PART 2 — SOMEONE WANTED THE MACHINE TO FAI
“I didn’t say I would do it before documenting what I found.”
Richard’s expression hardened.
“We’re losing thousands of dollars every minute.”
“Then you should be very interested in finding out why.”
I pulled my phone from my pocket and photographed the control screen.
Then I photographed the parameter history.
Then the alarm log.
Then the machine identification plate.
Richard stepped closer.
“What exactly are you doing?”
“Protecting myself.”
“From what?”
I looked at him.
“From whoever changed these settings deciding later that the contractor caused the damage.”
Nobody spoke.
Walter slowly lowered the wrench he was holding.
Mason stared at the floor.
Richard gave a short, irritated laugh.
“You think someone sabotaged the machine?”
“I think three critical parameters were changed outside their approved commissioning values.”
“That could be an accident.”
“One parameter could be an accident.”
I pointed toward the screen.
“Three related parameters changed in a way that creates exactly these alarms?”
I shook my head.
“That’s not somebody bumping the wrong button.”
Richard glanced at Martin.
“Who has access?”
Martin hesitated.
“Engineering. Maintenance supervisors. Operations management.”
“And Tyler?” I asked.
Martin’s eyes flicked toward me.
“Yes.”
Richard immediately frowned.
“Why are you asking about Tyler?”
I didn’t answer.
Instead, I turned toward Mason.
“Tell him.”
Mason’s face went pale.
Richard looked between us.
“Tell me what?”
Mason swallowed.
“I saw Tyler here this morning.”
“What time?”
“A little before eleven.”
My eyes went to the alarm history.
The first warning had appeared at 11:09.
Two minutes after my termination.
Richard noticed me looking at the screen.
“What?”
I pointed.
“First alarm, 11:09.”
Then I looked at Mason.
“You’re sure Tyler was here before eleven?”
“Yes.”
“Doing what?”
“He had the parameter screen open.”
Richard’s face changed.
Not dramatically.
Just enough.
That tiny tightening around his eyes told me he knew something I didn’t.
I noticed.
So did Martin.
“Richard,” I said quietly, “why was Tyler touching commissioning parameters?”
“He’s an engineer.”
“No.”
The word came out sharper than I intended.
“He’s a process analyst with eighteen months of experience. He isn’t authorized to modify servo calibration.”
Richard’s jaw tightened.
“He was recently given additional responsibilities.”
“By whom?”
Silence.
Walter looked at Richard.
Martin looked at Richard.
Mason looked at Richard.
Finally, Richard said, “Me.”
There it was.
I nodded slowly.
“You gave Tyler permission to modify a machine he wasn’t trained to commission?”
“I gave him permission to familiarize himself with it.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
Richard stepped closer.
“We are not paying you six hundred thousand dollars to interrogate management.”
“No.”
I met his stare.
“You paid me six hundred thousand dollars for one hour of emergency diagnostics.”
I tapped the control screen.
“And diagnosing why the machine failed is exactly what I’m doing.”
Richard looked at his watch.
“Forty-three minutes remaining.”
I smiled slightly.
“Then I suggest you stop wasting them.”
Walter coughed into his hand to hide a laugh.
Richard heard it.
He ignored him.
I connected my laptop to the controller.
The machine’s configuration history appeared.
Every significant change was timestamped.
I opened the audit trail.
11:01:42.
User login.
TYLER.B.
11:02:11.
Servo parameter accessed.
11:03:06.
Third-axis gain modified.
11:03:48.
Spindle compensation modified.
11:04:19.
Acceleration limit modified.
Nobody said anything.
I scrolled farther.
11:05:02.
Changes saved.
11:05:17.
User logout.
I leaned back.
“There you go.”
Richard stared at the screen.
Martin whispered, “Jesus.”
Walter muttered something considerably less polite.
Richard recovered quickly.
“That doesn’t prove intent.”
“I didn’t say it did.”
“You called it sabotage.”
“I said someone changed the settings.”
I pointed toward the audit trail.
“Now we know who.”
Richard pulled out his phone.
“Where is Tyler?”
Martin answered before anyone could call.
“He left.”
Richard turned sharply.
“What?”
“About fifteen minutes ago.”
“Why?”
“He said he had a family emergency.”
I looked at Mason.
Mason gave the smallest shake of his head.
He didn’t believe it either.
