Shadows of Power

[Jay]

​

The chilly wind cut through the narrow streets of Istanbul, the city’s fall bite sharp enough to make Ayşe Çiller pull her coat tighter around herself. She moved at a steady pace as she scanned the bustling street. The small cafes and boutiques lining the sidewalks were a mix of the old and the new, brightly lit store windows showcasing the latest fashions, interspersed with more traditional Ottoman architecture that had somehow survived decades of change. The constant rhythm of the city’s pulse, footsteps, conversations, the hum of passing cars, was strangely soothing. But for Ayşe, it was just noise.

She knew that she was being followed, watched from a distance, just as they had been every day since she’d become leader of the CHP. Türkiye slipped closer and closer into a deep coma induced by authoritarianism. Nevertheless, for Ayşe the CHP was going to move away from being a rubber stamp and turn into an opposition party. It did not ease however the feeling of being watched, monitored, but never fully engaged with. Whoever it was, the intelligence services or the new gestapo-like agency, they usually kept their distance, blending into the shadows of the city.

She paused in front of a high-end clothing store, her hands slipping into her coat pockets. She casually glanced at the display. She took a look at the sleek overcoats and colorful dresses on display, nothing that particularly caught her attention. Her eyes flicked past the window, beyond the reflection of the store, into the street beyond it. There. A figure near the bus stop, tall, nondescript. Ayşe noted the posture, the stance. The slight shift of the man’s body when he noticed Ayşe looking. An amateur she thought.

He turned away from the window, his gaze now sweeping across the street at the other potential surveillance spots. A small van parked on the corner, windows tinted just a shade too dark. And the old man with the newsstand, he’d been standing there for hours, glancing at his watch, then at Ayşe, as if he had somewhere else to be but was unwilling to move. A team of the Gizli Müdafaa Teşkilatı. GMT operatives keeping tabs on her, amateurs, Ayşe thought.

She continued walking, her eyes scanning the street with a detached indifference. The GMT operatives, three men in total, were keeping their distance, each operating under the same protocol. One man trailed slightly behind her, moving with the crowd, not too close but not too far, just within earshot in case Çiller ran into anyone. Another was ahead of her, moving down the street, occasionally glancing over his shoulder. The third man was across the street, hidden among the pedestrians somewhere.

She approached her usual spot, a café with its warm lights spilling onto the street like a welcoming glow against the gray afternoon sky. The smell of freshly brewed coffee lingered in the air. Ayşe hesitated at the door for a brief moment, her gaze sweeping across the cafe’s interior through the large window. The place was quiet, with only a few patrons scattered at tables. Nothing too unusual. Nothing to make her nervous.

She entered the café without breaking her stride, the bell above the door giving a soft chime as she pushed it open. Inside, the warmth of the café hit her immediately, a welcome reprieve from the cooler winds outside. She made her way to the counter, giving the barista a polite nod as she ordered her usual coffee.

Ayşe’s fingers wrapped around a steaming cup of Turkish tea. Her dark glasses were perched on the edge of her nose. Occasionally her eyes flicked over the cafe’s patrons, most of them disinterested locals wrapped in layers of coats, murmuring quietly amongst themselves. Since becoming the leader of the CHP she wondered if it’d place her friends at risk…and force her to change her return.

Just then she caught a glimpse of movement through the reflection in the window, a slim figure moving between the scattered pedestrians outside. She glanced down to her watch, taking note of the time.

A woman dressed in an elegant dark grey coat with a beige scarf opened the door to the cafe, the bells chiming as they did for Ayşe when she walked in. Her dark hair fell just past her shoulders. The lady ordered something at the front of the cafe before walking to take her seat. Her heels clicked sharply against the wooden floor. The woman’s approach was casual, almost unremarkable. She held a large handbag in one hand, her other arm hanging loosely by her side. But as she reached her table, there was a brief, calculated shift in her stride, just enough to make it seem like an accident when she bumped into her chair.

Her shoulder collided with Ayşe’s side, and for a fraction of a second, Ayşe felt a jolt of confusion ripple through her body. Her coffee cup wobbled dangerously, but she was already leaning down to pick up the bag that Ayşe had momentarily placed on the table next to her."Üzgünüm," she said in Turkish, her tone sweet as she straightened up and held Ayşe’s bag in her hands, offering it to Ayşe like an innocent gesture.

For a moment, Ayşe was caught off guard, the shove was rather rough."Endişelenme," Ayşe said back as she dusted herself and took the bag. Sitting down. The lady had already disappeared into the group of people behind her. She slowly sipped her tea, greeting a few patrons that recognized her.

As the time ticked slowly, she reached for her bag when she felt a paper along the brim. A small folded piece of paper. Just then a slight flicker of movement caught his eye, a man sitting near the window staring at her. No doubt tracking her. Ayşe didn’t react. She went to the bathroom, applying lipbalm but using the privacy of the female lavatories to read the note. Meet me at the basement of Topkapı Palace.

Her heart skipped. The note was thin, hidden in the lining of the bag. Her mind was already working out who she worked for. Worried that the GMT wanted to silence her already. Yildirm couldn’t be that brazen she thought. No…it must be someone else she thought. Afterall, why go through all the trouble, the GMT would just sweep her up off the streets.

