Chapter 1 - The Name On The Tag
Staff Sergeant Mason Briggs laughed before the target had stopped moving.
I was still prone behind the rifle when he looked downrange, saw the clean center hit on the nearest frame, and turned toward the soldiers behind us.
“Closest target? My grandma could hit that.”
A few people laughed because he was the instructor.
A few laughed because they thought they were supposed to.
I stayed where I was.
Mason walked down the lane, ripped the paper target from its frame, came back, and threw it into the sand beside me.
“Try a real shot—or get off my range.”
He pointed toward the farthest target.
I shifted.
Waited for the lane to be called safe for the next sequence.
Then fired.
The distant steel moved.
Nobody laughed.
Mason looked through the spotting equipment.
His face tightened.
I stayed behind the rifle.
Colonel David Hale stepped out from behind the observing group.
I had met him that morning.
Fifty-eight.
Quiet.
Senior enough that everyone around him seemed to become more aware of their posture.
He looked downrange.
Then at me.
“Again.”
I fired again.
Same target.
Same result.
Mason lowered the glass.
“Lucky twice.”
Hale said nothing.
I stood.
There was no satisfaction in humiliating Mason.
Not because I was above it.
Because I had learned a long time ago that proving one person wrong rarely changes the next person who has already decided what you are.
I reached for the target Mason had thrown.
As I lifted it, something metallic fell from behind the cardboard backing.
It landed beside my boot.
Old.
Rectangular.
Chain missing.
Dog tag.
I picked it up.
Colonel Hale took one step toward me.
That was the first strange thing.
Not the tag.
Hale.
His face had changed.
“Colonel?”
He didn’t answer.
I brushed sand from the metal.
The engraving was worn but readable.
KANE, RACHEL E.
I stared.
Then looked at Hale.
“This tag is older than me. Why does it have my name?”
Nobody spoke.
Mason turned toward the colonel.
Hale stared at the tag like it had been pulled from somewhere far more dangerous than the sand beneath a training target.
“Let me see it.”
I closed my hand.
“No.”
His eyes lifted to mine.
Not angry.
Worried.
That made me hold it tighter.
“Do you know who it belonged to?”
“Yes.”
The soldiers behind us went quiet again.
“Who?”
Hale looked toward Mason.
“Clear the range.”
Mason frowned.
“We still have two evolutions.”
“Clear it.”
Something in his voice removed the discussion.
Mason sent everyone toward the covered staging area.
I stayed.
Hale looked at the target frame.
“How did that get there?”
“I was about to ask you.”
He crouched near the frame.
Not touching it.
Looking behind it.
Then at the tag.
“This wasn’t supposed to be here.”
“Where was it supposed to be?”
He stood.
“In a box at Fort Avery.”
I had heard of Avery.
The installation had closed almost twenty years earlier.
Parts of its training equipment had been redistributed.
Including, apparently, target frames.
I looked down at the name again.
“Who was Rachel E. Kane?”
Hale’s answer came quietly.
“My best friend.”
That was unexpected.
Then:
“She died three years before you were born.”
I stared at him.
“So why do I have her exact name?”
Hale looked at me for a long moment.
May you like
Then said something that made Mason stop walking away.
“Because your father asked us to forget hers.”
Related Stories
