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  “Chris? How ya doin’?” Nick radioed.

  “Getting pretty warm in here. I’ve neutralized over half the vehicles. These BMPs back here are really easy pickings.”

  “Ammo?”

  “Pretty low. Almost out. Aaaaand there’s a shitload of ground troops.”

  “Time to retreat, pal.”

  “No can do. I’ve left a whole lotta wreckage back there—road’s blocked. I’m about to take out the last of the vehicles as we speak.”

  The airwaves blasted static for a few seconds before Christopher spoke again.

  “Vehicles neutralized. I’ve got ground troops and survivors crawling all over me. Plan to use out the last of the 25mm before they crack this bitch open and pull me out.”

  “Not gonna happen, Chris. We’re coming for you,” Nick radioed back.

  “Road’s blocked on your side, too. And you can’t drive through trees.” There was a long pause with minimal static, then: “Ah, hell. Turning thirty would’ve sucked anyway. Been fun working with you, boss.”

  Nick felt like an angry, rabid rat was thrashing around in his stomach. He swallowed back the bile rising in his throat and was about to reach for the radio when Mary spoke up.

  “Nick! Jamming’s down. Must have been in one of the tanks Chris took out,” she said.

  “Get on with Rattlesnake. Have them send out their choppers, now.”

  Mary got on the radio and relayed the message.

  “On the way, boss.”

  “Hang on for just a few more minutes, Chris. We’re bailing you out,” Nick said into his radio.

  There was no answer.

  “Chris! Respond!”

  Still nothing.

  “You stupid motherfucker,” Michael grumbled, blinking rapidly.

  “Dammit. Mary, you see a tree in our way, cut it the fuck down with the M240,” Nick said, slamming the Cougar to the right and off the road. His vision narrowed to just the obstacles in front of him, just those things that would stop him from getting to his friend. He slammed his foot down on the accelerator and navigated his way through the trees, plowing through some of the smaller ones. His heart was hammering in his ears loudly enough that he barely heard the radio.

  “Cougar 4-7 Echo, this is Cadillac 4-1,” the radio crackled to life. “We are ten seconds from your position.”

  “The choppers,” Michael said.

  “Cadillac 4-1, engage any ground troops forming up on the CDM. We have a friendly piloting the vehicle, so keep your fire clear of the CDM.”

  “Copy that. Rolling in now.”

  Nick heard the two AH-1 Cobra helicopters fly low over his vehicle, then saw them open fire. Both choppers swung in low, firing missiles and 20mm rounds ahead of them. Several seconds later, they stopped firing, and the radio switched on again.

  “Cougar 4-7, we’ve got enemy hostiles fleeing on foot. And fast. CDM is secure. We’re heading back to base.”

  “Copy that, Cadillac 4-1. Thanks for the assist,” Nick radioed as they passed the last motionless BMP tank and drove back up onto the road.

  The CDM was sitting in the center of the road, not moving. It no longer looked new, as thousands of bullets had cratered its surface. Nick drove right up next to the small assault vehicle. Michael opened the passenger door and hopped out, crouching and sighting his SAW down the road. It turned out to be unnecessary, as there were no soldiers anywhere in sight.

  Nick opened the driver’s door and jumped three feet to the ground, bypassing the built-in steps completely. He tried to open the CDM’s back door, but it wouldn’t budge. With his right fist, he banged on the door twice as hard as he could.

  “Chris! It’s Nick!”

  The door slowly opened. Christopher half-stepped, half-fell out of the vehicle. He was covered in sweat, his medium-short black hair plastered to his scalp.

  “Man. It gets really hot in those things, boss,” he said, wiping his forehead with his sleeve. There was a huge grin on his face.

  “Come on. Back to base with us. I’ll let you rest up, but then…”

  “I know, I know. I’m getting my ass kicked.”

  “Damn right you are,” Nick said, laughing. He reached out and grabbed Christopher in a bear hug.

  “Uh, boss? You’re crushing my spine,” Christopher said, coughing.

