Krueger sat in the reinforced room with his wrists cuffed and his legs shackled to the floor. The overhead light buzzed slightly off-frequency. Adina Ganz entered. She didn’t speak. Didn’t sit.
Behind her came Ford Cox and Sean Paulsen. Between them, a slim man in a suit stepped in and shut the door behind him with a click.
Paulsen dropped a printed dossier onto the table, sealed and official. The seal read:U.S. Air Force Academy – Incident File 442-19A.
Krueger didn’t look at it.
Ford sat across from him and folded his hands. “I want you to understand,” he said calmly, “you’re not under military jurisdiction anymore.”
Krueger smiled faintly. “Is that supposed to scare me?”
“No,” Adina said. “It’s just the only reason you’re still breathing.”
Krueger looked up coolly. “You’ve got no proof of anything.”
Paulsen slid a photograph across the table, clear, in color, and timestamped. Pieces of the broken ampoule. “You left your fingerprints. Thumb and pointer.”
Silence.
Ford leaned in. “You’re not walking out of this.”
ICU ROOM 4 – 0417 HOURS
The light in the room had dimmed further. The machines still beeped steadily. Shannon hadn’t stirred again, deep in a medicated sleep. One arm was draped over Dante’s, her head nestled beneath his chin.
He was still awake, eyes open and one hand curled loosely around hers, thumb brushing over the edge of her knuckles. He didn’t know what time it was, nor did he care. All he knew was he wasn’t going anywhere. Not until she opened her eyes again.
TWENTY-SIX
FORT NOVOSEL – CRASH SITE PERIMETER – 1123 HOURS
The trees hadn’t burned. They’d snapped. Pine and hardwood cracked like bones under the weight of the UH-60's descent, their jagged trunks still bleeding resin. Scorch marks rippled out from the tail’s final impact, but there was no fire, just ruin. The wreckage of the helo was broken across a half-acre, spread like a giant slammed it down with a handful of vengeance.
Bravo Team stepped through the perimeter in full kit, visors down, gloves on, weapons slung, ready to recover evidence.
Lieutenant Carter took point, sweeping low near the bent skids. “Tail section’s intact enough for forensic pull,” she said into comms. “Rotor cable shows signs of unnatural fray. Looks like chemical scoring. Mr. Paulsen, you’re right.”
Emerson “Coach” Davis followed behind, voice clipped. “Got the ampoule shard markers. Hazmat tagged the site already,but we’ll do a secondary sweep. Anything that looks like trace delivery gear gets bagged.”
Two CID agents worked in tandem near the cockpit, photos snapped every five seconds. Tags dropped beside key mechanical failures such as hydraulic lines, torque links, and the scorched housing of the flight control computer.
At the edge of the wreckage, Ford Cox stood with CID Commanding Agent Holbrook, watching from under the brim of his ball cap. “No way this was mechanical,” he muttered, scanning the scene. “You can see it in the way she came down. They were fighting the controls the whole way in.”
“You mean Johnson. Esten was already unconscious.” Ford nodded once, eyes hard. “That bird didn’t just fail. Someone made it fail.”
Behind them, Adina Ganz called out, “We’ve got the data module. Impact casing cracked, but the core’s recoverable.”
“Secure it,” Ford said. “Chain of custody starts here. Chase tech will log it and turn it over to CID by end of day.”
Carter radioed again, her voice cracking. “One more thing: I found Mara Esten’s headset. On the recording, mic cut out clean. Looks like she lost comms just before crash point. Could be related to the paralytic’s effects.”
Ford’s face didn’t change, but something behind his eyes darkened. “Mark the location and prep the flight path overlay.”
Holbrook adjusted his radio. “I’ll report up to the Army board. You’ll have your airframe walk-through by nightfall.”
Ford finally turned. “Good. Because when Krueger stands trial…” He looked back at the wreckage, twisted under the Alabama sun. “I want every screw, wire, and chemical trace lined up like a firing squad.”
SECURE BRIEFING ROOM – 1227 HOURS