She slipped the note into his beige overcoat, deliberately checking her surroundings as she left the cafe, walking past the guy at the counter. The cold air outside of the café hit her immediately as Ayşe stepped onto the Istanbul streets. She adjusted her turtleneck, her mind still racing over the note hidden in the lining of her bag.

Ayşe adjusted her pace slowly as she turned onto the busy street. Topkapı was only a few blocks away. The anonymity of it unsettled her. Whoever had planted it on her, whoever had sent her to that basement, had to know the risks. Ayşe’s eyes scanned the street, constantly moving, always alert. A group of teenagers were laughing and walking by, their faces illuminated by the orange hue of street lamps. Ayşe’s gaze flicked from side to side, but none of them held any significance to her.

​

Ayşe’s thoughts were still on the note. Topkapı had long since lost its significance before the fall of the Sultanate. Its faded pavilions and sun-burnished courtyards stood as relics of an age when Ottoman galleys had cast long shadows across the Mediterranean. Yet it was not history that unsettled her now. It was the basement. The idea of convening in that hollowed undercroft tugged at something instinctive. Too many narrow passages honeycombed the stone beneath the complex, too many forgotten chambers where secrets might gather dust, or where a person might simply vanish, if the right hands knew the architecture well enough to oblige.

Her gaze flicked toward the men in dark coats who loitered around the square in front of the palace. As she approached the massive building, she passed a group of tourists standing in front of the palace, admiring the imposing structure. The lobby was bustling with people, the sound of echoes from heels on the marble floor and conversations drifting up into the high ceilings.

As she walked inside the building, her brain began to put things together…she muttered under his breath, as she thought, was this message some kind of setup… a trap meant to pull her into something darker?

She glanced at her watch, only fifteen minutes had passed since he left the café. Time was moving slowly, but the tension in her body only increased. Her fingers grazed her coat pocket again, feeling the smoothness of the note’s folded edges.

She moved through the lobby, toward the staircase, which would take her to the lower levels. She checked for any signs of surveillance as she entered the lower catacombs of the building. The detail watching her were no where in sight.

Ayşe reached the stairs leading down to the basement and into the private parts of the Palace which used to house the Sultans of the 19th Century. She hesitated just for a moment, taking a moment to scan the area again.

As Ayşe got down, there he saw a well-built man. She paused…her heart beating as she thought it was over for her. The man simply raised his hand. “Durmak.” He said as he opened the door, allowing Ayşe to enter. Ayşe gulped as she went into the room. With that, he entered the room, private and away from any prying ears, to see an older looking man…the very one looking at his watch earlier on the street. He turned around and stared at Ayşe for a few moments before opening his mouth.

“Mrs. Çiller,” he began rather courtesyly for a man who had Ayşe's head spinning the past half an hour, “I regret the means by which this meeting was arranged. Were the matter anything less than urgent, I would not have resorted to such measures. Please… take a seat.” His hand extended gesturing to the empty chair beside him.

 

[Jay]

​

The streetlamps along the Boulevard switched on in sequence, their orange glow settling across the wet asphalt. Outside the headquarters of the Devlet Güvenlik Müdürlüğü, the black sedans of the Gizli Müdafaa Teşkilatı idled under the close watch of plainclothes men. Traffic thinned as the evening call to prayer echoed from Kocatepe Camii and filtered down the grey, rectangular streets of the administrative quarter.

Kınar Binevş left the marble colonnade of the Directorate at precisely 18:43, wearing a dark brown wool coat over his tailored charcoal suit. His security escort trailed behind him in a loose diamond formation, and four men, each former PKK paramilitary cleared by the Turkish Workers’ Party, had been deputized into the GMT’s executive security unit. Binevş did not look at them as he descended the steps.

He entered the backseat of the second vehicle in the motorcade, a Mercedes S-Class fitted with military-grade comms relays. He carried no briefcase and gave no instruction to his driver. The car door shut with a muted thud. The motorcade rolled northeast toward a coffee shop where a source was going to meet him.

He sat alone at a corner table of a kahvehane near the Boulevard. It was the sort of establishment favored by older bureaucrats and generals. It was a place where the soft scrape of porcelain cups and the muted scratch of newspapers mingled with the languid drift of tobacco smoke. The afternoon light slanted through faded lace curtains, painting the weathered wooden tables in sepia tones that belied the restiveness gripping the capital beyond its walls.

He scarcely glanced at the dog-eared broadsheet unfolded before him. The headlines were focused on the silent purging of the senior officer corps continuing apace. Kınar had been a man of the shadows long before his elevation to director; he recognized the tremors beneath Ankara’s neat façades more keenly than most.

Across the room, an old Bakelite radio crackled thinly with a broadcast from Radyo 1, where a party ideologue extolled the revolutionary progress of the new coalition. Kınar took a slow sip of dark Turkish coffee, its sediment clinging bitterly to the rim of the cup. His senses kept the man vigilant, not betraying none of the senses that threaded through his nerves. He had not survived the past decade of fighting the Turkish military as an insurgent without developing a particular sensitivity to moments when the ground shifted underfoot.

As he set the cup back on its saucer, he cast a faint glance towards the café’s long rear corridor. His bodyguards, both former PKK officers, had taken their posts as arranged, one by the entrance, another outside on the pavement, a third seated unobtrusively near the washrooms. They were men who understood discretion as much as they understood loyalty. Just then, someone left a yellow package on the table next to him.

