Chapter 27 #2
The building was a maze of shadows and half-seen shapes.
A figure lunged from the left with a Makarov clenched in his hand.
Rowan pivoted on instinct, his rifle barking twice in quick succession.
The muzzle flash lit up the man’s face for a split second, his features twisted in surprise before the bullets punched into his chest. He staggered back, his mouth opening in a silent ‘oh’ as blood bloomed dark and wet across his shirt, then he crumpled to the ground.
Rowan didn’t wait to watch him fall. His brain was already tracking the next threat.
He lunged, his boot connecting with the man’s ribs with a sickening crunch.
The guy gasped, his breath exploding out of him.
“Stay down, motherfucker.”
But the asshole didn’t listen. His hands clawed at Rowan’s vest, his plate carrier, anything he could grab.
Rowan adjusted his NVGs with a sharp jerk of his head, the green-tinted world swimming for half a second before snapping back into focus.
The man beneath him wasn’t Mikey—thank Christ—but his face was a mask of fury, his lips peeled back in a snarl as he spat something in Pashto, his free hand diving for his waistband.
Rowan didn’t need to understand the words to know it was a threat. Knife or gun, it didn’t matter.
Him or my men…
My men every damn time.
Rowan took him out of the game before he could do any damage. He scanned the room, his weapon back up, as he moved along.
“Mikey! Yo, Wilson. Where the fuck you at?”
The gunfire outside was relentless, combined with running commentary from his team.
“QC2 Clear left.”
“Roger,”
“Watch the door, Edge needs cover.”
“On it.”
Beneath it all, Rowan barely made out a whisper of sound and caught the faintest scrape of movement out of the corner of his eye.
“Here.”
The word was barely audible over the chaos, but it hit Rowan like a bullet to the chest. He whirled toward it, with his weapon at ready position.
Three feet away, half-hidden in the shadows, a man was curled against the far wall, with his wrists bound in front of him. His head lolled forward. His clothes were torn, his skin marked with bruises that told of days of torture. But his eyes were open and locked onto Rowan’s.
Wilson.
For the first time since this op had started, Rowan let himself believe they might actually pull this off. He used his body to shield Wilson as bullets chewed up the air around them.
Mikey grunted. “Took you long enough, asshole,” his voice rasped as if he’d been screaming for days. The words were laced with pain, with exhaustion, but there was something else there too, relief, gratitude, the kind of dark humor that only men who’d stared death in the face could muster.
“If you’re talking, you’re breathing, so I ain’t late yet.” Rowan returned fire and thumbed his comms. “All stations, I have the package.” He let his men know so they could start clearing a path for their exit. “M-TOC, send in the bird.”
“Yes, sir.”
Rowan’s heart pounded in rhythm with the gunfire, adrenaline coursing through his veins as he shielded Wilson, returning fire with deadly accuracy as they made their way back through the building toward the courtyard.
“Did you get him?”
“Get who?”
“El Fucking Pastor is here, Rowe.” Mikey winced as he bumped off a wall. “Don’t think he had time to leave before you started blowing shit up.”
Holy fucking shit!
Thank fuck Gael didn’t come on this job.
He scanned the cluttered room, every instinct screaming at him to find the target.
“Copy that,” Rowan replied, locking eyes with Mikey, who grimaced but managed a nod.
“All Stations, Seahorse One. The cocksucking bishop is here somewhere. I want that fucker dead.” Every one of his people knew exactly who he meant.
“M-TOC, get me a JDAM or a Hellfire, STAT.”
“Boss…”
“That’s an order, M-TOC, I don’t care whose ass we have to kiss to get it.” Before this day ended, this whole motherfucking compound was going to be dust in someone’s memory.
“Yes, sir, on it.”
The architect of Gael’s torture in Colombia, the man whose orders had murdered an innocent girl and left Enya’s skin marked and her nightmares endless, was officially on borrowed time.
Payback is a bitch, asshole.
Rowan’s heart pounded as he shifted into action mode, gesturing for the team to fan out and sweep the compound. It was time to flush out El Pastor and end this nightmare once and for all.
“Seahorse, on me,” he ordered, his voice a low growl. “Find me that fucker.”