  Chapter Five

  Rise Above

  Nick and his crew (in their now fully functional Razor, thanks to Bryce) made it home to Firebase Zulu before sunrise the next morning. As they approached the base, Anthony radioed the gate guard to announce their arrival.

  “We’re clear, boss. Colonel Ross wants to see you and Chris as soon as we’re on base,” Anthony said.

  “Tell them we copy. Looks like we don’t get to crash out just yet,” Nick told Christopher, who was sitting in the Razor’s passenger seat.

  “Eh. I’m still pretty keyed up anyway. Could use a beer or two to simmer down.”

  “I think I can do that. I have some stashed back at the house,” Daniel said.

  “Daniel, you’re a saint.”

  The Razor rolled past the gate guards, who saluted as it passed. They knew who was aboard, and Nick outranked both of the young Marines at the gate. He still hadn’t gotten used to saluting back, but in this case he didn’t have to, as they couldn’t see him anyway.

  “Right. Bryce, lock this thing down. Rest of you, get some sleep. We might be moving again very soon if the Colonel wants to see us already, but grab what rack time you can. Chris? Shall we?”

  Christopher and Nick hopped out of the Razor in front of the entrance to the C2 facility, located in an abandoned mine. The guard at the entrance waved them through, and Colonel Ross’ aide, a Marine Alpha Convict, wordlessly led them to the Colonel’s office.

  “Come in, gentlemen. Nice work out at Camp Rattlesnake. You’re adding to your already infamous reputation,” Sawyer Ross said without standing from his desk. The man was young for a Colonel, not yet even forty years old. He wore his dirty blond hair long, almost to his shoulders, and had several days of stubble on his face. He wore reading glasses, but he took these off as Nick and Christopher stood at attention in front of his desk.

  “At ease, you two. Sit down. Both of you look dead on your damn feet.”

  Nick and Christopher sat in the two folding chairs across from the Colonel’s desk, and Ross closed the file folder in front of him.

  “Mr. Lee. Some interesting developments since yesterday afternoon. I put in a request for a commendation for you—I know it don’t mean a hell of a lot, but you deserve some recognition. By our information, you saved about two hundred fifty Marines by charging out there when you did.”

  “Just doing my job, sir.”

  Christopher’s voice was flat, even bored-sounding, but Nick knew his friend better than that, saw the hints of a grin at the corner of his mouth. There would be bragging later, he knew, and Nick was a hundred percent on board with that—Christopher had earned it.

  “As I would expect from you. But I got an almost instant email back asking why the hell I was trying to get a convict a commendation. Seems we got nothin’ in place to do that, but I sent along the report anyway. Somehow, a representative from Florida’s seventh Congressional district, guy named Reg Holloway, got a hold of it. You know of him?”

  “Not really much into, uh, voting, or anything, sir.”

  “Seems Representative Holloway’s making a hell of a commotion back in Daytona. Don’t know if anything will come of it, but he’s pushing for a pardon.”

  “Really?” Nick asked, raising an eyebrow.

  “Seems that way. He’s saying the math doesn’t work out, as your boy here only killed two wanted felons. In the commission of robbing them, sure. But he also just saved two hundred fifty Marines and almost twice that many convicts. Since that story on the New York Times Network about you last year, Lieutenant, public sentiment’s been softening a little bit toward the CUs.”

  Convict Units was the official mil
itary term for the more than four million felons sentenced to serve in the war, which Nick had been until his conviction was recently overturned. He’d joined the regular Marines to return to the battlefield anyway, fighting alongside his friends.

  “I’ll keep you updated soon as I hear anything, gentlemen. Which brings me to the other reason I brought you in this morning, and it’s sort of related. Like I said, the public’s starting to ask more questions about the CUs. President Crozier has allowed one New York Times Network reporter and his crew to come out to Russia to do a story on them.”

  Nick had a feeling he knew where this was heading, but he didn’t say anything.

  “Now,” Ross said, standing up and pushing his long hair back, “the military brass wants to make sure we’re portrayed in the best possible light here, and with the way this place eats convicts, you can see how that’s not gonna happen without some careful…well, outright lying. You plunk this reporter in with pretty much any CU other than Alpha, and the story he’s gonna bring home ain’t gonna be pretty. And he’s specifically requested Marine Echo or Army Kilo.”