Rising from his seat with the smoothness of habit, Kınar picked up the package and threaded his way past the worn tables, his heels tapping softly on the patterned tile. He preferred the back exit. He gave a subtle nod to his bodyguards, who left first to clear the path.

The alley behind the café was narrow and dim, hemmed in by tall ochre walls whose plaster had long since begun to flake. The murmurs of Kızılay Square felt distant here, muffled by the heavy Ankara air and the slow hum of evening settling in. His breath rose in the chill, wreathing faintly in the space between street lamps whose organged glow flickered intermittently.

He had taken only three paces before his gait slowed. The stillness was too complete. He turned, and found the alley bare. His guards had vanished. Instinctively, his hand drifted toward the sidearm holstered beneath his coat, but the movement froze midway. A figure detached itself from the deeper shadow beneath a recessed doorway, silent, assured, and unhurried. Before Kınar could react, a gloved hand swept his reaching arm aside, and the cold muzzle of a pistol pressed firmly into his ribcage. He did not bother to struggle. The small metallic click of a disengaged safety echoed faintly between the walls.

His eyes, dark and unblinking, rose to meet the face of the assailant. Only a grim familiarity. His breath left him in a quiet exhale.

The sound of the weapon’s safety clicking off. Kınar’s gaze locked onto the assailant. The man holding the gun was unmasked, and Reshetnikov sighed. “You,” he said. The alley was filled with tension as Reshetnikov looked at the shadow figure.

“Don’t move,” the figure growled. Kınar’s face remained stoic. He shifted slightly, angling his body to minimize the pressure of the gun. “They let you out of the black crypts now have they?” Kınar said steadily. “I thought they’d buried you all beneath Etimesgut by now.”

The other man stepped further into the anemic circle of light. “Ghosts, is it?” The man’s mouth curled faintly. “In Ankara, old debts never truly sleep. You knew this day was coming, Kınar.”

Kınar’s lips twitched, the faintest hint of a smile touched by disdain. “Old debts? Don’t dress up revenge in the language of duty.” He said, laughing. “Look around you. We’ve won.”

“You confuse us for politicians,” the man said quietly, his eyes narrowing. “We don’t grovel at the first offer to become servants of an ideologue. They handed the republic over to traitors. Traitors like you. We will cleanse Atatürk’s republic from filth like you.”

Kınar’s gaze remained steady, unflinching. His words emerged clipped. “The General Staff failed to grasp the inevitable. The army clung to its parochial fantasies while the world moved past it…the people yearned for freedom, and we gave them that.”

“Freedom,” the other man replied sharply, though his tone did not rise. “Look around you Kınar…there is no freedom here…you should have never left the caves of the Qandil Mountains. You only made finding you all the easier.”

Kınar drew a long breath, his expression remote now, “You think a bullet will stop us? It only guarantees that you will suffer for a long time before they finally kill you. Turkish filth.”

The man did not answer. The muted phut of the silenced shot echoed softly between the brickwork, sharp and succinct. Kınar staggered slightly, then crumpled to the damp flagstones, his coat folding beneath him like a shroud. His eyes stared upward, glassy with a fading incredulity.

The assailant knelt, methodically searching Kınar’s pockets and jacket. A wallet and wristwatch were taken, scattered haphazardly nearby, the crude hallmarks of a botched mugging. Satisfied, he rose, casting a final glance at the fallen director.

Without hurry, he disappeared back into the narrowing shadows. The steady rhythm of Ankara, distant engines, faint radios, the slow murmur of a restless city, folded once more over the alleyway, as though nothing had ever disturbed it.

After a few minutes, he removed a disposable burner phone from his jacket and sent a single encrypted SMS to a number registered in Istanbul:

BAŞARIYLA TAMAMLANDI. TEMİZLİK BAŞLIYOR.
(Mission completed successfully. Cleanup begins.)​

He destroyed the phone in a drainage culvert behind the Patent Office before departing the scene on foot.

Several hours later.
Selçuk Demiralp sat alone at a table near the front window of the Küçükesat Kafe, a narrow establishment two blocks from the Polish Embassy. The afternoon sun reflected off the lacquered wood tables, muted by the gray veil of smog hanging over central Ankara. The hum of quiet conversation blended with the scrape of porcelain on ceramic; the waiters moved with unhurried precision.

The Cumhuriyet Gazetesi lay folded in quarters in front of him. He turned the pages slowly, his index finger tracing each column. The headlines relayed how protests were rising as Mosques were being shuttered under Article 17 of the new Internal Security Law. Clerics were being detained under suspicion of sedition. Protests had spread to Erzurum and Şanlıurfa.

He refolded the paper and reached for the glass of dark tea cooling beside his notebook. Across the street, two plainclothes men lingered under a fig tree. Both wore muted jackets, standard cut, nondescript. Selçuk’s gaze moved past them without pause.

At 0900, his mobile vibrated once on the tabletop. He answered without greeting. The voice on the other end was flat.

“Kınar’s is dead.” Selçuk’s eyes did not change. He set the tea back in its saucer.

“Time?”

“0450. Shot twice in Çankaya. No witnesses so far. His driver and bodyguards disappeared. The forensic report is incomplete. Two shots, single caliber. 9x19.”

He ended the call without reply. The street outside remained unchanged.

