Chapter 4 - The Sealed Folder
Bullets from Blackthorne's private security detail chipped the concrete bench inches from Nora's boots as she slung her heavy rifle across her back and lunged toward the referee podium.
Grabbing the wounded Pentagon official—whose badge identified him as Special Agent David Cross—by the tactical harness beneath his suit jacket, she dragged him down the concrete steps and kicked open the heavy steel service door beneath Lane Twelve.
She pulled Cross and the blood-splattered manila folder inside the subterranean ammunition storage vault and spun the manual iron locking wheel shut just as a hail of nine-millimeter rounds hammered against the outer armor plate.
Inside the dimly lit concrete bunker, emergency fluorescent tubes hummed overhead above rows of green metal ammunition crates.
Nora tore a sterile compression bandage from the wall trauma kit, pressed it hard against the gunshot wound in Cross's upper right shoulder, and taped it tight while checking his pulse through her gloved fingertips.
Because she could not hear his voice through the air, she pulled a ruggedized military speech-to-text tablet from her canvas bag and propped it on an ammo crate between them so the directional microphone could transcribe his words onto the screen.
"You are really alive, Captain Vance," the green glowing letters scrolled across the screen as Agent Cross gasped against the concrete wall.
"Why did you bring my classified file onto a public shooting range with five thousand witnesses, Agent Cross," Nora demanded in a quiet, even voice.
"Because twenty minutes ago, I discovered that the championship was not a sporting event—it is a live assassination demonstration for an international syndicate," Cross spoke rapidly into the tablet's mic, pointing a bloody finger toward the open manila folder on the floor.
Nora picked up the documents and flipped past her own military dossier to a set of top-secret ballistic telemetry logs stamped with the corporate crest of Blackthorne Defense Systems.
Her eyes widened as she read the technical schematics for Project Viper—the exact computerized smart-scope system that her six-man sniper unit had been ordered to field-test in Syria on the night they were wiped out.
According to the unredacted engineering diagrams inside the folder, Blackthorne's smart-scopes contained a concealed satellite backdoor chip wired directly into the electronic firing pin and reticle display.
From a remote laptop anywhere in the world, the operator of Project Viper could shift a shooter's digital crosshairs by three degrees without the marksman knowing, forcing an elite soldier to shoot a friendly target or miss an enemy insurgent on command.
"Your unit in Syria was murdered because your spotter, Ryan Cole, discovered the backdoor code in the field and tried to transmit a warning," Cross's words flashed across the tablet screen.
"Wait—I just saw Ryan Cole alive on top of the VIP broadcast tower thirty seconds ago," Nora said, her hands tightening on the edge of the paper.
"If Ryan is alive and working for Blackthorne, then he is the one who just tried to kill me from that tower," Cross panted, reaching into his jacket pocket and pulling out a laminated VIP schedule for the afternoon.
"Look at the timetable, Nora—the Secretary of Defense is landing at the championship helipad in twenty-five minutes to sign a four-billion-dollar contract putting Blackthorne's Viper scopes on every rifle in the United States military."
"Victor Blackthorne discovered yesterday that the Secretary secretly plans to veto the contract and indict him for your unit's deaths, so Blackthorne installed Viper override chips into the rifles of all twelve championship finalists on the line upstairs."
Nora stared at the schematic in horror: the moment the Defense Secretary walked onto the range, the twelve finalists' rifles were programmed to discharge simultaneously by remote satellite trigger, executing the Secretary in front of the world press while framing the shooters on the line.
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Before Nora could reach for the bunker's emergency landline to warn the Secret Service detail, a loud electromagnetic clunk echoed from the heavy steel door, followed by a sinister metallic hiss from the ceiling ventilation grates.
Thick, colorless halon fire-suppression gas began pouring into the sealed concrete room at high pressure, displacing the breathable oxygen in seconds while the digital wall panel outside flashed with a remote security override code entered from the VIP box.
