Betrayal

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.

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. Boston knelt, carefully opening the container’s secondary panel. He snapped photographs, recorded readings, and scribbled indecipherable notes onto a waterproof pad.

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 it.”

The operative narrowed his eyes. He didn’t buy it. “You’re not supposed to be here alone.”

He reached for his comm.

Boston acted.

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.

In the chaos, Boston’s mask tore off—his face exposed. The soldier shouted something, but the wind drowned him out. 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. 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.

For a second, time froze.

The team watched helplessly as centuries of mystery plummeted into the abyss.

Gone.

The remaining crew members in a hurry immediately reported , but only about the sculpture incident. 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.

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.

He activated a hidden beacon. Hours later, a black motorboat approached—his contact aboard. An old friend. No words were exchanged. Boston was pulled aboard, soaked and silent.

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. 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.

SYRIA 71's law was ironclad: 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.

But soon after, a problem emerged.

At that moment, Dexter’s comm buzzed.

The radio crackled to life. "We recovered one crew member," reported the field unit, static distorting their words. "And 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.

Another relic lost to the depths.

After an Hour, "Sir?" A security officer stepped forward, hesitant. "We only executed nineteen."

Dexter's jaw clenched hard enough to crack teeth. "There were twenty-one."

The scramble that followed was frantic—names checked and rechecked, manifests reviewed. 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.

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.

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 list.

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. "Close the case," he ordered through gritted teeth.

The paperwork would show nineteen executions, one drowning victim, one MIA (Missing in action) and it was Boston. Officially, the matter was settled.

But in the facility's darkest corner, Boston sat motionless—soaked, silent, and very much alive.

The game was far from over.