The 4x4 had been eating the trail for six hours. Nevada, ochre nothingness, dust glued to the windows. Elena drove with one hand, the other resting on the gearshift, right beside his.

"Bogotá," she murmured. "My mother washed hospital gowns. I counted stars from the rooftop. MIT took me at sixteen. Ever since, I'm the only woman in every war room I walk into. They listen when I speak numbers. They cut me off when I speak instinct."

Kom traced an equation in the air with his fingertip, like a conductor.

"Your instinct is already numbers, doctor. Just written in a language generals never learn."

She laughed. Fully. Long. She hadn't laughed in months.

He pulled the 4x4 to the edge of the trail, opened his case, poured warm Menik into two metal cups. Their fingers brushed on the burning rim. She didn't pull her hand back.

"I no fit shake devant les étoiles, docteur, mais devant toi, peut-être."

The sky opened, witnessless, immense. She leaned her head against the headrest and looked at him without flinching.

Dawn. Five seventeen. Kom raised his binoculars. There, embedded in the flank of a mesa, a parabolic antenna. Active. Hot. Around it, six armed silhouettes. No uniforms.

Curious who guards an antenna without a flag? Message me on Messenger, I'll answer before the sun fully rises. ☕