Kingdom of Mortal Hands

Six black Jeep Wranglers cut through Cairo traffic like they owned the road.

They didn’t.

But twenty-four armed mercenaries and enough firepower to start a small war usually convinced people otherwise.

Damon Prince sat in the back seat of the lead Jeep, elbow pressed against cold glass, watching Cairo smear past in streaks of yellow and white.

Midnight traffic still flooded the streets. Vendors pushed carts between cars. Motorcycles squeezed through spaces that shouldn't exist. Neon Arabic signs flickered across pavement still wet from rain.

“Ten minutes,” Vex said from the passenger seat.

Nobody answered.

Nobody needed to.

The man beside Damon checked magazines again. Tightened gloves. Adjusted holsters.

Damon didn’t move.

Vex twisted halfway around.

“Reminder for everyone,” he said, holding up four fingers. “Eighty million dollars.”

That got reactions. Whistles. Low curses.

“Enough money to disappear forever,” the man beside Damon muttered.

The driver laughed. “Or die trying.”

Laughter filled the Jeep.

Then Vex looked at Damon.

“And Royal Marksman here doesn’t get to choke this time.”

More laughter.

Damon kept watching outside. He didn’t react. He’d heard the nickname a thousand times. Once, years ago, people said it with respect. Now it was just another way of calling him a fucking joke.

“Royal.”

Damon blinked.

Vex was still staring.

“I said don’t choke.”

Damon finally turned from the window.

“Okay.”

He had answered, but Vex kept looking.

Damon already knew what came next.

“Anything else?” he asked.

“Yeah,” Vex replied. “Do your fucking job.”

The others laughed again.

Damon turned back to the glass. His reflection stared back.

Thirty wasn't old.

Twenty-nine somehow felt worse.

Sunken eyes. Unshaved face. Looking like a man who hadn’t slept properly in two years.

The city lights blurred again as the convoy turned deeper into Cairo.

The man beside Damon started talking about what he'd buy with his cut.

The driver argued about cars.

Vex laughed.

Damon stopped listening.

Outside, a boy stood beside a streetlight holding his mother's hand.

For half a second, Blood. Smoke. Children screaming. A building collapsing inward.

Damon shut his eyes.

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

When he opened them again, the streetlight was gone.

“Five minutes,” Vex announced.

The convoy kept moving.

Damon adjusted his gear.

Morning came gray.

Cairo didn't lack sunlight. It was because Damon hadn’t slept.

The apartment overlooked a crowded street six floors below. Laundry lines stretched between buildings. Car horns never stopped. Somewhere nearby, music played loud enough to shake old windows.

Twenty-three mercenaries turned the place into organized chaos.

Weapons stripped apart. Armor adjusted. People eating whatever cheap food they found downstairs.

Someone argued over football. Someone cleaned blood off a knife from the previous job.

Damon sat near the open window of the adjacent building across the street, rifle resting against the frame.

His scope stayed trained on the apartment entrance opposite them.

Across the room, a younger recruit, barely old enough to grow a proper beard, watched Damon for a while before finally speaking to another.

“Why do they call him Royal Marksman?”

He didn't answered at first.

Then the man from the Jeep laughed.

“Used to be because he never missed.”

The recruit looked confused.

“Used to?”

“Now he misses enough for the nickname to be funny.”

A few chuckles spread around the room.

Damon ignored them.

The recruit kept looking.

“But if he's bad now, why keep him?”

The room quieted for half a second.

Then someone answered.

“Because none of us have beaten his record.”

Another voice added: “Trust me, we've tried.”

The recruit nodded slowly. Then, asked the wrong question.

“So what happened?”

Awkward silence. No one wanted to talk.

Even Damon adjusted slightly, trying not to listen.

Someone zipped a bag shut.

Someone else looked away.

Finally, one of the older mercenaries shrugged.

“Kaduna. Nigeria”

That was all.

Nobody explained further.

Nobody wanted to.

Damon adjusted his scope again. Breathing slow. Finger resting beside the trigger guard.

Across the street, movement caught his attention.

A man leaning beside a parked car, watching their building.

Damon kept looking.

Two more men appeared farther down. Neither entered shops. Neither moved much.

Just watched.

His grip tightened slightly. Then loosened.

Maybe nothing.

Maybe paranoia.

Two years ago he would've trusted his instincts immediately. Now he barely trusted himself.

“Anything?” Vex asked from behind.

Damon kept looking through the scope.

“Maybe.”

Vex sighed.

“That's not an answer.”

Damon stayed on the scope.

“I know,” he said quietly.

But he kept watching the men anyway.

The men outside stayed there.

That bothered Damon more than if they had moved.

People with somewhere to be eventually went somewhere.

These men didn’t.

One smoked beside a parked sedan for fifteen minutes without leaving. Another pretended to scroll through his phone while repeatedly glancing toward their building. A third crossed the street, then crossed back.

Damon tracked all of them through his scope. Slowly. Patiently.

Someone complained about breakfast. Someone laughed at a video. Someone was losing money in cards.

Damon barely heard any of it.

“Vex,” he said.

No response.

“Vex,” he called again a little louder.

The commander looked up from cleaning his pistol.

“What? Eyes on Mena?”

Damon shifted slightly away from the scope.

“Three outside. Maybe four.”

“Armed?”

“Can’t tell.”

“Watching us?”

“I think.”

Vex sighed.

“You think?”

Damon stayed quiet. That answer annoyed him too.

Vex stood and walked over.

“Let me guess,” he said. “Gut feeling?”

