack nodded faintly, understanding more than he let on. "So your choice was to deliver the silver bullet to my door?"
"Nothing personal, Jack. You know how this goes. You walked away in the middle of the most important mission we ever had. Do you really think they'd let that go? You ruined decades of planning."
Jack leaned back slightly, his smile fading. "I knew leaving at that exact moment would hurt them the most. They needed me far more than I needed them."
Z chuckled, shaking his head. "Still the same, even after all these years. Ballsy as ever."
But Jack didn't laugh with him.
The moment passed, and then Z sighed. "It was good seeing you again, friend."
Swish.
In a blur, Z snatched the bullet from the counter, produced a revolver, and loaded it in a single fluid motion.
Jack reacted instantly. His hand flashed to the knife beside him, and he hurled it like a dart. The timing was perfect—his speed, terrifying.
BANG!
CLING!
The bullet and knife met midair, deflecting each other off course. In the same heartbeat, they both moved. Z reloaded another silver bullet while Jack grabbed nearby glass cups, already preparing his next strike.
And then shadows came alive. Figures in black burst from the corners of the bar, armed and swift.
Jack didn't hesitate. He flung the glasses with uncanny precision. They smashed into faces before the men even realized he'd moved.
BANG! BANG! BANG!
"AGHHH!"
Three dropped instantly, but two managed to fire. Jack slid beneath the counter, wood splintering and glass shattering as bullets tore the air apart. Z pressed forward, trying to trap him.
Jack crouched with his back to the counter, calm, listening, every muscle coiled like a predator's.
"Don't make this harder, Jack," Z called out. "I really don't want to fight you."
"Why'd you take the job if you knew it was going to be hard?" Jack's voice floated back, cold and steady. "You thought I would just let you kill me just like that? Maybe you should've let another one try their luck."
Gunfire erupted, tearing through the counter where he'd been a second before.
"You think I'd let a rookie be the one to kill my old friend?" Z shouted over the noise. Click. "Nobody in the organization gets to kill you except me."
His men crept closer, silent and practiced. But when one peeked around the counter, he saw nothing but the barrel of Jack's gun.
BANG!
The man collapsed instantly.
Chaos followed. Bullets roared, shattering bottles, tearing wood apart, filling the room with smoke and firelight. The bar was reduced to ruin in seconds. Yet when the dust began to settle, there was no body. No blood. No Jack.
Z narrowed his eyes, searching. He studied the reflections in the glass bottles, the faint movements in the haze. He saw it—a shadow, a trick. The man was somehow still alive even after all those bullets that rained down on him from every angle.
"Fire," he ordered.
More bullets thundered, shredding the counter, the shelves, everything. And then… silence. Complete and utter silence took over the entire place again, as if all the bullets fired weren't even real.
Smoke hung thick. They waited. Nothing moved. The tense few seconds that followed were hard even for them as they didn't know what Jack could be scheming at that moment or if he died or not.
Z's gaze lingered on the glass reflection, but it was obscured now. Too hazy to be sure. Slowly, cautiously, he stepped forward and leaned over the counter.
That was when he saw it. A gaping hole in the floor, big enough to fit an entire human through. There was a tunnel under the building that led somewhere underground.
"...Shit." His voice was low, bitter. "He ran from us."