Double or Nothing

The ringing in my ear made the world hazy and blurred in my eyes. Dirt and ash filled my mouth as I tried to move my body, but everything below my neck was numb. Go through your checklist, Ace: wiggle the toes, breathe; wiggle your fingers, breathe; get your sights back. I could slowly feel my toes shake as the flames from the explosion burned near me. I turned my head toward the fire, feeling the heat cook me through my uniform even though the explosion must have flung me a good few feet away from the impact point.

From where I lay, however, I could see the body of my target, Rook. He wasn’t moving; he had to be KIA. He couldn’t have survived, not guys like him, not the grunts. No, he was gone, mission accomp- his foot twitched. I then heard him groaning and coughing. Slowly and surely, he picked himself up from the ground. I could see the cuts and tears all over his body. How? How is he able to get up?! Come on, Ace, get up! You can’t fold just now. Finish the mission, confirm that-GAH! As my vision started to come back into focus, I felt the cold wind blow waves of heat and debris into a wound across my chest. I placed my hand over the opening and could feel the blood coming out. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched Rook step closer toward me, rustling for something that was on his back. His knife, no doubt. Commander Wallace told us that he and the rest of the traitors do not leave survivors. He’s going to finish me off. Sacrifice me to whatever god this world-

“Ace! Ace, can you hear me!?” Rook crouched down beside me, trying to look into my eyes while I saw his own. I recognized the gash that my knife left on the upper right side of his head, and the blood fell all along his face. The white part of one of his eyes looked so red, I couldn’t even see the color of his iris. When he saw my eyes following his gaze, he looked at the wound on my chest and undid my vest to expose the injury. I heard the rustling noise again, and then the sound of a pack unzipping. In his hands was a small red pack tightly filled with healing supplies. Some I recognized, others looked alien to me, much like this world of Yetva. And yet, he worked with the kind of practiced precision that I would have expected from a doctor or a medic, not a conscripted grunt like Rook.

“Ace, I don’t have any morphine, so this is gonna hurt.” I watched as he took a vial of green and orange liquid out of his pack and drenched a bandage with it before pressing it against my wound. It took every ounce of my remaining strength not to scream in agony. It was as if I was getting stabbed with a hot iron. My eyes searched for a distraction, for something to take my mind off of this moment. I didn’t want to think about how I failed my objective. I failed as one of the Spec Ops’ finest!

I looked toward the fire of the detonation’s impact and saw what caused the explosion and felt a pain hit my chest worse than Rook’s bandage with the slimy solution. I saw the tail end of what I confirmed as a drone, the same drones we found in the strange bunker in this world. It was supposed to be used for reconnaissance, but instead was packed with explosives and shrapnel. And it was sent right to my position. I reached for my radio strapped to my vest and I pressed the button to speak. “Advance Ops to Overwatch, come in Overwatch. Advance Ops Dog 1 has been hit. I confirm, Dog 1 has been hit by one of our own drones. The attack signal has not been deployed. I repeat, no attack designation has been confirmed. Please advise, over.”

“Overwatch to Advance Ops,’ the radio responded almost instantly. “Confirm success of primary objective.” The voice over the radio was cold, robotic, even as I looked into the face of my target.

“Confirmed target has been engaged. Body is currently MIA. Overwatch, confirm the origin of the drone, designation-”.

“Overwatch to all stations. Overwatch to all stations. Confirmation received; Advance Ops has been eighty-sixed. I repeat, Advance Ops agents are to be terminated on sight by order of Commander Wallace. You are clear to engage.”

“Wait, what, Overwatch, request briefing. I confirm Advance Ops is not compromised. I repeat, we ARE NOT comprom-” my ear twitched at the far-off sound of gunfire in the distance. I turned my head toward the snap and cracking sounds echoing across the forest that separated me from the rally point where I was going to find the remainder of my squad. “Clubs, Spades, Jack”.

Rook stood up and took hold of my sidearm. “You still stacked?”

“I…I…” I struggled to answer. Meanwhile, Rook took a spare magazine from his pack, slammed it into my pistol, and placed it back in my hand.

“You owe me a mag. Oh, drink this,” he said as he took out a small flask from the red pack and gave it to me.

“Wha…what is it?”

“Disgusting, but will get you back on your feet.” He wasn’t wrong, as I took the drink like a shot of whiskey. Even then, I was close to spitting it back out. The drink's taste was almost not worth the feeling of blood rushing through my legs and body again.

“So, you believe me now?”

“But…but I…followed orders.”

“Yeah, we all did.” Rook helped me up to my feet before he went to collect his rifle.

“So King is…”.

“KIA. But Hearts is alive; my guess is she’s supporting Ninjara right now.”

“What…what are they doing?”

