Amber
I wasn’t going to lie—I was scared.
Rylen sat tall next to me in the back of the pickup truck where we were crammed in with six others. A nearly-full moon blazed through the treetops. Only civilian cars were in our convoy, because the military vehicles were all at Elmendorf base. My hair was tied back in a ponytail that whipped my shoulders in the chilly air. I wore a camouflaged combat helmet secured tightly under my chin, with an all-black outfit. Like the others, I had on a heavy bulletproof vest. Most of them carried M14 rifles or whatever other big guns were on hand. I had an M9 pistol, which I wasn’t afraid to use. My medic bag was at my side, filled with scissors, tourniquets, gauze, medical tape, rubbing alcohol, iodine swabs, morphine syringes, and tons of muslin bandages.
I felt Rylen peering at me every so often. I stared straight out at the passing trees in the darkness, because I didn’t want him to see the worry in my face. I wished it was lighter outside so I could take in all the beauty we’d been denied underground, but just breathing in the fresh, crisp air made me feel twice as alive as I had an hour ago. I reached out and took his hand, which he gladly took in return, holding tight.
The guys driving wore night-vision goggles, and the headlights were kept off. Though they drove slow to keep our advancement as quiet as possible, the twenty-mile trek went by too quickly. A bout of nausea rolled over me when we stopped, my palm suddenly sweaty against Rylen’s. He squeezed my fingers and released them. Nobody spoke. I stayed very still, my heart pounding erratically, while everyone climbed out like ninjas. Rylen grabbed my waist to steady me as I jumped out, grabbing my heavy bag. The plan was for me to stay in the treeline, watching and waiting.
Everyone had their orders. Top was in the lead, carrying a walkie-talkie that connected him with Colonel Latham back at the bunker. The Colonel was watching the silent feed inside the primary tech building on base and would let us know when all was clear. By “clear” he didn’t mean no Baelese—there were always Baelese patrolling—but there was a time during the night when less guards were on duty, and that’s when we would strike.
I let out a deep breath as I followed the pack, everyone alert. And for such a large group, they were shockingly stealthy. I had to pay close attention to my footsteps, squinting at the dark ground to avoid twigs. Rylen had to grab my arm to stop me when the troop halted. My heart was steadily drumming. How did soldiers do this on a normal basis? Did they ever get used to it, or were they as nervous as me every time? Not that they looked nervous . . .
The entire group squatted, so I followed suit. An unnerving silence weighed heavily over us as Top held the comm box, waiting. After what seemed like forever, a tiny static sound came on, and Colonel’s voice.
“You’re a go.”
“Roger that,” Top said. He looked over our group, and in that moment he reminded me so much of my dad, so serious, full of pride and concern for his soldiers. He gave a nod and everyone pulled out earplugs, sticking them in to keep from being voice-commanded by the Baelese.
A lump filled my throat as Rylen pulled me aside and pressed his forehead to mine. We didn’t kiss. No hugs either. We just stood there, foreheads touching, eyes closed, breathing each other in, letting the urgency of our hope rise up and twirl between us, spinning until it was a powerful cyclone of unspoken words, holding us together.
Be safe.
Stay alert.
I love you more than life.
Don’t you dare die.
And then he was letting me go, pulling away, dragging my breath with him as he turned to join the others. The only one staying behind with me was Short Matt. Top handed over the walkie talkie to him. Colonel Latham would keep us updated and let us know if we were needed inside. And if, God forbid, we lost, he would tell Matt and I to head back to the bunker.
I’d already warned fate, and the universe at large, that I wasn’t going back without Rylen. We had to win this.
I crouched next to Matt, setting down my bag, but keeping my fingers wrapped around the handle. I felt the ear plugs in my pocket. I would put them in as soon as it was time, but I was paranoid that I wouldn’t be able to hear calls for help with them in.
It was nearly impossible to see what the troop was headed into as they moved forward as one, hunched but agile, guns ready. I knew there was a huge barbed wire fence they had to cut through to get in. Several of the special ops boys would go in first and take out the patrollers as quietly as possible. No gunshots.
The next round would infiltrate the primary building. Once the communications room was secured, they would scour the rest of the building and attached barracks to take out the remaining Baelese as they slept. But if the sneak attack was compromised at any time, and the enemy was able to put out a warning, the mission would be a fail, even if we managed to kill every alien there. It was no use having the base back if we couldn’t use their communications to find out what was going on at the Baelese headquarters.
Now, all Matt and I could do was sit and wait.
We were so still. The soldiers seemed far away. Quiet. But my freaking heart was loud as crap in my chest, booming inside my ears and thrumming every pulse point.
