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PROLOGUE
SECOND LIEUTENANT ADAM VERLICE
Trust is defined as a firm belief in the reality, truth, ability, or strength of someone or something.It is hard to gain and easy to lose.Such a simple word with a meaning that casts a light in the dark, illuminating the shadows that stand at your back.
Trust is shown in every muscle and nerve ending in your body. How you uphold yourself against the trials and tribulations that life throws your way. Ask yourself: are you a safe place? A safe place for the people that you love or even a safe place for yourself?
To gain trust is difficult to achieve. You must be humble and bare your soul to someone. Letting them see they are not alone in their struggle. Show your scars. Bleed truth. Never be vindictive in your pursuit of peace.
Trust is fragile and can be lost in a matter of moments. One word can shatter the heart of the strongest person. Words and actions must follow one another in order to preserve expectations. When that trust is broken or hindered, you will struggle to get it back, and sometimes it is lost for good.
The military forces you to trust your fellow man. Trained with precision and dumped into different parts of the world with different people. Sex and race mean nothing when you are being shot at by the enemy. It’s the brothers and sisters who stand at your back.
“I’ve got your six.”
My journey is not like yours or the next person’s. They taught me I must blindly trust my fellow soldiers while also going with my gut. Orders and commands spoken to me became ingrained in my mind, bringing solace to a lost soul. I built my life around this ideologic mission statement of the military. Signed my life away at the promise of a brighter future. Each for their own reasons. Some for the proud military lineage. Some for the travel promised. And then there are some, like me, needing to get out of an unpleasant situation and take care of the ones we love.
I lost my mom when I was still in high school. It happened so fast, giving whatever plans I originally had the shaft. I was left couch surfing from different friends’ homes until I graduated. Once I finished high school, I immediately joined the Marines. It didn’t take long for me to work my way up the ranks and take command of an entire platoon of men and women. I took pride in being the man in charge. The man in control. The man who people trusted. They didn’t just trust me, but their families and friends entrusted me to keep their loved ones safe. These were good men and women.
My platoon had been keeping this small village safe for a couple of months. The scorching hot summer month of July had everyone wishing for an artic breeze to push through the thick humid air in this small village in the Middle East. In the early morning, my superior informed us that there was chatter going around that someone had their eye on this community. They were in the middle of deciphering what the talk was about, but by that time, it was too late.
When we first arrived, the people of the village welcomed us with warm embraces. Now, let me tell you, they were the kindest people.Gave us food, water, and let us sit with them inside their homes if there was severe weather. I’d grown fond of each person my platoon was sent to protect. It always started off as a job, but the more you got to know someone, the more you let them in.Laughter broke the ice, and it continued until bullets rang freely.
Tuesday, June thirteenth. It was a day I will never forget.
My body was drenched in sweat, even though I was doing nothing more than standing still. The hot air seared my lungs and even with half my face covered with a mask, I could still taste the sand that blew in the wind. We had confirmed the perimeter was clear, and we were ready to make our shift change.
There was no warning. We never saw it coming.
“Incoming!” I heard the panic in Private First-Class John’s voice as he radioed the incoming attack.
The hollow staccato of bullets hitting the dirt around us pierced the air. Like a pile driver, the smooth metal of the bullet threw me backward, and I saw my feet above my head before my back hit the ground. My armor absorbed the force of the bullet, but I knew the impact would leave a nasty bruise on my chest. The plates behind the vest shattered, and I could hear them grinding against each other under the tactical material. I looked around to see my platoon running. Franklin went down. Shot in the skull, death was instant.
Whoever they were, they released all hell on us and the people we were defending. My men staggered their positions and stances. They prepared to face the unknown threat that was ringing our doorbell. Bullets soared through the air. The pounding of the semiautomatic rifles, the burning smell of gunpowder, the thick fog from the gas explosives.
“Take cover!” I yelled to my men.
