Chapter Twenty-Eight – The Chase of a Ghost
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
The Chase of a Ghost
T he next day I go through everything again at the DEA, briefing the team about Aranya.
He’s now officially a person of interest: someone the system admits is worth watching, but not someone they can charge, at least not yet.
It’s the best label we can slap on him until we have something solid enough to stick.
Right after the briefing, a man in uniform steps into the room, eyes scanning.
“Larsen pack?” he asks.
A few agents glance up.
“We’re right here,” I say.
He nods. “I need a word. Outside.”
We follow him down the corridor, and he waits until the door closes behind us to flip open a folder and pull out three sealed envelopes. He hands them out one by one.
“You’ve been served,” he says, then he walks away, like he just handed out mail, not court orders.
Jay tears his open first. “Our arraignment is at eight-thirty next Monday.”
It’s the worst timing possible. My head splits between the urge to focus on Aranya, on anything that might get us access to him, and the weight of the criminal charges hanging over us.
In the end, the charges lose. There’s nothing I can do about them right now, and thinking about it just makes me twitchy, so I bury it and go back to work.
The more I dig into the FBI report on that son of a bitch, the more I want to forget caution. What if Aranya’s protected top to bottom, and there’s never a clean way in? Would it really be so wrong to cross a few lines if that’s what it takes to get justice?
But not long after, the fucking charges demand my attention again: Jayme calls. It’s shit having to deal with this twice in the same morning, but I don’t have a choice. I answer.
“Renner wants to speak with you,” Jayme says. “We scheduled a video call for this afternoon. Four p.m.”
I shift the phone to my other ear. “Where?”
“My office. I’ll send you the location.”
“We’ll be there.”
Jayme’s firm ends up not too far from DEA: we get there in twenty minutes.
A receptionist leads us to a small conference room with exposed brick on one wall and bookshelves lined with thick legal volumes and trial binders.
A mounted flatscreen sits above the table, with a discreet camera fixed just above it, clearly built for depositions and remote hearings.
Jayme walks in without preamble, a leather-bound folder under one arm. He’s dressed like always: pressed shirt, no tie, sleeves rolled just once.
When the screen lights up, the camera steadies on a man in his late forties, wearing a sharp suit, with salt-and-pepper hair neatly cut and a clean-shaven face.
“Good afternoon,” he says. “You must be the Larsens.”
We nod. Jay leans back in his chair, arms crossed.
“I’m Thomas Renner,” he says. “I’ve been retained by the Military Aegis Board to serve as lead counsel in your case. Jayme and I are working in partnership, and I’ve already reviewed everything he’s built so far.”
His voice is measured, but not cold. “I know you’ve been briefed on the basics: arraignment, summons, the charges you're facing. But I want to give you the broader picture. Not just what this is, but what it means.”
He leans slightly toward the screen. “You are the first pack in Special Operations to be criminally charged. That it happened before your transfer doesn’t lessen the fallout. As far as the system is concerned, you represent Special Ops now, and the political consequences will be treated that way.”
Jay’s jaw tightens again. We’ve been clenching so much lately that if our teeth were as fragile as human’s, they’d have shattered by now.
Renner keeps going. “That’s not to say you did anything wrong, but it does mean your case will be watched closely. By courts, by lawmakers and by the Department of Defense. Every motion we file will set tone and precedent.”
“So here’s what I need from you,” he says. “Discipline. Composure. Absolute consistency. You are under more scrutiny now than you’ve ever been. And if anything new appears in your files, any misstep, even minor, the DA will use it. They'll build a narrative from whatever scraps they can find.”
Jay finally speaks. “So what’s the strategy?”
Renner nods, like he was waiting for that.
“Simple,” he says. “We anchor the case in facts. You are a federally sanctioned pack. You’re trained to neutralize threats.
A drunk civilian made aggressive advances toward your nyra.
Your response was instinctive, not premeditated.
Protective, not retaliatory. The legal term is justifiable use of force in defense of another. That’s our anchor.”
He glances off-screen, then back. “Jayme and I will handle the legal machinery. If the press knocks, you don’t answer. No comments.”
