Chapter 20

chapter

twenty

The desert night was cold, the air biting at his face and stealing his breath. Sand crunched beneath his boots, whispering accusations he couldn’t quite make out. His palms were slick with sweat inside his gloves, and his chest was tight, too tight, as if the air itself was squeezing him, wringing the life from his lungs with every step.

Ahead, the jagged pathway twisted like a coiled snake, leading toward the compound nestled in the rocky valley below. The place looked almost serene, its gates flanked by twin guards and lazy patrols circling under dim lights—too calm, the kind of quiet that made his gut churn.

He adjusted his grip on his rifle, but his fingers didn’t seem to work correctly. His gloves felt wrong—too thick, too tight, too loose all at once. His pulse thundered in his ears, drowning out everything but the sound of his own shallow breathing.

“Six, stay sharp,” Shane’s voice cut through the comms, sharp and commanding. Echo One. Master Chief Shane Trevisano. A legend.

Rylan tried to shake off the unease twisting in his gut as he scanned the compound through his NVGs. He was the youngest guy here, fresh from Green Team, still trying to prove he deserved the SEAL Trident pinned to his uniform. Tonight was supposed to be his chance to earn it. His chance to show he wasn’t just some green kid tagging along for the ride.

But something was wrong.

He glanced sideways at Shane, crouched beside him with Jax on his other side. Even in the inky night, Rylan could see the tension etched into Shane’s face, the way his jaw clenched, the way his finger hovered near the trigger of his weapon as if he could sense the ambush waiting to spring.

“We a go?” Echo Two—Jaxon Thorne—asked quietly.

Shane hesitated. That was the first crack in the illusion of calm, and it sent a ripple through the team. Shane never hesitated. Jax, nicknamed “Steady” for his unshakable nerves, never faltered, either. But now even Jax looked uneasy, his dark-painted face turned toward Shane with a frown.

Rylan’s grip on his rifle tightened until his knuckles ached. If they were nervous, he had every reason to be terrified. He was the FNG here, the newbie. The one expected to watch, learn, and shut the hell up unless he had something important to say.

Something was wrong.

But he stayed quiet.

Shane finally nodded. “Two, Five, secure the perimeter. Set overwatch. Four, prep for traps. Three, Six, you’re with me. We breach, capture the HVT, and exfil clean.”

Rylan’s stomach twisted. He knew his place—stay in line, follow orders, don’t fuck up. But he couldn’t help the flicker of doubt that surged through him when Echo Three, Alejandro Ramirez, muttered, “I like the exfil part. This pinging on anyone else’s shit-o-meter?”

Rylan swallowed the knot of apprehension in his throat. If even Alejandro, their steady-as-hell medic, was feeling uneasy, then shit was definitely about to hit the fan.

“You sure you don’t want me inside with you?” Jax asked.

“I need you on overwatch,” Shane said firmly, cutting off any further debate. “Now cut the chatter. We stick to the plan. Get in, get out, go home. Hooyah?”

A muted chorus of “Hooyah” echoed through the comms, but it lacked the usual conviction.

Rylan tried to ignore the tension crackling between Shane and Jax. This was the job. There was no room for doubt, no time for second-guessing. His hands trembled as he checked his gear one last time, then tightened his grip on his weapon.

“Move out,” Shane ordered.

Rylan’s stomach twisted. He was supposed to move now, follow orders, fall into step like clockwork. But something held him back, an invisible hand pressing on his shoulders, pinning him in place.

“Six, what’s your status?” Shane barked into his comm.

“I…” Rylan’s voice cracked, and he clamped his mouth shut, forcing himself to nod instead. He shifted his weight, his legs trembling beneath him, and fell into position behind Shane and Alejandro.

They moved forward, their steps silent on the sand. The compound loomed larger with every step, its walls casting jagged shadows in the moonlight. His pulse thundered in his ears, drowning out everything but the sound of his own breathing. Sweat stung his eyes, and he resisted the urge to wipe it away. He tried to focus on the mission, on the steps they’d drilled over and over during training. One step at a time. Stay sharp. Watch Shane’s six.

Ahead, Zeke “Fuse” Mitchell crouched by the door, his grin stark against the streaks of camo paint on his face. “You want it open, Chief, I’ll give you open.”

“Do it,” Shane said, his voice cold as steel.

Fuse set the charge, his hands moving with practiced precision.

Rylan exhaled slowly, bracing himself. This was it. His first real mission with Echo, the moment he’d been waiting for. A chance to prove he was more than just a green kid. A chance to prove he deserved to be here.

The world erupted into chaos.

“Hostiles incoming from the west!” Mack bellowed into their comms, his rifle responding with sharp cracks that echoed over the grounds.

