Chapter 2 - The Voice in the Static
Calloway turned toward Pike.
“Release her.”
Pike did not move.
“Sir, she entered through a sealed maintenance tunnel with a dead officer’s badge.”
“And she just identified a distress call before communications did.”
“That proves preparation.”
Hannah’s breathing remained controlled.
“The pilot is Lieutenant Grant Ellis.”
The room went still.
Pike glanced toward the intercom.
The transmission was too distorted for anyone else to identify the voice.
Calloway narrowed his eyes.
“How do you know?”
“Because I trained him.”
Pike laughed once.
“Ellis graduated two years after Mercer died.”
Hannah looked directly at him.
“He learned emergency approach patterns from recordings I made at Kingsley Test Range.”
Calloway turned toward the control-room staff.
“Verify it.”
A communications specialist typed rapidly.
Seconds later, she looked through the glass.
“Pilot identity confirmed. Lieutenant Grant Ellis.”
Pike’s confidence flickered.
Hannah raised her cuffed hands.
“The aircraft isn’t responding to navigation commands because someone replaced its secure guidance key.”
Calloway stared at her.
“How could you know that?”
“I watched the replacement happen.”
“Where?”
“On the ship where you buried me.”
The aircraft icon crossed another red boundary.
A controller announced that the plane had less than nine minutes of fuel.
Six people were aboard.
Four flight crew.
Two civilian engineers.
The restricted hangars below its path contained experimental fuel cells.
A direct collision could ignite half the installation.
Calloway unlocked one cuff himself.
Pike grabbed his arm.
“Admiral, she could be directing the attack.”
Calloway slowly looked down at Pike’s hand.
Pike released him instantly.
The second cuff opened.
Hannah rubbed the bruised skin around her wrists and moved to the intercom.
“Patch me directly to Ellis.”
The controller hesitated.
Calloway nodded.
Static filled the room.
Hannah pressed the transmit button.
“Grant, this is Mercer.”
The pilot’s breathing stopped on the other end.
Then came a whisper.
“Commander?”
Pike’s face tightened.
Hannah continued.
“You’re flying on a false beacon. Stop fighting the turn.”
“If I release pressure, we hit the hangars.”
“No. That’s what the display wants you to believe.”
Calloway looked toward the tactical screen.
The radar data showed the aircraft descending toward the base.
Hannah studied it for two seconds.
Then she pointed to a second signal hidden beneath the primary return.
“That isn’t his aircraft.”
Pike stepped closer.
“What?”
“The screen is showing a ghost track.”
She turned toward the corridor.
“The real aircraft is approaching from the ocean.”
Calloway’s expression hardened.
“Then what is heading toward our hangars?”
Hannah answered quietly.
May you like
“Something already inside the base.”
👉 The emergency was not an incoming crash—the system had been manipulated to hide a vehicle moving beneath the installation.
