Page 55 of Duty Compromised
“That’s different.”
“No, it’s not. It’s just a different kind of intelligence. One that’s probably saved more lives than my algorithms ever will.”
He was quiet for a moment, then asked, “What made you go into quantum computing? Why cryptography specifically?”
“I wanted to protect things. Information. People.” I pushed my vegetables around my plate, searching for the right words. “When you can see all the vulnerabilities in systems, all the ways they can be exploited, you want to build better walls. Stronger locks.”
“Is that why you developed the Cascade Protocol originally? Before you realized it could be weaponized?”
“We thought we were making communication safer for first responders. Law enforcement.” The familiar weight of that mistake settled over me. “We never imagined someone would use it as a weapon.”
“That’s not on you. You were trying to help.”
“Tell that to everyone who’ll suffer if it gets sold.” I set down my fork. “Sometimes I wonder if we should have seen it coming. If I should have been smart enough to realize?—”
“Hey.” His voice pulled me from that spiral. “You can’t predict every way someone might twist something good into something harmful. That’s not your failure.”
“Is that why you joined Citadel Solutions?” I asked, wanting to shift the focus off my mistakes. “To protect people?”
“Part of it.” He took a drink of water. “Wanted to help people. Protect them. The Army gave me purpose, but Citadel gave me…more. A different way to serve.”
“Must be dangerous.”
“Sometimes.” He took another bite, seeming to weigh his words. “We extracted a doctor a few months ago. International medical volunteer named Lauren Valentino. She was working at a clinic in Corazón when the local cartel decided they wanted her.”
“What happened?”
“We got her out. Barely. The whole thing was a mess, but she made it. So did the team.” He smiled at the memory. “You know what the crazy part was? My colleague and buddy Logan—toughest guy I know, never smiles, barely talks—he fell for her. Hard. They’ve been together ever since.”
I couldn’t stop my smile. “That’s romantic.”
“That’s Logan Kane experiencing human emotions for the first time in recorded history.” He grinned at the memory. “The man went from having two facial expressions—scowl and slightly less scowl—to actually smiling at team dinners. It’s like watching a statue learn to laugh. We’re all still adjusting.”
“She’s a doctor?”
“Yep, and he’s a soldier. But somehow it works. She gets him. Gets all of us, really. Shows up to team dinners now, knows everyone’s stories.”
“Must be nice,” I said softly. “Having someone who understands that life.”
“Yeah. Someone who gets that the job isn’t just a job. That sometimes you do things because they’re right, even when they’re dangerous.”
“I could never do something like that. Put myself in danger deliberately.”
He moved his hand across the table, fingers barely brushing mine, then finding the bruise on my cheekbone with impossible gentleness. “You’re doing it right now.”
The touch lasted maybe two seconds, but I felt it everywhere. “That’s different. I’m just writing code.”
“You’re rebuilding something that was sabotaged. Going back to work when someone was willing to hurt you, or worse, to stop you from working. That takes guts.”
“I never thought of it that way.”
“Well, you should.” His hand was back on his side of the table, but I could still feel the ghost of his touch. “You have more courage than you give yourself credit for.”
Something shifted in my chest, a warmth I didn’t recognize. “Thank you for saying that.”
“Thank you for trusting me.”
“You make it easy.” The words escaped before I could stop them. “I mean, you make me look at things differently. See myself differently. I’m usually so stuck in my head, in the patterns and the code, that I forget there’s a whole world of different ways to be smart. To be brave.”
