It crossed the dark water, moving southeast toward the open ocean.

“It’s bypassing the local grid entirely,” I said.

The line ended at a set of coordinates just past the three-mile limit, in international waters.

“There is a receiver out there,” I said. “A vessel.”

“We have patrol boats in the sound,” Turner said quickly. “I can radio them.”

“No,” I said. “If they know we’ve detected the signal, they’ll terminate the connection and destroy the physical transmitter before we can trace the identity of the traitor inside this base.”

The progress bar hit fifty-five percent.

“We need that physical device,” I said. “And we need whoever is holding it.”

Above us, the ventilation shaft rattled again, louder this time.

A small flake of grey paint drifted down from the ceiling, landing on the glass screen of my tablet.

Hayes looked up, his eyes narrowing as he raised his rifle.

“Patterson, cover the ladder,” Hayes ordered.

A sharp, metallic scrape echoed through the ductwork directly above our heads.

I held my breath, my thumb hovering over the tablet screen as the signal strength indicator suddenly spiked to one hundred percent.