“You’ll find out in three… two…one.” On cue, an explosion erupted from a cliffside half a click north of our position. I knew it was a cave entrance because that’s where I established Wallace’s Observation post for the Yue Harbor area. For months, we stayed and spied on the city, trying to understand the best way to free them from the current leadership. And now… I didn’t even believe we were really doing that.

“I…I’m so confused right now.”

“Not just that, but you were lied to, Ace. And you wouldn’t be the first, hell, not even the fifth one who got screwed over by him.” Rook said, changing the magazine of his rifle. When I squinted my eyes, I could see the smoke rising from above. “To be honest, I had a hunch but no proof of what was happening, until now. I’m fully confident now to say that Wallace sold out to the Imperials. He’s using Earthborn assets to increase the armaments for the Empress and her army to fuel her war against the Holy Pillars. However, he is also planning to use that to sow discord and chaos throughout Yetva, making it easier to stage a coup against the Empress. Star, erhm, The Wayfinder… Wallace wanted me to bring him in for testing. Since when is a jarhead like Wallace a scientist?”

“Why… why spare me though?”

“Because I don’t want to kill Earthborn, Ace anymore. “

“Earthborn? What the hell is that?”

“It’s what the people of Yetva call us, call me. It’s what Star called me.”

“Who?”

“The Wayfinder, your “person of interest” he wanted you to bring in for questioning. I mean Jesus Ace, did you ever ask why they wanted him brought in?”

“I…I don’t know where they are keeping him. I haven’t even heard a thing about “The Wayfinder” for a few…weeks now. They’ve… they’ve been planning on letting me go for a while now, weren’t they?”

“The first time I stumbled across Wallace’s man Kane, he drew on me. So yeah, they’ve been planning this.”

“But…how could you have known? We were practically living twenty-four seven as black ops.”

“Black ops for Earth standards doesn’t ring the same as Yetva’s standards. This world isn’t anything like what we’re used to, Ace…but the monsters are still the same.”

“Yeah, I noticed. I thought… I thought we were really going to save some lives with Wallace’s plan…hey, you have a lead on “the Wayfinder”?

“Yeah, due northwest. What’s up?”

“I need to regroup with my men. If Wallace is turning on us…”.

“Can you walk?” Rook asked as I noticed myself standing firmly on both legs without any pain or numbness whatsoever. The medicine he gave me worked; I hardly felt any pain from my chest wound. Not only did he give me a fresh mag for my sidearm, but he also patched me up to a combative state. This was so much; it felt… unreal.

“Why…why are you doing this?” He looked at me with a confused look as I pointed to my wound and the gun in my hand.

“Because it’s what Star would have done,” Rook said, pulling the charging bolt of his rifle. “And because of that…he’s captured now. I’m going after him, Ace. We take care of our own, hoorah?”

“I…I don’t understand Rook. HE’S NOT ONE OF US! He’s an alien! He’s not from our home. Why are you willing to betray your leaders for him?”

“You mean the leaders who sent you a suicide drone to Frdex your assto Yetva’s version of heaven?” His words reopened the wound on my chest. As the fires of the drone’s wreckage began to smother out, Rook turned toward the woods. “You know, when I was given my assignment on Earth, I was ready to die. I knew what was asked of me, and I was ready for it. Now, here in Yetva, I see a major difference between Earth and here. On Earth, we were treated as expendable. Ace, if we died, we would be replaced with the next G.I. In line before we hit the ground. Here, we’re mourned by acquaintances if they don’t hear from us for a while. People would notice if we stepped out of a room without telling anyone.”

Rook’s eyes then trailed off, as if a memory was replaying in his mind for him to see all over again, even if he didn’t want to. “After Kane left me to die in some ditch in a desert, it was Star who spent days searching for me. I think only after a week of watching me recover did he finally stop crying.” His voice was soft and sincere as he spoke; it was strange to hear from a soldier. I tried to fake a similar speech pattern when I had to interact with the locals, but hearing it come from one of our own was… unsettling.

“I…can’t believe I lost to someone like you.”

“To be fair, Wallace stole the victory from both of us. What do you say we go and steal it back?”

“You…you’re joking, right? You know the kind of guns Wallace has on him?”

“Ace, we had probably more guns on Earth than he does now, and we still lost the planet to monsters. I’m not impressed.” Rook, a soldier I had never met face to face on Earth, whom I had only heard of from mixed, distant scouting reports, labeled a hostile, was now talking about offing my CO. If we were back home, I would have the greatest pleasure in personally overseeing his court-martialing and then begging for the honor of executing him.

But we’re not on Earth. And my CO not only authorized an intended kamikaze drone strike on friendlies, but actively ordered the killing of my men and me. Right now, we need to regroup and figure out what's best for us as a squad. “Okay, Rook; cover my six, we’re heading to the rendezvous point.”

