Chapter 20
TWENTY
CHASE SECURITY TRAINING CENTER – DC
The warehouse smelled like cordite and cold sweat.
Dante stood in a line of six, dressed down in a black long-sleeve tac shirt, combat pants, gloves, and body armor so tight, it felt stitched to his ribs.
His rifle hung low, safety off. His comms were wired in.
No one spoke a word. His left arm and butt cheek ached from the shots.
Bravo Team didn’t do introductions. They didn’t even glance sideways. He’d shaken Paulsen’s hand out in the gravel lot half an hour ago, and that was it. No orientation. “Full kit. Training starts now.”
The concrete walls around them were peppered with scorch marks.
The shoot house was laid out like a rat maze with shifting doors, cleared zones, and blind corners.
Paper targets popped up randomly, some armed, some civilian.
You hit the wrong one, you heard about it. You hesitated, you didn’t come back.
Paulsen stood outside the range tunnel with a tablet in one hand and a stopwatch in the other. The man hadn’t raised his voice once since Dante arrived.
“Stack up,” the team lead barked. “Room three. Live ammo. Flash clearance only.”
Dante slotted into the third position behind two Bravo vets. Their faces were expressionless, visors down. The breacher moved. The charge went.
Boom.
The room lit white. Smoke billowed. They went in low and fast.
Dante tracked right as per protocol, his rifle up, corner cleared, IDed the target, too late.
A second pop fired in the far corner. It was a pressure flash, simulating return fire.
Heat skimmed his cheek as the sim target triggered an auto-detonation burst. Just a pulse. Enough to sting and enough to punish. He spun, dropped, covered the flank and fired twice. “Target down.”
“Room cleared!” the point called out.
Dante stood in place, weapon up, breath slow. The air stank like magnesium and nerves.
Paulsen’s voice finally filtered in through comms, “Olivetti.”
“Copy.”
“You slow or you indecisive?”
“Split second on my right pivot. Target obscured.”
“Burn your jaw next time; it won’t be split.”
“Understood.”
There was no further commentary. The team moved out. No one patted him on the back. No one asked if he was good. They just restacked. That was the test. Not the run, but what you did after it.
Outside, the sun was beginning to set over the range. Paulsen didn’t stop him. Didn’t offer notes. Just looked at him once, head tilted, unreadable.
Dante walked past, sweat clinging to his spine under the plate carrier. He didn’t limp. He didn’t touch his cheek. He didn’t flinch, because if they were watching him—and they were—that was the first mark.
Can you get burned and still walk forward? He could, and he did.
FORT NOVOSEL
The simulator smelled like warm plastic and static, sterile and used, like every other box in the bay. Shannon sat still, strapped in, her boots flat and her hands light on the controls.
Chief Marston’s voice crackled through the headset. “Johnson. Hover test. Three inches. Ninety seconds. Crosswind variable.”
She flexed her thumbs once. No nerves, just the checklist. Throttle. Pedals. Trim. She lifted the bird smoothly with no bob and locked in. The fake horizon pulsed beyond the canopy showing a flat field and painted sun. She held.
At fifty seconds, wind simulation kicked in with a shove from the left. She corrected. Barely moved. Outside the sim, Rhodes watched with arms crossed. Marston didn’t blink.
Ninety seconds ticked past.
“Power down,” the comm said.
She did.
Ten seconds later, she stepped out, and her boots hit the concrete. Marston didn’t say a word. Instead, he turned away. But she saw the pause. It was a beat of recognition.
In the hallway, Rhodes matched pace beside her. “Nice run.”
“Thanks.”
They walked in silence.
“You breathe in there?”
“Only when I’m not flying.”
Rhodes snorted. “Fair enough.”
CHASE SECURITY TRAINING CENTER – DC
The air in the kill house was stale and dry, like it had soaked up every echo of gunpowder and sweat for a decade and decided to keep them.
Dante adjusted his comm earpiece and rolled his shoulders once beneath the tight plate carrier.
His shirt clung to his spine. The day’s third sim was about to start, and the last one had already left a stripe of bruises across his ribs.
Across from him, Bravo Team was gearing up. There were no jokes, no chatter, only the practiced rhythm of men who had been doing this together long enough to predict each other’s moves. Except for him. Dante was still the variable. And they weren’t trying to hide it.
