Chapter 1 - Contact East
Captain Silas grabbed Sarah Jensen’s old wooden rifle near the barrel and forced it down toward her injured leg.
Pain tore through her so sharply that the mountain disappeared for half a second.
Sarah sat wedged against the granite ledge, one hand pressed against her blood-stained thigh, the other gripping the sling of the Remington 700 her team called the Fence Post. Sergeant Miller knelt beside her, trying to keep her stable while wind tore at their uniforms.
Silas stood over them.
“Leave her. She’s a liability.”
Miller seized his arm before he could push harder.
“Sir, she predicted the ambush.”
Sarah lifted her face through the pain.
“They’re not west. They’re already at the saddle.”
Silas looked toward the climbing trail with the contempt of an officer who believed admitting doubt was more dangerous than being wrong.
Then the radio at his shoulder exploded with static.
“Contact east! Contact east!”
The soldiers farther up the ridge froze.
A distant burst of fire echoed from the saddle.
Silas’s face went still.
Miller turned toward him.
“You walked us into it.”
Sarah pulled a blood-stained notebook from inside her vest. Her hands shook, but her eyes sharpened as she looked down the valley.
Miller dropped beside her.
“Jensen, tell us where to aim.”
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The captain who had just ordered her abandoned remained standing in silence.
The wounded soldier on the rocks had become the only command that mattered.
