The Ghost’s Signal

The Ghost’s Signal

Conakry, Guinea – 2040

The red sun bled into the Atlantic, painting the skyline with colors too vivid to be real — another augmented reality glitch, no doubt. Matei leaned back against the crumbling wall of a café along the corniche. Once a soldier in the French Foreign Legion, now a ghost in a city submerged in invisible wars. No one knew exactly why he was discharged, and he never bothered to explain.

The Legion left its marks on people — scars, secrets, and silence. Conakry had changed since he first arrived years ago, back when soldiers like him were sent to prop up weak governments or incite regime changes under the pretext of peacekeeping. Now, the battlefield was harder to see. The drones hummed above, weaving webs of disinformation and propaganda. Their payloads weren’t explosives, but influence: neural nudges to steer thoughts, loyalties, and actions.

Matei’s comm implant buzzed. Another broadcast from Les Messagers, a rogue faction strategically influencing anti-corporate sentiments. His feed filled with vivid, AI-rendered images: Nema Corp engineers poisoning the water supply, government leaders swayed by hidden bank accounts, and foreign mercenaries tightening their grip on Guinea’s mines. A second buzz. This time from Projet Équilibre, a coalition motivated by Western interests. Their videos countered the rogue narrative, showing Nema’s solar farms and job programs lifting communities out of poverty. Both feeds claimed to reveal the “truth,” but Matei knew better. In the Legion, truth had been a luxury no soldier could afford. Orders were truth. Survival was truth. But in Conakry, the truth was whatever version you paid for.

“Are you still with us, Dorian?” A familiar voice crackled through his earpiece. It was Moussa, a former member of the Guinean Special Forces that ousted Alpha Condé in 2021 under Mamady Doumbouya. He was now a fixer with a knack for staying afloat in the city’s chaos.

“Malheureusement,” Matei muttered, lighting a cigarette.

“We’ve got a situation.”

Matei scanned the street. Pedestrians moved in jittery patterns, as if waiting for commands. The tension was palpable. Nema drones circled low, trailing soft holographic displays: La prospérité pour la Guinée.

“What kind of situation?”

“A bad one,” Moussa answered. “Someone hacked the Nema drones. They’re pushing conflicting commands. Half the city will see ‘work harder,’ and the other half will see ‘burn it all.’ If this gets out of hand…”

Matei rubbed the butt of the cigarette between his lips, “Who’s behind it?”

“Could be anyone. Les Messagers, or Nema’s corporate rivals, maybe even a third party stirring the pot. Doesn’t really matter. People are on edge.”

“Alors, what’s our play?”

Moussa’s voice dropped. “I need you to infiltrate the Cimenterie’s drone hub. It’s the most lightly guarded in the city and you can access the primary hub’s mainframe from there since they’re all connected. If we cut the signal, we can keep the city from tearing itself apart.”

Matei put out his cigarette. He knew the relatively calm day he’d been having was over. It was a tempting thought, though, to let it all burn — to let Guinea’s manipulators reap what they sowed, but there were children on these streets. Families. People just trying to survive. The hub was hidden in an old telecom tower in the Cimenterie prefecture, about 20 miles from his position.

Matei exhaled slowly, “I don’t get paid enough for this.” He exited the café and walked toward his Rav4. He had a new mission.

He reached the edge of la Cimenterie and parked the car on a side road leading into Kountia, a smaller neighborhood on the outskirts of the prefecture. From there, he moved on foot towards his objective. After navigating the labyrinth-like streets of the neighborhood, Matei arrived at the edge of the telecom compound as night fell, crouching along the fence. The first signs of unrest erupted in the distance — screams, breaking glass, and occasional pops of gunfire. The protests had begun, and the conflicting drone feeds were adding fuel to the fire. He checked his gear: silenced Glock 19 fitted with night sights, a karambit blade in a sheath along his left hip, and two EMP grenades clipped to his belt. The Legion had trained him well, and those instincts remained sharp. He wasn’t just another grunt, he was trained to operate with cold precision, to turn his brain off and move with pure instinct and purpose.

His hand drifted to his rifle, a compact MK18 fitted with a red dot sight and suppressor. It was light, quick, and perfect for the task ahead.

He tapped his earpiece, scanning comms traffic from Moussa’s encrypted line. “Jammings coming. Once you’re in, you’ll be on your own.” Without a word, Matei moved, breaching the perimeter like a shadow, gliding low along the wall, rifle raised in a ready stance. Two armed guards manned the rear entrance — likely contractors from one of the PMCs Nema employed.

