We drove for nearly two hours before my mother finally turned off the highway.
By then, the rain had begun. It started as a light tapping against the windshield, then thickened until the wipers struggled to keep the glass clear. The road narrowed as we entered a stretch of pine forest. Branches hung low over the pavement, and the headlights caught occasional flashes of wet bark and pale stones.
Mom drove without music.
Every few minutes, she checked the rearview mirror. Sometimes she glanced at the side mirrors, too. When a pair of headlights appeared behind us, her shoulders tightened. They eventually turned onto another road, but she didn't relax.
I tried to make sense of what had happened.
That morning, I'd been worried about a school presentation. By lunchtime, I'd been embarrassed in front of the entire eighth grade. By late afternoon, my mother had revealed that she'd worked on a secret military project, a supposedly dead man had appeared outside my school, and a retired admiral had disappeared.
Now we were driving into a forest to meet someone Mom trusted.
I had a hundred questions. I couldn't find a way to ask any of them without sounding frightened.
"Did you know Elias was alive?" I finally said.
Mom's hands shifted slightly on the steering wheel.
"No."
"But when you saw him, you looked like you recognized him."
"I recognized the way he moved. And the salute."
"What's so special about a salute?"
"People develop habits. Especially people who've spent years working together."
"Was he your friend?"
She was quiet for so long that I thought she wouldn't answer.
"Once."
I stared at her profile.
"Then why would he come after you?"
"Because he believes I took something from him."
"Did you?"
Her jaw tightened.
"Yes."
I waited.
She didn't explain.
The road curved around a steep hillside. At the end of a gravel track stood a small cabin with dark windows and a weather-beaten roof. There was no porch light, no mailbox, and no visible sign that anyone lived there.
Mom stopped the car several yards from the front steps.
Before I could unbuckle, the front door opened.
An older woman stood in the doorway holding a shotgun. Her gray hair was cut short, and a pair of reading glasses rested on top of her head. She wore a thick wool sweater and sturdy boots, as if she'd been expecting company but hadn't planned to make the evening particularly welcoming.
"Well," she called, "Rachel Miller. You certainly know how to choose an inconvenient night."
Mom stepped out of the car.
"Hello, Aunt June."
I stared at her.
Aunt June.
I'd heard that name throughout my childhood. Mom had told me June lived in Arizona, where she supposedly spent her retirement tending a garden and complaining about the heat. I'd sent her a birthday card once and received a short note in return, written in careful blue ink.
This woman was standing in a forest hundreds of miles from Arizona, holding a shotgun.
Mom opened the rear door and took out the metal box.
I followed her toward the cabin.
"You told me she lived in Arizona," I whispered.
"I know."
"Did you lie?"
Mom looked at me.
"Yes."
That answer bothered me more than the gun.
Aunt June lowered the barrel and examined me.
"So this is Lucas."
"Yes," Mom said.
The older woman studied my face, then gave a small nod.
"He's got your eyes. Poor kid."
"Nice to meet you, too," I muttered.
For the first time that evening, Mom almost smiled.
Inside, the cabin looked surprisingly ordinary. A plaid couch stood beside a woodstove. Books covered the shelves, and a battered coffee table held a stack of magazines and a half-finished crossword puzzle. A framed photograph of a trout hung crookedly above the fireplace.
The room smelled of wood smoke, coffee, and damp wool.
Aunt June shut the door and slid the deadbolt into place.
"How bad?" she asked Mom.
"Bad enough."
"That isn't a measurement."
"Carter is missing. Voss showed up at the school."
June's expression changed.
She glanced at me, then back at Mom.
"Did he see the boy?"
"I don't know."
"Did you bring the original?"
Mom lifted the metal box.
June exhaled through her nose. "Then we'd better stop standing around."
She walked toward a tall bookshelf in the far corner. Most of the books were old military histories, engineering manuals, and thick volumes about aviation. She placed both hands against the shelves and pushed.
The entire bookcase moved.
I stepped backward.
A narrow steel door appeared behind it, set into a reinforced frame. A keypad glowed beside the handle.
"What's behind that?" I asked.
"Something your mother should have shown you years ago," June said.
Mom shot her a look.
"June."
"What? We're past the point of pretending this is a normal family visit."
June entered a code. The steel door released with a muted click.
Beyond it was a room filled with equipment.
Monitors covered one wall. Radios and computer towers occupied metal desks. Maps had been pinned across a large board, connected by colored lines and marked with dates. Photographs showed people I'd never met, aircraft I'd only seen in documentaries, and locations identified by names I didn't recognize.
The air was cooler inside. It smelled faintly of dust and hot electronics.
At the center of the main board was a photograph of Admiral Carter.
Beside it was another photograph.
Elias Voss.
I stopped in the doorway.
It was unmistakably the same man from the school parking lot, except the image had been taken years earlier. He had no visible scar. His hair was darker, and he was smiling beside Mom near an aircraft hangar.
He looked like someone who might have helped carry groceries into our house.
The thought made my stomach turn.
Aunt June crossed to a desk and switched on a lamp.