  Marine Echo and Army Kilo were the worst of the worst. All of the convicts in those units had severe felonies and, in most cases, at least two or three murders under their belts. These were not the kind of people the government wanted their constituents to see in prime time.

  “I know it’s been a little while since you’ve been back to Camp Justice, but we need you on this one. You’re to take a few of your men—not Martin Chase, that one’s a nutjob—and meet this reporter out at Liberty. You’ll have a Marine Public Affairs officer with you.”

  “And you want us to, what? Lie, sir? Paint the Convict Conscript Act in a favorable light?”

  “Me? No. Was up to me, I’d tell the reporters to fuck off,” Ross said, a quick grin appearing on his face before it snapped back to impassivity. “But this order ain’t coming from me, Lieutenant. This order’s coming from higher up than you’d believe. The Public Affairs guy has you on light duty. You’re to answer the reporter’s questions in an…we’ll call it an agreeable manner.”

  “Sorry for saying so, sir, but I don’t like this,” Nick said, shaking his head.

  “You and me both, Marine. But orders are orders. And besides,” Ross said as he opened another file folder on his desk, “I’ve got several requests here, from you, for training for your guys. Full paramedic training for Martinez. Weapons training for King, Rice and Riley. Also got some gear requests here. You give the reporter a nice, happy story to go back home and shut people the fuck up with, and I’m authorized to make this stuff happen.”

  Nick thought about that for a moment. He didn’t like the idea of lying about the convict units, not one bit. But the idea of his men finally getting decent training and gear…that would help keep them alive. They’d been limping along for months now on whatever Christopher had been able to charm out of other units or what they’d been able to scavenge in the field, and Nick knew they were the lucky ones. No other convict unit had it as good as they did, because they were the only Special Forces convict unit.

  It had gotten bad enough that, after a particularly hairy battle two months ago, Nick had used his own bank account back home to buy surplus German body armor on the Internet and have the vests shipped out to Firebase Zulu. Those vests were already trashed. They needed new gear, and having a medic actually trained to keep them from dying was a definite plus. Gabriel did the best he could, but he’d learned what little he knew from a few books and one crippled Army Ranger.

  “Orders are orders, sir. When do we leave?”

  “This afternoon. Take four of your people with you—like I said, it’ll be light duty. And take that kid Daniel. Camera’s going to love the shit out of him.”

  * * *

  After a few hours of sleep, Nick had his team ready to go. He’d gotten off a video conference with the Marine Public Affairs office just prior to selection, and they certainly had suggestions as to who he should pick.

  “I see you have a woman in your squad. You’ll definitely want to bring her,” a short, red-faced Colonel had said.

  “Peter King. His file says he’s African-American. We’d like him on your team,” another Colonel, this one black, said.

  To each of them, Nick had simply said, “Yes, sir.” He couldn’t argue anyway, as both men outranked him by a mile. And to be honest, he didn’t care. He wanted the whole thing over with already.

  To round out the five-man squad, Nick chose Daniel and Christopher. As they were forming up near one of Zulu’s helipads for the Black Hawk ride to Camp Justice, Colonel Ross came out and stopped them.

  “Mr. Lee’s a no-go,” Ross said, shouting over the Black Hawk’s rotors.

  “Why’s that, sir?”

  “Word just came back from the States. Full pardon. Mr. Lee, you’re a free man.”

  Christopher just stared at the Colonel blankly, then looked over at Nick and shrugged. Nick was surprised by his friend’s lack of reaction. He wanted to pick the larger man up on his shoulders and run around yelling like an idiot, but of course there was no way he’d actually do it in front of Ross.

  “You’ll be hitching a ride to Liberty anyway to be processed out and wait for the Federal Marshals to take you back to the States,” Ross yelled.

  “Not going to happen, sir,” Christopher shouted back.

  “You out of your mind, kid?”

  “That’s affirmative, sir!”

  Ross smiled, pulling an envelope out of the cargo pocket of his ACU pants.