Richard dialed Tyler.
Straight to voicemail.
He tried again.
Voicemail.
Richard cursed under his breath.
Then his phone rang.
He looked at the caller ID.
Whatever name appeared there erased the anger from his face.
He answered immediately.
“Mr. Holloway.”
The owner.
Richard walked several feet away.
“Yes, sir.”
Pause.
“We have someone working on it.”
Another pause.
Richard looked at me.
“Yes. Ethan.”
Longer pause.
His face tightened.
“No, sir. He’s not technically an employee anymore.”
I almost laughed.
Even from twenty feet away, I could hear the owner shouting through the phone.
Richard turned his back to us.
“It happened before we understood the scope of—”
More shouting.
“Yes.”
Pause.
“Six hundred.”
Another pause.
“Thousand.”
Walter looked at me.
I looked at Walter.
Mason covered his mouth.
Richard pulled the phone away from his ear for a second.
Then put it back.
“Yes, sir. I approved it.”
Another pause.
Richard looked directly at me.
“I’ll ask.”
He lowered the phone.
“How quickly can you get the machine running?”
I checked the clock.
“Assuming nothing mechanical has been damaged, maybe twenty minutes.”
Richard relayed that.
The owner apparently said something else.
Richard’s shoulders stiffened.
Then he handed the phone toward me.
“He wants to speak with you.”
I didn’t take it.
“My contract is with Horizon.”
“He owns Horizon.”
“Then he can come downstairs.”
Richard stared at me like I had lost my mind.
“He’s the chairman.”
“And I’m on the clock.”
Walter turned away completely this time.
Richard whispered, “You are enjoying this.”
“No.”
I looked back at the machine.
“I spent eleven years being useful enough to call at two in the morning but apparently not useful enough to keep employed.”
That wiped the anger from his face.
For a second, neither of us said anything.
Then Richard raised the phone again.
“He says he’s coming down.”
“Good.”
I returned to the controller.
The recovery itself wasn’t complicated.
The danger was restoring settings without understanding whether the machine had suffered physical damage while running under Tyler’s altered configuration.
I commanded a diagnostic check.
Third-axis temperature.
Elevated, but safe.
Servo load.
High.
Spindle bearing vibration.
Borderline.
I frowned.
Walter saw it.
“What?”
“Spindle vibration is higher than I like.”
“Damaged?”
“Maybe.”
Richard heard us.
“Can we run?”
“We can test.”
“We need production.”
“You need a machine that doesn’t throw a spindle through its housing at twelve thousand RPM.”
That ended the argument.
I restored the approved parameter set from my commissioning backup.
Then I locked the configuration behind administrator access.
The controller rebooted.
For ten seconds, everyone watched the screen.
One alarm disappeared.
Then another.
Then the third.
Walter whispered, “Come on, sweetheart.”
The controller finished loading.
GREEN — READY.
Someone behind us actually applauded.
I raised one hand.
“Not yet.”
The applause stopped.
“We haven’t cut anything.”
I loaded the qualification test block.
Walter secured the test piece.
Mason moved behind the safety line.
Richard stood close enough that I could hear his breathing.
I pressed cycle start.
The spindle began turning.
Three thousand RPM.
Five thousand.
Eight thousand.
No alarm.
The third axis moved.
Smooth.
The tool changer rotated.
Perfect.
Then the spindle accelerated toward twelve thousand.
I watched the vibration graph.
0.7.
0.9.
1.1.
Then—
2.8.
I hit emergency stop.
The machine went silent.
Richard nearly shouted.
“Why did you stop it?”
“Because we have damage.”
His face drained.
“How bad?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“Can Meridian’s parts run?”
“Not safely.”
Richard looked like someone had punched him.
“What do you mean not safely?”
“I mean Tyler’s parameter changes didn’t just crash the controller.”
I pointed toward the spindle housing.
“He may have damaged the spindle bearings.”
Martin stepped forward.
“How long to repair?”
“If the cartridge needs replacement?”
I exhaled.
“Best case, twelve hours.”
Richard stared at me.
“Meridian’s qualification begins in seven.”
“Then you have a problem.”
“We have a problem.”
“No.”
I looked him straight in the eye.
“You have a problem.”
The elevator doors opened behind us.
A man in his late sixties stepped into Bay Three wearing a dark suit without a tie.
