Chapter 1
The jungle is alive.
Not in the peaceful, nature-documentary kind of way. It breathes with danger, every sound a question you have to answer fast. The rustle of leaves could be wind. Could be an enemy moving into position. The insects are loud but not loud enough to cover the distant crunch of boots against wet earth, slow and deliberate.
Five armed hostiles between us and the extraction point.
Not on my watch.
I crouch behind a fallen tree, heat sitting on everything like a second skin, sweat at my temple. The rifle in my hands is steady. My heartbeat is slow. This is what we do, what we have always done, and I am not about to start being bad at it now.
I press two fingers to my comms. “Hudson, talk to me.”
His voice comes through even and unhurried. “Two tangos on the ridge setting up a perimeter. Three more moving south.” A pause. “We could wait for them to pass.”
“I vote we don’t.” Red, already.
Of course.
From somewhere up in the canopy Logan exhales. “We have a clean window if we hold two more minutes. But sure, let’s not do that.”
I almost smile. “We move. Clean and fast. Red, you save the theatrics for when I say.”
“That’s genuinely hurtful.”
“Copy or don’t.”
“...Copy.”
We move.
The first kill is silent.
Logan’s suppressed shot drops the hostile on the ridge before the man takes his next step. Hudson and Red bleed left through the undergrowth, low and quiet in the way that takes years to get right. I take Tyler's right, keeping close to the tree line. The three hostiles ahead are moving loose, rifles easy, not expecting anything.
They don’t get time to fix that.
My knife finds the first one’s throat clean. I catch his weight and lower him into the mud and he barely makes a sound. Tyler puts down the second without breaking stride. The third turns, a half second too late, eyes wide, hand going for his weapon.
I close the distance before he gets there.
For a moment the jungle is still.
Then the tree line opens up and everything goes loud.
Gunfire tears through the canopy, rounds ripping through the space I’d been standing in a second ago. I throw myself behind a trunk and press flat against the bark.
“They were expecting us,” Briggs grits out.
“Appreciate the update,” Hudson says.
I run it fast in my head. Machine gunner at eleven o’clock, two more working the flanks, and we are pinned in a spot I do not love. “Reaper. Give me something.”
A beat.
Logan’s rifle cracks once and the machine gun goes quiet.
“Red.”
“Already on it.”
The C-4 goes and the ground shudders under my boots, a deep thud that rattles through my chest. Fire and smoke swallow the left flank whole. I’m moving before the debris lands, Hudson appearing through the smoke like he was never anywhere else, Tyler right behind me.
What’s left of them doesn’t last long.
Then it’s over. The jungle settles back into itself, insects and heat and nothing else. I stand in the middle of it and let my heartbeat find its way back down.
Mission complete.
The moment our boots hit the tarmac the exhaustion shows up, not dramatic, just quiet and heavy in the legs. We’re alive. Job done. Another one in the books for Viper Team.
General Monroe is waiting, arms crossed, face unreadable until he nods. “Good work out there.”
“Our pleasure sir!” I say.
He lets out a short laugh. “High command is impressed. This one’ll be remembered.”
Red straightens up immediately. “You hear that? We’re getting famous.”
“Infamous,” Hudson says. “Different thing.”
“Is it though.”
Monroe looks back at me. “Get some rest, Captain. You and your men earned it.”
Rest. Sure.
As we head inside Red and Briggs are already into it, some argument that started on the chopper and apparently didn’t finish. Tyler finds a wall and becomes part of it. Logan doesn’t say much, which means he’s fine. I’ve learned the difference.
Hudson falls into step beside me. “You could at least look like you enjoy being told good job.”
“I’ll enjoy it when we get a full night without a call-out.”
He huffs. “Yeah. Like that’s ever going to happen.”
