Novels by Ling Fara

Hamdan shifted his weight to the balls of his feet. The red light pulsed, casting long and jagged shadows across the bunker walls. He did not lower his weapon. He watched the woman, his eyes flicking from her face to the heavy steel rafters above their heads. The grinding noise grew louder. It was the sound of a cutting torch chewing through high-grade reinforced plating.What is in the wall?" Hamdan asked. His voice sounded like dry gravel in the confined space.The woman did not retreat. She took a step closer, the tip of his pistol barrel now resting near her collarbone. She had eyes like polished flint, cold and entirely devoid of fear. "You think you were just an engineer. You think you were just a man building a bunker. You were the lead architect for a black site facility that you signed away your memory to protect. They did not come for your money, Hamdan. They came for the prototype core embedded in the bulkhead behind you."The ceiling groaned. A shower of sparks rained down

The man behind the barrel of the gun mirrored Hamdan in every terrifying detail. His posture, the slight callous on his trigger finger, the cold set of his jaw, it was as if Hamdan was looking into a warped, lethal reflection of his own soul. The intruder stepped fully into the flashlight beam, his tactical vest scuffed and stained with the gray dust of the exploded concrete wall. He did not blink. He kept the weapon steady, his gaze locked onto Hamdan with a chilling intensity that felt like a surgical blade against the throat."You look confused," the doppelgänger said. His voice was a perfect, gravelly facsimile of Hamdan’s own, though it lacked the underlying tremor of shock that Hamdan struggled to suppress. "I suppose that is natural when you come face to face with the ghost you never managed to bury."Hamdan stayed motionless, his pulse drumming a frantic rhythm in his ears. He looked for a tell. He looked for a twitch in the man’s eye or a flaw in the way he held the rifle. Th

Hamdan flattened himself against the cold concrete pillar, his heart hammering against his ribs like a frantic bird. He held his breath, his ears strained to catch the slightest friction of rubber on floorboards. The footsteps stopped. The silence that followed was heavy, filled with the sharp, metallic tang of ozone and construction dust. He did not move a muscle. He calculated the distance to the emergency exit, his mind tracing the blueprints he had studied only hours earlier."I know you are in here, Hamdan," a voice echoed through the vast, empty shell of the bunker. It was gravelly, familiar, and cold as the grave. "You always were good at hiding, but you were never good at disappearing."Hamdan stayed low. He reached into his waistband and felt the familiar, reassuring grip of his tactical knife. He did not answer. He watched the shadows cast by the moonlit frame of the unfinished blast door. A figure detached itself from the gloom. It was tall, lean, and carried the stiff, rhy

Hamdan felt the cold weight of his phone as he stared at the screen. The pixelated image of his own back, captured from a distance, stared back at him. He shoved the device into his pocket and scanned the dark street. Every shadow looked like a threat. Every parked car felt like a potential sniper nest. He did not panic. He moved with the calculated stillness of a predator that had learned to hunt in the dark.He walked to his secondary vehicle, a nondescript gray sedan he had purchased under a shell company identity, and slid into the driver seat. He did not start the engine immediately. Instead, he pulled a small portable signal jammer from his glove box and flicked it on. The device hummed with a low frequency, effectively cutting off any remote access to his car or his location."They think they are clever," he muttered to himself. He gripped the steering wheel, his knuckles white.He did not drive back to the villa. He drove straight toward the Al Fay Oasis Estate. His mind moved

The train car rattled as it pulled away from the station, the fluorescent lights flickering overhead in a rhythmic, jarring dance. Hamdan stared at the blank, dead screen of his phone. He felt the cold weight of the metal in his palm before he slipped it into his jacket pocket. He did not look at the other passengers. He kept his eyes on the reflection in the dark tunnel glass. Behind him, the station platform disappeared into the gloom. Zayed and the rest of the Ketbi family were likely still scouring the area, their greed making them blind to the fact that he was already gone.He arrived at the villa two hours later, the sky a deep, bruised purple as the sun dipped below the horizon. He walked up the driveway with a quiet, lethal grace. The lights in the living room were blazing. He could see shadows moving through the floor-to-ceiling windows. He pulled a thick, heavy manila folder from his bag. It contained the formal notice of divorce and the sealed, notarized DNA results that wo

Khalifa Al-Ketbi pushed open the heavy mahogany doors of the villa with an air of practiced authority. He marched into the room, his white thobe crisp, his face set in a mask of stern disappointment. He stopped when he saw the tension in the room. He sensed the shift in the atmosphere immediately."What is the meaning of this?" Khalifa asked, his eyes narrowing as he looked at the torn paper scattered on the floor. "Latifa, why are you crying? Zayed, why are you standing there like a statue?"Hamdan watched the old man with a detached sense of irony. Khalifa looked exactly as he had in the original timeline, arrogant and entirely convinced that he was the apex predator in this ecosystem. Hamdan did not offer a greeting. He simply reached into his pocket and pulled out his smartphone, checking the time."You are just in time, Khalifa," Hamdan said, his voice steady. "I was just explaining to your daughter and her friend here that the deal is dead. The mortgage is not happening. And the