The city didn’t know it yet, but a war was about to start.
It wouldn’t come with sirens or shootouts in the street. No declarations. No turf lines.
It would begin with whispers.
Disappearances.
And a silence that stretched too long before the scream.
Eve met Marco on the rooftop of a burned-out church in Northpoint.
The sky above them was bruised purple, the kind of dusk that feels like it might never break into day.
She didn’t speak right away.
Neither did he.
When she finally turned to him, her voice was quiet. Even.
“They’ve started looking at me. Really looking.”
Marco leaned on the rail, hands raw and wrapped from the fight no one had seen. “Then they’re too close.”
She nodded. “Which means we can’t afford missteps.”
“You think I’m a misstep?”
“I think you’re the only move I trust,” she said.
That stopped him. Not because it was romantic — it wasn’t.
It was real.
And dangerous.
Eve didn’t hand out trust. She dealt it, like a weapon. Measured. Sharp.
“So,” he said. “What’s next?”
Her answer was cold.
“We pull teeth.”
Nathan sat at his desk, hands stiff around a mug of stale coffee.
A sealed envelope sat in front of him. No markings.
It had been left in his locker that morning. No note. No sender.
Inside:
Photos.
Three bodies.
All men he’d flagged months ago as informants circling the edges of the mystery cartel. All presumed missing.
Now confirmed dead.
Laid out like warnings.
On the back of the third photo, a message was scrawled in ink:
“You keep digging, you’ll be next.”
Nathan didn’t report it.
Not yet.
He took the envelope home, lit a match, and watched it burn in the kitchen sink.
At the same time, Vasha followed orders.
She was fast, sharp, and invisible — just like Eve trained her to be.
Her target: Daryl Krane, a mid-tier player in the Nova Trade group — the corporate shell laundering most of the eastern sector’s product. A man who smiled in public and gutted cities in private.
He had started asking questions.
Not just about the network.
About Eve.
That was all it took.
Vasha didn’t kill him.
She framed him.
A stash of unregistered weapons. Two encrypted laptops filled with falsified intel. A forced trail of bribes and offshore accounts.
He’d be gone by week’s end.
A scandal. A fall from grace.
No blood.
Just ruin.
The kind of violence Eve preferred.
But Marco didn’t wait for instructions.
He found another traitor. One who hadn’t made it onto Eve’s list.
Or maybe she hadn’t planned to touch him yet.
Didn’t matter to Marco.
He dragged the man — alive — into the tunnels below the Southline freight yard.
Bound. Gagged. Terrified.
And left him there. With a live camera feed wired to Vasha’s burner.
No explanation. Just a message.
“Handle it. Or I will.”
Vasha called Eve that night.
“He’s getting sloppy,” she said. “He’s emotional. You said we’d do this your way.”
“We are doing it my way,” Eve replied, calmly sipping tea at her desk. “You’re handling it.”
“And if I don’t?”
“Then he will. And someone we need alive ends up dead.”
There was a long pause.
Then Vasha said what neither of them had dared say aloud yet.
“You’re losing control.”
Eve’s voice dropped to a whisper.
“No. I’m changing the rules.”
Back in his apartment, Nathan got a visitor.
Not a friend. Not a colleague.
A woman in a grey suit. Crisp. Unbothered. ID just barely visible — Internal Affairs.
She didn’t wait to be invited in. Just stepped past him and sat on the edge of his kitchen table, placing a slim file on the surface.
“We know what you’ve been circling, Cross.”
He stayed still. “I’m not working anything formal.”
“Which is exactly the problem.”
She flipped open the file.
Inside: grainy surveillance stills. Nathan at the flower shop. Following unknown figures. Cross-referencing case files not assigned to him.
“Something big is moving,” she said. “Quiet. Coordinated. Every time we get close, it disappears. Like someone’s cleaning the board.”
Nathan kept his expression neutral.
“We think you’re circling part of it. Maybe without even knowing.”
He said nothing.
“There’s a task force forming,” she continued. “Unofficial. Backed by people who want results — not red tape. We want you in.”
He eyed the file. “You don’t even know who you’re chasing.”
Her smile didn’t reach her eyes.
“Not yet. But we know they’re organized. Precise. Invisible until they choose not to be. And lately… they’ve been sloppy.”
She stood. Adjusted her jacket.
“We’re going to catch something. The question is whether you want a front-row seat… or end up collateral.”
She left the file behind and walked out without waiting for an answer.
Nathan stared at the door long after it closed.
Not sure what worried him more —
The invitation.
Or the feeling that whoever they were chasing… was already watching them.
Baawa Unfiltered 