Chapter Two
Washington, D.C. gave him nothing.
For days, Matt moved through the city on routes that should have yielded something. Early mornings, when habits slipped. Late afternoons, when people overlapped without noticing. Cafés chosen for sightlines, not comfort. Streets that funneled traffic the same way every time.
WTO3 never appeared.
Carissa couldn’t pull him from the feeds. Not traffic cameras. Not storefront lenses. Not the places that should have produced residue—coffee shops near offices, religious centers with predictable flow, intersections that caught everyone eventually. The trail didn’t thin.
It ended.
No noise. No mistakes.
Someone had learned.
Matt adjusted his timing. Changed angles. Waited longer than necessary. Still nothing.
By the third day, the absence itself became the data point.
He left the city.
Richmond returned him to baseline.
He reset the house the way he always did—methodical, unhurried. Food replaced. Gear cleaned. Clothing washed and folded. Every object returned to its place. The work steadied him.
Later, he took the BMW out, letting the road unwind ahead of him. Late season now. The light softer, stretched thinner across the pavement. He drove without destination, attention fixed on smooth inputs, clean lines through curves, engine response measured and exact.
Thoughts surfaced anyway.
The first attack had been contained. The second, broader. WTO3 was something else entirely.
An adoption clinic.
A fertility clinic.
A children’s hospital.
Not the wing where children were dying.
The wing where they were getting better.
The pattern bothered him—not emotionally, but structurally. These weren’t symbolic targets chosen for spectacle. They were places built on optimism. On patience. On long timelines and quiet hope.
People trying to start families.
People trying to grow them.
People already invested in a future that assumed continuity.
This wasn’t rage.
It was intrusion.
It suggested money. Planning. Permission.
Who funds something like this?
Who benefits from interrupting lives before they fully begin?
He thought about what Carissa had flagged—capital movement that didn’t stay put, shell structures designed to collapse after use. Temporary scaffolding. Disposable pathways.
The front-end actors might never know the full picture.
That meant the back end mattered more.
The boat sat in the slip when he arrived at the marina, lines still tied, cover half-folded. He stepped aboard and paused before starting the engine. The water was darker now, wind cutting across it in uneven bands, small waves tapping the hull in restless rhythm.
He stayed there a moment, hands resting on the rail.
Thoughts drifted again—to WTO3, to funding channels, to unanswered questions—but he didn’t chase them. He never did. This wasn’t the place for solutions.
A larger swell rolled through the marina entrance and rocked the boat hard enough to demand attention. He adjusted instinctively, stance widening, weight shifting.
That was the signal.
He started the engine and eased out of the slip.
Once clear, he pushed forward into open water. The chop grew heavier, the wind sharper. Steering required constant input now. No autopilot. No drifting. Every correction mattered.
The world narrowed.
Water.
Wind.
Throttle.
Balance.
The rest receded.
This was how he reset—by reducing everything to a single operating system. One environment. One set of rules. Muscle memory taking precedence over thought.
Rugby had taught him that long before this life ever had. Control before contact. Awareness before reaction. Discipline carried quietly.
He’d pushed far once. Far enough to earn a walk-on look with the Eagles. Far enough to know where the edge was. He hadn’t made the roster, but the work had stayed with him. The certainty that preparation mattered even when recognition didn’t follow.
The boat cut through the water cleanly now, engine steady, hull responding exactly as expected.
Matt leaned into the wind, focused, composed, letting the motion strip everything else away.
The questions would still be there later.
For now, this was enough.