Chapter 15 — The Last Ping

Arjun Mehta returned to active RAW work in February 2024. His cover identity has been retired. He works under his own name, which is a change he has described as "genuinely more comfortable, in a way I did not anticipate." His operation is classified but its outcomes are not: the international framework he helped establish for investigating cross-border commercial surveillance has been used in two subsequent cases.He was formally recognized by the RAW director in an internal ceremony that he was not allowed to bring his wife to.She sent congratulations via message.He responded: Thank you. Rajma tonight?She responded: You're making it this time.He made it. It was good.— ◆ —Naina Mehta was promoted to Detective Chief Inspector in June 2024.Superintendent Bhave, in his recommendation, wrote: "DI Mehta conducted an investigation of exceptional complexity and reach under conditions that included significant personal adversity. The resulting case is the most comprehensive international cybercrime prosecution this unit has been involved with. Her documentation practices were exemplary. Her judgment, while sometimes applied outside officially sanctioned parameters, was correct in every material instance."The phrase "outside officially sanctioned parameters" was the institutional version of the question she had asked herself sixty-one days into the most difficult thing she had ever done: was the work right, independent of whether the procedure was followed?The work had been right.The procedure had been corrected retroactively.This was, she understood, the best available outcome and also the imperfect one, because the correct procedure was there for reasons, and those reasons were real, and a world in which the procedure was reliably followed was a better world than the one she had navigated.She held this.She went back to work.— ◆ —One more thing, which she noted in her private case file and which does not appear in any official record:On March 28th, 2024, Naina received a WhatsApp message from an unknown number.The message read: I saw the news. You found it. Thank you.She replied: Who is this?The response: AMBER COAT. The second one. The one Arjun didn't have time to document.She looked at this message for a long time.She typed: There's a second source inside Vayu?The response: Was. I left in October. But I have documentation he didn't. Material that extends the financial trail further than Philippe found. If you want it.She sat at her desk.She thought: this is the nature of the work. It doesn't end. You close one case and the next one is already sending a message.She thought: this is fine. This is exactly fine.She typed: Send me what you have. We'll talk.She opened a new file.She started a new page.— THE END —