Chapter 10 - STOP THE CRANE
The case became harder to hide once Pallet Six had a second location.
NCIS obtained old gate logs.
Forklift records.
Commercial warehouse scans.
The pallet moved from Hold 7 to Pier Two at 00:48.
Then to container staging beside 28F.
At 03:12, 28F was listed aboard a commercial feeder barge headed for Naval Repair Annex Bayport.
But Bayport never recorded receiving Pallet Six.
Somewhere between Pier Four and Bayport, its custody disappeared again.
Then current operations made everything worse.
Two days after Glassline was exposed, a forklift arrived to move Container 73A from Pier Four.
Nothing unusual.
Except Rachel recognized the serial from Mason's notebook.
73A had been resealed three months earlier without formal report.
She was technically still removed from cargo duties.
She had no business directing the operator.
Old Rachel would have stepped in anyway.
This time she used the radio.
“Pier Control, Carter. Stop movement on 73A pending security verification.”
The dispatcher answered:
“Carter, you are not assigned control authority.”
“Correct. I'm reporting a seal-integrity concern.”
That wording mattered.
Security arrived.
Movement stopped legally.
The forklift operator was annoyed.
Then terrified when NCIS checked the dispatch order.
It was fake.
Not completely.
The container was scheduled to move tomorrow.
Someone had advanced the order eighteen hours.
Destination:
Secure Destruction Yard.
Inside 73A—
boxes of retired metal seals.
Broken tags.
Misprints.
Old bolt cutters.
Secure-print ribbons.
Exactly the kind of material that could prove which press produced past seals.
Someone was trying to get it destroyed early.
Pierce looked at Rachel.
“Good call.”
No smile.
Then the container inventory found something Mason recognized.
A destruction envelope from seven months ago.
Ethan's old jammed duplicate seals.
Most labels unreadable.
One still intact enough for lab work.
Serial ending:
4112
D-44112.
The second Carter seal.
Rachel stared.
It had not been destroyed.
The envelope was marked:
HOLD FOR SYSTEMS QA
Signed:
C. PRICE
Caleb Price.
NCIS brought him in.
His lawyer came too.
Caleb looked at the envelope.
“I held defective output for vendor analysis.”
“For seven months?”
“I forgot it existed.”
Pierce stared.
“That envelope was inside a container someone just tried to send to destruction ahead of schedule.”
“I didn't create the order.”
“Your signature is on the material.”
“From seven months ago.”
“Did you know Rachel Carter's duplicate seal was inside?”
“No.”
“Did you know her name had appeared on unauthorized seals?”
“After Glassline.”
“Did you know before?”
Caleb stopped.
There.
His attorney leaned over.
Caleb answered anyway.
“I knew the template was being reused.”
Rachel felt cold.
“How?”
“Because I reported it.”
“To who?”
Caleb looked at Brooke Hale.
Then Mason.
Neither knew.
“Fleet systems office.”
“When?”
“Six months ago.”
“Response?”
Caleb opened his archived email.
Stored custodian-name behavior is a local workflow issue. Remove unused templates during quarterly cleanup.
No investigation.
No urgent fix.
Caleb had warned someone.
Not enough.
Then Pierce asked:
“Did you swap the seal on 44C?”
“No.”
“Did you delete printer logs after Carter texted you?”
“No.”
“Did you try to move 73A to destruction?”
“No.”
Three denials.
Then Caleb asked something strange.
“Did you check who approved the early destruction order?”
Pierce stared.
“Yes.”
“And?”
Caleb leaned back.
“You won't like it.”
The approval had come from a Navy command credential.
May you like
Not a contractor.
Brooke Hale's.