Selçuk Demiralp had been Kınar’s deputy at the Gizli Müdafaa Teşkilatı and always thought the former PKK fighter was a liability rather than an asset. Kınar’s elevation had been brokered jointly by the Turkish Workers’ Party and their new coalition partners from the Kurdish movement. His role had expanded beyond state security into oversight of the Gendarmerie and regional intelligence bureaus. His closeness to PKK-linked provincial governors had been a matter of record. Selçuk opened his notebook and marked three names in the left margin. He underlined each twice. His handwriting was compact, unornamented.

The facts, were these:

— Kınar dead.
— No external claim of responsibility.
— Security organs remained fragmented.

He closed the notebook and rose from the table. No signal was given, but one of the plainclothes men across the street stepped off the curb and began following at a measured distance.

Selçuk exited onto the street, his shoes clicking against the limestone pavement. He turned east toward the old parliament complex. A courier package awaited him there. Within it, an itemized list of the individuals. The matter of identifying the direct perpetrators of Kınar’s killing was secondary. The operational logic was clear. This was the first overt strike. Countermeasures would follow within forty-eight hours.

By that point, it would not matter who had pulled the trigger.

 

[Jay]

There was pause. Cemal nods toward the door behind her. It shuts with a mechanical thud, locked by the agent outside.

Çiller said nothing at first. She stepped into the room, her eyes scanning the corners. One bulb buzzed above them. No windows. Just pipes above them and vents funneling air through the vast room that used to be one of the Sultan’s private quarters. Her escort had taken her phone, checked her bag, and offered no words. They had swept for bugs, but she was still uneasy.

The man motioned to the empty chair. "You’ll want to sit."

"I’ll stand," Ayşe said, looking at the man. Trying to figure out who he was.

At that moment his burner phone rang, he looked at it seeing the following message. He closed it and placed the phone away as he looked at Ayşe.

BAŞARIYLA TAMAMLANDI. TEMİZLİK BAŞLIYOR.
(Mission completed successfully. Cleanup begins.)​

He showed no reaction. "I know this may be very frightening, Ms. Çiller, but I am not with the GMT or the Security Services. My name is Cemal. Head of the AİAB. I assume you've heard the acronym."

She nodded. "You run the intelligence wing of the general staff. You arranged this meeting?" She asked, looking at the man.

"I did," he said. "You came. That tells me you're smarter than your predecessor."

She finally sat. Her fingers interlaced tightly on her lap. "Why am I here…Do you do this often?

Cemal looked at her. “Only when the situation warrants it. Tonight it does.”

Cemal took his seat. He studied her, not with suspicion but with assessment. "Do you know why Kemal is stepped down?"

Ayşe’s voice was even. "He cited personal reasons. That..."

Cemal leaned back, arms crossing. “You knew about Kemal, didn’t you?”

Ayşe blinked, unsure where he was steering the conversation. “What do you mean?”

Cemal took a slow step forward. “Kemal was a rubber stamp. He nodded at every directive that came from the Workers’ Party. He made speeches about being democratic while watching passively as they purged the opposition.”

She looked at him, a flicker of confusion in her eyes.

“You forced his hand?”

“No,” Cemal replied, looking directly at Ayşe. “We showed him his own handwriting on the wall. Gave him a choicestep down quietly or be publicly discredited. He chose the door.”

Her voice dropped. “He told me he wasn’t ready. That he couldn’t stomach the compromises anymore.”

Cemal nodded slowly. “He couldn’t. But he also wasn’t going to fight. And we need someone who can.”

Ayşe crossed her arms, her voice cold. “So you decided the CHP is your last vessel within the system.”

“That’s right,” he said without flinching. “If we want to avoid a full military seizure, it needs to happen from inside. Institutionally. Publicly. With legitimacy. Otherwise, we’re back to tanks and curfews. People will feel under threat and fight back. The communists won’t hand over power peacefully. You think they will?”

“I think the people want something better.” Ayşe, leaned back into her chair.

“They do,” he said. “And that’s why you need to rally them. The Welfare Party tried like hell, Ayşe. Look what happened to them. They locked up Erdoğan for reading a poem.”

Ayşe’s hand trembled slightly. She hadn’t thought about that in yearshow a single verse had become an act of sedition. How easily the machine turned.

Cemal watched her closely. “I’m not telling you this to scare you.” He said, seeing her hand tremble. “I’m telling you because this is the only window we have. You lead now, or we do. And we both know what it looks like when the Army takes the reins without a civilian face.”

Ayşe looked down, then met his eyes. “I won’t be a puppet."

Cemal didn’t blink. "Good. Puppets don’t last." Cemal opened a folder, pulled out a photo. He placed it on the table and slid it toward her.

Your husband. Kıvanç. He filled out a disclosure form for assets last year. There was a company vehicle he didn’t list. It was under his name for two months. Registered as a business lease. When the communists go hunting, they’ll call it fraud. It isn’t. But it will be enough.

Ayşe tensed. ”He didn’t know. That was a loaner. The dealership said…”

Cemal looked at her. “I know. It’s a footnote. But Eda is the one overseeing the file. Personally. She’s waiting for a reason.:

Ayşe looked at him, for the first time showing fire in her eyes. “So you want me scared?”

Cemal held back a smile, finally seeing what others said about her. “I want you alert.”