It was no use. They dropped like flies. Grenades and gunfire filled the evening sky, clouding the sunset. The screams from my men, the people of the village, and the commands from the enemy overlapped one another. Adrenaline consumed my body as I aimed my gun at the enemies. Their faces were covered, no camouflage, no labels or insignia to give away who they were. My finger tapped at the trigger, letting my bullets find their rightful home. A few of their guys fell down and others ducked behind structures or vehicles that sped toward us.
A scream from inside the house behind me had me stopping and turning around. I ran toward the home and felt a burning sensation on my shoulder, just where the back of the vest ended. A blast behind me propelled my body forward. Ringing in my ears caused a chill down my spine. I tried to shake my head, hoping like hell it stopped. The voice inside the home called out to me. Begging me to get inside to safety. Khalil was one of the teenagers from the village we were guarding. His hand appeared through the dusty air, pulling at my shirt and vest.
“No!” I tried to yell back at this kid.
Panic overwhelmed me. If I could see his hands, that meant the enemy could too. I forced myself up when another blast to my left drove my body into the doorframe. Khalil pulled me farther into the structure. His small hands gripped my blood-soaked clothes, and he tried like hell to drag me to safety. With as much strength as I had left, I scrambled my legs to help propel me backward in the direction of the house that Khalil was struggling to pull me into. He hauled me to his bedroom, where he rolled me into a corner. My body felt full of shrapnel metal from the bombs and bullets that had singed my skin. I could already sense the accompanying bruises caused by being thrown around like a rag doll. My body writhed as I was delirious and fought to stay awake. I reached for Khalil and mumbled my words. I wanted to tell him to hide, to run, to get away, anything to make sure he was safe. This kid hushed me while covering me with clothes and furniture. The more I tried to fight, the more I lost consciousness. The last vision I remembered seeing was Khalil running from the room.
“Be safe,” I whispered before my body betrayed me.
Time is a hallucination of real life. My body and mind replay that day constantly. Each time differs slightly from the last. I question what death feels like. The only pain I feel is the emotional pain of being blindsided, watching my friends and military family fall… one by one. The memory of the assault leaves a nasty taste in my mouth, much worse than the blood-soaked sand that had filled my mouth that awful day. I don’t recall how many days or weeks passed before I finally came back to life. The horrendous reality of a new life.
My eyes fluttered against the dim lighting, fighting to wake up. My head turned to see the beige curtains of the hospital room partially open. Pain radiated through my entire body. I looked down to see the bandages that adorned my body. My torso was wrapped in several layers of high-pressure bandages and a wrap covered my head. My tongue was swollen from medication, lips dry from the breathing tube I must have had at one point. Mouth felt full of cotton from all the medication that they had pumped into my body. I tried to move my achingly stiff muscles, but the pain was too much.
“Don’t move too much,” Captain Timmons said.
I peered over to see my superior and his haggard face. He looked like he hadn’t slept in days, stress weighing heavily on his shoulders. He wore the look of death. Captain Timmons was the one who first gave the deployment orders. Shook my hand and wished me safe travels. Now there I lay, and there he sat.
“My platoon?” I asked.
I should’ve known better than to ask. His face solemnly displayed half the answers to my questions. He told me what they were able to decipher from the chatter. As I listened, my insides twisted in anguish. This was not a terrorist group that attacked us or insurgents that were dead set on taking over. This was what we would consider “friendly fire.” This was American corporate greed at its finest. Captain Timmons told about me the pay-for-mercenary assignment the killers had accepted. This made you wonder: How many knew they were attacking innocent lives? How easy was it to pull the trigger while looking into their eyes? Captain Timmons had a team that had been trying to locate all the people connected to the mission. He knew as well as I did that there was more to the story than just the feet on the ground. The price of corporate greed paid its price with the lives of innocent people. The man at the center of it all, Mitchell DuPont of DuPont Enterprises, sat so unapologetically and unfazed, not caring that he caused the slaughter of an entire village or the deaths of American soldiers. He knew that the legality of what happened could take years, if that, to bring a case in front of a judge, and even then, the sway of money in the right pockets could let the monster walk free. DuPont’s deep pockets would help turn heads in whichever way he deemed necessary.