“Roger,” the team echoed, the urgency translating into a flurry of movement as they set to work.
Rowan felt the adrenaline coursing through him, sharpening his focus.
Every second mattered if they were going to ensure they kept their mission objective and had time for a little payback.
He flipped his NVGs to infrared and got to hunting.
“One, Three, QD2 clear,” Colson confirmed his quadrant had been cleared over comms, “Moving to QD3.”
“Copy.”
Damn it, where the hell are you, Fuck Face?
Frustration started to creep into his thoughts. The kitchen was filled with trash; rotting food and filthy magazines littered the floor. He kicked aside a chair, his eyes scanning the corners for movement.
“One, Six, first floor secure,” Bronx reported.
“All Stations, M-TOC. Hurry your asses up,” Theo ordered. “I have a JDAM spinning up.”
“Roger that, M-TOC.” Adrenaline was turning impatience into a simmering heat in his chest. They were on borrowed time.
They ascended the creaking stairs to the second floor, each step heavy with anticipation.
Rowan pushed open a door, swinging wide to reveal a long corridor.
Shadows danced in the dim light, and the stench of sweat mixed with something putrid wafted toward them.
“Eyes open. Let’s not get killed in this funnel of a K-Zone. ”
A door exploded inward at the end of the hall and Rowan’s breath caught as he recognized the silhouette. It was him. El Fucking Pastor. The man was a ghost, a figure out of nightmares, and he was moving with purpose, trying to escape out the window.
Rowan surged into action, adrenaline igniting like a wildfire in his veins.
“Six, cover me!” he roared, charging forward.
Before El Pastor could make his exit, Rowan closed the distance and the world became a blur of motion. In seconds, he lunged, tackling the fucker to the ground, their bodies crashing against the splintered wooden floorboards.
El Pastor twisted like a contained beast, swinging a fist toward Rowan’s head. Rowan ducked and spun, the movement fluid, a well-rehearsed dance of combat honed over years of training. He grappled with the man, the two rolling over each other as they fought for dominance.
A sharp elbow connected with Rowan’s gut, forcing air from his lungs, but he tightened his grip, locking his opponent’s wrist hard against the floor and positioning his knee on his chest. “You’re not going anywhere, asshole,” he snarled through gritted teeth.
El Pastor twisted again, a wild, feral look in his eye, and Rowan felt the weight of desperation fueling him. He kicked his legs, aiming for Rowan’s knees, but he was prepared. He swiftly brought a fist down onto El Pastor’s jaw, the impact ringing like a war drum.
“We’re done here,” He growled, ignoring the pain as he maneuvered, shifting his body weight to keep El Pastor pinned.
With a surge of determination, he pulled back his fist, readying for a decisive blow.
But as he leaned in, El Pastor’s foot found a weak spot, kicking out hard, and sending Rowan stumbling sideways.
El Pastor surged to his feet, eyes wild with rage, and swiped at Rowan’s throat with a knife, his arm flicking out from his waistband. Rowan dodged just in time, his instincts kicking in as he reclaimed the defensive stance, circling in a quick rhythm with his opponent.
“Are you really that desperate to die?” El Pastor spat, breathing heavily. Rowan could see the hunger for survival in the man’s eyes—a rabid animal cornered, desperate and dangerous.
“Desperate to end you,” He shot back, lunging forward. He tackled El Pastor back to the ground. This was about more than just the mission; it was personal as it got.
They struggled as they wrestled for the knife, El Pastor’s grip fierce, but Rowan was relentless. He drove his weight down, finally overriding the desperate flailing that sought to escape him. With a sudden surge of strength, Rowan twisted the blade from El Pastor’s hand and tossed it aside.
“Time’s up,” Rowan muttered, gritting his teeth.
He pinned El Pastor’s arm behind his back, inching closer, feeling the weight of the man beneath him with every measured breath they shared.
With one swift move, he leaned down, whispering the words that had been building since he had stormed into that godforsaken compound.
“You lose, asshole.” He slammed his fist into El Pastor’s face, over and over, with a fury that surged from deep within, a vengeance that transcended the mission.
Each punch was a reminder of the pain his brother had endured, and the tears his woman had shed.
“Finish that shit, Boss,” Titan urged. “The boom bus will be here in a few, and neither of us wants to be in here when that happens.”