I recognized him immediately.
Samuel Holloway.
Founder and majority owner of Horizon Precision.
He rarely visited the floor.
When he did, managers suddenly discovered safety glasses and remembered employees’ names.
Samuel walked directly toward us.
“Which one of you is Parker?”
Richard started speaking.
“Sir, Ethan is—”
Samuel ignored him.
His eyes settled on me.
“You’re Ethan Parker?”
“Yes.”
“You got my machine running?”
“Temporarily.”
“Then why is it stopped?”
“Possible spindle damage.”
He looked at the machine.
“From the parameter changes?”
“Yes.”
His eyes moved to Richard.
“What parameter changes?”
Richard hesitated.
I rotated my laptop toward Samuel.
“These.”
Samuel studied the audit log.
His expression didn’t change until he saw the username.
TYLER.B.
Then he looked up.
“Tyler Bennett?”
“Yes,” Mason said.
Samuel turned toward Richard.
“Your nephew?”
The room went dead silent.
I looked at Richard.
Nephew?
Nobody had ever told me that.
Mason’s eyes widened.
Walter slowly crossed his arms.
Richard’s face became rigid.
“That isn’t relevant.”
Samuel stared at him.
“It became relevant when his username appeared next to unauthorized modifications on a two-million-dollar machine.”
Richard lowered his voice.
“Tyler was being trained to take over some engineering responsibilities.”
And suddenly everything made sense.
My termination.
Tyler spending more time around my projects.
The strange questions he had asked over the previous month.
Requests for my documentation.
Requests for passwords.
Requests for commissioning notes.
I looked at Richard.
“You fired me to give Tyler my position.”
Richard said nothing.
He didn’t need to.
Samuel looked between us.
“Is that true?”
Richard finally spoke.
“We were restructuring.”
“That’s corporate language.”
Samuel stepped closer.
“Did you terminate the engineer responsible for commissioning this machine so your nephew could replace him?”
Richard’s face reddened.
“Ethan’s salary was significantly higher.”
I almost laughed.
“Seventy-two thousand.”
Nobody laughed.
Richard realized too late how ridiculous that sounded after approving a $600,000 emergency payment.
Samuel looked at me.
“You made seventy-two thousand dollars?”
“Yes.”
“And we just paid you six hundred thousand for an hour?”
“Yes.”
Samuel slowly turned toward Richard.
“That may be the most expensive cost-saving decision in the history of this company.”
Walter couldn’t hold it anymore.
A laugh escaped him.
Then Mason laughed.
Even Martin covered his mouth.
Richard looked furious.
But Samuel wasn’t finished.
“Where is Tyler?”
“Nobody knows,” Martin said.
Samuel looked at security.
“Find him.”
One of the guards nodded and stepped away.
I checked my timer.
“Fourteen minutes.”
Samuel looked at me.
“What?”
“My contracted hour.”
Richard stared.
“You cannot be serious.”
“I am.”
Samuel raised one hand before Richard could continue.
“What happens after fourteen minutes?”
“My emergency diagnostic engagement ends.”
“And the machine?”
“Still needs repair.”
“How much?”
Richard immediately interrupted.
“Don’t.”
Samuel looked at him.
“Excuse me?”
“He’ll give you another insane number.”
Samuel looked back at me.
“How much?”
I closed the laptop.
“For continued emergency service through Meridian qualification?”
“Yes.”
“Two million dollars.”
Richard exploded.
“Absolutely not!”
Samuel didn’t even look at him.
“What does that include?”
“Inspection of the spindle assembly, emergency sourcing of replacement components if required, installation oversight, recalibration, test cuts, and support through Meridian’s qualification.”
Samuel considered it.
“What happens if we don’t hire you?”
“You find another specialist.”
“How long?”
“For this model?”
I shrugged.
“Call Germany.”
Samuel looked at the clock on the wall.
“And Meridian?”
“Probably walks.”
Richard stepped between us.
“Samuel, this is extortion.”
“No,” I said.
Richard turned toward me.
“This is a man exploiting an emergency he helped create.”
That sentence changed the room.
I stared at him.
“Say that again.”
Richard realized immediately that he had gone too far.
But pride wouldn’t let him retreat.
“You were responsible for this machine.”
“Until 11:07.”
“You knew nobody else understood it.”
“You fired me anyway.”
“You started a company a month ago.”
