Chapter 7 - A Dead Operator’s Blood
The second profile belonged to Lieutenant Aaron Vale.
The name meant nothing to me.
It meant everything to Donovan.
He backed away from the analyzer as if the machine had accused him aloud.
“You know him,” I said.
Donovan stared at the blood-stained map fragment. “Vale died during a maritime training accident.”
“Three years before Ben’s mission?”
“Yes.”
“Then how was his blood on something hidden inside Rex’s collar?”
No one spoke.
Harper moved toward the mission display board, where photographs from Rex’s years of service had been mounted for the ceremony. Most showed handlers in groups, their faces distant and insignia intentionally unreadable.
She stopped before an older photograph.
“There,” she said.
A younger Donovan stood beside Ben and another operator. The third man’s face was partly shadowed, but the name strip beneath the photograph had been removed, leaving a pale rectangle.
“Was that Vale?” I asked.
Donovan did not respond.
Rex gave a low whine.
“Yes,” Donovan finally said.
The dog remained still.
Truth.
“What happened to him?”
“He drowned during a night insertion.”
“Was the body recovered?”
“No.”
The answer landed with terrible familiarity.
No remains.
Catastrophic conditions.
Official confirmation.
Ben’s case was not the first.
I looked at the scratched-out man in the photograph on Harper’s phone.
“Aaron Vale was the third man beside the aircraft.”
Donovan’s silence confirmed it.
“But he was declared dead three years earlier,” Doc said. “So either the photograph’s date is false, or Vale survived.”
Harper checked the image metadata. “The date was embedded by the device that took it. It could be altered, but the encryption signature is military.”
“Whose device?” I asked.
She enlarged the lower edge of the photograph. A reflection appeared in the aircraft’s polished panel.
A fourth figure had taken the picture.
Only one hand and part of a sleeve were visible.
On the hand was a ring identical to Donovan’s.
I looked at him.
“How many of those rings exist?”
“Twelve were made.”
“For whom?”
“The original members of a compartmented recovery team.”
“Name them.”
“I can’t.”
“Because it’s classified?”
“Because most of them are dead.”
Rex’s ears shifted.
“Most?” I repeated.
Donovan looked tired suddenly. Older than forty-eight.
“Vale was our communications specialist. He discovered that recovered intelligence was being diverted before reaching command. Three weeks later, he disappeared during training.”
“You believed he was murdered.”
“I believed the accident report was false.”
“And you stayed silent.”
“I tried to investigate. Two witnesses recanted. One was discharged. One vanished.”
“You still wore the ring.”
“It was the only way surviving members recognized one another after the unit was dissolved.”
I held up Ben’s tag. “Then this belonged to one of those members.”
“To Ben.”
“You said it was recovered from his mission.”
“It was.”
“Yet you said nothing was recovered.”
Donovan closed his eyes for a moment. “Because the tag was delivered to me afterward.”
“By whom?”
“I don’t know.”
The answer sounded honest.
“Where?”
“My quarters. The morning after I returned.”
“Returned from the mission you claimed you never attended.”
His eyes opened.
“I was ordered to observe from a remote aircraft. I never entered the ground site.”
Rex did not reject the statement.
A partial truth.
I stepped closer. “What did you see?”
Donovan’s controlled breathing became shallow.
“I saw Ben board the extraction vehicle.”
Hope struck so violently it felt like injury.
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
“Then why was he declared dead?”
“Because seven minutes later, the vehicle entered a tunnel and exploded.”
“Did you see the explosion?”
“Yes.”
“Did you see Ben inside when it happened?”
“No.”
The room seemed to contract around me.
Ben had survived the point listed as his death. He had reached extraction. Then he disappeared inside a tunnel with a man declared dead three years earlier.
Doc examined the black drive. “The countdown may mark a scheduled release.”
“Of what?” Harper asked.
“Evidence, coordinates, or a signal.”
The drive pulsed.
The case beside the aircraft clicked again.
This time, its main lid unlocked by half an inch.
Rex stood.
I moved toward it.
Donovan grabbed my wrist.
Rex struck the kennel gate.
Donovan released me immediately.
“Listen to me,” he said. “If Vale is alive, that case may not belong to Ben.”
“Then why did Ben’s command open it?”
“Because Ben and Vale built the system together.”
A soft electronic tone sounded from inside the case.
Then a man’s voice, distorted beyond recognition, spoke through a hidden speaker.
“Widow authenticated. Donovan status unresolved.”
May you like
Every person in the hangar turned toward him.
📖 Find out why the system labeled Donovan unresolved—and what Emily risked by opening the case before the countdown ended in CHAPTER 8. 👇