She processes this, jaw clenched. Cemal didn’t press the point.

"You have no right…" She started with before Cemal cut her off.

His brow scrunched. "I have every right to protect this country. And if you intend to be a figure of opposition, you need to understand what that means."

A long silence. He let it settle. Then continued.

"Eda is preparing to move against you. She's consolidating internal security. President Arslan is in Spain for her summit. That leaves her. The PKK and TIP cadres are in charge of the ministries now. Interior. Justice. Communications. You are one step from the chopping block."

Ayşe's mouth tightened. "What do you want from me?"

Cemal took a sip of tea from a chipped white glass. He hadn't touched it before, not until now.

"I want to know who you are," he said. "Not your press statements. Not your party manifestos. I want to know if you're going to ask the army to step aside and let another regime take power."

"You mean democratic elections," Ayşe said, correcting him. She folded her arms. "I believe in institutions."

"Institutions are compromised. TIP has purged the senior ranks of the judiciary. Half the colonels in the Air Force are under house arrest. You think you can talk your way through this?" Cemal said, looking at her.

She stared at him. "I believe the people still matter."

"They do. But the people are scared. They want stability. Not slogans."

She leaned forward. "And you think you can offer that? With what? Another junta? You think they'll cheer your tanks in the streets?"

He didn't answer immediately. His hands were flat on the table. "We don’t want power," he said finally. "We want to restore order. Then hand it to people who can manage it. People like you."

Her laugh was bitter. "You expect me to believe that?"

"I expect you to understand what happens if we do nothing." Cemal said, looking at Ayşe. “They aren’t waiting around twiddling with their hands. Every day that goes by is violent. You want to know why it was urgent. The GMT leader is dead. We killed him. We did it because the communists are escalating and they’re after us. They won’t stop." Cemal said.

She looked up. "You assassinated him."

"Yes." Cemal retorted with a sense of irritation.

Her voice dropped from before. "Was that your call?"

Cemal's eyes narrowed. "It was the only option. We saw what they were planning."

She glanced at the door. "You said Eda is coming for me. When?"

"Within a few weeks. The financial crimes unit will make the case. National security will do the rest."

She inhaled sharply.

"We can protect you,” Cemal said, trying to reassure her. “But you need to start thinking strategically. You need to rally the CHP. Not for platitudes. For action."

She shook her head slowly. "You think I can convince the country to support a military-backed transition?"

"No, but give them hope for something else. The ones watching. If they believe you're a reformer, they will fight like hell to get that chance.”

"And after?" She asked.

He paused. "We install a caretaker government. Technocrats. You can even pick the faces. We clear the field. We disappear."

She stared at him. "You expect me to trust you."

"No. I expect you to survive."

The light flickered above as the two sat in an awkward silence.

She broke the silence this time. "I believe in democracy. The Turkish people have been told what to do for too long. First, by the military. Now by these so-called revolutionaries. Enough is enough."

Cemal chuckled. Dry, almost kind. "And now you think the CHP won’t be a rubber stamp for the Army? That’s rich."

She didn’t laugh. Her face hardened. "We were complicit. I won’t deny it. For years, we offered them legitimacy in exchange for the illusion of order. And now I see what that cost us. But if you think we’ll do it again, you’re mistaken."

Cemal leaned forward slightly, resting his elbows on his knees. "Like it is now with the communists? You’ve seen the purge lists, Ayşe. Or have they kept you in the dark like your predecessor?"

"Kemal knew what was coming. He saw what they were doing. And he did nothing," she said, voice rising slightly. "So they let him walk. Or made him walk. I don’t even know anymore."

"We did," Cemal said plainly. "We asked him politely, and then not-so-politely. He understood."

Ayşe’s jaw tightened. "Will there be violence?"

Cemal didn’t answer immediately. He studied her. Her face, her posture, the way her right hand gripped her wrist, the tension masked by control. He looked away, then opened a black folder resting on the table beside him. Slowly, he slid a photograph across the table.

The picture was high-resolution. A man’s body, limp and twisted in a position no living person could hold. His face was unrecognizable, caved in and mottled with bruises. One eye was swollen shut. Electrical burns scored his arms.

"That," Cemal said quietly, "was one of mine. Field agent. He refused to take a loyalty oath for the Party. Said he was loyal only to the Republic and its guiding philosophy of Kemalism."

She stared at the image. Her throat clenched involuntarily.

"His crime?" Cemal continued. "He wouldn’t be a yes-man. He believed the same things you do. That Turkey should be free. That the law matters."

She placed the photo back on the table, face down. Another silence.

"So yes," Cemal said finally, "there will be violence. I won’t lie to you. We can’t let the PKK or TIP leadership walk away from this. They’ve replaced the intelligence services with political commissars. They’ve built cells inside our bases.”

She nodded slowly. "And when it’s done? When you’ve cleaned house? What then?"

"Then," he said, voice steady, "we hand power to technocrats. They run elections. The Army withdraws. We fade."

She looked up at him. Searching for doubt in his face. "You’ll forgive me if I don’t believe that just yet."

"I wouldn’t expect you to."

She stood, but didn’t move toward the door. “If I do this, I’ll be complicit."

"You already are," Cemal said, looking at her. “Every day you don’t do something, you are complicit in this whole system. In everything they are doing.”