Gunfire exploded from every direction, ripping through the quiet darkness.

“Door’s charged,” Fuse said.

“Blow it,” Shane said.

“I’ve got your six covered, Echo One,” Jax said through his comm. “We’ll hold ‘em off. Finish the mission.”

A blast rocked the ground beneath his boots, sending a shockwave through the compound that knocked Rylan flat on his back. His head slammed against the rocky dirt, and for a moment, everything was spinning—sky and sand and smoke blending into one dizzying blur. The sound of gunfire exploded around him, sharp and deafening, as tracer rounds lit up the night like fireworks.

Shane’s voice cut through the chaos, sharp and unforgiving. “Push forward! We finish the mission!”

Rylan scrambled to his feet, his rifle shaking in his grip. His legs wouldn’t obey. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think.

“Six, what are you doing?” Shane’s voice barked in his ear. “Move your ass!”

“Grenade out!” Alejandro was beside him, his face grim as he lobbed a grenade into the mass of enemies swarming toward them. “C’mon, Kentucky. Head in the game. We need you here.” The explosion sent bodies flying, but it wasn’t enough to stem the tide. Shadows swarmed toward them, figures emerging from the darkness like wraiths.

They needed him. Right. They needed him to do the job he’d trained for. The only job he’d ever wanted. They needed him to ? —

His heart pounded as he turned to cover their flank, and movement at the far side of the compound caught his eye. A man darted behind a stack of crates, carrying something bulky. His stomach sank as the realization hit—an RPG launcher.

He had a clean shot. His rifle was trained on the man’s head, his finger already brushing the trigger. One squeeze. That’s all it would take. But his body wouldn’t respond. His finger locked up as if frozen, his breath caught in his throat.

The insurgent turned, his face illuminated for a brief second in the compound’s dim light, and met Rylan’s gaze. He smiled. A cruel, knowing smile that seared itself into Rylan’s memory as he lifted the launcher to his shoulder.

Rylan pulled the trigger, and his bullet hit its mark, but it was too late.

“RPG!” Jax’s shout also came too late.

“Get down!” Rylan turned and reached for Alejandro…

The rocket hit at Alejandro’s feet, and, in the split-second before the flames consumed him, Alejandro’s eyes locked with Rylan’s, wide with shock and fear. Then the world exploded in a blinding flash of heat and light. The force of the blast hurled Rylan backward. His head cracked against the rocky earth, the impact driving the air from his lungs. His vision swam, but he forced himself to sit up. Smoke choked the air, turning the night into a hellish landscape of fire and chaos. Fuse lay motionless a few feet away, his face distorted into a horrific version of his usual grin, the skin peeled back off his skull.

Jax’s garbled voice was both in his ear and simultaneously miles away, nothing but an echo of a shout. “One is down! I repeat, Echo One is down! Echo Six is down! Four is down! Three is—Jesus. Alejandro is gone. Just fucking gone.”

“Six is still alive!” Mack shouted. “I’m going in for him.”

“Don’t,” Rylan tried to say, but his voice came out as a broken rasp. Pain lanced through his arm, his shoulder, his chest. “It’s a trap.”

Nobody heard him.

Or if they did, they didn’t listen.

Through the haze of smoke and dust, he saw Mack running toward him…

Bullets tore through him before he made it halfway across the courtyard. He staggered a few more steps, then collapsed when another bullet blasted past the protection of his helmet.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Jax’s voice was like a mantra, raw and desperate through the comms. “Hang on, guys. QRF is inbound. Hang on. Help is coming. Fuck!”

Rylan tried to move, to stand up, but pain flared through his body, so intense it stole his breath. He looked down at himself and nearly retched. His arm—his right arm from the elbow down—was gone, replaced by a mangled, bloody stump. Bile rose in his throat as he stared at the jagged edges of bone protruding through the shredded flesh.

He screamed, the sound painful as it tore from his throat. The chaos around him faded, the shouts and gunfire growing distant, muffled like he was underwater. His vision tunneled until all he could see was the empty space where his arm used to be.

“Ry… lan…”

Rylan turned his head at the ragged whisper and saw Shane sprawled on his back a few feet away. Smoke curled from the edges of his gear, filling the air with the acrid stench of burning flesh. His weapon was still clutched in his hands.

No, not clutched.

Melted, fused to his fingers.

But his chest was still moving. He was still breathing. Still alive.

Rylan’s stomach lurched as he dragged himself toward Shane. “Chief. Shane, c’mon. We gotta move. We gotta ? —“

Shane’s eyes fluttered open, unfocused and glassy with pain. “Ry… lan.” Blood bubbled at the corner of his mouth as his skin melted. “You did this.”

