BIRTHCRY1: CHAPTER 2 – BETRAYAL
The cabin of the extraction plane hummed with quiet tension. Most of the team had dozed off in their seats, their bodies heavy with exhaustion after the brutal firefight in Shambhala. But not Dr. Boston. He sat silently, his thoughts racing in circles that refused to settle.
Moments later, unnoticed, he slipped from his seat and moved toward the rear of the aircraft—where the sculpture was secured. Inside the cold cargo bay, bathed in dim red lighting, the relic sat encased in a reinforced crate, its edges still humming faintly with a rhythm that seemed almost intentional. Boston knelt, carefully opening the container's secondary panel. He snapped photographs, recorded readings, and scribbled notes onto a waterproof pad with hands that trembled despite his attempts at steadiness.
Suddenly—footsteps.
Boston's heart clenched.
He turned slowly.
A soldier stood at the bay entrance, one of the operatives. His brow furrowed.
"What are you doing here?"
Boston stayed calm.
"I heard something strange... a vibration from the artifact. I came to check, that's all."
The operative narrowed his eyes. He didn't buy it.
"You're not supposed to be here alone."
He reached for his comm.
But Boston acted quickly.
With no other choice, he stepped back and slammed his hand on the emergency hatch control. Alarms blared. The back door blew open with a deafening roar of wind that tasted like metal and ice.
In the chaos, Boston's mask tore off—his face exposed. The soldier froze when he saw it. He shouted into his comms, "It's Bos—Boston!" but the wind swallowed his words like they'd never existed. The others scrambled to respond.
Then—without hesitation—Boston dove into the sky, grabbing the soldier mid-leap.
The cold air screamed around them.
Inside the plane, chaos erupted. Someone screamed, "They jumped!" But that wasn't the worst of it.
The sculpture, its restraints weakened from the earlier landing, jolted forward with the force of the pressurized vacuum. The massive object slid violently and, with a thunderous metallic groan, was pulled from the cargo hold—vanishing into the black ocean below as if the water itself had been waiting to swallow it whole.
For a second, time froze.
The team watched helplessly as centuries of mystery plummeted into the abyss.
Gone.
The remaining crew immediately reported the incident—but only the sculpture's loss. Within minutes, the alert reached Dexter.
His rage was instant. His voice cut through encrypted comms like a blade.
"Launch all search teams. Deploy sea-drones. I want that sculpture found."
Ten units mobilized across the oceanic coordinates. Below the surface, drones swept the seafloor with mechanical precision that somehow felt desperate.
Meanwhile, Boston drifted alone through the freezing night sky, parachute cutting across the wind. The soldier he'd taken with him had disappeared into the sea. Boston didn't care. He had bigger priorities that made mercy seem like a luxury he couldn't afford.
He activated a hidden beacon. Moments later, a black motorboat approached—piloted by one of his old friends. No words were exchanged. Boston was pulled aboard, soaked and silent, as if speech itself had become obsolete.
Back at SYRIA 71, Dexter received an encrypted transmission. The seal of the Hiranian Presidency glowed on the screen. The President's voice was sharp, furious.
"You lost the sculpture. You lost everything."
Dexter tried to respond, but the words died in his throat like small animals.
The President slammed the call shut after demanding immediate accountability.
The pressure was crushing. The sculpture wasn't just symbolic—it was a political lynchpin. And now, it lay somewhere beneath miles of saltwater, possibly laughing at them all.
SYRIA 71's law was brutal: mission failure meant execution of all personnel involved. No exceptions.
The order was issued.
An hour later, when the extraction plane touched down, the returning squad was marched directly from the landing pad to the facility gate.
The execution was swift. Nineteen operatives were shot outside the gate like traitors, their bodies incinerated before dawn could even think about arriving.
But soon after, a problem emerged.
Dexter's comm buzzed. The radio crackled to life.
"We recovered one crew member," reported the field unit, static distorting their words. "And a part of the sculpture. But..." A pause that stretched too long. "The saltwater corroded everything. The inscriptions, the markings—all gone. It's blank."
Dexter didn't move. Didn't breathe. The silence in the command center became a physical weight that pressed against everyone's ribs.
Another relic lost to the depths.
Hours later, a security officer stepped forward, hesitant.
"Sir? We only executed nineteen."
Dexter's jaw clenched.
"There were twenty-one."
The scramble that followed was frantic—names checked and rechecked, manifests reviewed until the paper itself seemed ready to confess. Dexter's finger traced down the list, each name a potential betrayal.
Meanwhile, Boston moved through SYRIA 71's hidden infrastructure like a ghost—slipping in with the ocean recovery team as they returned through the secondary dock, just another soaked figure in the chaos of their arrival, invisible because everyone expected him to be dead.
He found his old quarters undisturbed, the lock still responsive to his codes.
The door sealed behind him with a hiss.
He waited in perfect stillness, knowing the hunt had already begun but would probably end before it ever really started.
Above, Dexter paced like a caged animal. The math wouldn't balance. One name unaccounted for—but Boston's was right there on the list, and every member's name was on the attendance roster.
Then the realization hit like a bullet.
"Then who's missing?" he demanded, voice dangerously quiet.
No one answered. The oversight was unforgivable.
Dexter's gaze fell to the encrypted screen where the Hiranian president's last message still glowed. Another failure would be fatal. His fists tightened until his knuckles blanched white as bone.
"Close the case," he ordered through gritted teeth.
The paperwork would show nineteen executions, one drowning victim, one MIA—and it was Boston. Officially, the matter was settled with the kind of finality that left no room for questions but somehow created more.
But in the facility's darkest corner, Boston sat motionless—soaked, silent, and very much alive, repeating the words like a mantra that might protect him:
"South Eldia."
The game was far from over.