Chapter 5 - The Fifth Round
The wind howled through the pavilion rafters with sudden, violent intensity, threatening to rip the score sheets off the clipboards hanging from the range safety station. A cloud of fine alkaline dust swept through the lane, momentarily blurring the silhouette fifty yards out.
Sergeant Tyler Briggs folded his arms across his plate carrier, stepping directly behind Claire’s shoulder. His sneer was wide, arrogant, and dripping with cruel amusement.
"Last one, Morgan," Briggs mocked, leaning his head forward so his voice hit the side of her ear. "Make it count. Put one into the dirt so we can at least log a confirmed impact on the range manifest."
Caldwell chuckled softly, checking his wristwatch. "Let her finish, Briggs. We have an actual infantry squad waiting for this bay."
Claire did not acknowledge their existence.
To Claire Morgan, the two senior non-commissioned officers and the mocking colonel behind her simply did not exist. The noise of the wind, the fluttering of the red safety flags, the heat baking through the soles of her tan boots—all of it faded into a vast, silent cathedral of interior focus.
Her cheek remained pressed firmly against the polymer comb of the stock.
Her hazel eye looked through the rear aperture. The front sight post—a thin, black steel blade—floated smoothly in the center of the aperture ring, its tip bisecting the three-inch black zeroing dot fifty yards downrange.
She waited.
The wind surged. Thirty knots... thirty-two knots... the red flag strained against its grommets.
Then, as the atmospheric pressure shifted across the basin, the gust crested. The flag dipped two inches. A split-second pocket of dead air settled over the fifty-yard corridor.
In that microscopic window of aerodynamic stillness, Claire’s lungs emptied halfway.
Her heart beat once.
Thump.
Between the contraction and the relaxation of the muscle, her index finger applied the remaining four ounces of mechanical pressure against the trigger shoe.
CRACK.
The fifth round broke cleanly.
The rifle bucked slightly, venting gas from the muzzle compensator. The fifth and final brass casing tumbled through the golden afternoon light, spinning three times before landing squarely atop the small cluster of empty shells on the concrete slab, clicking against its brothers with a light, musical chime.
Claire did not drop the rifle.
She did not lower the barrel to peer over the sights to see where the round had gone. She maintained her follow-through position for one full, calm second—eyes locked through the iron sights, finger held firmly to the rear, breathing completely stationary, ensuring that no premature muscular relaxation corrupted the departure of the five-point-five-six millimeter projectile.
Only after that disciplined second elapsed did Claire smoothly release the trigger, slide the selector lever back to safe with her thumb, and lower the carbine from her shoulder.
She turned the ejection port upward, locked the bolt to the rear with a fluid motion of her left palm, and laid the safe, empty rifle gently onto the concrete bench.
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Downrange, fifty yards away, the paper target stood in the wind.
It appeared completely, utterly untouched.
