Chapter 1

_ Not these annoying bastards again!

The cry came from the upper floor of a run-down building in the suburbs of Manchester, England. Startled, Mikhail Loskov, alias Kestrel, froze in his tracks. Here we go again, he sighed. He backtracked, taking two steps at a time to join his partner in the decrepit flat. He found her in what they called "the office", fuming behind her three computers.

_ What now? he asked mildly, keeping his deep voice calm as falling snow. The Engineers?

_ Yes! the woman replied angrily. Looks like Fourth Echelon finally captured and are detaining their leader, that scumbag Sadiq, and they cannot keep that info fucking quiet! I'm not the only one knowing, every smart hacker on the planet does!

_ Which is to say, very few people, tempered Kestrel. Come on, Alpha, you are the smartest and best hacker on the planet.

_ Not enough! she said. The lieutenants of Sadiq know, and that's the problem. At least four of them. And they know the whereabouts of the Fourth Echelon team. We have a major problem, Misha. They all are in great danger.

_ I don't think so, said Kestrel, whom his partner nicknamed Misha as short from Mikhail in Russian. Sam Fisher will protect them. And this guy, Briggs, is not bad either. That I can assure you, he added darkly.

_ I'm not thinking about them, but their family, especially Fisher's daughter.

Kestrel considered the thought. He had heard a lot of things about Sarah Fisher, but one thing he knew for sure: she was everything for Sam Fisher, and about the only person in the world that kept him in the race against the Engineers. And in spite of everything that had happened between himself and the old Splinter Cell, he knew that he couldn't stay idle and let an innocent woman into the Engineers' clutches.

_ She must be under protection already, he observed. What can we do?

_ I'm sure she is in danger, Misha. We must act.

Kestrel held her severe gaze, noting the storm in the blue eyes that was announcing trouble. The spikes in her short brown hair, her tousled clothes showed her lack of sleep, but the energy and strength emanating from her rather broad build convinced him of the urgency.

He decided to trust her, like he had done six months ago, when he had met her in a dark parking lot in Moscow and about to be killed by an ex-comrade from Voron, to be saved by this small woman who disposed of his opponent like a real combat-trained operative, which she wasn't. She was AlphaOmega, a brilliant hacker who had a serious issue with thugs in general and the Engineers in particular. She had smashed an empty bottle of vodka on the skull of the guy, giving him time to get up and finish the job. Afterwards, she had dragged him, wounded, into her hotel room and nursed him to health.

During three weeks they got to know each other and found common points in the combat against Voron, in where some high-ranked agents worked for the Engineers.

She became his field operator while wreacking vengeance upon Voron, thus keeping him alive while she provided him vital information by hacking security systems and using satellites, and in return he trained her in combat and stealth techniques. In the last five months, they had neutralized nine double agents inside Voron and three officers who were responsible for the attack of Washington and had sentenced Kestrel to death with Third Echelon.

During the last three months Alpha even went on the field with him, and she was gifted. Maybe even better than Sam Fisher himself, Kestrel thought. But he didn't know her true identity or her motives, neither did he know which country she was from. They usually talked in English, and she had a pure British accent, but sometimes they talked in Russian, which she could speak fluently without any foreign accent, leaving him clueless about her nationality. She saved him countless times, always doing the job but never leaving him behind.

He liked having her at his side, and learned to listen to her intuition, which was often right. After all, she had had a hint on the net about a list of Engineers' hackers in Manchester, which they had discovered and neutralized, thanks to her.

_ Ok, he decided, I'm in. Where does she live?

_ Hold on a sec.

She typed on one of the keyboards, all three computers searching the database of the NSA, the CIA and the FBI. He marveled at the fact that she was able to penetrate those systems at least twice a day without being detected, and was happy to know she was on the good side, a "white hat".

_Got it! she rejoiced. She lives now in Baltimore, Maryland. We can take a plane in two hours directly from Manchester.

_ Then pack, he said. We're leaving in twenty minutes.

They emerged from the Baltimore airport at 5 am, looking for a taxi. It drove them to a hotel near the address of Sarah Fisher. They took a hasty shower, then Alpha went to the basement of the hotel where the director, whom she had helped clean the slate after an incident with drug dealers a few years ago, gave her their gear smuggled in the country by well-paid airport agents and blind-eyed police officers in debt of the famous AlphaOmega.

