Chapter 8 - Priya Left Her Badge Behind
Priya’s badge was still in her desk drawer.
Her purse was under her chair.
Her car remained in the lot.
She had not voluntarily gone home.
That transformed the investigation.
Base security expanded the search.
Access points locked down.
Dog teams checked unused spaces.
Ross coordinated.
I watched Mercer.
If Priya had been taken because she discovered the leak, everyone in that room was now either a witness, a target, or a participant.
Maybe all three.
Ellis pulled Priya’s local email cache.
The draft to me had autosaved earlier versions.
The first said:
I think I know who is feeding Harbor our internal schedules. I was wrong about Lieutenant Ellis.
The second added:
The access logs are being altered after export.
The third:
Someone is using Mercer-level authorization but the source device is—
Then nothing.
Ross pointed at the screen.
“Mercer-level.”
Mercer nodded.
“My credentials can authorize schedule exports.”
“Who has delegated access?”
“My executive assistant. Operations scheduling. Two IT administrators.”
“Names.”
He provided them.
One stood out.
Chief Warrant Officer Calvin Rhodes.
I knew Rhodes only by reputation.
Twenty-seven years in.
Network systems specialist.
Quiet.
Trusted.
He had installed the secure workspace my team used.
“Can Rhodes access my internal files?”
“Technically, yes,” Mercer said.
“Logs?”
“Yes.”
“Camera systems?”
Ross answered.
“Yes.”
“Badge cloning?”
“Potentially.”
The room went quiet.
We had finally identified someone with the technical capability to do almost everything.
Not motive.
Capability.
Ross ordered Rhodes located.
His office was empty.
His phone went to voicemail.
His vehicle had left the base forty minutes earlier.
Priya disappeared thirty-five minutes ago.
“Vehicle cameras?”
“Checking.”
Five minutes later, we got a hit.
Rhodes’s truck exiting the south gate.
Passenger seat occupied.
Female.
Priya.
My stomach tightened.
“Was she restrained?”
“Can’t tell.”
Ross enlarged the image.
Priya faced forward.
No obvious distress.
No one forcing her.
“She went with him.”
Mercer exhaled.
“Maybe they’re working together.”
I shook my head.
“She left her badge, purse, phone, car, and unfinished warning.”
“Unless that was staged.”
True.
Everything could be staged now.
My secure phone vibrated.
Message from an unknown internal address.
DO NOT TRUST PRIYA.
Attached was a photograph taken inside the mess hall that morning.
Jake approaching my table.
Ethan behind him.
Me seated.
The angle came from a position near the kitchen doors.
In the foreground, partly obscured by another sailor, stood Priya Nolan.
Watching.
I stared at it.
“She was there.”
Ross looked closer.
“Did you see her?”
“No.”
Priya had never mentioned witnessing the assault.
Why?
Another image arrived.
Priya speaking to Jake outside Barracks C the previous evening.
Timestamp 2108.
Ellis cursed.
“She recruited him.”
“Maybe.”
I called Jake back into interview.
Showed him the photo.
His reaction was immediate.
“That’s her.”
“You know Priya?”
“She gave us the instructions.”
The room shifted.
“What instructions?”
“For the breakfast thing.”
Noah had said Jake received messages.
Jake had let us assume Rebecca or Harbor sent them.
Now he pointed at Priya.
“She said it was a command climate exercise.”
“You believed a civilian analyst was authorized to tell recruits to harass a sailor?”
“She said you were an evaluator.”
“I am.”
“She said the point was to see if you abused rank.”
“Did she tell Ethan to hit me?”
“No.”
Ethan finally spoke from the adjacent interview room.
“That was Jake.”
Jake spun.
“You hit her.”
“Because you told me to.”
“I told you to grab her.”
“You said make it real.”
They started shouting over each other.
I raised my hand.
Silence.
“Did Priya offer money?”
Jake shook his head.
“The payment came later.”
“So who offered the five hundred?”
“Message account.”
“Name?”
“Harbor.”
Priya initiated the scenario.
Harbor funded it.
That did not make her mastermind.
It made her connection real.
Then Ross’s radio crackled.
Rhodes’s truck had been found abandoned at a civilian marina.
No Rhodes.
No Priya.
Inside the vehicle, security found blood on the passenger door.
Not much.
Enough.
And Priya’s handwritten notebook on the floor.
One page was open.
W.M. DOESN’T MEAN WILLIAM MERCER.
Underneath:
W.M. = WATCHMAN.
I stared at Ross.
“Watchman?”
Mercer went pale.
Laura noticed.
“You know it.”
He didn’t answer.
“Captain.”
Mercer rubbed his jaw.
“Watchman was Aaron Sloan’s nickname for the person who altered Compass scenarios.”
Rebecca’s brother had believed someone inside the program was changing tests beyond authorized safety limits.
“Who?”
“He never identified them.”
“Male? Female?”
“Unknown.”
“What did Aaron know?”
“He wrote one phrase before he died.”
Mercer looked directly at me.
“Watchman never watches alone.”
My phone rang.
Emily.
I answered.
“Sarah?”
Her voice was shaking.
“What happened?”
“Someone sent a package to my school.”
My stomach dropped.
“What package?”
“No return address.”
“Do not open it.”
“We didn’t.”
“Police?”
“Here.”
“What’s on it?”
Emily inhaled.
“Your name.”
Then quieter:
May you like
“And Aaron Sloan’s.”
📖 Discover what was inside the package addressed to me and a dead Compass participant—and why Rebecca Sloan wanted me to see it before anyone else in CHAPTER 9. 👇