“If I am going to help you, we are doing this my way. No military detentions and retribution. They all get a fair trial. I won’t sign off death sentences to people en masse. We must be different from them. We have to be if we are going to break this cycle of violence. You want the CHP to stand up? To rally the people? Fine. But it’s on my terms. Not yours."

He said nothing. Just watched her walk back up the stairs, back into the light. The air outside was colder now. The sun had set. Shadows moved along the old Ottoman walls as Ayse hurried back home. She walked alone toward her car. Cemal disappearing into the shadows once again, where he often lurked, wondering still…did she have it in her?

 

[Jay]

The glow of monitors bathed the windowless room in a sickly blue. Static hissed through headsets as the SIGNIT team traced the encrypted traffic. On the fourth floor of the Turkish intelligence services buried beneath layers of biometric checks, the air smelled of stale coffee and burnt circuitry.

"Another one," murmured Teğmen Aydın, his finger freezing over a waveform spike. His screen parsed the raw SIGINT feed—a burst transmission, routed through a military repeater near Etimesgut Garrison. The decryption algorithm churned, spitting out text in jagged fragments:

[REDACTED] to [REDACTED]:
"...Kara Kuvvetleri Komutanlığı toplantı... hazırlıklar tamam... Cumhurbaşkanı’nın Madrid dönüşünde..."

Aydın’s throat tightened. He glanced at Seda, her face lit by the same damning script scrolling across her terminal.

"This is the third one this week," she said quietly. "Same cipher. Same recipients."

Aydın exhaled. "They’re not even hiding it anymore."

Seda leaned in, her voice low. "That’s the fourth general officer this week. It looks like the Young Turks aren’t vetting as closely as they did before. Looks like they’re mobilizing now."

Aydın nodded. "And they’re moving faster than we predicted. Look at the recipient nodes." He pulled up a network map, red dots flaring across Anatolia. "Eighty, minimum. Maybe more if you account for repeat cryptonyms."

Seda’s fingers flew over her keyboard, cross-referencing the data. "They’re using private-sector relays. Zirve Telecom’s nodes, mostly." A grim smile. "Lucky for us, we built backdoors into those after ’95 ."

The door clicked open.

Albay Demir, their case officer, stepped inside, his uniform knife-creased despite the hour. He took in their expressions, the frozen screens, and shut the door behind him with deliberate softness.

"Report," he said.

Aydın hesitated. "Sir, we’ve intercepted coordinated chatter between General Staff officers. They’re discussing..."

"Timing," Demir finished, his voice flat. "I know. I just saw the report."

Seda broke it first. "It’s not just timing. They’re reaching out to operational commanders. That means they’re finalizing the plan. They’ll move by year’s end."

Demir didn’t react. He studied the network map, then tapped a cluster of nodes near İzmir. "No Navy activity."

Aydın shook his head. "None. And the Air Force is dark too. It looks like they've only been recruiting from the land forces."

Demir’s jaw tightened. "That’s a problem. Without the Air Force, they can’t secure the skies. Without the Navy, they can’t lock down the straits or the Thai fleet."

Seda crossed her arms. "A gamble they’re taking anyway. And if they roll tanks into Ankara without full support, it might end up like the ’60 all over again. Half the military fighting the other half."

Aydın zoomed in on a fresh intercept:

[REDACTED] to [REDACTED]:
"Madrid return date changed. D-Day to be reset. H-Hour aborted."

He looked up. "Looks like the failure at Madrid bought the President sometime. They’ll need a new launch date and it means they are going to be worried about what to do next."

Demir stared at the screen. For a long moment, the only sound was the hum of servers. Then, asked quietly, "You two are the only ones who’ve seen this?"

Seda nodded. "Raw SIGINT hasn’t been logged yet."

Demir reached down and wiped the transcripts with a keystroke. The screens went black.

"Good. Keep it that way." Demir said as he turned away.

Aydın stiffened. "Sir, if they’re this far along..."

"Then what," Demir cut in as he turned back to face the analyst. "The Party’s already hunting for plotters. If this leaks, the only thing those officers will see is a firing squad. And we lose the last leverage we have."

Seda’s eyes narrowed. "You’re not going to stop them."

Demir met her gaze. "No. I’m going to make sure they win."

There was a silence but then Seda spoke up. "We should file this. Immediately."

"There’s nothing to file." Demir replied.

Aydın joined in. "Sir, this is a direct violation of..."

"Of what?" Demir’s voice was a harsh. "The law? The same law that let them purge the judiciary? The same law that handed Interior to the Workers’ Party commissars?"

Demir leaned in, his breath sharp with nicotine. "You think I don’t know what this is? You think I haven’t seen the arrest lists?" He tapped the dead screen. "But if we report this, who do you think they’ll send to round up those officers? You? Me? Or their new ‘People’s Guard’? Do you think their red guards will stop with these officers?"

Seda’s jaw clenched. "So we do nothing?"

Demir straightened, "Yes. We do nothing. We allow what is in motion to proceed"

He left without another word. The door hissed shut.

Aydın stared at the blank monitor and rubbed his eyes as clouds outside the building erupted in thunder and poured down rain.

---

The rain had turned the cobblestones slick, the gutters overflowing with runoff from the presidential quarter. Albay Demir stood beneath the awning of a shuttered meyhane, its neon sign flickering like a dying pulse. He checked his watch as he looked into the mirror to make sure he didn't have any tails.

