Chapter 78 - Hull to Hull
The distance between the two ships was less than forty feet. The massive gray steel wall of the aircraft carrier loomed on our port side, its decks crowded with armed security personnel and flight deck crew members who had rushed to the railings, completely transfixed by the apparition that had risen from the grave.
I climbed out of the upper bridge hatch onto the battered conning tower. The ocean wind tore through my soaked hair, and the sharp bite of cold salt stung the cuts across my face, but I stood at full attention, my right hand holding the master broadcast transmitter.
Across the narrow void, Vance stood at the bridge wing of the *Dauntless*. He looked old. The unyielding imperial facade was gone, replaced by the frantic, hunted glare of a man whose fortress had collapsed into dust beneath his feet.
"Security detail!" Vance screamed, his voice cracking into the damp air as he pointed down at me. "Man the rail! Fire upon that vessel! She is a traitor to the United States Navy! That is a direct order from the Fleet Commander!"
Not a single rifle was raised.
The Master-at-Arms standing on the catwalk lowered his weapon slowly, looking between the four stars on Vance’s shoulder and the damning evidence still playing across the flight deck loudspeaker system.
"Did you hear me?!" Vance shrieked, seizing a sidearm from a startled young lieutenant standing beside him. "Shoot her! Shoot her now!"
"They won't shoot, Admiral," I said, my voice carrying over the carrier's own loudspeakers, amplified by the quantum transmitter. "Because unlike you, these men and women took an oath to protect the Constitution, not your private syndicate in Dayton."
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"You are nothing!" Vance snarled, leveling the stolen pistol with trembling hands across the abyss toward my chest. "You were an insect born in an Ohio gutter! I gave you your uniform! I gave you your command!"
"No," I replied, staring straight down the barrel of his gun without flinching. "You whispered four words in Norfolk that you thought would buy my silence. You told the world I earned this command. And for once in your miserable, corrupt life... you were telling the absolute truth."
