After Death: The Senator's Secret Daughter

Another blizzard night shift. I should've been used to them by now, but something about tonight felt different.

Maybe it was because Grace was sleeping over at the rescue base with Captain Sarah, curled up in my office with that worn teddy bear she refuses to give up. I'd promised her pancakes in the morning – the kind with way too much syrup that she loves.

God, I hope this shift ends soon.

The radio crackled to life, cutting through my thoughts. "Base to Med-1, we've got an avalanche situation up on Devil's Ridge. Two skiers buried, GPS coordinates incoming."

I was already reaching for my helmet before Sarah's voice came through. "Eva, conditions are getting bad fast. Are you sure about this one?"

I looked out at the swirling snow, thinking about Grace asleep in my office. For a split second, the thought crossed my mind – what if something went wrong?

But I pushed it away. I was the only pilot qualified to fly in these conditions, and I'd done this a hundred times before. I'd be back for pancakes in the morning.

"Med-1 responding," I said into the radio, already moving toward the helicopter.

I ran through my preflight checklist with practiced efficiency.

These motions were as automatic as breathing after twelve years of mountain rescue. The helicopter was my second home, and tonight she'd have to carry us through hell.

The wind hit us the moment we lifted off. I fought the controls, feeling every gust through the cyclic.

The weather was worse than the forecast had predicted – visibility dropping to nearly zero as we climbed toward the ridge.

"Med-1 to Base, conditions are really bad up here. Proceeding to target area."

Sarah's voice crackled back, barely audible through the static. "Copy that, Eva. Be careful."

My GPS showed we were close, but I couldn't see anything through the wall of snow. I dropped altitude, hoping to get under the worst of it.

There – a flash of orange fabric against the white.

I found them.

Two figures, partially buried, one waving weakly. Still alive. The relief hit me harder than I expected.

"Base, I have visual on both victims. Beginning rescue approach."

This was the tricky part – maintaining a hover in these winds while my partner Jake went down with the rescue equipment. The helicopter bucked and fought against the gusts, and I could feel the strain in every muscle as I worked to keep us steady.

That's when I heard it. A grinding sound that every pilot knows and dreads.

Engine failure.

The warnings lit up my instrument panel like a Christmas tree, and suddenly the helicopter was falling, not flying. I had maybe thirty seconds to find somewhere to put down before we became part of the avalanche ourselves.

No, no, no. Not now.

I pulled on every skill I'd learned, every emergency procedure drilled into me. But the mountain was too steep, the wind too strong, and the engine too far gone.

"Mayday, mayday! Med-1 going down!" I shouted into the radio, fighting the controls even as I knew it was hopeless. "Sarah, if you can hear me – tell Grace that mommy loves her. Tell her to be brave, and make sure she knows—"

The radio cut to static.

I'm sorry, baby. I'm so sorry.

The impact came like a sledgehammer. Pain exploded through my chest, my head, everywhere at once. The world spun and went dark, and the last thing I heard was the terrible sound of metal tearing apart on rock.

Then... nothing.

Wait.

I opened my eyes, expecting to see either heaven or nothing at all. Instead, I was standing in the snow, looking down at the wreckage of my helicopter. The scene was surreal – emergency flares casting an orange glow across the crash site, search and rescue teams swarming the area.

And there, in the twisted metal, was my body.

This can't be real.

I tried to touch my face, but my hand passed right through. No substance, no weight. I was there but not there, seeing everything but unable to affect anything.

I was dead.

The realization hit me like a second crash. Grace. My little girl. What was going to happen to her?

As if summoned by my thoughts, I heard it – Grace's voice, thin and frightened, calling for me from somewhere far away. The sound pulled at something deep inside me, and suddenly I wasn't at the crash site anymore.

I was at the rescue base, standing in the doorway of my office.

Grace was there, wearing my spare rescue jacket that was way too big for her, the sleeves hanging past her hands. She stood at the window, face pressed against the glass, watching for helicopter lights that would never come.

"Where's Mama?" she asked Sarah, who was sitting nearby with red eyes and tissues in her hand.

"She's... she's on an important mission, sweetheart," Sarah managed, her voice cracking. "A really important one."

Tell her the truth, I wanted to scream. Don't make this harder than it has to be.

But Grace just nodded solemnly. "Mama always saves people. She's a hero." She pressed her small palm against the window. "I'll wait for her to come back."

The knife in my chest twisted deeper. I rushed forward, desperate to hold her, to tell her I was right there. But my arms passed through her small body like she was made of air.

I can't touch her. I can't comfort her. I can't do anything.

I sank to my knees beside her chair, useless tears I couldn't feel streaming down a face I no longer had. Grace continued her vigil at the window, so brave, so trusting, wearing my jacket like armor against a world that was about to get a lot scarier.

The TV in the corner was playing the local news. "...search and rescue helicopter crashed during a blizzard rescue operation. Pilot Dr. Evangeline Torres was killed at the scene..."

Sarah quickly reached for the remote, but it was too late. The damage was done, even if Grace didn't fully understand yet.

But then something else caught my attention. A phone was ringing in the background, and someone answered it.

"Mountain Rescue Base, this is Patterson."

The voice on the other end was distant, but I knew it instantly. A voice I hadn't heard in eight years but would recognize anywhere.

Will.

"I'm calling about the helicopter crash tonight. The pilot... was she...?"

My incorporeal heart stopped. Why was he calling? After all this time, why did he care?

"Yes sir, Dr. Torres didn't make it. Can I ask who's calling?"

There was a long pause. "Just... just someone who knew her a long time ago."

Will. Even after eight years, even after everything, he was still checking on me. But why? I thought he'd moved on completely, focused on his political career and forgotten about the mountain girl who'd saved his life once.

As I stared at Grace, still waiting by the window in my oversized jacket, a new question formed in my mind.

Does he know about her?