“Yes. We’re ghosts inside their systems,” Colonel Rooke confirmed as he pulled up a forensic analysis. “The attack uses their own switching logic against them. There’s no malware signatures to look for. No external connections to back-trace. To the investigators, it’ll look like the catastrophic failure it was.”
“And if we nudge them a bit with CHIMERA, they’ll believe whatever narrative we feed them,” Yuryevna added.
Batista smiled slowly. Another tool of war. Another crossed line in defense of his country.
“All right, Colonel, Yuryevna. Keep the capability warm but weapons tight. This is a wartime-only option unless directed otherwise.” Batista checked his watch. Nearly noon. “And on that cheerful note, let’s break for lunch. Reconvene at 1400.”
Chairs scraped back. Conversations sprouted in small groups. Special Agent Cross caught up to Colonel Rooke near the door. “Hey, Colonel, out of curiosity, does it bother you that some of these actions you talk about will invariably lead to the death of civilians who are certain to be caught in the crossfire??” The FBI agent’s voice carried an edge. “It seems cold how we choose who lives or dies when these people are just doing their job.”
Colonel Rooke paused, studying the younger man. “I do. I think about it every day.” His drawl returned, softer. “The same way I think about our port workers if the PLA succeeds in their attempts to harm our people. It’s war, and war has casualties.”
Rooke’s hand found Cross’s shoulder. “We’re supposed to be better?”
He leaned in. “You think we’re the good guys. They think they’re the good guys. Know the difference?” His eyes hardened. “I want
Cross stared, uncertainty shifting to understanding. The weight of their decisions was suddenly real.
The Baltic Sea lay shrouded in predawn darkness, its surface disturbed only by the gentle wake of merchant vessels following the invisible highways of international shipping lanes. Twenty-three nautical miles southeast of Gotland, Sweden’s strategic island fortress, the HSwMS
The
Tonight, she ghosted along at eight knots on electric power alone, her passive sensors cataloging the electronic heartbeat of every vessel within sixty kilometers.
Lieutenant Commander Mats Algotsson hunched over the communications console in the state-of-the-art combat information center, his face illuminated by the blue-white glow of LED displays. The flash priority header from NATO Maritime Command made his stomach tighten. He read the message twice, then grabbed the internal phone.
“Bridge, CIC. Wake the captain. Immediately.”
Captain Henrik Dahl arrived on the bridge at 0441 hours, his uniform crisp despite the hour. Twenty years in the Swedish Navy had trained him to transition from deep sleep to full alertness in seconds. The concerned expressions on his officers’ faces gave him an additional boost of adrenaline — something was up.
“Talk to me, XO.”
Algotsson handed him a tablet displaying the encrypted message. “MARCOM alert came in twenty minutes ago. High priority. A US Air Force RC-135 Rivet Joint detected anomalous electronic emissions from a Chinese-flagged vessel approximately forty kilometers from our position.”
Dahl scrolled through the report, his expression hardening. The American surveillance aircraft, bristling with signals intelligence equipment, had picked up military-grade radar emissions from what should have been a civilian freighter. They were short bursts, precisely timed — the kind of pattern used to test targeting systems.
“Which vessel?” asked Dahl.
“MV
Lieutenant Stefan Lindström added from the navigation plot, his fingers tracing routes on the holographic display, “Sir, at her current course and speed, she’ll pass directly over the GosNet-1 cable junction in approximately three hours.”
