From Ex-Convict To General

Chapter 2

WHO THE HELL ARE YOU?

A gasp reverberated across the prison visiting walls.

It tore through the visiting room like a crack of thunder, silencing laughter, cutting through whispers, freezing every breath in the hall.

The prisoners and the guards were stunned as well as surprised.

A moment ago, they had laughed at him, even mocked him. Called him trash, a convict, a burden. Olivia Steele had spat her cold words, her brother Ethan had sneered, her mother Margaret had smiled with cruel happiness.

And Dorian Ford had signed the divorce papers without protest.

But now...

"General Ford," the guard said, his salute strong, and his voice firm. "Awaiting your orders."

The title, General, hung in the air, heavy and electric.

The prisoners stared, their jaws on the floor. The visitors blinked in disbelief. Even the other guards shifted uneasily.

"General? Did he say General?"

"No, no... he’s a convict. He’s nothing."

"But that salute, no guard would fake it. Not with a name like that."

The whispers rolled across the room like waves in water.

Dorian sat still, handcuffs tight around his wrists, the steel table cold beneath his palms. He did not flinch. His face was calm. But his heart was not.

Olivia’s voice still rang in his ears.

He had taken her rejection like a soldier takes a wound, silently, without showing pain. But now, before her words had even faded from the walls, the truth had slipped into the open.

The guard stepped closer, bending low as if to check the cuffs. His lips barely moved.

"Command has moved. The council is waiting, word just came, your enemies are already in the city."

Dorian’s reply was just as soft.

"Hold position until I return."

The guard straightened himself, his face blank, and strode away.

To the others, it looked like routine. To Dorian, it was the beating of war drums.

The room was still heavy with silence. No one dared mock him now.

A prisoner across the aisle leaned forward, with a trembling voice. "General? Who the hell are you really?"

Dorian turned his head slowly. His eyes met the man’s and in that look, there was an aura enough to silence him.

"Someone you’ll never understand," Dorian said quietly.

The man looked away at once, swallowing a hard gulp.

Chains rattled softly as Dorian leaned back again. His gaze lifted toward the ceiling, but his mind was far away.

The memory came quickly and clearly, the night he chose this path.

They all thought prison had broken him. They thought the chains meant failure, that the divorce proved his worthlessness.

But they didn’t know the truth.

The mission had required this disguise.

The council had warned him, there was a network growing in the city, hidden behind powerful names and respectable faces. Smugglers. Traitors. Men who moved weapons like shadows and bought loyalty like bread. They had warned him that these people trusted no soldier, no officer, no hero.

They trusted only the hopeless and the disgraced. The ones who had nothing left to lose.

That was why the council had chosen him. That was why he had agreed to become a fallen man, they told him. Wear disgrace like armor. Only then will the snakes let you near enough to strike.

And so he had stepped into chains. He had let his honor be torn apart. He had let his name rot in public and become a pauper, a nobody. He had let Olivia believe he was nothing.

He closed his eyes briefly. The weight of it pressed heavily on his chest.

This prison, these chains, this pain, they were all weapons. Tools sharpened against the enemy.

For a moment, her face rose in his mind, her smile from years ago when she had waited for him in the rain, her voice whispering promises of loyalty, her hands clutching his before he left for training. Promises broken now, shattered at a prison table with divorce papers.

He clenched his jaw. He had endured battlefield wounds, betrayals in war, scars that would never heal. But her coldness had cut deeper than any blade.

"Visiting hours are over!" a guard shouted, snapping Dorian back to the present.

Chairs scraped and families hugged loved ones, then let go with tears. Prisoners were led out in handcuffs. The room emptied slowly, but the whispers lingered.

General. General. General...

Back in his cell, Dorian sat on the narrow bed. The walls were cold, cracked, pressing in. But solitude did not frighten him. Silence had been his companion long before prison.

Still, Olivia’s face haunted him. Her smile from years ago when she ran through the rain to meet him.

Lies.

Now she stood with Ethan and Margaret, calling him trash, tearing their bond apart with cold words.

He closed his eyes, letting the pain harden into something else.

The nation had asked him to sacrifice everything. He had given it without hesitation, long before Olivia

Footsteps echoed in the hall and his door unlocked.

The same guard appeared. "General, the room is ready."

Dorian rose. His cuffs clinked as the guard removed the handcuffs. He followed him down a narrow corridor, past shadowed walls and closed gates, until they entered a hidden room.

This was no prison cell. This was war’s secret heart.

Maps covered the walls, dotted with red pins. Radios buzzed with encrypted messages. Files lay stacked on the table, thick with reports of smuggling, bribery, and assassinations.

Several men straightened when Dorian entered. Their eyes carried respect. One stepped forward, his hair lined with gray.

"General Ford," he said firmly. "The mission is working. The enemy believes you are disgraced. They believe you are nothing, and that lie blinds them. It gives us an edge."

Dorian nodded once. He needed no reminder. He had lived that lie every day since he stepped into chains.

The officer’s voice lowered. "But there is more. We traced a meeting in the city. One of the enemies has already reached the Steele family."

The name cut through Dorian like ice.

He accepted the folder handed to him. Inside was a grainy photograph. A man in a dark suit was shaking hands with Margaret Steele, Olivia’s mother.

The air in the room seemed to grow colder.

So, the same family that had mocked him, cast him aside, and called him worthless, was now entertaining shady people.

He closed the folder slowly. When he lifted his head, his eyes were hard as steel.

"Prepare everything," he said quietly. His voice was relaxed, but it carried a command that made the men straighten at once.

"If the Steele family wants to walk into the fire, then let them. War is coming."

The men exchanged grim looks. They knew what his words meant.

War was not a threat. It was a promise.

And Dorian Ford, disgraced son-in-law, chained convict, secret general, would lead it.