Marcus's eyes widened for a beat before he snatched the comm. "The entire forest?"
"Every section of its existence," Kade replied, leaving no room for debate.
Orders flowed out like water through channels. Responses came back almost instantly—confirmations, acknowledgements, units reassigning.
Additional helicopters were vectored in. Ground teams were mobilized and search grids expanded.
Nightshade soldiers readied ropes and lit gear to descend from multiple points. As Marcus translated the plan into a storm of messages, the faint throb of other rotors began to weave through the comms: reinforcements on the way.
Kade gazed through the window, immobile, eyes traveling through the endless green.
Something was missing in that vast spread of trees, some small grief he could not name it; instinct told him to trust the itch. He had learned to trust that feeling. It had cost him little to follow it before.
—
