“Touch her and you’ll find out how fast I can draw, Chief or no Chief,” Hayes said.

His voice was very quiet, but the security guards stopped instantly.

They looked at Turner, then at Hayes, who was still holding his weapon toward the deck.

“You’re relieved of duty, Hayes,” Turner said, his voice shaking. “Hand over your weapon.”

“I take my orders from the base commander,” Hayes said. “But only when those orders are lawful.”

“This is a matter of base security,” Turner said. “She is a spy.”

“That’s a lie and you know it,” I said. “You tried to sell the telemetry to cover up the structural failure on the *Providence*.”

Turner’s eyes narrowed, his pupils shrinking to pinpricks under the fluorescent tubes.

“The *Providence* was a design flaw,” Turner said, taking a step toward me. “Your design.”

“The design was sound,” I said. “Your maintenance logs were falsified to save your promotion.”

The silence in the room was heavy, broken only by the steady hum of the cooling fans.

Lieutenant Carter looked from Turner to me, his mouth slightly open.