Chapter 7 - Forty Minutes to Andrews
The maintenance panel at the rear galley had been forced.
Not dramatically.
No torn metal.
No obvious destruction.
Just enough tampering that someone who knew aircraft construction could slip into a restricted space without attracting attention.
Daniel stared into the dark opening.
“You first?”
I looked at him.
“You're volunteering me?”
“You're the Navy SEAL.”
“Retired.”
“That distinction feels unhelpful right now.”
Despite everything, I almost laughed.
The flight attendant handed me a flashlight.
I lowered myself carefully.
Pain tore through my leg as soon as I put weight on the narrow ladder.
For one second, my knee nearly folded.
Daniel grabbed my arm.
“I've got you.”
Three hours earlier, this man hadn't wanted to sit beside me.
Now he was keeping me from falling through an airplane.
Life moves fast.
The access area was cramped.
Mechanical systems lined the walls.
Noise from the aircraft structure was louder down there.
I moved slowly.
Daniel followed.
“You know where we're going?” I asked.
“Approximately.”
“Comforting.”
“I'm an executive, not an aircraft mechanic.”
“Even more comforting.”
We reached the service passage leading toward the cargo bay.
A panel stood open.
Someone had been here.
Inside, emergency lighting illuminated rows of luggage containers and secured freight.
Daniel checked shipping labels.
“Diagnostic unit should be forward right.”
We moved.
Then a voice came from behind us.
“You got old, Cole.”
I turned.
Viktor Sayegh stood ten feet away.
Gray hoodie gone.
Underneath he wore a dark fitted shirt.
Average build.
Ordinary face.
The kind of man people forgot five minutes after passing him in an airport.
Now I remembered him perfectly.
“You were supposed to be dead.”
“So were you.”
His accent was faint.
European influence over Middle Eastern roots.
“You boarded under a false identity.”
“That seems to have upset everyone.”
Daniel backed toward me.
Viktor noticed.
“Mr. Mercer.”
Daniel said nothing.
“You cost my partners a great deal of money.”
“You compromised my system.”
“Your system was compromised before your engineers finished celebrating themselves.”
Daniel's jaw tightened.
“What do you want?”
Viktor looked at me.
“History corrected.”
“Tyler and Luis aren't history to me.”
For the first time, his expression shifted.
“Karim wasn't history to me either.”
“Your brother built networks for men who murdered civilians.”
“And your government has never killed civilians?”
There was anger in the question.
Real anger.
I didn't answer the political argument.
At thirty-five thousand feet with innocent passengers above us, it was irrelevant.
“What happens to this plane?”
“If everything goes correctly? Nothing.”
“And if it doesn't?”
He smiled faintly.
“Then your government learns a painful lesson about automated trust.”
Daniel whispered, “The diagnostic unit.”
Viktor glanced toward a hardened black case secured among cargo.
A series of lights blinked across its front panel.
Daniel's face fell.
“It's active.”
I asked, “How long?”
Daniel crouched near the unit but didn't touch it.
“Could be transmitting already.”
Viktor said, “It is.”
My secure phone vibrated.
No service should have been available that deep in the aircraft.
Yet the device had a hardened antenna.
Hale.
I answered.
“Mason, we have a serious development.”
“Viktor's with us. Cargo device active.”
A pause.
Then: “Do not allow that device to complete its next authentication cycle.”
“How long?”
“Eleven minutes.”
Daniel heard.
He moved toward the unit.
Viktor stepped forward.
I blocked him.
He looked down at my left leg.
“You're slower.”
“Yes.”
“Painful?”
“Yes.”
“I wondered.”
“Your concern is touching.”
His expression hardened.
Then he moved.
He was good.
Not military operator good.
But trained.
He went for my damaged side immediately.
Smart.
I shifted.
Pain exploded through my knee.
I nearly dropped.
Daniel reached the equipment case.
Viktor drove forward again.
I caught him, redirected him into the cargo restraint netting, and pinned one arm.
No dramatic punches.
No movie fight.
Real confrontations in confined spaces are ugly, fast, and exhausting.
Viktor struck my injured leg.
My vision flashed white.
I went down.
He turned toward Daniel.
The executive saw him coming.