A black Renault Symbol glided to the curb, its wipers sweeping away the downpour. The passenger window lowered halfway.

"Get in," said the voice inside.

Demir slid into the car, the leather seats cold against his back. The Chief Aide, Albay İlhan Korkmaz, a wiry man with the posture of a career staff officer, didn’t look at him. The driver, a stone-faced çavuş, kept his eyes on the rearview.

The car pulled away.

"Your boys are leaving a trail of breadcrumbs," Demir said finally. He handed Korkmaz a folded sheet. "My field operatives managed to capture a group of them near Etimesgut. Amateur mistakes."

Korkmaz scanned the grainy stills of four officers in civilian attire entering an apartment block. He knew the men Major Tarık, Lieutenant Colonel Emre, and two others, all members of the "Young Turks Club", the informal cadre of reformist officers.

He exhaled through his nose. "They’re not my boys. The General Staff isn't running this operation."

Demir shook his head. "No. But they’re your problem now. If they are caught then the Prime Minister will use this to get rid of all of you."

The car turned onto Atatürk Bulvarı, the streetlights bleeding into streaks through the rain.

Demir tapped the photos. "Tell them to stop meeting in the open. The DGM has eyes everywhere."

"They’re impatient," Korkmaz admitted. "They see what’s happening, the PKK running Interior, the Workers’ Party gutting the courts. They think we’ve already lost. We're running out of time to act."

Demir stared out the window. A billboard loomed overhead, the president’s face smiling beneath a slogan "Yeni Türkiye, Yeni Güvenlik". The irony curdled in his gut.

"We lose if they’re reckless," he said. "Your Young Turks aren’t just risking a court-martial. They’re giving the Party an excuse to purge the rest of the officer corps. You need to be careful with the communication systems."

Korkmaz was silent for a long moment. Then he responded quietly "You could’ve reported this."

"And what? Hand the list to Eda’s red guard?" Demir’s voice was flint. "I didn’t join MIT to serve the PKK."

The Chief Aide studied him. "No. You joined to serve the Republic. Just like the rest of us" Korkmaz reached into his coat and brought out a packet of cigarettes. He offered it to Demir who declined. Korkmaz lit the cigarettes and let out a puff.

"They’ll be more careful," Korkmaz said at last. "I will speak with them."

The car slowed near Genelkurmay Başkanlığı, its gates visible through the downpour. "Why didn't you guys launch while the President was returning from Madrid?"

Korkmaz took a slow drag from his cigarette, the ember flaring in the dim car. The rain drummed harder against the roof.

"You knew about Madrid," he said, exhaling smoke.

Demir kept his eyes on the gates ahead. "We knew she cut her trip short. What we didn’t know was why."

Korkmaz’s fingers tightened around the cigarette. "We don't know either. However it made their plan far more difficult to execute.

Demir’s jaw tightened. "So she rushed back. Which means your timeline collapsed."

"Ours?" Korkmaz’s laugh was bitter. "You think this is just our operation? Without the Chief of the Defense Staff, the other service chiefs won’t move. They’re waiting for someone to take the first shot. It is a bunch of young officers who have a spine that their superiors lack."

The wipers thudded against the windshield.

"And who would that be?" Demir asked. "Who would take the shot? The Young Turks didn’t have a single general on board until last week. Now you’ve got Ergün, and with his 2nd Army you could probably take Ankara but not much else. That’s not enough."

Korkmaz flicked ash into the tray. "It’s enough to start. If we secure the Black Sea Fleet, the rest of the Navy falls in line. The Air Force will follow if they see momentum. I have a few air force pilots I can count on. Unfortunately Cemal is on the run from the GMD and the AİAB officers are either in jail or on the run."

Demir turned now, his gaze sharp. "And the AİAB? Their chief is missing. You can’t coordinate a coup without intelligence backing."

A muscle twitched in Korkmaz’s temple. "We’ll find him. But right now, we’re blind on the political front. The opposition hasn’t stirred the chaos we need. No protests, no unrest, just small scale build up."

Demir leaned back, studying him. "You’re not ready."

"We don’t have a choice!" Korkmaz snapped, then lowered his voice. "The GMT and HDMB took control the airport. far faster than we predicted. They're learning how to be an effective security force. They are not just the PKK fighters we used to neutralize...they've evlved. And if we wait, then they'll purge every officer they can get their hands on.

The car idled at the curb, the engine a low growl.

Korkmaz finally spoke, his voice quiet. "Our officers watching the President say she’s flying to Russia next. That buys us time."

Demir shook his head, "She is sending the Interior Minister. She is sitting this one out."

Korkmaz looked at him as he crushed out his cigarette. "How do you know that? Why is she sending the interior minister?"

"How I know is not releveant," Demir countered. "Right now, you’re a knife fight in the dark. The Interior Minister being abroad means that the organizatin around the GMD will be severely chaotic. It does help the AİAB killed their leader early on into this saga."

Korkmaz stared at him, then nodded slowly. "Still doesn't answer why the Minister is going."

Demir said nothing at first but then spoke. "There is a rift growing between Ayşa and Eda over what Eda has been doing while the President was in Madrid. The official inner-party narrative is that Ayşa wants to focus on her domestic credentials following the failed China and Spain summits. The unofficial reason...Ayşa's advisors are worried that Eda is making a power move to get rid of her."