Their posture was lazy, weapons slung low, heads buried in their HUDs. Fatal mistake. Matei didn’t give them a chance to react. He drew the karambit in a reverse grip, sliding through the gap between them with smooth, practiced efficiency. His right hand caught the first guard’s head in a clamping muzzle grab, yanking it to the side while the blade opened his throat in one fluid arc. Before the second guard could process what had happened, Matei had already pressed the

Glock into his sternum — thup, thup. The suppressed shots muffled the man’s gasp as he crumpled against the wall. He dragged both bodies into the dark and moved on. No wasted movement, no noise. Time was already working against him. Inside the telecom hub, the corridors were narrow, ideal for the sort of brutal, close-quarters combat Matei thrived in.

He scanned the interior with quick, controlled movements.

Pied the corners.

Cleared the angles.

His steps were silent, boots barely brushing the tiled floor as he ghosted forward. A guard appeared at the end of the hall, another contractor, rifle slung, distracted by the chaotic drone feeds on a screen. Matei brought the MK18 to his shoulder, exhaled slowly, and squeezed the trigger twice. Center mass, clean hits. The man folded where he stood. Matei advanced before the body hit the ground. As he approached the main control room, there was movement in his peripheral. A guard rounded the corner too fast for Matei to bring the rifle to bear. CQB instincts kicked in. He dropped the MK18 to his sling, stepped off-line, and drove his left elbow into the guard’s nose — a sharp, brutal strike that crushed cartilage and forced the man backward. Before the guard could recover, Matei drew the karambit and plunged it into the gap between the man’s ballistic vest and rib cage and twisted hard, shoving the dying man into the wall to muffle his fall. Matei scanned the hall, heart steady.

Combat was a rhythm, and his was flawless.

The final stretch to the control room was where things got messy. Two guards — better trained, rifles raised — spotted Matei as he crossed an open threshold. The first fired immediately, bullets sparking off the walls as Matei dove for cover behind a server rack. He tapped an EMP grenade and rolled it into the room. “Un…deux…” The blast detonated with a sharp crack, frying every electronic device within range and plunging the room into temporary darkness.

Matei capitalized on the moment, emerging from cover with the MK18 raised. His rifle spat controlled bursts, dropping the closest guard mid-reload. The second scrambled to adjust his aim, but Matei was too fast. He closed the gap in three long strides, using the muzzle of his rifle as a blunt weapon to knock the guard’s rifle aside. With a wrap and trap technique, Matei rammed his MK18 into the man’s jaw, sending him sprawling. Before the contractor could recover, Matei pressed the barrel into his temple and pulled the trigger. He moved quickly toward the control room, locking the door behind him and slinging his rifle. A thin sheen of sweat glistened on his brow, but his breathing remained steady.

Inside the control room, screens flashed erratic commands: Travailler pour l’avenir. Battez-vous pour votre liberté. Ne faites confiance à personne. He approached the control console, fingers hovering over the interface. The drone network was still live, pumping orders to every drone around the city deployed from this hub. Matei’s mind raced. He could kill the entire feed by hacking into the primary hub’s mainframe, but it would plunge Conakry into an information blackout. People needed clarity, not silence. His comm buzzed. It was Moussa. “Whatever you’re doing, do it fast.” Matei weighed his options. He could shut down the drones entirely, kill the feeds and plunge Conakry into a chaotic blackout.

Or he could try something riskier: upload a neutral, unified message to every drone. Something to break the cycle of manipulation, if only for a moment. His fingers hovered over the keys. Could people even handle the truth? He thought of children walking through market streets, oblivious to the invisible hands pulling their strings. If he left them in the dark, someone else would just turn the lights back on in a different color.

He typed: ARRÊTEZ. RESPIREZ. CE COMBAT N’EST PAS LE VÔTRE.

Not the most eloquent message, but it was simple. A brief moment of clarity in a sea of noise.

Matei hit Enter.

The effect was immediate. Across the city, drones froze mid-air, their projections glitching before displaying his message. Protesters halted mid-throw, workers paused at their stations, and even looters hesitated, confused by the sudden stillness. For a fleeting moment, the war of influence was suspended.

For the first time in months, the streets of Conakry fell silent.

People looked at each other without the veneer of manipulative narratives between them. Matei sat back, wary but satisfied. It wouldn’t last. But for now, Conakry had a moment. A breath. His comm crackled, Moussa’s voice barely audible through the residual jamming. “You alive, Dorian?” “Ouai,” Matei muttered, wiping sweat from his brow. “For now.” Moussa’s voice crackled through the comm, incredulous. “You did it. The feeds are down. But for how long?”

Matei smiled, though there was no joy in it. “Long enough.” He knew the peace wouldn’t last.

Conakry was a contested battleground, and wars like this never really ended. But in this brief moment of silence, he’d given the people a chance to remember what it felt like to think for themselves, and in a world where truth was just another weapon, that brief moment of clarity was the most dangerous thing of all.