“It’s weird how silent it is,” Matt whispered. “Normally they’d cause a distraction, something to get the enemy out of their element, but they don’t want them to have time to report any suspicious activities.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. We didn’t need the DRI sending any extra aliens up to Alaska to check it out.
Matt stared out into the darkness, both of us crouching. He held the walkie-talkie in one hand and the comm box in the other. His body was alert yet calm, but I saw the guarded fear glistening in his eyes. We waited so long that my knees began to cramp, and I slowly stood, leaning against a tree.
“I feel like it’s taking too long,” I whispered.
“No.” Matt stood too. “They have to take their time on a stealth mission. Don’t worry.”
I rubbed my face. My ears practically throbbed from straining to hear something other than night bugs chirping and snoring. And then I nearly jumped out of my skin when I heard a thump and scuffle behind us in the trees. I grabbed Matt’s arm and spun, reaching for my gun with my other hand.
“It’s okay!” Matt said, pointing. I squinted and could barely make out a huge thing in the trees, moving.
“What the hell is that?”
“It’s just a moose,” he assured me.
Oh, holy shit. I closed my eyes and tried to catch my breath. I could sort of make it out now, the long legs and massive body moving slowly. Matt chuckled low.
A quiet sound of static suddenly zapped, and Matt pulled the walkie-talkie up to his face.
“They’re in,” came a whispered voice. “They’ve paused all media, so we’ve lost visual contact.”
“Roger that,” Matt said back.
“Paused all media?” I asked.
“Yeah, one of our techies broke into the electrical system and paused the cameras, so those on night duty won’t see us. But it also means the one camera we were able to link into is down, too.”
My heart really started racing now as I imagined our troops spilling into doorways, down halls, into rooms, getting the drop on unsuspecting Baelese.
“This is good,” Matt assured me. I nodded, hoping they could do it fast, because waiting was the worst.
From afar, in the direction of the base, I heard a male cry out. I froze and listened.
“What was that?” I whispered.
“I don’t know.”
I heard it again, and panic rose. “Someone’s trying to get to me.”
“Wait,” he whispered. “Stay put a second.”
A small grunt, and the sound of someone trying to drag themselves. If one of our guys was injured, I couldn’t just stand here waiting.
“They’re hurt!” I took off running.
“Amber!” Matt whispered. “Shit!”
Someone needed me, and it could be Ry. It’s all I could think about. I ran as softly as I could, getting slashed by branches too thin to see in the dark. The sounds got louder as the outline of a fence came into view. Then a body, laying, dragging themselves, trying to sit up. Several holes had been made in the fence. I climbed through, scraping the top of my head on a jagged piece, but not stopping.
I got several feet away from the body and heard it say, “Stop.”
My feet skidded to a halt, and my heart slowed as all thoughts softened to a blur. I could make out the face now, and the navy blue uniform of a Baelese man. Blood seeped from his neck.
“Don’t move,” he told me, and it was a perfectly good idea. I stayed still. Even as he raised his gun at me. Nothing computed.
The assaulting bang reverberated through the air.
Several things happened at once. I felt the impact on the right side of my stomach, hard enough to knock me back on my ass, taking the wind out of me. And from nowhere, Matt was there, kicking the gun out of the alien’s hand and putting a knife clear through his neck. In my fogged brain, all I could think was wow . . . sweet, romantic Matt. A killer.
The murkiness began to clear from my head just as Matt scrambled to my side, cupping my face. “Where are you hit?” he demanded.
I sucked in a deep breath, wincing at the pain in my side. I felt for it, and he lifted my ripped shirt to reveal the bulletproof vest, damaged, but in tact. That was going to leave a bruise.
“Jesus, Amber, you scared the shit out of me!”
“I’m sorry,” I said, mind cleared enough for me to begin trembling. My ear plugs! God, if he had shot higher, at my face, or at one of the arteries in my legs or arms . . . I shivered at the thought, and the gross memory of being mind controlled.
“I really hope that gun shot didn’t alert any of them inside,” he muttered.
The horror of realization splashed me like ice water. Yes, I’d been told by Top in my debriefing that I could make my way onto the base once the perimeter was cleared, but in my haste, I might’ve singlehandedly ruined the entire operation. And sure enough, a series of pows echoed out from the building, followed by shouts. My heart jolted as I pushed to my feet, ignoring the sharp pain in my side.
“We have to help them!”
Matt didn’t argue. He ran with me, notifying Top on the handheld that there’d been shots fired inside and we were going in. I let Matt lead the way, but my eyes darted around for other Baelese that might’ve survived the first assault. That last one looked like he’d been stabbed in the neck, but I remembered learning how their skin was much thicker than ours. They were harder to kill by normal means.
