Chapter 10 - The Vote No One Cast
We had ninety seconds before the automated vote completed.
General Hayes ordered the power cut.
The ballroom emergency systems switched to independent batteries.
I ordered the fiber connections severed.
The countdown continued through a wireless military network.
Daniel looked at the black card.
“Destroy it.”
“It may trigger a failsafe.”
“Keeping it is already triggering one.”
He was right, but haste was what the operation expected.
I examined the pulse pattern.
Not random.
A challenge-response sequence.
The card was polling badges for cryptographic signatures.
If we isolated the badges physically, the system would lose its electorate.
The MPs moved the shielded containers into the hotel’s kitchen freezer, then wrapped them in emergency foil from the communications kit.
Names began disappearing from the voting interface.
Four-star officers.
Civilian officials.
Commanders.
The list dropped from forty-two to nine.
Nine badges remained active.
All belonged to people who had kept them instead of surrendering them.
One was Victoria.
She touched her necklace.
“My badge is in my handbag.”
The MP searched it.
Nothing.
Victoria looked toward Daniel.
“I gave it to your father.”
“When?”
“Yesterday.”
James had entered the ballroom using more than one identity.
The remaining badges moved on the tracking map.
Three were above us.
Two outside.
Four inside the ballroom.
One signal came from General Hayes.
His surrendered badge was in the freezer.
We searched him.
A second credential was sewn into his uniform lining.
He looked genuinely stunned.
Caroline tore the seam open.
The badge displayed another name:
ARTHUR HAYES—INTERIM CROWN AUTHORITY.
“Did you know?” she asked.
“No.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
He looked at her.
“I understand why you don’t.”
We removed it.
Eight votes remained.
The automated tally began.
Daniel received three.
Caroline received two.
I received three.
A tie.
The system paused.
DECISION REQUIRES FOUNDING OFFICER.
The speakers activated.
James Whitmore said, “Bring Rachel’s card to the stage.”
I responded without moving.
“Show yourself.”
“I already have.”
The ballroom screens displayed live camera feeds from every angle.
Faces.
Guests.
Officers.
Musicians.
Waitstaff.
One camera focused on Lieutenant General Hayes.
Another on Victoria.
Another on Daniel.
No James.
“Your face is not proof,” I said.
“Neither is your title.”
“Then we agree on something.”
A quiet laugh.
The stage curtain opened by itself.
Behind it stood Peter Lang’s double-bass case.
Now upright.
A compartment opened.
Inside was a man in an oxygen mask, restrained to a metal frame.
Colonel James Whitmore.
Older than the photograph.
Alive.
His eyes opened.
Daniel ran toward him.
MPs intercepted him until bomb technicians cleared the frame.
James had wires attached to his chest, wrists, and throat.
A voice synthesizer connected to his breathing.
He had not been speaking freely.
The distorted messages had been generated from his captured voice.
Someone was using him exactly as they used me.
The true operator remained hidden.
James lifted one trembling finger and pointed toward the orchestra conductor.
The conductor froze.
MPs seized him.
He removed no disguise.
He was exactly who his documents claimed: Samuel Reed, civilian musician, sixty-one.
But General Hayes recognized him.
“Adrian Cole.”
The man smiled.
The recruiter who supposedly died eight years ago had conducted the orchestra all evening.
Cole raised his hands.
“You finally looked at the man controlling the tempo.”
Daniel moved toward his father.
Cole clicked a small remote.
The device on James’ chest beeped.
May you like
“Choose a commander,” Cole said, “or Colonel Whitmore’s heart stops.”
📖 The manipulated vote ended in a tie, but the orchestra conductor revealed himself as Rachel’s dead recruiter while holding Daniel’s father’s life in his hand. 👇