Shane raises a brow. “And the DoD?”
Renner smiles faintly. “Let me worry about them. This isn’t my first political firestorm.”
The screen flickers slightly as he checks his notes. “We'll meet in person on Monday at your arraignment. Until that moment, stay quiet. No statements and no surprises.”
He looks at each of us through the screen.
“This isn’t unwinnable. It’s just unprecedented.
Which means that, if we do it right, we can do more than just clear your names; we can prove that not every aegis accused of violence against a human deserves to be condemned.
That context matters, and due process applies to all of us.
This case could actually change something. ”
I don’t say anything. None of us does. But my thoughts are loud. Before this call, I was ready to find any way to get to Aranya, even if it meant crossing legal lines. But if doing that means risking our case, I can’t do it.
I can’t do that to myself, my brothers, and Jo. We deserve better than that. And if Renner’s right, maybe this is bigger than just us. It could mean something for other aegis too, a chance to be treated fairly by human justice.
If I don’t find any legal way to bring Aranya down… then, as much as it guts me, I’ll have to let him walk.
Over the next few days, I keep digging, trying to find a legal breach. But every time I hit another dead end, and the rage rises like bile in my throat, I remind myself that I need to keep my head down, no matter what.
The following Monday, instead of heading to the DEA, we go to Milstone Courthouse. When we arrive, Jayme is already there with Thomas Renner, waiting in the lobby.
Renner’s handshake is firm, and his expression calm. “Prosecutor will ask for restrictive release, but we’ll push back,” he says. “Stay quiet. Let us handle it.”
He’s right. As soon as it begins, the prosecutor rises. “Your Honor, the State requests continued release under bond with additional conditions: surrender of firearms, mandatory check-ins, and a no-contact order with the victim—”
Renner cuts in. “Objection, Your Honor. The defendants are federal agents with no flight risk, and were cleared by Internal Affairs.”
The judge eyes us. Then exhales. “Sustained. Conditions of release will remain as previously set. Plea?”
“Not guilty, Your Honor,” Renner replies.
The whole thing lasts less than five minutes. At the end, the judge sets a pre-trial hearing date for two weeks later.
The next morning, Josh pulls us from physical training. “Command room.”
When we step into the room, all the packs from the garrison are there.
“We’re opening a task force for Aranya,” Sam announces. “Weekly inter-agency briefings every Tuesday.”
Everyone here knows this isn’t just another case. It’s personal to me. It’s the man who took away my mother. So when I look around, I expect to find resentment, annoyance at being pulled from their routines to join my case. But all I see is focus and determination.
I just nod. I couldn’t be more grateful.
And their support doesn’t end with the task force: over the next few training days at the garrison, I can’t help but notice the shift.
At first, it’s subtle, just other aegis showing up to the gym during our physical training time, making casual conversation about the equipment and the grind of T1P.
Then it gets weird, like they’re going out of their way to be friendly. Like they’re trying to get to know us. It’s annoying, to be honest. Slows down training. I don’t know what to do with this kind of friendliness. It throws me off my rhythm.
But it’s also… really good.
My brothers and I have never had real relationships with other aegis, and now I can see how good it is talking to someone who actually understands what we are.
We learn a lot.
David Solomon tells us about a tailor up in Great Sky all the garrison aegis go to. He makes good stuff for reasonable prices, way better than the fortune we paid in Bridgeport.
We’ve been wearing only the garrison boots, even for workouts, until Andreas Zervas tells us about an online store that sells sneakers in our size. Now we have proper running shoes.
Otto Bielke gives us a discount code for a protein powder brand, twenty percent off.
His brother Claus tells us about a shop in Bridgeport that sells blankets made from a special fabric.
Says Lucy, their nyra, swears it’s softer than anything she’s ever touched.
He guarantees Jo will lose her mind if we bring some home.
That week, we go to the store on Friday, just after our shift at the DEA, and buy a blanket and four pillowcases.
When we get home and give it to Jo, we see Claus was right: she’s over the moon.
Since that day, she’s only taken it off the nest to wash it, and the moment it’s dry, it goes right back on.
We need to go back and buy her at least one more set.