“No…” Rylan whispered, his voice breaking.

A bloodied hand grabbed his boot, and Fuse—what was left of him—dragged his shattered body forward like something out of a zombie movie. “You did this.”

“No, no, no.”

Mack sat up and looked at him with blankeyes, blood streaming down his face from the hole in the side of his skull. “We needed you, Kentucky. You let us down. You killed us.”

“I’m sorry. Jesus, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

They closed in around him, and he tried to scramble away, but the ground beneath him shifted, turning into quicksand that pulled him under, suffocating him, dragging him down into darkness…

Rylan jackknifed upright, a strangled scream tearing from his throat as he fought to escape the grasping hands of his dead teammates. His heart thundered against his ribs and cold sweat drenched his body, plastering his hair to his forehead. For a moment, he couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move, trapped in the space between nightmare and reality.

It wasn’t real. It was just a dream. The same damn dream that had haunted him every night for the past nine years.

Just a dream.

It was just a dream.

Except it wasn’t. Not really. The details might change, but the ending was always the same.

Alejandro blown to pieces.

Mack and Fuse, dead.

Shane, burned beyond recognition.

And him, frozen, useless, watching it all happen.

Dream Shane’s words echoed in his mind, an endless loop of guilt and regret. “You did this. You did this. You did this.“

In reality, Shane hadn’t said that. He’d only been conscious for a few moments, and though he’d tried to talk, the only sound that had emerged from his charred lips was a raspy, unintelligible whisper. But in the nightmare, Shane’s accusation rang out loud and clear, a condemnation he couldn’t escape.

Rylan scrubbed a hand over his face, his fingers shaking as he pushed his hair back from his forehead. He forced himself to take a deep breath, then another, trying to slow his racing heart. It was a technique he taught his clients, a way to ground themselves in the present when the past threatened to overwhelm them. But tonight, the old trick wasn’t working fast enough. The ghosts of his past were too close, their icy fingers still wrapped around his throat.

In a few short months, it would be the tenth anniversary of the mission from hell. Ten fucking years and the memories were still as fresh as if it had happened yesterday. The acrid smell of smoke and burning flesh. The coppery tang of blood in his mouth. The searing pain as the blast ripped his arm from his body.

And the guilt. The soul-crushing, gut-wrenching guilt that he hadn’t been able to save them. That he had hesitated, just for a second, and it had cost them their lives.

Finally, the terror began to recede, leaving him hollow and exhausted. He glanced at the clock on the nightstand. 4:17 AM.

Too early to be awake, too late to go back to sleep.

He flopped back on the bed and draped his arm over his eyes. The sweat was drying into chills now, but the sheets tangled around him were too damp to provide much warmth.

The soft pad of paws on the hardwood floor pulled him from the dark spiral of his thoughts. He lifted his arm to see Valor standing in the doorway, head cocked to the side as he regarded Rylan with those too-intelligent eyes.

“What do you want?” he grumbled, but there was no heat in his words.

Valor took that as an invitation and trotted into the room. He hopped up onto the bed without hesitation and laid down, pressing his warm body against Rylan’s side.

Rylan froze, unsure how to react. It had been so long since he’d allowed anyone, human or animal, to get this close. His first instinct was to push the dog away, to snarl at him to get off the bed and leave him alone.

But Valor was a solid, comforting presence, and he found himself slowly relaxing, the tension draining from his muscles. He reached out tentatively and laid his hand on Valor’s head, stroking the soft fur between his ears.

It was… nice.

Valor sighed contentedly and leaned into the touch, his tail thumping gently against the mattress.

Rylan’s throat tightened, emotion welling up in his chest. How long had it been since he’d experienced this kind of simple, uncomplicated affection? Valor didn’t judge him, didn’t demand anything from him.

He didn’t deserve this comfort, this unconditional acceptance. Not after what he’d done. Not after failing his team so completely. But Valor didn’t seem to care about his past or his failures. The dog was here, now, offering solace without judgment.

Something inside him cracked, just a little. A tiny fissure in the walls he’d built around his heart. For the first time in longer than he could remember, the tightness in his chest eased just a fraction. He focused on the rise and fall of Valor’s ribs beneath his palm, the rhythmic cadence helping to slow his own ragged breathing.

Minutes ticked by, marked by the glowing numbers on the clock. Outside, an owl hooted, the sound distant and mournful in the pre-dawn stillness. Rylan’s eyelids grew heavy, his body finally succumbing to exhaustion.

He knew the nightmares would return. They always did, dragging him back into that hellish memory, forcing him to relive the worst moment of his life over and over again.

But for tonight, with Valor’s grounding weight against his side, Rylan drifted into a dreamless sleep.