My family told everyone I failed. I sat quietly at my sister’s promotion ceremony…

Back then, I thought you were hiding. Now I think you were just trying to survive. Quietly.

I didn’t reply. I couldn’t. The words she gave me weren’t an apology.

They were something older. Heavier. Recognition.

I smiled. Not because I was proud, but because something had shifted. Later that evening, our systems traced a login ping from a remote IP.

It had tried, unsuccessfully, to scrub logs tied to the original breach. The location? A motel just outside Fort Campbell. A three-day booking.

Paid in cash. The name used on the reservation. Derek Glade.

It wasn’t just about my sister anymore, or even my family. There was someone out there. Clever, patient, and willing to use our fractures as his camouflage.

A man hiding behind the chaos we’d made for ourselves. The raid on the decommissioned tech bunker felt like a stormfront moving in. Silent at first, then electric and sharp.

Under emergency authorization, we surrounded the area with strategic precision. Derek had returned to the one place no one was monitoring. The old data relay room from a forgotten division, still wired into the secondary military net.

He was halfway through uploading a compressed bundle of data when we breached. He didn’t resist. He didn’t even flinch.

Just looked at me and said, Took you long enough? In interrogation, he laid it all out. Not proudly, but clearly. I didn’t want to take you down in public.

Just wanted you out of the room. The intel leak was supposed to paint you as a liability. Once your clearance was stripped, no more NATO council, no more front seat at strategic talks.

You rose too fast. People stopped questioning you. His voice was bitter, not manic.

A man who’d clung to his grudge until it soured into obsession. He’d built a strategy to exploit our family’s divisions, banking on Erica’s misstep to ignite the rest. I realized then, he didn’t break us.

He just watched us unravel, then planted his flag. When Erica read the transcript of his confession, she sat still, silent. She stared at the words as if they might rearrange themselves into something less devastating.

After a few minutes, she spoke without looking at me. I didn’t know what I did would lead to this. I folded my arms.

Sometimes we set fire to a dry field because we’re jealous. We forget people sleep in that grass. Her face crumpled slightly, but she held it together.

That was Erica. Pride armored her guilt. The next day, during the compilation of our final report, Erica submitted an addendum.

She took full responsibility for initiating the chain of emails that ultimately enabled Derek’s breach. Though she wasn’t charged criminally, there was no intent to leak state secrets. She accepted a formal reprimand…