We passed two dead guards outside of the doors. Their guns had been stripped from them. Matt stopped and looked over his shoulder at me, pointing to his ears. The earplugs! I dug mine out of my pockets with shaking hands and shoved them into my ears. How could I have been so stupid running to the base without them in? I’d never been more mad at myself.
Matt attached the walkie-talkie to his belt and slung the rifle from his back to his front, then he pushed open the door and let the barrel of the gun lead him. I pulled out my gun in one hand, safety off, and held my medic bag in the other. I wished I could calm my heart. I couldn’t afford another mistake.
Two more pops sounded farther inside the building, followed by cries and someone shouting orders. We started to move that way, and my heart jumped out of my chest as someone came around the corner. Matt froze just as the other person did, and I recognized Carmen’s face under the helmet.
“Don’t shoot!” I said, waving my arms since they had ear plugs in.
She and Matt both let out loud breaths and unplugged their ears to talk.
“What’s going on?” Matt asked.
“Comm room was secured, and then shots were fired outside.” Guilt soured inside my gut as she looked to me. “We need you.”
I pushed past Matt in the narrow hall and followed her, stepping over several Baelese bodies along the way. Matt stayed close behind me. When we rounded a corner to what looked like barracks rooms, I gasped at the familiar lanky body splayed unnaturally on the floor.
“Fuck!” Matt dropped to his knees at the same time as me. I reached for Tall Mark’s bloodied head wound, and Carmen grabbed my shoulder.
“He’s gone, Amber. Come on!”
Gone? Oh, God. Matt pressed his hand to Mark’s chest as I felt for a neck pulse, turning his head to see the gaping injury. He’d taken a gunshot wound to the skull. Already, his face was pasty, eyes glazed. A choking sob stuck in the back of my throat as Matt closed Mark’s eyes one last time. Tall Mark had been our silly, dorky Cali boy. Tex used to swat his head for saying hella. He’d made me laugh during horrible times when I wouldn’t otherwise have been able to fathom a smile. I pressed the back of my hand to my mouth.
“It’s not your fault,” Matt whispered to me.
We both knew that was bullshit.
“Come on,” Carmen urged more gently this time. I don’t even remember getting to my feet. I followed like a zombie to where one of our men lay at the other end of the hall, leaning against the wall and holding his calf. He sagged with relief when he saw me.
“Fucking ricochet to the back of my leg,” he said. I opened my bag, too shaken to speak, until Carmen started to leave.
“Have you seen Rylen?” I asked her.
“No,” she said. “But he was one of the ones securing the comm room, so he should be okay.”
That settled my heart enough to let me concentrate. I cleaned his wound quickly and took a better look. “The bullet went through and took out a piece of your muscle, but no bone was hit. It’s going to hurt like hell, but you’ll definitely recover. We have to keep it super clean.”
He closed his eyes and leaned his head back as I administered a shot of morphine, then swabbed the area and winded a thick bandage over a wad of gauze. I made the mistake of peeking into the room behind him and seeing three of the four bunks had dead Baelese bodies. Blood dripped from the fingertips of one dangling hand.
“We got most of them in their sleep,” he said.
I nodded and closed my bag. Most of them. Except the ones who were woken because of my stupidity. I was guessing that’s what happened to Mark.
New York Josh ran around the corner as I stood. His face was elated.
“The base is ours!”
Cheers rang out down our hall and throughout the building. Matt got on his handheld, unsmiling, and reported to Top. “Elmendorf is secured. All enemy dead. Comm room was uncompromised. Mission was a success. Over.”
“Any casualties? Over.” Top asked.
“One.” Matt swallowed. “Sergeant Mahalchick. Over . . .” He looked down at Mark’s body and his chin trembled until he swallowed and looked away.
Top cursed into the receiver and sighed. “We’re on our way.”
I stood beside Matt, the two of us silent and still while everyone ran around other parts of the building hollering, rejoicing. New York Josh approached, whispering, “Ah, fuck, man,” as he looked down at Mark. Slowly, Devon, Texas Harry, Officer Sean, and Rylen found us in the hall. I reached for Rylen’s hand, and as soon as my fingers were enveloped in his warmth, I let the tears I’d been holding back fall. We took off our hats and helmets.
In the midst of celebration, the seven of us mourned.
“He died a soldier’s death,” Tex said. “He’d be glad to know we won this round. We’re one step closer to taking it all back.”
I’d watched a lot of people I loved die in the past six months, but knowing my actions directly affected this one hurt more than anything. The guilt was paralyzing. I wanted to tell him I was sorry. I’d never been more sorry.
Devon bent down and put his large hand over Mark’s thin one. “Rest in peace, brother. It was an honor to serve with you.”
“Hooah,” the others murmured.
Rest in peace.