“Your draw, Ace.” He said as I weaved through the trees toward the sound of gunfire. The shots grew louder and louder until I reached the rendezvous point. My squad: Clubs, Spades, and Jack were dug into foxholes, popping up like goofers to send off a few rounds at a large squad of enemy Earthborn soldiers. Geez, “Earthborn”? Quick to talk like Rook now, are you, Ace? I thought as he and I took cover behind a large tree. Turning over toward him, I saw he was waiting for my call. The look in his eyes- I’ve seen it every time I look in the mirror back home on Earth, during The Collapse. It was the look of someone willing to go all the way for what they believed in. I could respect that, because it meant his bullets were on my side.

The enemy squad did not let up, like a storm of gunfire they unloaded at my men, but between the cover made by fallen trees and the fox holes they dug, they stayed out of the line of fire, for now. From my position, I saw an enemy cock his arm behind him, the stance of someone throwing a grenade. I snapped into action. “Squad expendable,” I said before squeezing the trigger of my handgun. Two shots were fired, and the man was hit once in the chest and again in the head before he fell. I ducked for cover as a hail of bullets crashed into the tree I was behind. Rook, with his auto rifle, ducked from cover and unloaded a magazine toward the squad.

“Ace,” he tossed me a flashbang grenade. “Stay low and flank ‘em; I’ll keep their attention on me!” The sun was down, enough darkness to conceal me as I crawled through the bush. Under the cover of Rook’s suppressive gunfire, I pulled the pin and chucked the flashbang right between the hostiles. A blinding light followed. An ear-shattering POP disabled the squad’s combat effectiveness, making it easy to drop them.

“Clear up!” I shouted toward my men.

“Clear down,” my squad emerged from their foxholes: two men and a woman.

“I KNEW IT! I fuckin’ knew Wallace was a rat bastard!”

“What the hell was all that, sir!?”

“Holy shi-”

“Stand down, Jack, all of you! Rook’s on our side.”

“Do you have any idea why Wallace put a damn kill order on us?” Spades asked as Jack lowered her handgun. Rook has already secured two rifles from the dead and handed them over to them.

“The same reason he’s been offing other Earthborn holdouts and survivors is my guess,” Rook said, anger layered on his breath. “Beyond that, I only have theories. One of them involves a friend of mine; he’s got squatting in his compound.”

“You mean “The Wayfinder”?” Spades asked jokingly to Rook, who wasn’t laughing. “You mean “The Wayfinder.”

“So the whole bit about returning to Earth by siphoning The Wayfinder’s power was a lie?” Clubs said as Rook’s eyes widened.

“Where did you hear that?”

“It was one of the broadcasts Wallace sent out over our radios. Said he had a plan to “make us all great again”; to be honest, I never liked the way it was worded. Sounded like something a nepo-baby would say when Daddy gifts him a business.”

“I got a bead on a possible hold-out site where they took Star.” Rook took up another rifle from a dead soldier and handed it to Clubs. “Ninjara and Hearts are heading back to Yue Harbor; you can link up with them there.”

“Wait, what about you?” I asked as he looted another untouched corpse and refilled his pockets with what munitions he found.

“I’m going after Star.”

“What…you? Alone? You ain’t spec ops; hell, you're not even advanced recon.” Spades pointed out as Rook started to walk away, only for me to step in the way.

“Can you…Can you think it over some more?” Rook shook his head before placing his hand on my shoulder.

“Take your men back to Yue Harbor and regroup with Ninjara and Hearts. They have a place set up for you to hide out while you think up a plan. Good luck, Ace.” Rook gave a nod to the rest of my men before walking away through the darkness of the trees.

“He’s crazy; he’s friggin’ AWOL.”

“You gonna detain him, Spades? Cuz from what I’ve just heard, we’re not military anymore.”

“No, Jack, no, we’re not,” I said, looking at the handgun loaded with the magazine Rook spared for me. “Which means you all have no obligation to listen or follow me.” I walked over to another corpse to start looting it for ammo.

“Wait, Ace; are you-,”

“Rook spared me a magazine when I needed it, Clubs. I’m gonna return the favor.” The three ex-soldiers who followed my command and have earned my trust a thousand times over stood at attention before me. “Since Wallace was so generous to send me a drone, I’d figure sending him a bullet to his head would be a good trade.”

“I’ll call with that,” Jack said as Spades racked the bolt on his rifle.

“You know, the disaster at The Gorge is starting to sound much less like an accident now!”

I looked over to Clubs, who finished filling his backpack with what salvaged munitions and tech he could find. “We should have left after we heard about those orders to kidnap civilians from him. Come on, Ace, four of a kind; sounds like a winning hand already.”

“Five,” I added as I pulled the charging bolt of my own rifle. Clubs looked perplexed as I turned toward the direction where Rook went. “I may not know much that is true about The Wayfinder or this Yetva planet, but I now know we’re all in against Wallace; double or nothing.”