There were seventeen.
Not three.
Not five.
Seventeen flights across four airlines.
Different aircraft.
Different countries.
Different crews.
But the same pattern.
An unexplained technical event.
A maintenance record altered afterward.
A passenger complaint removed.
And a classified administrative code attached to the incident.
Rachel stared at the spreadsheet.
“This is bigger than our airline.”
Naomi nodded.
“Much bigger.”
They began reviewing passenger complaints.
That was when they discovered the strangest part.
Several passengers had reported seeing unusual activity during the incidents.
A technician entering the cockpit area.
A maintenance employee carrying equipment that wasn't listed on the work order.
A security officer ordering passengers away from a particular section of the cabin.
One passenger claimed someone had deliberately shut off an emergency communications system.
Every complaint had been removed from the official database.
Rachel checked the backup archive.
Deleted.
She checked email records.
Deleted.
She checked legal holds.
Nothing.
Then she found one surviving document.
A passenger had mailed a physical letter.
It had never entered the digital system.
The letter described Flight 443.
The passenger claimed that immediately before the aircraft experienced the warning cascade, a man wearing an airline maintenance uniform had entered the cockpit.
He had shown the captain a document.
The captain had looked confused.
Then the man had left.
Three minutes later, the warning system activated.
Naomi read the letter twice.
“Who was that man?”
Rachel enlarged the attached photograph.
It was blurry.
But the uniform badge was visible.
The badge didn't belong to the airline.
It carried a symbol.
A circle divided by three horizontal lines.
Naomi recognized it.
She had seen it once before.
On a security document recovered from Marcus Vale's office.
She pulled an old photograph from her private files.
Marcus was standing beside a government official at an aviation conference.
Behind them was a banner.
The same symbol appeared in the corner.
Rachel stared.
“That's federal.”
Naomi nodded.
“But I don't know which agency.”
Then Rachel's phone rang.
She answered.
Nobody spoke.
“Hello?”
Silence.
Then a man's voice whispered:
“Dr. Ellis has forty-eight hours.”
Rachel froze.
“Who is this?”
The line went dead.
Naomi looked at her.
“What did he say?”
Rachel's face had gone pale.
“He said you have forty-eight hours.”
Naomi walked to the window.
Outside, the city moved normally.
Cars.
People.
Aircraft rising into the afternoon sky.
Nobody knew that something was hiding inside the system designed to keep those aircraft safe.
And now Naomi had forty-eight hours to find it.
The Federal Door
Naomi's first instinct was to contact federal investigators.
Her second was to remember that the evidence suggested someone in Washington was already involved.
She chose carefully.
Instead of calling a government office, she contacted Daniel Cross.
Daniel was a former federal aviation investigator who had worked with Naomi years earlier.
He had left government service after a classified investigation was abruptly terminated.
When Naomi told him about Project Orion, he went silent.
“You found Orion?”
“Yes.”
“Then you need to stop using company devices.”
“Why?”
“Because Orion was never an airline program.”
Naomi's heart tightened.
“What was it?”
Daniel lowered his voice.
“Officially? Nothing.”
“Unofficially?”
“A predictive aviation security project.”
“What does that mean?”
“It was supposed to identify threats before they became accidents.”
Naomi frowned.
“That doesn't explain the manipulated records.”
“No.”
“Or the aircraft.”
“No.”
“Then tell me the truth.”
Daniel hesitated.
“Orion was testing how much control could be exerted over airline operations without passengers or crews knowing.”
Naomi stared at the phone.
“Control?”
“Maintenance scheduling. Security procedures. Passenger screening. Flight routing.”
“Why?”
“Because someone believed commercial aviation was too vulnerable to human decision-making.”
Naomi felt sick.
“Who?”
“I never learned the name.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“I learned enough to know that people who asked too many questions disappeared from the project.”
Naomi thought of Marcus Vale.
“Marcus knew.”
“Yes.”
“He warned me.”
“I know.”
Naomi froze.
“How do you know?”
Daniel didn't answer immediately.
Then he said:
“Because Marcus called me the night before he died.”
Naomi's breath caught.