Blink: Phantom (Book 3)

29

He stepped into Smith's office, alone.

This was no ordinary debrief. No other operatives accompanied him into the lion's mouth, no back up, no support. Darien tried to keep himself calm, bracing for the avalanche that was about to come crashing down on his head. One by one the others had been summoned before him, escorted by marines to confront the head of Blink operations.

The moment he'd thrown his career as a Blink operative under the bus replayed itself over and over in his mind. He could see Theodore Logan's panicked, disbelieving face. He felt the kick of the Compac against his shoulder as he fired, ending a life in cold blood.

But he still stood by his decision. The long flight home from the dead, empty volume of space Logan had been using as a staging point had given Darien plenty of time to second guess his actions. He re-ran every decision, every step they'd taken aboard that ship and every single time his mind came to the same conclusion. The only way to ensure such a barbaric thing never happened again was to destroy the evidence.

All of it.

The door slid shut and Darien forced himself to look up.

At a glance Smith looked as calm and collected as ever. The all-too-familiar pen of filing cabinets lined the walls – to this day he still hadn't figured out why the man had such an archaic means of data storage clogging up his office. In the centre lay the arc of screens, Smith swivelling back and forth between them, his eyes flickering.

Darien wondered how the others had fared. This individual debriefing was unprecedented – Blink squads always gave their after-action reports as a group. Then again, he'd never disobeyed a direct order before. Had they spoken out against him? Had they blamed him for everything? His mind twisted at the thought, but he knew as a squad leader that the consequences of their actions, wrong or right, rested with him.

Niamh and Idas would back him to the hilt over anything, loyal, almost to a fault. Uther was a pragmatist, not prone to outbursts of emotion, and he'd raised no real objections either on board the ship or on their long trip home.

That left Amber and Hekket. Darien didn't need to be a mind reader to know that both of them seethed with resentment over his actions. He couldn't even blame them, really. All of them had been given the same pitch when they'd been recruited: being in Blink didn't make you a soldier, and it definitely didn't make you a killer. The situation they found themselves in had forced Darien's hand – made him overrule that promise – and he hated Logan even more for that.

"I believe you know why you're here," Smith said quietly, snapping Darien out of his thoughts. He swallowed hard and looked the head of Blink operations in the eye, jaw clenched tightly. He knew this would end badly – just how badly depended on his responses.

So he nodded once.

"I've spoken to the other members of Hammerhead Squad," Smith continued. "You received a somewhat...mixed review."

"They're individuals," Darien answered. "They have opinions. I'm not hiding from that."

"So I see." Smith leaned back in his seat pouring himself a drink of the clear, gleaming spirit from a crystalline decanter. "Before we go further, I will put your mind at rest over one thing I'm sure is troubling you. You were in command – you gave the orders and your team members followed them. That is what is expected of them. The consequences, therefore, however severe they may be, will fall solely on your head. The rest of your team will face no punitive measures."

He nodded again. "Good."

"So, perhaps you would like to explain why you thought killing Theodore Logan and destroying the ship he built was the most prudent course of action?"