COLD PROTOCOL

Berlin, Christmas 1979. The Wall cuts the city like a scar, its watchtowers and floodlights casting long, cold shadows across the snow. West Berlin glitters in neon and shopfronts; East Berlin hides in darkness, ruled by the unblinking eyes of the Stasi.

Mike Peterson, Political Adviser to the US Military Government, knows the rules: never cross without clearance, never get close to an East Berliner. He has broken both. Her name is Helena, young, magnetic, trapped behind the Wall. Every meeting risks not just his career but their lives.

When a US reconnaissance run explodes into chaos, Mike and his old Ranger buddy Luke Reeves are suddenly prey, hunted by a rogue Soviet armoured carrier through snow-choked fields and backroads. Radios jam. Guns track them through the glare. And waiting at the border is Lev Leviaski, the ruthless Political Adviser to the Russian command. Leviaski has orders to make sure the Americans never see the West again. For reasons of his own, he lets them go.

That single choice lights a fuse. Soviet manoeuvres breach the Christmas truce. Checkpoint Bravo turns into a pressure point. Spandau Prison hides secrets in plain sight. Every handshake conceals a trap, and every ally could be an enemy. One misstep and the Cold War could go hot in the heart of Berlin.

From the smoky backrooms of power to the opera house foyer, from safe houses to the killing ground beneath the Wall, the game tightens. For Mike, it is about more than survival. It is about finding a way to get Helena out before the Stasi disappear her into a labour camp. For Lev, it is about staying alive in a world where one wrong move earns a bullet in the back of the skull.

Espionage, betrayal, and forbidden love collide in the deadliest city on earth, where the line between loyalty and treachery is as thin as the snow on the Wall.