The sniper leaned back from the rifle and removed a small leather case from her bag, unzipped it, and propped it on the night table. The device was the size of an e-book reader but it was a very powerful portable computer with a satellite uplink. The sniper booted the device, entered her password, and activated the voice interface.

“Authorize Arklight field protocol five.”

The monitor flashed several times and then settled on a screen saver with the smiling face of the Mona Lisa.

The Mona Lisa spoke.

“Oracle welcomes you.”

The Oracle computer had been designed by a man named St. Germaine but re-programmed by her mother; the voice was hers as well, though with a slight alien quality when composing unique phrasing. The sniper had added the animation of the Mona Lisa to give it a less threatening feeling. She loved her mother but, like everyone else who ever met her, was deeply intimidated by her. Even the other two Mothers of the Fallen deferred to her.

“Access all data for mission coded Arklight eight-one-one-seven.”

“Accessing. Do you want to update your field report?”

“Yes.” She gave the computer a detailed report beginning with the phone call from Rasouli that morning and the resulting change in the mission for which her Arklight team had been contracted. At the conclusion of the report she said, “Collate data. I will want a set of probabilities.”

“Collating,” said Oracle. “Is there anything else I can do for you?”

“Yes. I want everything you can find on Joseph Edwin Ledger. White male, early thirties, American.”

“There are ninety-seven unique instances of living people named Joseph Edwin Ledger; one-hundred and sixteen for deceased—”

“Stop. Subject is likely military or ex-military. Possibly law enforcement.”

“There is one instance of a Joseph Edwin Ledger with the Baltimore Police Department in the state of Maryland. There is also one instance of a Joseph Edwin Ledger with the United States Army Rangers. Personal identification numbers and Social Security numbers match.”

“Open a file on him. I want everything. Ledger’s background. Service record, awards, citations, reprimands, psych profiles, his politics. Anything you have.”

“There is already an active Arklight file on this subject.”

“When was the file opened and who opened it?”

The computer gave an open date from July of the previous year. “The file has an L1 code.”

L1. Lilith.

“My mother opened that file?”

“Yes.”

“Summarize the content of that file.”