Chapter 6 - The Command Room
Colonel Moss entered the command room with the confidence of a man who had spent seven weeks believing a buried problem stays buried. Then he saw General Harrison seated at the head of the table, me standing beside Captain Reeves, and three folders opened in front of him.
His face did not change fast enough to count as fear.
But it changed.
“General,” Moss said. “I wasn’t informed you were visiting.”
“I noticed.”
Moss’s eyes flicked to me. “Staff Sergeant Chen is under review.”
“So I heard.”
“She made an unauthorized deviation during Red Mesa that resulted in severe injury to Sergeant Reyes.”
Harrison opened one folder. “Original imagery showed a secondary structure on the west side.”
Moss blinked.
The general opened another. “Revised imagery removed it.”
Moss said nothing.
Captain Reeves placed a third page down. “The after-action timeline indicates Chen identified the missing structure under fire, rerouted the witness, and applied lifesaving aid to Reyes before extraction.”
Moss’s jaw tightened. “She exceeded mission parameters.”
“She saved the mission,” Harrison said.
“She endangered the team.”
Harrison looked at him. “No. Someone endangered the team before they left the wire. I’m asking who.”
The room cooled.
Moss glanced at me again, and I saw the calculation in his eyes. He needed me angry. Emotional. Defensive. He needed the version of me he had described in reports.
I gave him nothing.
Harrison turned a page. “Why was a Nightshade operator assigned to manual labor before investigative findings?”
“Administrative discretion.”
“Why was her badge removed?”
Moss’s throat moved.
I answered before he could polish the lie.
“He ripped it off my vest in front of the motor pool and stepped on it.”
No one spoke.
May you like
Harrison closed the folder softly.
Some sounds are more dangerous than shouting.