“Stack up,” barked the team lead, voice flat through the comms. “Dante, you’re with Callow.”
A few heads turned.
Callow was rangy, lean, fast. Younger than the others, maybe thirty, but with that tight, forward posture of a guy who didn’t trust anyone to have his six. Not unless they’d earned it. And Dante hadn’t.
Callow didn’t say anything, just jerked his head to the second door. The signal was clear: keep up, don’t talk.
The flash charge was prepped. The command came: Go.
The door burst inward, and Callow entered like a coiled spring.
He was too fast. Dante swept the opposite angle, but the timing was off.
Callow was halfway across the room before Dante cleared his sector.
A pop sim round fired from the corner, fake but loud, and Dante adjusted on instinct.
Sweep. Two shots. Clean. But it was close.
They cleared the final corner together, shoulders nearly colliding. Callow’s body language was all silent scorn. No words, just the kind of heat that lingers after someone blames you for their own mistake.
“Room clear,” Dante said, clipped.
The rest of the team moved on. No one spoke. The silence was worse than a dressing down.
The locker room stank of gun oil, salt, and stress like fuel burning through the last dregs of patience. Dante stripped off his sweat-drenched tac shirt. His shoulders ached from the weight of his vest. Across the aisle, Callow dumped his gloves into his bag with a little too much force.
Dante didn’t look at him.
Callow looked anyway. “You don’t belong in that stack.”
Dante’s voice came low. “You ran early.”
“I run fast. We’re not here to babysit.”
Dante met his eyes. “I’m not here to be babysat.”
Callow didn’t break the stare. “Then stay out of my space.” As Paulsen entered, Callow grabbed his towel, slung it over his shoulder, and walked out.
Paulsen lingered a moment, looking at Dante. “Be here at 0600. Full kit.” Then he left.
That night, Dante sat on the edge of the hotel bed, fresh out of the shower, towel slung low on his hips, water still clinging to his shoulders. His ribs ached where the plate had slammed into him earlier. He reached for his phone. There were no messages.
He stared at the screen, turned it face-down on the nightstand and lay back on the bed.
FORT NOVOSEL
The room was quiet. Carter slept above, and the window screen hummed with insects.
Shannon sat on the edge of her bed, posture straight, expression still.
She opened the footlocker and took out the scarf.
She wrapped it once, then again, around her wrist. She tied it off and faced the mirror. She didn’t blink.
The van pulled up ten minutes late. Two new pilots stepped off like they were reporting to no one, both Army, both already wearing the fatigue of weeks on the move.
Warrant Officer First Class Mara Esten looked exactly like the paperwork warned.
She was sharp, seasoned, with zero tolerance.
She scanned the flight line like a battlefield, her jaw set.
The man behind her stepped forward. Shannon’s stomach tightened. It was Daniel Krueger. He hadn’t changed, at least not in the ways that mattered. He still walked like nothing touched him. He still held his bag like it belonged on someone else’s shoulder.
His hair was shorter now, sharper. His nameplate was clean. His eyes flicked toward her and stayed.
The chill that went down her spine wasn’t fear. Three years ago, he’d quietly been removed from the Academy. Officially, for conduct violations. Unofficially? For what he did to her.
Mike shut it down before the arrest ever landed. No hearings, no exposure. Shannon had been nineteen. She didn’t want to talk about it. Her father didn’t make her.
Now here he was. In the Army, back in the pipeline. Which meant his daddy stepped in for him again.
He stopped ten feet from her. “I see it’s Johnson now. Mommy’s name wasn’t good anymore?” He said it like it still belonged to him.
She didn’t move and didn’t answer.
He smiled that same smile. “Sweet Shannon, I didn’t expect to see you here. Thought you might’ve dropped the flight track. Especially after all that turbulence.”
Rhodes blinked at the exchange, suddenly alert beside her.
But Shannon didn’t flinch, just lifted her clipboard and turned away. “Keep walking, Krueger.” Her voice was low and controlled, with no heat and no forgiveness.
Time for her last go round for the day. The canopy hissed shut. Darkness dropped around her as Shannon locked in. Mara Esten was already strapped tight, flicking switches like she owned the bird. Just this side of reckless.
The sim lit up. It was jagged mountain ridges, dusk horizon, and storm brewing. One evac. One reroute. One hostile hidden among survivors.
