The Buyer Watched Thirty Shots Malcolm Could No Longer Select

We met at Bellwether on the morning that had been set aside for Malcolm's show.

Ada opened the gate herself. Beyond it stood a low block building, a gravel lot, and a wind sock hanging limp over the cannon shed.

Malcolm arrived in polished shoes that sank into the wet gravel.

"Glad we got past the contract drama," he said.

"We haven't," Ada said. "Today's access is a single session. Winona and I signed it yesterday. So did the buyer."

Flint Acre's board had approved the $2,400 session fee. The audit would pay it whether the product passed or failed.

Priya checked the signed page before she took off her coat.

She had asked for thirty new shots, in an order she would choose. The targets would include the full range of strike points our sales report claimed to cover.

"We usually start with a center hit," Malcolm said.

"Today we start with my list."

I worked the controls with Ada as safety observer. My leave from Flint Acre didn't bar me from doing a session through my own firm. Lena had put that in writing before I agreed to come.

I weighed each ice ball. Ada read the scale. We logged the freezer temperature, checked the gates, and tested the emergency stop.

Nora stood at the recording desk. Ben sat beside Priya, his hands flat on his knees.

Before the first shot, Priya opened the historical workbook on her screen.

"Mr. Strake, did you direct the eleven exclusions?"

"I directed a fair presentation."

"That wasn't the question."

He turned to Ben. "You understand the context."

Ben took a breath.

"He gave me the row numbers," he said. "I didn't review the videos before I changed them."

"Were you qualified to call them ice faults?"

"No."

Malcolm put his coffee down hard enough to spill it.

"Everyone here wants this company to succeed."

"Then we need its actual limits," Priya said.

We began.

Compressed air pushed the first ball down the barrel. The target gave a flat thump. Two green lights showed that both gates had read its speed.

Nora called, "Detection."

She read the time stamp. Priya compared it with the logger.

For a while, everything worked.

On shot seven, ice hit near the tray edge. The sensor stayed silent.

Malcolm stepped forward. "Bad ice."

Ada raised her hand before he crossed the floor line.

We watched the replay. The ice ball stayed whole until it struck. Its speed fell inside the allowed range.

"Valid shot. Missed detection," Priya said.

She asked Nora to enter those exact words.

By lunch, the sensor had caught twenty-five of thirty valid strikes. Most misses came near the edge of the mount. I had flagged that pattern in an engineering note six weeks earlier.

Malcolm had told me not to delay the new sales deck for a bracket problem.

"Can it be fixed?" Priya asked.

"We can try a stiffer mount," I said. "Then test it. I would budget six weeks, including freeze and thaw cycles."

"Or six months," Malcolm said. "Engineers always want more time."

I took off my hearing protection.

"A date doesn't change a reading."

Nora asked to speak with Priya alone. They went into Ada's office. Through the window, I saw Nora place a printed email on the desk.

Later, she told me what it said.

She had warned Malcolm that the edge misses were repeatable. His reply told her to keep that note outside the buyer folder until the retention payments cleared.

The accountant already held the same email. Nora had given Priya its location in the archive.

Priya added the file reference to her notes and asked Nora to check it. A loose printout could start a question. The saved message, with its date and reply chain, could help answer one.

She hadn't trusted her own courage until she heard Ben speak.

While Ada shut down the air supply, I picked a bent white fragment from the catch screen. It looked like another comma.

I put it in a sample bag, marked it with the shot number, and placed it in the test freezer.

Malcolm watched me.

"You really love a failure."

"I like knowing where one starts."

He left before Priya finished her session notes.

On the way home, Lena called. Her voice had lost its usual easy pace.

"Flint Acre filed a petition against you and your consultancy this afternoon. Malcolm signed the statement supporting it."

I pulled into a gas station and put the truck in park.

"What does he want?"

"An order forcing access. And an order stopping you from discussing the test results with the buyer. There's an emergency hearing tomorrow."