PART 2
The valley below us had turned into a furnace with guns.
We had inserted the night before under a sky so black it looked fake.
Six miles through shale, scrub, and vertical rock.
The target package called the place a staging compound for a mid-level bomb maker.
Routine key-leader engagement.
That was the phrase.
In my experience, “routine” was what officers said right before enlisted men got buried.
By sunrise, the valley had opened its mouth.
Fifty fighters, maybe more, poured from positions intelligence swore were empty.
Machine guns on the left ridge.
Riflemen moving through the dry wadi on our right.
A classic L-shaped kill zone with our backs pinned against a ravine.
Pretty work, if you were grading the ambush.
Terrible place to die.
A round cracked over my helmet and punched into the wall behind me.
I ducked, reloaded, and felt my last magazine lock into the weapon.
That was when the math got ugly.
Doc Miller shouted, “Chief, Danvers is fading.”
Beckett slid across the dirt to him.
He took one look at Danvers’ face and went still.
“How long?”
Doc didn’t sugarcoat it.
“He needs blood and a surgeon. Not motivation. Not prayer. A surgeon.”
Hayes looked up from the radio.
“Chief.”
His face was gray under the dust.
Beckett held his gaze for half a second.
Then he said the two words nobody wants to hear.
“Tell them.”
Hayes keyed the mic.
He shielded it with one hand and whispered into the static.
“TOC, Romeo Two-Zero. Broken Arrow. We are black on ammo. Send help.”
May you like
The air after that was worse than gunfire.
It had weight.
