Chapter 4 - The Fortress in the Woods
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The three black Suburbans did not head straight toward the federal courthouse in Raleigh.
Instead, they turned north onto a secluded logging road four miles outside the installation gates.
Behind them followed two tactical transport vans and a mobile forensic command unit.
Evelyn Cross sat in the passenger seat of the lead vehicle, studying a satellite map on her ruggedized tablet.
The target was a reinforced steel warehouse hidden behind a dense curtain of pine trees.
Public land records listed the property under a dummy construction firm, but the utility bills were paid from Ethan’s offshore accounts.
Within ten minutes, the convoy breached the perimeter gate and surrounded the structure.
Tactical agents breached the heavy steel doors with a hydraulic ram.
Inside, the air was thick with the scent of motor oil, packing grease, and industrial plastic.
Row upon row of stacked wooden crates lined the concrete floor.
A federal agent used a crowbar to pry open the first shipping container.
Inside lay twenty factory-sealed crates of Gen-3 night-vision goggles, each marked with serialized Department of Defense stencils.
Beside them sat military-grade thermal scopes, encrypted tactical radios, and crates of specialized sniper ammunition.
All of it had been logged into base records as destroyed during training exercises or lost at sea.
Captain Archer, who had accompanied the federal convoy as an official military observer, stood frozen near the entrance.
“My god,” Archer whispered, running a trembling hand across his face.
“He didn’t just skim supplies.”
“He built an entire black-market armory right under our noses.”
Evelyn stepped up to a metal work desk in the corner of the warehouse.
Resting beside a commercial shipping scale was a high-speed label printer and a stack of fraudulent export manifests.
The destination addresses printed on the labels were routed to private maritime freight companies in Eastern Europe and Central America.
She snapped high-resolution photographs of every single document with her handheld scanner.
“Call the federal prosecutor’s office,” Evelyn directed her lead agent.
“Add illegal arms exportation, conspiracy to defraud the United States, and weapons trafficking to the indictment.”
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The evidence was no longer just circumstantial.
It was an ironclad wall of undeniable proof.
