Chapter 15 · Her Father's Last File

"Open it."

Mara's hand froze on the archive drawer. The label read Q-17, her father's case number, the one they'd sealed the day he died. Adrian stood three feet behind her, close enough she could hear his breathing.

"You sure about this?" he said.

"No." She pulled the drawer anyway. The file inside was thin. Too thin for fifteen years of field work. Someone had gutted it.

"What's missing?"

"Everything that mattered." She flipped through the pages. Incident reports, all redacted. Witness statements, black bars across every name. The last page was a transfer order, dated two days before the accident. Her father had been reassigned. To what, the ink didn't say.

Adrian moved closer. "That's the cover-up."

"That's my whole childhood in six pieces of paper." Her voice came out flat. She hated how it sounded, like she'd already lost.

"Mara."

"Don't." She shoved the file back and slammed the drawer. The metal rang through the archive, too loud, and somewhere in the back of the room glass shattered.

They both turned.

The dead zone had split the archive in half.