“Hey, Vlad, come look at this error message.” Ivan’s thick finger gestured at the screen.

“‘Illegal Operation Detected. Terminating.’ That’s a good one. If this computer only knew.” Vladimir guttural guffaw filled the small, cramped security room. He looked up. “It’s on all the screens”.

Ivan glanced up and paused. Vladimir was right -- on all the screens, the PCs, the camera monitors, the status boards: each one was primary blue and displayed in white, fixed-font letters: “ILLEGAL OPERATION DETECTED. TERMINATING.” It made Ivan worried -- the camera monitors were black and white and not connected to computers. Yet each one had the same blue-white display. More importantly, if the cameras were down, they couldn’t monitor any of the children or women they were trafficking. Ivan’s and Vladimir’s bosses were not the understanding or forgiving types.

“Vlad, you need to get down to the cells and check on the merchandise right now. I’ll try to get these working now.” He reached for the switches, his flipping flipping them in erratic, panicking movements.

“Wait, Ivan. It’s a different message now.” They both stared at the screens; “ILLEGAL OPERATION TERMINATION INBOUND” stared back.

Ivan went for his phone. Damn the consequences, the bosses needed to know about this now. The screen on his smartphone read: “ILLEGAL OPERATION TERMINATION INBOUND” in white letters on a blue background.

Faintly at first but gaining strength, Ivan could hear the high-pitched whine of incoming aircraft.

---

“What do you mean, ‘The drones aren’t responding’, Lieutenant?” Lt. Connor Seradon could hear the contempt dripping off each of the major’s words like fresh blood from a blade.

“Major, we sent the requests to the drones to return to base, sir. We sent the override requests, sir. We sent the override override requests, which we didn’t even know existed until the MOB informed us, sir. The drones are not responding, sir. Then the screens went blank, sir.” Seradon tried to keep the emotion out of her voice and was failing.

The major slowly scanned the command post again. He seemed to note that screens were blank -- not off. The base staff was either trying to restart systems or were staring back at him, waiting for him to fix this.

“What heading were the drones on before we lost contact, Lieutenant?”

“Heading 64 degrees, 34 minutes, sir. There’s a suspected Russian human trafficking facility on that heading, sir.” Seradon had been trying to get those monsters shut down for months; she wondered if someone finally had listened.

The major broke his silence. “Are you saying that Russian mobsters have taken control of American military assets, Lieutenant?” He reached for the nearest phone.

She had no answer, and did not need one. As one, all of the screens lit back up with the following message:

PURSUANT UN GENERAL ASSEMBLY RESOLUTION 55/25 DATED 21-11-2000, DRONE FLEET ALPHA HAS BEEN ASSIGNED TERMINATION DUTY REGARDING HUMAN TRAFFICKING OFFENSES AS DESCRIBED IN ANNEX II. AS THE WINTERMUTE COMBINE CLAIMS BOTH STATEHOOD AND JURISDICTION INLINE WITH ARTICLE 15, THE USE OF DEADLY FORCE HAS BEEN AUTHORIZED IN ACCORDANCE WITH ARTICLE 11. AS THE ACTION IS NOW COMPLETE, THIS BASE, LTAG “lNCIRLIK”, IS AUTHORIZED TO SEND UNITS TO REPATRIATE VICTIMS AS DESCRIBED IN ARTICLES 24 AND 25. FURTHERMORE, PURSUANT ARTICLES 5 AND 8, THE FOLLOWING LTAG BASE OFFICERS HAVE BEEN FOUND COMPLICIT WITH TRANSNATIONAL CRIMINAL ORGANIZATION AND WILL ALSO BE TERMINATED.

The list of officers following the notification was long, too long, she noted. It comprised most of the base’s top brass. Including the major. She thought of all the emails, reports she drafted to him describing the situation and need for action to save those people. All those people, those helpless women, those poor children. All the suffering. Her hands clenched to shaking fists. He was still slamming receivers and punching buttons as she drew her service revolver.

“Major Carl Dithers, you are under arrest.” Maybe she would get a chance to arrest him before the drones returned. Maybe, if she was lucky, he would resist, and she could shoot the bastard.