Daniel grabbed the nearest object—a padded cargo strap.
For one absurd moment, he looked at it as though disappointed it wasn't something more impressive.
Viktor reached him.
Daniel threw the strap.
Not at Viktor.
Around a metal handle.
He pulled.
A cargo net dropped between them.
Viktor became tangled for two seconds.
Two seconds was enough.
I got up.
Grabbed him.
Forced him down.
This time Daniel helped secure him with cargo restraints.
Viktor laughed while we did it.
“You think you've won.”
“No,” I said. “I think you're tied to a freight anchor.”
Daniel was already examining the diagnostic unit.
His hands moved quickly.
“It's locked.”
“Can you shut it down?”
“Not normally.”
“Today seems bad for normal.”
He looked at me.
“There may be a hardware isolation switch inside.”
“How do you open it?”
“Security fasteners.”
“Tools?”
“No.”
“Alternative?”
He looked around.
Then toward a mounted emergency maintenance kit.
I opened it.
Daniel found what he needed.
Seven minutes.
The case opened.
Inside, the hardware looked less dramatic than most people would imagine.
Boards.
Protected modules.
Status lights.
Cables.
Daniel stared.
“What?”
“This isn't ours.”
“The label says it is.”
“The shell is ours. The internal radio hardware isn't.”
“How bad?”
“Very.”
Five minutes.
Hale's voice came over secure comms.
“Meridian signal is attempting to authenticate simultaneously across multiple defense nodes.”
Daniel leaned toward the phone.
“I need revocation authority at enterprise root.”
Hale asked, “Can you execute?”
“Not alone.”
“What do you need?”
“Halcyon CTO authorization.”
Daniel and I looked at each other.
Evan Rourke.
The man who had ordered Daniel to bring the compromised laptop to Washington.
Hale said, “We're locating him.”
Viktor laughed again.
“You still haven't understood.”
I turned.
“Understood what?”
“Rourke isn't going to answer.”
Daniel froze.
“What did you do to him?”
“Nothing.”
Viktor smiled.
“Evan has been helping us for three years.”
Daniel's face collapsed.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“You're lying.”
“Ask yourself who approved Meridian's architecture. Who bypassed the first audit. Who told you to carry that laptop onto this flight.”
Daniel looked physically ill.
Two minutes thirty seconds.
Hale's voice returned.
“We have Rourke on secure connection.”
Daniel stared at the phone.
A man's voice came through.
“Daniel?”
Evan Rourke.
Daniel's anger erupted.
“You son of a bitch.”
“Daniel, listen to me.”
“You knew.”
“I can explain.”
“We have two minutes.”
Silence.
Then Rourke said, “Give me the device identifier.”
Daniel read it.
Typing on the other end.
One minute.
Rourke said, “I can send the revocation.”
Viktor stopped smiling.
Interesting.
Daniel noticed too.
“Do it.”
Thirty seconds.
Nothing.
“Evan?”
“I'm trying.”
Viktor began struggling against the restraints.
I watched him.
Ten seconds.
Rourke said, “Daniel, I'm sorry.”
The line disconnected.
Daniel stared at the phone.
“No.”
Five.
Four.
Three.
Then Daniel looked inside the device.
Found a physical fiber link.
“Authentication can't finish if the trusted hardware loses its signing module.”
“What happens if you pull it?”
“It could destroy the unit.”
“Passengers?”
“No.”
“Do it.”
He pulled.
A bright spark.
The lights died.
Silence.
The countdown on Hale's end stopped at one second.
One.
For several moments, nobody spoke.
Then Hale said, “Signal terminated.”
Daniel sat on the cargo floor.
I leaned against the wall.
Viktor closed his eyes.
We had made it.
Or I thought we had.
Then Captain Rodriguez came over my phone.
“Chief Cole, we have Andrews in range. But we've just received an emergency warning from the escort.”
“What warning?”
“One of the F-35s has been ordered to break formation.”
“Why?”
Rodriguez answered quietly.
“Because another aircraft has entered restricted airspace ahead of us and is not responding.”
Daniel stared at me.
The device on our plane had been only one part of the operation.
Whatever Viktor started wasn't over.
May you like
And we had less than forty minutes before Washington.
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