  “Thought you might be! This is a letter of intent, U.S. Marine Corps. You sign it, I get it processed and you’re back in the war.”

  Christopher didn’t hesitate—he took the envelope, opened it and yanked out the one page inside. “Got a pen, sir?”

  The Black Hawk took off five minutes later, with Christopher’s signed letter of intent in his cargo pocket, ready to be delivered to the brass at Camp Justice, formerly the city of Novosibirsk. Before the war, the town had been called the Chicago of Siberia, but now it was bombed half to oblivion and served as the major base for all of the American troops and convict units in Russia. It would take a while to get Christopher’s release from the convict unit and entry into the Marines processed, anywhere from several hours to a couple of days, so he was still a no-go as far as the reporter was concerned. Nick had asked Bryce to fill in for him, and the small blond driver was only too happy to take a trip with his boyfriend Daniel.

  “You know, you could just hang onto that letter and head back home,” Nick told Christopher as the chopper ferried them west.

  “I could. Not gonna, though.”

  “I’m not saying don’t join up with the regular Marines. I understand that. But take a couple of weeks at home before you do it. See your family. Take a little time off.”

  Christopher laughed, or at least Nick assumed he did. He opened his mouth like he was laughing, but if he did, Nick couldn’t hear it over the rotor noise.

  “You ever been to Daytona Beach, boss? Not much better than here, really. Warmer, sure. But it’s a shithole. Besides, this is war. We don’t get any days off. And someone’s got to be around to keep an eye on you.”

  Nick saw in his second-in-command’s face that arguing the point further would serve no purpose. Christopher had his mind made up. Nick was thankful he wasn’t going to lose him—over the past year and a half, he’d come to think of Christopher as his best friend—but he also wished the guy would go home and leave all the blood and bullets behind.

  Instead of arguing, Nick turned his attention to the brief the Public Affairs officer had sent. Colonel Ross had uploaded it to the command screen embedded in the sleeve of Nick’s BDU jacket just before takeoff, and Nick realized he’d have to learn it and make it sound convincing before they landed at Camp Justice in a couple of hours.

  Chapter Six

  Road Block

  The reporter sat just behind Captain Chandler, the Marine Public Affairs
officer, who was driving the large Cougar 6x6 through the outer gates of Camp Liberty. Nick was on the opposite bench seat behind the reporter’s cameraman, perched in the passenger seat and filming out the front windshield. They were on their way to run guard duty on one of the roads leading into the camp from the west, which just happened to be the only direction enemy forces weren’t coming from.

  Nick studied the reporter as he flipped through a few screens on his tablet computer. The guy was young, maybe twenty-six or twenty-seven, with longish brown hair and a trimmed beard. Someone had given him Army ACU pants and a thick, olive-drab field jacket. He wore a black Kevlar helmet and brand-new body armor. When they’d been introduced a few minutes before, Nick had learned the man’s name was Douglas Keane.

  Nick and his crew had been given new uniforms as soon as they’d stepped off the Black Hawk. Nick’s was a standard-issue woodland camouflage Marine BDU with “US Marines” over the left side of his chest and “Morrow” over the right. His rank insignia just over his sternum indicated that he was a 1st Lieutenant, which was correct, though he’d only been promoted a couple of days ago, just before picking up the Navy survivors.

  His men all had clean, new, concrete-gray Convict BDUs. None of them had worn that particular uniform for a while now—more than a year ago, they’d gotten their hands on some black, unmarked BDUs that they wore instead. These had “USMC-CU” on the left side of the chest and “47 Echo SRF” on the right.

  They’d also gotten brand-new body armor, new helmets, clean, unused weapons, and new boots. Someone wanted the reporter to think the convict units were being supplied just as well as the regular armed forces. Thinking back to the Chucks at Rattlesnake, Nick knew just how big that lie was. Just remember—this is a means to an end. If you didn’t do it, someone else would, Nick thought. The justification sounded lame even in his own head, and did nothing to cut the taste of the acid in the back of his throat.

  “So, how long have you been running your, uh, people, Lieutenant?” Keane asked, looking up from his tablet.