Chapter 2 - MY FATHER’S NOTEBOOK
My father, Ethan Cole, had never been a Navy SEAL.
That was one of the first details Graves used later when he tried to explain why he dismissed me.
Ethan had served as a military marksmanship instructor before a damaged knee ended his active career. Afterward, he worked as a civilian range-safety specialist and helped design desert navigation courses for several federal training programs.
At home outside Reno, he taught me patience before he taught me shooting.
By six, I could sit quietly without fidgeting.
By eight, I understood distance was not empty space.
By ten, I knew fear ruined judgment faster than recoil ever could.
When I was thirteen, a doctor told us the cancer had spread.
My father responded by becoming more organized.
He labeled tools.
Updated insurance records.
And filled a brown field notebook with diagrams, range observations, and numbers that meant little to me at the time.
One page showed the Nevada training grounds where I now stood.
At the top, he had written:
THE COURSE IS SAFE ONLY IF THE MARKERS REMAIN FIXED.
Beneath it were small symbols assigned to each lane marker. A triangle. Two parallel lines. A half-circle cut beneath the metal base.
I assumed they were maintenance codes.
Three months after his death, I received a notice inviting me to the Nevada Desert Precision Evaluation, a trial combining endurance, navigation, observation, and controlled marksmanship.
The letter said my father had nominated me before his illness became terminal.
I accepted because it felt like the last instruction he had left behind.
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What I did not know was that Ethan had also submitted a sealed safety complaint against Jonas Graves.
And Graves recognized my surname before I ever reached the gate.
