Chapter 95 - Breach at Thirty Thousand Feet
Arthur, his face pale as chalk, grabbed the flight yoke with his good hand and threw the stealth aircraft into a violent, forty-five-degree snap roll.
On the exterior of the hull, the sudden shift in centrifugal force slammed Claire’s torso sideways against the titanium paneling. One of her magnetic boots lost its lock, her left leg swinging out into the screaming void. The thermite torch was torn from her grasp, tumbling away into the freezing clouds below.
Pain shot through her fractured ribs, a white-hot knife of agony reminding her that despite the myth of the "One-Eighty-Seven," she was still human, made of meat, bone, and blood.
*Breathe,* she told herself, the voice of her former drill instructors echoing through the dark corridors of her memory. *A ghost does not feel cold. A ghost does not feel fear. Pain is just the signal that you are still alive to finish the mission.*
Claire slammed her tactical combat dagger deep into the narrow incision she had already cut through the hatch seal. The hardened tungsten blade bit into the locking mechanism. Using her entire body weight, she pulled the manual emergency release toggle located beneath the panel.
*BOOM!*
The pressure differential did the rest. The maintenance hatch blew outward with catastrophic force, the sudden decompression violently venting the cabin air into the sky. Claire let go of her tether and fell directly through the smoking maw of the open hatch, tumbling into the aircraft's lower cargo hold.
She landed heavily on an aluminum deck grate, instantly rolling into a combat crouch, her customized suppressed Sig Sauer raised and sweeping the shadows.
The cargo bay was dark, illuminated only by the rhythmic strobes of red emergency decompression lights. Fog billowed through the cabin as the freezing outside air mixed with the warm internal atmosphere.
Footsteps echoed from the metallic staircase connecting the lower hold to the executive deck.
Two private military contractors in black tactical gear emerged through the mist, their assault rifles coming up. Claire didn't wait. She took two steps forward, firing through the fog. Two double-taps—clean, rhythmic, and deadly. Both men collapsed before they could clear their safeties.
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Claire stepped over the bodies, ejecting the half-spent magazine and snapping a fresh one into place with a crisp, metallic click that echoed through the dying aircraft.
"Mother," Claire’s voice was barely louder than a whisper, but it carried the weight of twenty years of silence, trauma, and betrayed honor. "Your party is over."