"Carter disappeared about twenty minutes after the assembly," she said. "The security cameras went dark. His driver was found unconscious in the vehicle. No visible injuries beyond a blow to the head."
Mom placed the metal box on the desk.
"Voss wanted me to see him."
"Probably."
"He's been moving again?"
June nodded. "We've heard reports from Europe. Engineers disappearing. Contractors turning up dead. Research facilities losing equipment without signs of forced entry."
"Ghostwing," Mom said.
"That's what it looks like."
I stepped toward the board.
"You're tracking him?"
June gave me a sideways glance. "We're trying to."
"Why?"
"Because some people are very bad at leaving dangerous things alone."
Mom opened the box and removed the old photograph with the scratched-out face.
June took a small handheld light from a drawer.
"Put it under this."
She switched on a narrow blue beam and moved it slowly across the photograph. At first, nothing happened. Then a tiny symbol appeared near the lower edge.
A pale shape resembling a broken wing glimmered beneath the light.
I leaned forward.
"What is that?"
Mom's face went rigid.
"He marked it."
"Who did?"
"Voss."
June turned the photograph over and inspected its back. "This wasn't on the copy Lucas used at school, was it?"
"No," Mom said. "The original was in the box."
"Then he must have known which one to look for."
I thought about Mr. Reynolds taking my photograph before the presentation. He'd held it for several seconds, studying the image with an amused expression. At the time, I'd assumed he was checking the details.
Now the memory felt different.
"He touched the picture," I said.
Both women looked at me.
"At school. Mr. Reynolds took it from my hands before I went onstage. He held it for a while."
June straightened.
"Did he leave the auditorium afterward?"
"I don't know."
Mom's expression darkened.
"Why didn't you mention this earlier?"
"I didn't know it mattered."
She started to answer, then stopped. Her gaze moved toward the monitors.
Every screen flickered at once.
A wave of static rolled across the room.
June hurried to the main console. "That's not supposed to happen."
The overhead lights dimmed.
One by one, the monitors went black. A moment later, a face appeared on the largest screen.
Elias Voss.
The scar running from his temple to his jaw was more pronounced than I'd seen from the parking lot. One side of his mouth pulled slightly when he smiled. His eyes were pale and unusually steady.
"Rachel," he said. "Still choosing the most complicated route."
Mom stepped in front of me.
"Where's Carter?"
"Alive."
"Where?"
"That depends on how cooperative you intend to be."
June reached toward the console. A warning flashed across the screen.
"He's inside the system," she muttered. "I can't isolate the connection."
Voss leaned closer to the camera.
"I was hoping we'd speak privately. You always hated an audience."
"Then you should have stayed away from my family."
His smile faded.
"You've always had a talent for making everything personal."
"It became personal when you started threatening people."
"I haven't threatened anyone."
"You abducted Carter."
"He insisted on interfering."
Mom's voice grew colder.
"Let him go."
Voss looked at her for several seconds. Then his gaze shifted slightly, as if he were looking past her shoulder.
At me.
"Lucas Miller."
My stomach clenched.
I had never spoken to him. I had never seen him outside photographs and the brief glimpse from the parking lot. Yet the way he said my name made it sound as if he knew me.
Mom moved farther in front of me.
"Don't speak to him."
Voss ignored her.
"Your mother has told you about Ghostwing, hasn't she?"
"Some of it."
"Then ask her why the program was shut down so suddenly."
Mom's shoulders became rigid.
"Enough."
Voss continued as though he hadn't heard.
"Ask her why the entire project was terminated shortly after you were born. Ask her why the system responded to only one pilot's neural signature."
I looked at Mom.
"What is he talking about?"
She didn't answer.
Voss smiled faintly.
"She saved Admiral Carter during that operation. But the first person she saved was you."
A sharp, cold sensation moved across my skin.
"Mom?"
The image distorted.
Voss's face broke into fragments of light and static before the screen went black. Every monitor followed.
For several seconds, nobody moved.
Then a deep mechanical hum passed over the cabin.
It was so low that I felt it in my chest before I heard it properly. The floor vibrated. A metal cup on the desk rattled against its saucer.
June grabbed her shotgun from the adjoining room.
Mom seized my arm.
"Stay close."
The lights died.
Darkness swallowed the equipment, the maps, and the faces on the walls. Outside, the rain suddenly sounded strange. Instead of falling straight down, it seemed to curve around an enormous shape moving above the cabin.
A shadow passed over the windows, but there was nothing visible to cast it.
I stumbled toward Mom.
"What is that?"
She pulled me against her.
For one brief moment, I felt her hands trembling.
Then she leaned close enough that her breath brushed my ear.
"Lucas, your father didn't die in a crash."
I froze.
Before I could ask what she meant, the mechanical hum deepened again.
The dead monitor crackled.
Voss's voice returned, calm and almost affectionate.
"Hello, son."
Click here to continue reading: PART 4: The Man I Had Mourned Since Childhood Was Alive, and My Mother Had to Lead Me Toward the Place Where It All Began
The Moment My Teacher Turned My Proudest Memory Into a Joke in Front of the Entire Eighth Grade
Part 3 of 40