Korkmaz nodded. "I appreciate the information...and the warning. I'll be sure to speak with the young ones later."

"The Party’s days are numbered," Korkmaz murmured. "But when the time comes, we plan to restore Kemalism, not another junta."

"You think the Army will step aside after?" Demir asked earnestly. The driver shifted in his seat, a silent cue. Korkmaz opened the door, the rain gusting inside.

"I think," Korkmaz said, opening the door, "we’ll both be on the right side of history."

"Be careful who you trust," Demir said as Korkmaz stepped out. "The DGM isn’t the only one with ears everywhere."

Korkmaz paused, then vanished into the downpour.

Demir watched until the shadows swallowed him. Then he pulled out his phone and typed a single name:

"Zelimkhan Abdulmuslimovich Yandarbiyev."

---

Several Days Later

The café had no name. Just a rusted sign above the door, its letters long since faded, and a single flickering bulb that cast jagged shadows across the cracked linoleum floor. The head of the GMD's interrogation unit, Erkan Başol sat in his usual corner, his back to the wall, a half-finished cigarette smoldering in the ashtray. The coffee in front of him had gone cold. He wasn’t here for the caffeine however. He read through GMD documents on opposition figures.

Outside, the streets were still, the predawn chill settling over the industrial district like a shroud. A stray dog nosed through a pile of garbage near the curb. A lone taxi idled at the intersection, its driver dozing behind the wheel.

Murat observed from the second-floor window of a derelict textile workshop across the street. Through his binoculars, he watched Başol check his watch for the third time in ten minutes.

"He’s nervous," Murat murmured into his radio.

"He should be," came the reply. Leyla, positioned inside a parked utility van down the block, monitored the café’s rear exit responded with. Thermal imaging showed no additional heat signatures, just Başol.

"No visible security," she confirmed. "He’s alone."

A third voice crackled over the comms, Cem Demirci, monitoring from an unmarked sedan three blocks away.

"Move in."

The café was a relic of a quieter Ankara, its walls yellowed with decades of cigarette smoke and whispered conspiracies. The air smelled of stale coffee and wet wool.

Kutay entered first, his high-vis vest glowing under the flickering neon sign. His shoulders slumped, boots scuffing the linoleum, the very picture of a municipal worker on a predawn break. He nodded at Başol as he passed, then slumped into a chair near the door, his back to the wall. His fingers drummed idly on the table.

It would be several minutes later when. The bell above the door jingled again.

Murat and Tekin stepped inside, their collars turned up against the damp chill. Murat’s hands were buried in his jacket pockets; Tekin’s swung loose at his sides. They moved with the casual aimlessness of men killing time before a shift.

Başol barely glanced up from his coffee until Murat slid into the seat across from him.

"Erkan Bey," Murat said, smiling faintly. "You look like a man who’s had a long night."

Başol’s fingers twitched toward his coat. "Who the hell are..."

Tekin’s pistol pressed into his ribs beneath the table, the cold muzzle biting through fabric. "Don’t."

A beat. The cafe shop owner, an old man with a face like crumpled paper, froze mid-wipe behind the counter. His eyes flicked to Leyla, who came from the kitchen, her suppressed HK MP5 leveled at his chest. He raised his hands slowly, the dishrag dangling from his fingers.

Cem stood, blocking the door, his vest now unzipped to reveal the Glock 17 holstered at his hip.

"We’re leaving," Murat said. "Quietly."

Başol’s jaw tightened. His eyes darted to the fire exit, a rusted door near the bathrooms, then back to Murat. "You’re making a mistake."

"Stand up," Tekin growled, digging the pistol deeper.

Başol stood up. They moved together, Murat and Tekin flanking him, As Kutay left the building and started up the car. Leyla swept the rear as she made sure no GMD officers were waiting for them. The taxi idled at the curb, its trunk gaping open like a mouth.

Then Başol moved. He drove his elbow into Tekin’s throat, twisted free, and slammed Murat’s head into the table. Coffee cups shattered. Kutay lunged, but Başol was already sprinting for the fire exit, shoving chairs in his wake.

"Kapı!" Murat barked, spitting blood.

Leyla rushed past the store owner and slipped over the ccounter. Başol hit the fire exit at full speed, shoulder checking it open.

When he did so, Devrim was there, a shadow in the alley, his boot lashing out. The kick caught Başol square in the chest, hurling him back into the café. He crashed into a table, gasping.

Tekin was on him first, swinging a right hook. Başol ducked, countered with a knee to the gut, then slammed a porcelain saucer into Tekin’s temple. Blood sprayed.

Murat tackled him from behind. They went down in a tangle of limbs, Başol snarling, his fingers clawing for Murat’s eyes. Tekin pistol-whipped him across the jaw. Bone crunched.

Başol roared, bucking them off, and scrambled toward the kitchen...Leyla tackled him, slamming his leg into the counter. Başol collapsed, clutching his thigh, his breath coming in ragged gasps.

Murat wiped blood from his lip. "Told you we were leaving quietly."

They dragged him to the taxi, heaved him into the trunk, and slammed it shut. The engine growled to life. Behind them, the café’s neon sign flickered once, then went dark as they pulled away.