Chapter 46 - The Phantom Dispatch
We crawled out through the western utility drainage canal forty minutes later, emerging into the blinding, crystalline purity of the alpine morning.
The contrast was dizzying. Behind us, the great wooden amphitheater of the velodrome stood scarred and smoldering, surrounded by an armada of emergency vehicles, blue and red lights flashing against the snowbanks. Helicopters circled overhead like metallic hawks, their rotor blades churning the icy mountain air. Ahead of us lay the tranquil expanse of the Swiss valley, the sun cresting the snow-capped peaks in a wash of rose-gold light.
Paramedics rushed toward us with thermal blankets and oxygen masks, but Mia refused the stretcher.
She stood on her own two feet, leaning against my side, her golden champion’s jersey torn and blackened with grease, but her chin held impossibly high. The crowd of evacuees, huddled by the thousands on the lower access roads, suddenly caught sight of her silhouette against the snow.
A murmur rippled through the freezing air. Then someone began to clap.
Within seconds, the entire hillside erupted into a roaring ovation—an echo of the wooden thunder that had shaken the boards only an hour earlier. It was not just applause for an athlete who had broken a world record; it was an ovation for a child who had stared into the mouth of the abyss and refused to blink.
Callahan sat on the bumper of an ambulance, letting a medic bandage his burned hands. He looked up at me as I approached, his face lined with utter exhaustion.
"Montgomery’s body was recovered from the lower staging tarps," Callahan said quietly, keeping his voice beneath the roar of the helicopter blades. "He died on impact."
I nodded, feeling no satisfaction, only the cold, hollow emptiness that follows the end of a long, brutal war. "The police have his terminal?"
"What's left of it," Callahan said. "The federal investigators are pulling the drive right now. But Thomas... before the terminal crashed, Montgomery was receiving an external data stream. Callahan’s leak wasn't just going to the media."
I froze, the thermal blanket slipping slightly from my shoulders. "What do you mean?"
"The handshake code that Montgomery used to override the tunnel switches," Callahan whispered, his eyes dark with unease. "It didn't originate from Montgomery’s company. It was routed through an offshore holding trust registered in Delaware. A trust created eight years ago."
My heart went entirely still. "Eight years ago?"
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"The exact week of your accident on County Road 9," Callahan said, his voice barely audible over the wind. "Thomas... Montgomery wasn't the mastermind. He was just the buyer."
***
