Page 15 of Echo: Burn
"Already working on it." More screens light up, schematics loading. "But here's where it gets interesting. Odin showed up at Dr. Hart's clinic the same day the facility went dark. He had chemical burns on his paws. Burns consistent with exposure to organophosphate compounds."
My blood goes cold. "Nerve agents."
"Nerve agent precursors," Tommy corrects. "The building blocks for chemical weapons. Nothing that would kill you oncontact, and definitely nothing that should exist outside military research facilities."
"Christ." Mercer runs a hand through his hair. "The Committee's running a chemical weapons program?"
"Or stealing one." I set the empty mug down harder than intended. "Which means Odin can lead us to their cache. And they know it."
"That's why they want him dead." Stryker's expression is grim. "Why they want Dr. Hart dead. Why they're burning through Protocol Seven. If that dog alerts on their facility, if anyone follows that trail, the Committee's exposure goes from bad to catastrophic."
Silence settles over the war room, heavy and oppressive.
"So this isn't just about protecting a civilian who stumbled into the wrong place at the wrong time," Mercer says quietly.
"No." Stryker's jaw tightens. "This is about a conspiracy that reaches into government agencies, military installations, shadow operations that don't officially exist."
"Weapons," Rourke adds, his voice flat. "Weapons that could kill thousands."
The weight of it sits on all of us. Not just one woman's life. Not just one dog's detection. An entire operation designed to manufacture death on a scale that makes our kill counts look like rounding errors.
"We need to get her out of here." I voice what everyone's thinking. "Send her somewhere the Committee can't find her. Mexico. Canada. Give her a new identity and enough money to disappear."
"She won't go." Tommy's tone suggests he already knows this. "I've been monitoring her communications for the past week. She ran away from an abusive ex six years ago. She won’t run again."
"She will if I order her to."
"Will she?" Rourke meets my eyes with that unsettling directness he uses when he's calling bullshit. "You saw her out there, Kane. She killed two men without hesitation. Kept her head when professionals were trying to put rounds through her. She's not some helpless civilian who needs saving."
"She's a target...”
"We're all targets." Stryker cuts me off. "Morrison was on that list. Sarah barely survived her extraction. Every person in this facility is marked for death by the Committee. Dr. Hart's name is just the newest addition."
"Which is exactly why we should get her clear before...”
"Before what?" The voice comes from the doorway, and I turn to find Willa standing there with fresh clothes and damp hair. She's showered, changed, and the exhaustion in her eyes has hardened into something sharper. "Before the Committee kills me? They're already trying to do that."
"How long have you been standing there?" I ask.
"Long enough." She moves into the room with the confidence of someone who's decided to stop asking permission. "Protocol Seven. Nerve agent precursors. A dog who knows where the Committee hides their chemical weapons. Did I miss anything?"
Tommy at least has the grace to look uncomfortable. "Dr. Hart, I'm sorry. You weren't supposed to hear...”
"But I did." She turns to me, and there's steel in her voice that wasn't there before. Or maybe it was always there, and I'm only now seeing it. "So let's talk about what happens next."
"What happens next is you leave." I cross my arms, falling back on command authority. "We get you out of Montana, set you up somewhere safe with a new identity. The Committee loses your trail, and you get to live."
"And Odin?"
"Stays here. We'll use him to find the Committee's cache, expose their operation, and shut them down."
"Without me."
"Without you."
She's silent for a moment, studying me with those eyes that probably spent years diagnosing problems people didn't want to acknowledge. Then she shakes her head.
"No."