“Yes.”
“And now, conveniently, our most important machine fails the same day we terminate you.”
Mason spoke.
“Richard—”
“Stay out of this.”
I calmly opened my laptop again.
Then I pulled up the audit log.
“11:01. Tyler changes parameters.”
I held up my termination letter.
“11:07. You fire me.”
I pointed toward the alarm history.
“11:09. First machine alarm.”
Then I looked at Samuel.
“Unless Richard would like to explain how I sabotaged a machine six minutes before I knew I was being terminated, I think we’re finished with that accusation.”
Samuel’s expression became very cold.
“Richard.”
Richard said nothing.
Samuel held out his hand.
“Your badge.”
Richard blinked.
“What?”
“Give me your badge.”
“Samuel—”
“Now.”
The entire floor seemed to stop breathing.
Richard slowly unclipped his badge.
Samuel took it.
“You are suspended pending investigation.”
“You can’t be serious.”
“I have a two-million-dollar machine damaged, a critical customer deadline at risk, an unauthorized employee changing calibration parameters, and the manager who authorized his access accusing the one person capable of fixing the situation.”
Samuel pointed toward security.
“Escort him upstairs.”
Richard looked at me.
The hatred in his eyes was unmistakable.
“This isn’t over.”
I didn’t respond.
Security walked him toward the elevator.
The doors closed.
Samuel turned back toward me.
“Two million?”
“Two million.”
“Guaranteed repair?”
“No.”
He raised an eyebrow.
“I don’t guarantee what I haven’t inspected.”
For the first time, he smiled.
“Good answer.”
He extended his hand.
“Get me a contract.”
I shook it.
“I already have one.”
Of course I did.
I opened my bag and removed a standard emergency service agreement.
Samuel read the first page.
Then the second.
When he reached the liability clause, he paused.
“You really did start this company before today.”
“I did.”
“Why?”
I looked around the manufacturing floor where I had spent eleven years.
“Because I eventually realized Horizon wasn’t paying me for what I knew.”
I glanced toward the elevator Richard had disappeared into.
“It was paying me for how afraid I was to leave.”
Samuel studied me for a long moment.
Then he signed.
At 12:18 p.m., Parker Precision Services received its second contract.
Two million dollars.
And suddenly my terrible morning had become the most profitable day of my life.
But money wasn’t what had my attention.
Something about Tyler’s changes still bothered me.
The values were wrong.
Dangerously wrong.
But they weren’t random.
Someone had chosen them deliberately.
And if Tyler simply wanted my job, destroying the machine he was supposed to inherit made absolutely no sense.
Unless the machine wasn’t the real target.
I turned toward Mason.
“Pull up the Meridian program.”
He frowned.
“The machining program?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I want to know whether Tyler touched anything else.”
Mason logged into the programming station.
We checked the file history.
Nothing.
Then the tool library.
Nothing.
Then the inspection sequence.
Nothing.
I was almost ready to move on when I noticed a small revision marker beside Meridian’s material specification.
“Open that.”
Mason clicked.
A change history appeared.
My stomach tightened.
Someone had altered the approved material code.
Not today.
Three days earlier.
User:
TYLER.B.
Walter leaned over my shoulder.
“What does that mean?”
I stared at the screen.
“It means the machine may not have been what Tyler was trying to sabotage.”
Samuel stepped closer.
“What was he trying to sabotage?”
I opened the original Meridian specification beside the altered version.
The approved alloy was aerospace-grade material certified for high-stress applications.
Tyler had substituted a cheaper grade with a nearly identical internal code.
To someone glancing at a production traveler, it would look legitimate.
To Meridian’s laboratory?
It would fail.
And not immediately.
The parts could pass dimensional inspection.
They could pass surface inspection.
They might even pass initial qualification.
But under sustained stress, they could fracture.
Samuel’s voice became very quiet.
“Are you telling me we were about to ship Meridian parts made from the wrong material?”
“If this revision reached production, yes.”
“Could someone get hurt?”
I looked at him.
“Depending on where Meridian uses the components?”
I paused.
“Yes.”
Nobody spoke.
Samuel pulled out his phone.
“Lock the facility.”
Martin blinked.
“What?”
“No one leaves until security preserves every access record and every relevant file.”
He looked at me.
“Can you determine whether any parts were already made under this revision?”
“I can try.”
