Chapter 13 - the raven six archive
Major Sloan moved toward the archive case.
Elias blocked her.
“Don’t touch it.”
“If that case contains classified material, I am authorized to secure it.”
“You are not authorized to do anything until you explain why Claire saw you at the warehouse.”
“I was never there.”
Claire stood beside Elias.
“You asked me for the letter.”
“No.”
“You knew Lily activated the camera.”
“So did every investigator monitoring the house.”
“You said Elias would understand when he learned what Adrian had done.”
Sloan stared at her.
“I have never spoken to you before tonight.”
The monitors flickered.
Rusk watched them with visible amusement.
“You see the value of a familiar uniform,” he said. “People believe the face they expect.”
The warehouse video returned on one screen.
This time, the angle changed.
The woman in uniform turned toward the camera.
She looked exactly like Major Sloan.
Then the image zoomed closer.
A thin line appeared near the woman’s jaw.
A mask.
The disguise was sophisticated but imperfect.
Sloan’s face hardened.
“Identity replication.”
Rusk nodded.
“Your division developed the first prototypes.”
“For protected witnesses, not criminal operations.”
“Tools do not care who uses them.”
Mercer’s officers entered the corridor and surrounded the archive case.
Captain Mercer recovered Elias’s weapon and earpiece, then looked at Sloan.
“You’re not cleared yet.”
“I understand.”
Rusk continued speaking from the monitors.
“The archive contains the unedited mission records from Raven Six. Every order. Every transmission. Every officer who altered the route.”
Elias looked at the metal case.
“Why hide it here?”
“Because Crown Hill was the only place connected to the mission but excluded from the final investigation.”
“Why did Adrian have the key?”
“He did not.”
“Then why did you call it his final message?”
“The key opens the archive. The message explains who made it.”
The case clicked.
A green light appeared above the lock.
Mercer brought in a bomb technician and digital specialist before allowing anyone to approach. The specialist inspected the exterior and confirmed that the case contained an isolated data system.
“No external transmission,” she said. “We can open it safely, but I cannot guarantee the files won’t erase themselves.”
Elias looked at Claire.
“Where is the compass?”
She held it up.
The wooden object had separated along one edge, revealing a tiny storage device inside.
“The letter’s hidden data may contain the decryption sequence,” she said.
Sloan shook her head.
“Do not connect unknown media.”
“Then we may never open the archive,” Elias replied.
“That may be what Rusk wants. The drive could corrupt the files.”
Rusk smiled.
“Major Sloan remains cautious even when the truth is inches away.”
Mercer turned toward the nearest camera.
“You’re enjoying this too much.”
“I waited eight years.”
“For what?”
“For Colonel Grant to ask the correct question.”
Elias stepped closer to the screen.
“Which question?”
“Why was Raven Six allowed to fail?”
Elias had asked himself that every night for years.
Bad intelligence.
Delayed support.
Changed extraction coordinates.
He had blamed himself because commanders were trained to accept responsibility.
Now he looked at the archive.
“Because the mission was not designed to succeed.”
Rusk’s smile disappeared.
“Better.”
“Someone wanted Adrian silenced.”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
“Open the archive.”
The digital specialist inserted the storage device from Lily’s compass into an isolated reader.
A list of files appeared.
Transfer records.
Audio logs.
Photographs.
A document titled ORIGINAL AUTHORIZATION.
The specialist selected it.
A scanned order filled the screen.
It authorized the creation of the Rusk identity as part of an internal intelligence program. The identity could be assumed by designated operatives to infiltrate military logistics networks.
At the bottom was the approval signature.
Major Rebecca Sloan.
Sloan stepped forward.
“That is forged.”
The document date was twenty-two years earlier.
Mercer looked at her.
“How old were you?”
“Seventeen.”
“So it cannot be yours.”
“No.”
Elias examined the full name printed beneath the signature.
Rebecca Anne Sloan.
Major Sloan’s face lost color.
“My mother,” she said.
Rusk leaned closer to his camera.
“Brigadier General Rebecca Anne Sloan created Rusk.”
Major Sloan stared at the screen.
“My mother died twelve years ago.”
“Your mother disappeared twelve years ago.”
“I attended her funeral.”
“You attended a closed casket.”
Sloan turned away from the screens.
Elias understood her expression.
It was the same shock he felt whenever someone suggested Adrian might have survived.
The specialist opened the first audio log.
Static filled the corridor.
Then Adrian Grant’s voice emerged.
“If Elias is hearing this, the mission record has survived.”
Elias could not breathe.
The recording continued.
“Do not believe the casualty report. Raven Six was divided before we crossed the border. Rusk was already inside our command.”
A second voice interrupted the recording.
A woman.
“Captain Grant, the convoy is changing direction.”
Adrian replied, “Under whose authority?”
The woman answered.
“Colonel Elias Grant.”
Elias stared at the speakers.
He had not been a colonel then.
And he had never changed the convoy route.
The specialist opened the associated order.
The document carried Elias’s signature.
The first order ever forged in his name.
Ruth had been wrong.
The fraud had not begun last year.
It had begun during Raven Six.
The final line of Adrian’s recording played.
“If they used my brother’s name, they will use it again. The next time, they won’t redirect a convoy.”
The audio stopped.
A new file automatically opened.
May you like
It showed a map of the Pacific Northwest covered with recent dates and transport routes.
One route ended at Lily’s school.
