The production staging area behind the main broadcast tents was normally a hive of organized chaos, but at two in the morning, it was reduced to a graveyard of shadowed tents and humming generator lights.
Xiao Li, the junior equipment technician, stood shivering near a stack of empty supply crates. His hands were trembling so violently that he could barely hold his electronic clipboard. Just ten minutes ago, he had walked past the main security tent and seen three senior officers huddled around a glowing monitor, pulling the time-stamped night-vision footage of the primary equipment locker.
They knew. They knew someone had tampered with Team A's compass, and it was only a matter of hours before the digital audit traced the access codes back to his specific crew badge.
