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/Eye-du-lan/ noun.

Derived from ancient Greek literature

A phantom being

PROLOGUE

Every agency bureau and special force knows the legend of the Eidolon.

The Eidolon is someone that all assassins fear and strive to be measured against and yet no one even knows who the Eidolon really is. It is unknown whether the killer is a man or a woman or even if the Eidolon is an actual person and not just a fictional legend. The legend entails of a person who was specifically drafted along with 19 others in a CIA black operation entitled 'Eidola'. The details of the operation are unknown as most things are with the CIA, yet it was known that the operation was designed to create a Special Forces branch of the CIA made up of 20 highly advanced and lethal assassins, much like the Navy SEALS or Green Beret's yet trained only to kill and without remorse. The branch if successful was going to be named Eidola, plural for Eidolon and the ancient Greek term for phantoms, aptly named for they were extensively trained to be unseen when killing.

However, the operation was a horrific failure from the beginning. The CIA operatives and "trainers" in charge did unspeakable things to push the candidates to their limits, to break them so their enemies couldn't. They were being reborn as mindless killing machines not to feel pain, but it failed as the candidates didn't just break, they had shattered. Of the original 20; 10 killed themselves before the first week, 5 died of their injuries due to the training exercises and 2 had suffered a severe mental breakdown and spiraled into a psychosis that saw them brutally kill another 2 candidates before killing themselves. Only one was left, the lone survivor of an operation that was meant to have 20 survivors. After that no one knows and it's where the legend began, all the CIA operatives and trainers who had contact with the operation had turned up dead and at the hand of the lone survivor. Now dubbed the Eidolon, the last living candidate fled the CIA and has never been seen since.

The legend while unknown to the general public had spread to every organisation of power. It had taken hold indefinitely when foreign terrorists and criminals on the world's most wanted lists started to drop dead, killed by the dozen by an unknown killer that seemed to take pleasure in what they were doing. With the numbers in dead rising, still no one had seen the perpetrator which every agency had no doubt was the Eidolon. From then on the CIA had openly admitted their mistake in ever having such an operation sanctioned and that they were deploying all forces to eliminate the Eidolon before the rogue assassin could start killing innocent people.

It had been years since the CIA had released that statement and began the manhunt for the Eidolon yet it was obvious to all other agencies and the CIA themselves that the Eidolon would most likely never be caught, every operative sent to retrieve the assassin came back in a body bag. The Eidolon became the CIA's dirtiest secret and despite all evidence of the operation and the Eidolon disappearing, the legend lived on and carried through the FBI, NAVY, NSA, ADF, DOD, Homeland Security and every other renowned agency and force that one could think of.

It was apparent with the death toll of hundreds of most wanted criminals at the Eidolon's hands, that the assassin was very correctly named. When forces were sent to investigate suspicious deaths on a large scale, there would be dozens of dead men in a room yet there was never even a single hair that led to their killer. Not a single hair, shred of skin or even a drop of blood, it was as if a ghost had swept into the room and merely floated out after decimating all life in its remorseless path. Like all legends it continued to spin and weave where now it's told if the phantom killer is after you, all you'll see is a flicker of a shadow, like a ghost you see in your periphery before it strikes and you are dead before you hit the floor.

It was a topic so talked about throughout the years it still came up when conversation was sparse. Some feared or admired the Eidolon while others believed the whole legend is entirely fictional and designed to slander the CIA or henceforth told just to inspire other agencies to fear the CIA itself. One thing however, was concrete, whenever another terrorist group, drug cartel or criminal organization suddenly collapsed with every member dead, the agency leaders would look at each other not with confusion but with a resigned demeanour, pleased of the enemies' downfall but equally fearful that one day this rogue and seemingly invincible killer would turn to them.