Chapter 3 - The Digital Ghost
The grip on Maya’s wrist loosened instantly as Thomas processed the sheer gravity of her threat. His face drained of its remaining color, leaving the small red cut on his forehead stark against his pale skin. He stepped back, running a trembling hand through his short blonde hair, realizing for the first time that he was completely outmaneuvered.
"You downloaded the core drive?" Thomas asked, his voice cracking slightly despite his best efforts to maintain military composure. "That terminal requires a dual-key biometric authorization. Even with my clearance, it takes a general's override code to access the encrypted partition."
Maya adjusted her uniform jacket, smoothing the fabric with maddening slowness. She looked around the empty locker room to ensure no one else was within earshot before leaning in close enough for him to smell the faint scent of gun oil and coffee.
"You underestimate who is backing me, Thomas," she said quietly. "General Vance didn't send me here to spar with you on red mats for fun. He sent me to recover the missing encryption keys from the night your unit went dark. You sold those keys to an off-the-books private contractor syndicate, and you used the chaos of the extraction to cover your tracks."
Thomas let out a bitter, humorless laugh, shaking his head slowly as the weight of the accusation settled over him. The anger in his eyes was replaced by a deep, terrifying resignation.
"Vance told you that?" Thomas whispered incredulously. "The general himself fed you that fairy tale? He's the one who authorized the ghost drop in Berlin, Maya! I was just the field officer holding the bag when the wire went dead. If I hand over those keys to him, I'm dead within forty-eight hours, and so are you."
Before Maya could formulate a response to his desperate claim, a sharp, repetitive knocking echoed against the steel locker room door. Three slow raps, followed by two fast ones—the standard security signal for an immediate lockdown.
Thomas’s eyes darted toward the exit, then back to Maya. The handle of the heavy door began to turn from the outside.
"Hide the drive," Thomas hissed urgently, grabbing her shoulder. "That's not base security. That's Vance’s personal internal affairs detail."
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Maya stood frozen as the door slowly swung open, revealing the stoic face of Captain Vance Jr. standing in the threshold with a digital recording device raised and glowing in his hand.
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