Chapter 2 - The Audacity at Lane 42
The dry gravel crunched beneath Lieutenant Colonel Adrian Cross’s combat boots as he approached the red tape marking the boundary of Lane 42. The brilliant Arizona sun hit his shoulders, casting a sharp, crisp shadow across the pristine concrete apron. The harsh desert light rendered every detail in vivid clarity—the fine grains of dust suspended in the air, the deep metallic sheen of Claire’s precision rifle, and the subtle ripple of wind flags fluttering erratically in the desert breeze downrange.
Cross came to a halt two steps behind Claire’s prone figure. He lowered his coffee cup slightly, his eyes narrowing as he tracked the trajectory of her rifle barrel once more. It was completely misaligned with the range's established target zones.
“Your rifle is pointing the wrong way,” Cross said, his tone carrying the heavy, unyielding authority of a commander used to immediate compliance.
Claire didn't panic. She didn't pull her head back in surprise or turn her shoulder to look at the senior officer. Her hands remained steady on the grips. With an astonishingly calm, fluid movement, her left gloved hand came up and pulled back the bolt slightly, checking the open chamber to verify the status of the round without altering her frame's alignment. She peeked down into the metallic port, seeing the glint of brass sitting securely in the feed ramp.
“I heard you,” Claire said, her voice entirely flat, utterly unbothered by the rank standing behind her. She slid the bolt forward just enough to engage the detent without seating the round fully, keeping her eyes fixed downrange through her optic.
At Lane 40 and Lane 41, several operators who had been pausing between shot strings overheard the exchange. Mason Cole let out a short, stifled laugh. Two other shooters turned around on their elbow pads, smirking as they waited for the inevitability of a high-ranking officer tearing down a stubborn shooter.
"She’s been locked on that patch of dirt for twenty minutes, Colonel!" one of the operators shouted from down the line, chuckling. "Must be targeting a subterranean gopher!"
Cross didn't smile. The light laughter echoing off the zinc roofing only served to deepen the crease between his brows. He stepped around Claire’s left side, stepping right up to the edge of the rubber shooting mat, looking straight past her muzzle into the sun-scorched abyss.
“The far target is two thousand meters,” Cross said, pointing a finger out toward the prominent steel torso plate resting on the elevated dirt berm two kilometers away. The plate glittered like a pinprick under the intense midday sun. “That is the physical limit of this range, Donovan. That is the edge of our safety fan.”
Claire’s thumb rested lightly against the bolt handle. With a crisp, mechanical clack, she pushed the heavy steel bolt forward and rotated the handle down, locking a high-precision match round tightly into the chamber.
“I’m not aiming at that one,” Claire said softly.
The blunt simplicity of her statement hung in the baking heat.
The laughter along the firing line abruptly stopped. Mason Cole’s smile vanished; he slowly lowered his shooting glasses and looked between Claire and the Lieutenant Colonel. The two operators at Lane 40 fell completely silent, sensing the sudden shift in the atmosphere. The casual banter that usually filled the breaks between active firing strings evaporated into the hot desert air.
Cross leaned forward slightly, his eyes squinting against the blinding glare as he looked far past the two-thousand-meter target. He stared into what appeared to be entirely empty desert—miles upon miles of barren alkaline flats, heat distortion waves, and distant, dead mesquite bushes.
“There’s nothing beyond it,” Cross snapped, his voice dropping an octave, losing its initial annoyance and replacing it with a sharper, more dangerous edge.
“There is,” Claire replied instantly.
She did not elaborate. She did not offer coordinates, distance calculations, or explanation. Her steady breath continued in a rhythmic, measured cadence, her chest rising and falling against the shooting mat with absolute control.
Cross’s expression hardened into stone. As range commander, he was responsible for every grain of powder burned and every piece of lead launched within a fifty-mile radius. An operator firing blind into unmapped space was a nightmare scenario. He shifted his stance, his combat boots grinding against the dirt, and as he did, his eyes caught the brightly painted red steel stanchion mounted right next to the lane's bench.
RESTRICTED / AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY.
Cross froze for a moment. He had seen the marker when he walked up, but in his mind, it was merely set aside for maintenance or special weapons testing. Now, seeing the absolute conviction in Claire’s posture, a different realization flickered in his eyes.
May you like
He turned his body sharply away from Claire, looking forty feet to his right toward the elevated range table where the central monitoring equipment was housed.
Sitting under the canvas shade structure behind a array of radio monitors, digital telemetry screens, and wind-speed gauges was Sergeant Owen Barrett.
