Dead in Damascus: A Special Operations Group Short Story ([#0] Special Operations Group) Read Free

gunned the gas pedal. Kapua had become uncharacteristically quiet, so Chris attempted to engage him: “You remember in Ramadi when we raided that hut and that dude sprayed us with automatic AK fire?” Chris asked. “Not one shot hit us.”
    Kapua seemed less irritated now. “Maybe that was a miracle, too, and I just didn’t notice. You know what we say about complacency.”
    “It’s a killer.”
    “The thrill is gone,” he said in a deep, bluesy sing-song voice that he used when trying to make a disappointment seem less disappointing. “The thrill is gone, baby.”
    Chris was saddened. “We were going to reenlist together.”
    “Sorry, brah,” Kapua said with sincerity in his voice.
    “What’re you going to tell the skipper?”
    “I’ll tell him what happened.”
    “You’re serious, aren’t you?” Chris said.
    “Serious as a heart attack.”
    “What’ll you do out in the world?”
    Kapua appeared to think for a moment. “I’ll figure something out.”
    Operating in separate platoons and with the high operational tempo, Chris already saw less of Kapua, and if Kap left the Teams and went home to Hawaii, Chris would see much less of the jolly giant.
    “I’m still committed to the Teams a hundred and ten percent. Until my contract runs out. I know I’ll never find a brotherhood like this again, but when it’s time to go, it’s time to go.”
    Chris wanted to tell him to stay, but if that resulted in Kapua’s death, Chris didn’t know how he could live with himself. On the other hand, he didn’t want to encourage Kapua to leave, either.
    Chris just sat there in silence. He still wasn’t convinced that surviving the explosion was a miracle, but it did give him pause to think that he’d shrugged off their survival too easily. He was in danger of becoming complacent, and in his line of work that often led to a tactical arrogance which resulted in death, and maybe his spiritual well-being was in danger, too. Even so, Najeeb was providing them with a flash drive full of intel, and Chris and his Teammates would likely be asked to act on the information before it expired.
    The driver took them southeast into the desert before circling around in a nebula of sand floating in the air. As the taxi accelerated, the nebula faded and the base lights came into view.

 
    An excerpt from
     
    Trident’s First Gleaming

    A Special Operations Group Thriller
    Stephen Templin

1
FALL 2009
    C hris Paladin sped through the murky straightaway, the foul, viscid air of the Euphrates clogging his nostrils. The camouflage he and the other six SEALs wore couldn’t hide them from the rank wind when going nearly forty knots against the dying flow of the ancient river. Around them, the desert choked the stretches of the bank, leaving the land barren as they raced into Syria.
    Chris glanced at Little Doc sitting next to him.
    Only weeks ago, back at their base in Al Anbar Province, Iraq, Chris and Little Doc had paired off in a game of pool against a talented Agency cyber warfare tech named Young Park and a top spook, Hannah Andrade. They’d played an epic contest of SEALs versus CIA. But so much had changed since then.
    Young’s kidnapping was why they were out here now. Those damn tangos had dressed up as Iraqi troops while Chris and his crew were out on an op and snatched the man. And along with him, potentially dangerous knowledge that needed kept out of enemy hands.
    A terrorist named Professor Mordet was behind it all, intelligence told them. Chris struggled to focus on the mission rather than his anger. This mission was personal—and a top priority for JSOC and the Agency. He had to keep a clear head.
    He took a breath and pushed back the messy emotions, locking them down in the depths of his psyche. His laser focus picked apart the dark fig palms and tangles of weeds that appeared on the portside shore. He searched for anyone or anything that might deny their rescue.
    After traveling another klick, off the