“Coming.” He wrapped his arm around El Pastor’s neck and, with a sharp twist and a sickening crack, ended him. “Swab him, and anyone else we pass on the way out.”
“Seahorse One. Damn it, boss, don’t make me come over there. Status report, STAT.” Theo’s voice sliced through the heaviness, grounding him back to the reality of the mission.
“Tell my brother his boogeyman is no more. Target down.” His voice was a little unsteady with the adrenaline still buzzing in his bloodstream. “We’re good to extract. Let’s get out of this hellhole.”
With a final glance back at El Pastor, Rowan felt a flicker of closure settle within him.
He had avenged his brother and Enya; maybe now they would reclaim their lives, and the horrors that haunted their dreams might fade.
“Let’s move.” Urgency rode him hard, and the moment he stepped back into the courtyard, he felt the weight of the mission ease.
“Regroup!” he yelled over the din, scanning the courtyard for his team. He spotted Dawsyn and Calloway moving toward the exit. Jericho and Bronx were closing in, providing cover fire as they dashed from the building, adrenaline still pulsing through their veins.
“Move, move, move!” Rowan barked, pushing them away from the compound’s heart, weaving them through the debris-littered courtyard. Behind him, the echoes of life and death radiated, and gunfire synchronized with the thud of their boots pounding against the earth.
“M-TOC, we are outside, clear of the building!” Bronx confirmed, his weapon still at the ready, eyes darting for any lurking threats.
“Copy, Seahorse, get to the extraction point ASAP,” Theo’s voice crackled over their comms. “We’ve got a JDAM inbound to wipe the site. ETA three minutes.”
“Let’s move!” Rowan shouted, pushing them into a relentless march away from the rising chaos of the compound.
They hurried through a narrow gully lit by sporadic flashes of gunfire that flickered behind them. Their destination was a clearing just beyond the compound, where the helo would be waiting. Each step took them farther from the firestorm, closer to freedom.
“Gonna feel good to get out of here, right?” Dawsyn gasped, the pain evident in his voice but overshadowed by his will to keep pushing.
“Damn straight,” Rowan replied as he kept pace, adrenaline fueling their escape, the need for survival overriding the weariness threatening to slow him down.
The hot wind picked up behind them, a low rumble echoing in the distance.
Rowan glanced over his shoulder one last time, the compound silhouetted against the horizon—a dark specter of their fight.
The urgency in Theo’s voice echoed in his mind; the clock was ticking.
“Go, go, go!” he urged his men faster toward the clearing with every ounce of strength he had left.
They burst into the open, the clearing stark and vulnerable under an expansive sky. The sound of the helicopter blades thumping in the distance grew louder, the machines of extraction echoing the promises of escape.
“LZ’s hot; move to the chopper.” Jericho took the lead as the whoop-whoop of the helo’s blades washed them with a down blast of rotorwash. Rowan pushed his legs harder, muscles screaming, adrenaline coursing through his veins.
They reached the helo just as the pilot yelled for them to board. “Get in. Come on, ladies, this ain’t the fucking mall. Get your asses in.”
Ensuring his team and Mikey were on the helo, Rowan scrambled in, slamming the door shut as the bird started to climb.
The chopper lurched upward, gaining altitude as it propelled them away from the chaos unfolding below.
“JDAM drop in thirty seconds,” Theo said. “Prepare for significant boom.”
“Hold on to your skirts, ladies. I don’t need to see no asses on display in my bird,” the pilot warned, increasing their speed as they cleared the tree line, spinning into rotation to get as far from the target as possible.
A deafening roar echoed from below as the JDAM fell.
The ground erupted in a blinding flash of light, illuminating the landscape like a miniature sun, and a shockwave rattled through the air as the compound was obliterated in an all-consuming fireball.
Dirt and debris shot into the sky, cascading down as if in slow motion, swallowing what once stood.
“Holy shit,” Dawsyn gasped, momentarily frozen in awe.
“Keep your heads down!” Rowan shouted instinctively, despite knowing they were securely inside the helicopter, watching the fiery inferno reduce the compound to mere rubble.
I win, motherfucker.
See you in hell in a couple of years.