Jase Campbell leaned back on the hood of his Viper and drank water from his canteen. Murphy, his second, was dipping Copenhagen and spitting over the side, looking for a varmint to hit. Campbell had been straight-edge since the age of seventeen. He didn’t drink alcohol or smoke, avoided over-the-counter drugs, and didn’t touch coffee. If he needed a quick pick-me-up, he chugged a Red Bull or a Rip It energy drink. But he preferred action to sugar, caffeine, and artificial color.
“I don’t like it,” he said.
“I agree,” Murphy replied.
They had been watching the road into Mosul since first light, with both their binos and their unarmed spy drone. Campbell thought of the drone along the same lines as energy drinks: nice enhancement, but no substitute for the real thing. Technology would never replace human judgment or instinct.
An hour ago, the traffic was light. Now the road was jammed with cars, and security was heavy. Vehicles were being stopped and searched at a checkpoint. Sizable groups of militants were congregating near a large mosque, where they figured the United States wouldn’t bomb. His instincts said something was happening; ISIS was paying attention. Campbell hadn’t fought ISIS, but he’d fought plenty of other Arab militias. They never paid attention. He’d have to rethink his strategy.
“Something’s coming from the west,” Campbell said. “ISIS is watching. If our boy made it this far, we could be fuzucked.”
“You think he’s the reason for the roundup?”
“Doubt it. I think something’s going on. I think if the SOB is coming this way, it’s because of this shitstorm, not the reason for it.”
“Probably,” Murphy said. Jase Campbell had strong opinions. The kind that gave a man the confidence to lead eleven human beings into the line of fire, or to get a python tattooed around his neck like a tourniquet. But he had good instincts, and he never risked a life unnecessarily. Murphy knew it was best to keep his opinions to himself and trust his leader. Unless it was important.
Campbell was playing with his knife, tossing it in the air and catching it different ways, always a bad sign. The boss didn’t like waiting on intel from the boys back at Apollo HQ in Falls Church, Virginia. Murphy knew exactly what his CO was thinking: We’re the hammer, goddammit, find a nail.
The knife began to pick up velocity, until Campbell caught it with finality. “I say we head down the road, raise some ruckus, see what we can stir up. That way, we’ll meet the SOB on our terms.”
Murphy spat. He figured he knew what was coming.
“I’m done standing around here with our dicks in our hands,” Campbell said. “We’re wasting daylight.”
Murphy spat one more time, then rolled off the Viper to his feet. He knew Jase Campbell. He knew how much the man loved this region. Not like one of the residents, whose families had been here for centuries, but like someone who had given the best years of his life to this patch of sand, and who died a little inside when he watched it go to shit after he was gone. That was why Jase was here, because Apollo Outcomes was his ticket back to the fight. And he was itching to get wet.
But he was no butter bar hothead. And no fool. Jase Campbell knew what he was doing, and Luke Murphy was going to follow him, no matter how inconvenient the man’s moods, or how unnerving his neck tattoo.
“Mount up,” he yelled to the team. “We’re moving out.”