“Mitchell!” Carter yelled from the corridor, his shoulder slamming against the heavy steel door. “Open this door right now!”

“Keep back from the door, Lieutenant,” Hayes called out, his voice flat and steady.

Hayes shifted his weight, his boots squeaking slightly on the wet linoleum.

He kept his hand on the butt of his sidearm, his eyes fixed on the brass dog lever.

The metal of the lock assembly creaked as someone applied a heavy tool to the exterior handle.

I tapped the enter key, forcing the final injection script into the primary outbound buffer.

The terminal screen went entirely black for a fraction of a second.

Then, a single line of green text appeared at the top of the monitor.

*Data corrupt. Redundancy check failed. Transmission terminated.*

I let out a breath I had been holding for what felt like minutes.

The outbound telemetry was gone, replaced by a useless string of random binary code.

The design specifications for the new silent propulsion system were safe.

The deployed fleet would remain invisible.

“It’s done,” I whispered, my voice sounding thin in the small room.