“Sim start.”
Esten yanked them off the pad without a word. Banked hard left. She moved too fast.
Shannon corrected silently, torque, drift, and trim. “Too low.”
“I see it.”
“You’ll clip the trees.”
“I said I see it.”
The rotor screamed. They cleared the ridge by inches and slammed down at the pickup zone with a lurch.
“Package onboard. Weather shift incoming,” Shannon called.
Esten grinned. “Perfect timing.”
They punched back into the sky. The wind hit sideways and violently. The sim pitched.
Esten fought it. Shannon matched. There were no words now. Just instinct and survival. Lightning flashed. The cockpit shook, but the bird stayed level—barely. They touched down five seconds early, hard but clean.
The comm snapped, “Sim complete.”
Neither of them moved.
Esten popped her harness and stood. “You fly like you’ve got ghosts.”
Shannon stared straight ahead. “You don’t?”
Esten gave a half smile and walked out.
Behind the observation glass, Krueger watched, elbows resting on the rail. His eyes were fixed, his face unreadable. He didn’t speak or blink. He just stared at her like he was remembering something she hadn’t given him permission to remember.
Shannon climbed out of the sim. When her boots hit concrete, she didn’t look up, but her skin crawled like she’d been marked. And for the first time that day, the sim bay went quiet.
Shannon stood alone on the upper platform, palms braced on the railing, eyes on the dimmed training floor below. She’d stayed after the others left, needing air and space. There was less noise in her head here.
Footsteps sounded behind her, not loud but deliberate. She didn’t turn.
“Didn’t peg you for the brooding type,” Mara Esten said.
Shannon stayed still. “I’m not.”
“You skipped chow. You’re standing in a dark bay after midnight. So either you’re brooding or haunted.”
She didn’t move. “Is there a third option?”
Esten stepped up beside her, arms crossed, gazing out into the same space. “There’s always a third option. But this one feels personal.”
Shannon finally turned, just enough to meet her eyes. “You’re not subtle.”
“I’m not trying to be.” Esten paused. “That guy, Krueger. He’s not just a bad ex. He’s worse.”
Shannon didn’t answer, but she didn’t deny it. That was enough.
“I don’t need details,” Esten said. “But you’re a good wing. You don’t have to handle it solo.”
Shannon’s jaw worked slightly. “I didn’t think he’d ever wear a uniform again.”
Esten nodded. “Someone greased the wheels. That’s clear.”
Shannon’s eyes flicked toward the bay doors. “He’s watching me. I can feel it.”
Esten’s voice lowered. “Then he’s not going to like what happens if he touches you again.”
A long pause. Then, almost too soft to hear: “I’ve got you, Johnson.” No theatrics. Just certainty. The kind Shannon hadn’t realized she missed.
CHASE SECURITY DC
The file landed on Mike’s desk at 0640. Black tab. No cover memo. Internal routing code only. Mike flipped it open.
One page.
KRUEGER, Daniel C.
Army Aviation. Active. Fort Novosel. Clearance: Full.
No disciplinary history on record. No flags. No warnings. No mention of the real reason he'd been disappeared from the Air Force Academy three years earlier.
Mike’s jaw locked. He didn’t need to read it twice. He picked up the desk phone and hit the direct key for Ford Cox’s office.
“Cox,” came low and clipped.
Mike didn’t waste time. “It’s me.”
“Tell me this is about the quarterly budget and not a ghost.”
Mike stared at the page in front of him. “Krueger. Novosel. Full clearance.”
His voice dropped. “Jesus.”
“Just came in this morning,” Mike said.
Ford exhaled. “That kid was supposed to be done.”
“He was in the Air Force.”
“And Shannon?”
“She had to see him yesterday.”
Ford’s voice went quieter. “How bad was it?”
“I don’t know yet. She hasn’t called. I don’t expect her to.”
“You want something done?” Ford asked.
Mike didn’t raise his voice. “I want him watched. Closely. Quietly.”
“Done.”
“I don’t want a team. I don’t want a paper trail. Just someone who knows what to look for.”
“I’ve got a guy,” Ford said. “Low profile. Civilian cover. He won’t spook the flight line.”
“Good.” Mike hesitated. “If this goes sideways…”
Ford finished it for him, “It won’t.”
But they both knew better.