Mason was already searching.
Then he froze.
His face went white.
“Ethan.”
“What?”
He pointed at the screen.
A production batch had been completed two days earlier.
Twenty-four components.
Status:
TRANSFERRED TO SHIPPING.
Samuel’s voice sharpened.
“Where are they?”
Martin grabbed his radio.
“Shipping, hold Meridian batch MP-774 immediately.”
Static.
Then a voice answered.
“MP-774?”
“Yes.”
A pause.
My chest tightened.
The voice came back.
“That truck left twenty minutes ago.”
Samuel looked at me.
Nobody moved.
The machine suddenly wasn’t our biggest problem anymore.
“Where is the truck going?” I asked.
Martin checked the shipping system.
His fingers shook as he typed.
Then he stopped.
“Meridian Aerospace.”
Samuel immediately began issuing orders.
“Call the driver. Call Meridian. Tell them not to open that shipment.”
Martin ran toward the office.
Mason stared at the material revision.
“Why would Tyler do this?”
“I don’t know.”
Walter shook his head.
“Maybe he was covering up a mistake.”
“No.”
I pointed toward the revision date.
“He changed this three days ago.”
Then I pointed toward today’s machine parameters.
“And he changed these minutes before I was terminated.”
I looked toward the empty elevator.
“Those are two different actions.”
Samuel understood.
“The material change was the real plan.”
“And the machine failure?”
I thought about it.
Then the answer came.
“A distraction.”
Mason whispered, “From the shipment.”
Exactly.
Everyone would be focused on Bay Three.
Production managers.
Engineering.
Quality.
Even senior leadership.
And while we fought to save the Meridian qualification deadline, a truck carrying compromised components would quietly leave the facility.
Samuel’s face hardened.
“Find Tyler.”
A security officer hurried toward us.
“Mr. Holloway.”
Samuel turned.
“What?”
“We located Mr. Bennett’s vehicle.”
“Where?”
“Still in the employee lot.”
That made no sense.
Martin had said Tyler left.
If his car was still here—
“Check the cameras,” I said.
The officer nodded.
“He didn’t leave through the main exit.”
“Then where is he?”
The officer hesitated.
“We’re trying to determine that.”
My phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
I almost ignored it.
Then a message appeared.
ETHAN, DON’T LET THEM RUN THE MERIDIAN PARTS.
I stared at the screen.
A second message arrived.
TYLER DIDN’T DO THIS ALONE.
My heartbeat changed.
Mason noticed.
“What is it?”
I didn’t answer.
A third message appeared.
CHECK RICHARD’S OFFICE BEFORE SECURITY CLEARS IT.
I showed Samuel.
His expression darkened.
“Who sent that?”
“No idea.”
Then a fourth message arrived.
And this one made my blood run cold.
YOU HAVE 8 MINUTES BEFORE THE FILES ERASE THEMSELVES.
I grabbed my laptop.
“Where is Richard’s office?”
Samuel was already moving.
“Upstairs.”
We ran.
The elevator felt impossibly slow.
Samuel called IT while we climbed.
“Disconnect Richard Cole’s workstation from the network. Do not shut it down.”
Pause.
“What do you mean you can’t?”
Another pause.
Samuel’s face changed.
“When?”
He looked at me.
“Someone initiated a remote deletion.”
“How long ago?”
“Two minutes.”
The elevator opened.
We ran down the executive hallway.
Richard’s office door was locked.
Samuel didn’t bother asking for a key.
“Security!”
A guard swiped an override card.
The door opened.
Richard’s computer was on.
A progress window sat in the center of the screen.
SECURE DELETION IN PROGRESS.
63%.
I dropped my bag.
“Don’t touch anything.”
67%.
I reached behind the workstation and disconnected the network cable.
The progress continued.
71%.
“It’s local.”
I opened a command terminal.
74%.
Mason arrived behind us, breathing hard.
“Can you stop it?”
“Maybe.”
78%.
I killed one process.
Nothing.
82%.
A second.
Nothing.
86%.
Then I noticed the deletion utility wasn’t targeting the main drive.
It was targeting an encrypted virtual partition.
I forced the partition offline.
The progress bar froze.
91%.
Nobody breathed.
The window remained frozen.
Samuel whispered, “Did you stop it?”
“I stopped something.”
I opened the remaining directory.
Most files were gone.