Damon didn’t answer, mostly because it was.

Vex looked through the scope for himself. He saw nothing obvious. Just cars. Pedestrians. Morning traffic.

“You're seeing ghosts again,” Vex muttered.

Maybe.

Maybe not.

Damon repositioned slightly, then froze.

Black SUV two streets away. Engine running. Driver inside. Not moving.

His breathing slowed.

A memory surfaced.

Kaduna.

Vehicles waiting outside.

Spotters.

People watching.

Then...

Movement.

A sedan turned the corner and stopped directly outside the apartment building across from them. Passenger door opened.

A man stepped out, dark jacket, hands in pockets, walking too carefully.

Damon's eyes narrowed.

Then he saw it.

A rifle strap beneath the jacket.

His pulse kicked.

“Contact,” Damon said immediately.

The room quieted.

“Armed male. Front entrance.”

Mercenaries moved instantly now. Rifles lifted. Conversations died.

Vex stepped beside Damon.

“Take the shot.”

Damon lowered himself behind the scope. His finger hovered on the trigger.

One clean shot. Just like old times.

The target stopped. A little girl walked behind him.

Then another figure appeared.

Then another.

Civilian traffic. Bodies moving through the sight picture.

Damon’s breathing changed.

But the moment he exhaled, the memory flashed.

Small bodies lying in the dirt, children screaming, his own rifle still hot in his hands.

He hesitated.

“Damon,” Vex snapped.

Crosshair drifting.

Hands shaking.

“Take it.”

The man looked up. Their eyes almost met through distance.

Then Damon saw it.

The rifle coming out.

Too late.

He fired.

The shot cracked across Cairo. Concrete exploded beside the target.

Miss.

The armed man dove for cover.

Across the street, windows burst open. Gunfire erupted.

“Shit!”

“Ambush!”

“MOVE!”

The first few seconds belonged to panic. The next belonged to training.

Mercenaries scattered from windows as rounds tore through plaster.

Damon pulled back from the scope just as a round punched through the wall where his head had been. Concrete dust burst across his face.

“Move!” Vex roared.

The apartment erupted into motion. Men overturned tables. Furniture became cover. Rifles barked through broken windows.

Across the street, armed men poured from vehicles.

At least fifteen.

Maybe more.

Damon dropped beside the window again, controlled breathing.

Ignore the shaking.

Find targets.

His crosshair settled on a shooter leaning from behind a sedan.

Clean shot.

He hesitated.

No civilians.

No children.

Just armed men.

He fired.

The shooter dropped.

First kill in months.

His stomach twisted.

“Stairs!” someone yelled.

Damon turned.

Two enemy gunmen were already entering the building below. Too fast. Way too fast.

“They knew we were here!” the recruit shouted.

No one answered because everyone already knew.

Gunfire echoed through the stairwell.

One mercenary fell near the hallway entrance.

Another dragged him back by his vest.

Blood followed both.

Vex grabbed Damon by the shoulder.

“Forget outside. Mena’s across the street.”

Damon looked toward the opposite building.

Apartment 6B. Curtains shut. No movement.

Their target was still there.

Assuming he hadn’t run.

“Cover us,” Vex ordered.

Four men rushed downstairs. Three more followed. Damon stayed on overwatch. Another hostile appeared.

Shot.

Missed.

His shoulder still shook.

A burst of automatic fire ripped across the room. The young recruit dropped, screaming, holding his leg.

Damon moved without thinking. He grabbed the recruit’s vest and dragged him behind cover just as more rounds shattered the wall.

“Pressure it,” Damon said.

The recruit stared.

“You missed.”

Damon looked back toward the street.

“Yeah.”

Then movement at the right side.

A civilian woman trapped behind a food cart. Pinned.

Enemy shooters using vehicles nearby.

Damon adjusted, breathing slower now.

One shot.

A gunman dropped.

Second shot.

Another pulled back.

The woman ran.

Good enough.

The radio crackled. Vex’s voice.

“We’re inside. Sixth floor.”

Then shouting.

Then gunfire.

Then: “Damon— MOVE!”

Heavy footsteps thundered from the apartment stairwell behind him.

Damon spun. The first man hit him hard enough to drive air from his lungs, and the rifle from his hands.

The attacker came fast. Military movement. Disciplined.

And Damon knew how disciplined people fought. More importantly, he knew how to ruin it.

The second gunman raised his weapon.

Damon grabbed the first thing his hand touched.

A broken bottle.

He drove it forward into the attacker’s wrist.

The man screamed and dropped his gun.

Damon took it.

Too slow.

The other attacker tackled him sideways. Both crashed through a cheap shelf.

The attacker grabbed for the pistol.

Damon headbutted him twice, then slammed his thumb into the man’s eye.

The attacker recoiled.

Damon finally got space.

Two shots.

Two bodies dropped.

For a second, he just stayed there. Gun still raised. Waiting for movement.

Nothing.

His hands began shaking again.

Radio chatter exploded.

“Damon!”

Vex.

“Where the hell are you?”

Damon grabbed his rifle and moved.

Down six flights.

Past bodies of both the enemy and his men.

Across the street, into the opposite building, the stairwell smelled like dust and gunpowder.

One of Vex’s men kicked open a door.

“Clear!”

Sixth floor. Apartment 6B. Door hanging open.

Inside, three mercenaries held an older man against a wall.

Mena Farouk.

Vex looked over as Damon entered.

“Took your time.”

Damon looked around.

Broken furniture. Spent casings. Blood.

But no civilians.

Good.

He can't bare look at that again...

Not after the last time.