They equipped themselves with their combat suit, designed by Alpha to be as much discreet and protective as possible, and their weapons. Alpha carried a sniper, a Cheytac M200, plus a Five-SeveN and a Fairbairn-Sykes knife for closer combat. Kestrel preferred a Ka-Bar knife and a Beretta Px4 Storm, and a brand new SIG-556.

_ Wish I had some of the toys of Fourth Echelon, said Alpha. You know, non-lethal things like gas grenades...

_ You don't need them, said Kestrel evenly. You have your stealth and both arms.

_Yep, I suppose. Ok, let's go.

The helpful director gave them his personal car, and around 6 am they parked around the apartment of Sarah Fisher. Kestrel took the binoculars and peered at the four-floored building and around. Nothing there... wait.

_ The blue van down on the right.

_ I see it.

_ Government?

_ Nope. The guys are scruffy.

Kestrel watched them closely with the binoculars. Alpha had an excellent view, and she had spotted it immediately: these men were brutal-looking and definitely not official agents.

_ Is there a back door?

_ Yep. But most certainly watched, too.

_ So, what's the plan?

She turned towards him and gave him one of her mischievous smiles.

_ Time to do stealth and subtlety, Micha.

_ What do you have in mind? he asked suspiciously, not wanting to be stacked in another dirty laundry bag.

_ I thought...

She stopped abruptly. The thugs were leaving the van, four gorillas armed with the inevitable AK-47. Time for rash.

_ Plan B. We go in, we kill them, we bring her with us.

_ Subtlety and stealth, huh? Kestrel asked, poker-faced.

They put on their hood, masking their faces, and exited the car. Hopefully nobody would be peering out their window and see them. They ran to the entrance of the building and very carefully checked the lobby. No thugs there.

Alpha and Kestrel entered the building and made progress to the third floor, where Sarah Fisher lived in a small flat. They communicated with sign language, even if they had a radio equipment, not to raise the alarm. How many? Alpha asked with her hands. Maybe seven or eight, Kestrel answered silently.

He could hear muffled screams and broken glass. They had to act now. Go! he mimed. Alpha nodded. They worked like one, each one knowing the job perfectly.

Kestrel stepped in first, taking down the guy guarding the door in one clean shot in the head, and crouched behind a huge sofa before anyone realized one of them was dead. Five left, he signed to Alpha, who nodded, slowly advancing towards two thugs in the corner of the living room. In the center of the room, Sarah Fisher was being tied up by two guys who were having trouble holding her, because she was thrashing around and kicking a lot. The apparent leader of the guys, a middle-aged Hispanic-looking man, Kestrel recognized as one of Sadiq's lieutenants, a guy named Garcia. In the next second, he and Alpha launched their attack.

Alpha took down the unsuspecting guys in the corner like shooting clay pigeons and tackled down the leader, pinning him to the ground while breaking his right arm. Whereas Kestrel shot one of the thugs behind Sarah Fisher and jumped over the sofa to shoot the other squarely in the head.

He then surveyed the carnage, breathing deeply. Five men dead, one ex-leader pleading with Alpha for not cutting his throat, and a bewildered Sarah Fisher who had stopped moving and was watching the scene around her with great eyes. In one swipe of his Ka-Bar, Kestrel cut her free and removed the piece of cloth gagging her. She coughed a little bit, then asked timidly:

_ What's going on?

_ Just saved you, it seems, said Kestrel, with a slightly amused tone. Now that you're safe from these men, I would like you to take a few clothes and pack. We're leaving.

_ Where to? said Sarah. Who are you? Where is my dad? Is he okay?

_ To safety, Kestrel said. We are the ones who obviously saved your life. I'm Kestrel, and this is Alpha. We don't know where your dad is, but we are planning to contact him very soon so you can be with him. Please go packing now.

Still disoriented, she nodded and headed for a small bedroom next to the back window. Kestrel then turned towards Alpha, still maintaining the moaning lieutenant beneath her knees, her knife set against his throat.

_ So, she said calmly. You're going to spill the beans, Garcia. You have three seconds before the entertainment starts.