But not all.
One folder remained partially intact.
MERIDIAN TRANSFER.
Inside were emails.
Purchase records.
Material certifications.
And photographs.
I opened the first email.
Sender:
Richard Cole.
Recipient:
Tyler Bennett.
Subject:
TRANSITION PLAN.
Samuel leaned closer.
The message was short.
Tyler—
Once Parker is gone, the floor will be yours.
Do exactly what we discussed.
Do not make any changes until Wednesday.
R.
Mason whispered, “Oh my God.”
I opened another.
This one wasn’t between Richard and Tyler.
Richard had sent it to an outside address.
The message contained Meridian’s confidential drawings.
Samuel’s hand tightened against the desk.
“That’s proprietary customer data.”
Another email.
Pricing information.
Another.
Production schedules.
Another.
Qualification requirements.
Someone had been feeding Horizon’s confidential information to an outside company.
Then I saw the company name.
Northstar Manufacturing.
I knew Northstar.
Everyone in our industry did.
They were Horizon’s biggest competitor for the Meridian contract.
Walter, who had just reached the doorway, read the name over my shoulder.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
Suddenly the entire scheme became clearer.
The wrong material.
The damaged machine.
The missed qualification.
If Horizon failed Meridian badly enough, Northstar would be perfectly positioned to take the program.
Samuel stared at the evidence.
“This could destroy the company.”
“No,” I said.
“It almost did.”
Then we heard shouting in the hallway.
A security officer rushed past.
Samuel stepped outside.
“What happened?”
The guard turned.
“We found Tyler.”
“Where?”
“Loading dock four.”
Samuel frowned.
“Doing what?”
The guard hesitated.
Then said something none of us expected.
“He was unconscious.”
The hallway went silent.
Samuel stared at him.
“Call an ambulance.”
“Already done.”
I looked back at the computer.
If Tyler was unconscious, then who had sent me the messages?
My phone buzzed again.
Unknown number.
I opened it.
One final message.
RICHARD KNOWS YOU FOUND THE FILES.
Then another line appeared.
AND HE NEVER LEFT THE BUILDING.
I slowly raised my eyes toward Samuel.
“Where did security take Richard?”
Samuel looked at the guard.
The guard reached for his radio.
“Unit Three, confirm Richard Cole is in conference room B.”
Static.
Nothing.
He tried again.
“Unit Three?”
Still nothing.
Then the radio crackled.
A voice finally came through.
But it wasn’t security.
It was Richard.
“Ethan.”
Everyone froze.
Richard’s voice came through the radio calmly.
Almost pleasantly.
“You always were too curious.”
Samuel grabbed the radio.
“Richard, this ends now.”
A quiet laugh came through the speaker.
“No, Samuel.”
Then Richard said five words that made me turn immediately toward the windows overlooking Bay Three.
“You should check the machine.”
I ran to the glass.
Below us, the machining center we had just stabilized sat in the middle of the floor.
For one second, nothing looked unusual.
Then Mason pointed.
“Ethan.”
A red indicator began flashing on the electrical cabinet.
Not a controller alarm.
A power-system warning.
I knew that signal.
And my stomach dropped.
“Everybody away from Bay Three.”
Samuel stared at me.
“What?”
“NOW!”
I grabbed the radio.
“Walter! Clear the bay! Nobody touches that machine!”
Below us, Walter started shouting.
Workers backed away.
The red indicator flashed faster.
Mason looked at me.
“What did he do?”
I stared at the machine.
And suddenly I understood why Tyler’s parameter changes had never made complete sense.
They weren’t designed merely to damage the spindle.
They were designed to force repeated restarts.
Repeated diagnostics.
Repeated power cycles.
Richard had been waiting for someone to bring the system back online.
Maybe he had been waiting for me.
I looked at the emergency electrical schematic mounted beside the office door.
Then at the machine.
Then at the secondary power cabinet behind it.
And I saw something that should not have been there.
A small black device attached near the cabinet housing.
Mason whispered, “What is that?”
“I don’t know.”
But I knew one thing.
It had not been installed during commissioning.
The radio crackled again.
Richard’s voice.
“You wanted contractor rates, Ethan?”
A pause.
“Let’s see what you’re worth now.”
Then every light in Bay Three went out.
The building shook with a violent metallic boom.
And somewhere below us, someone screamed.
