Go.
He pulled, the canopy snapped open with a violent jerk, and his body surged upward in a hard swing. His lines tightened, and his descent slowed. The world reassembled in his goggles—lush, green, and hostile.
Ahead, Trace drifted left over the dense foliage. Juice flared early, angling to hit the far side of the secondary DZ. Reaper followed, cutting sharply to the right. Zero and Kaze hung back slightly, covering angles.
Perfect.
The impact of his boots hitting the ground came hard as they slammed into volcanic soil. His knees flexed as the jolt punched up through his legs and into his spine. He tucked, rolled, and came up crouched behind a wide fern the size of a compact car. A horn sounded faintly in the distance, and he dropped to the ground and brought his weapon up. Using the scope, he searched the area.
Was that an alarm?
Have we been made?
No gunfire or attack came toward him, yet he couldn’t shake the unease that slid into his soul.
Maybe I imagined it.
“All Stations, status check.” As he listened to the click-click from each of his men, he mentally ticked Checkpoint Alpha off the list in his head and stripped off his chute. He secured it under a slab of exposed basalt. If they had time, they’d grab them on the way out. If not, then the Navy would replace them. He paused and double-checked his M4 as his HUD flared green. No damage—he’d take it.
All systems solid.
He crouched low and keyed the hand signal.
Form up.
Shapes emerged from the shadows one by one. Reaper, with his weapon up, swept the left. Kaze moved silently through the underbrush. Trace materialized out of the dark, eyes glowing faintly as Bran’s spirit emerged from inside him. Juice came last, his nod tight, his eyes already scanning the tree line for movement.
Viper held up two fingers, then pointed northeast toward the heat signature he’d spotted from the air. They moved as one—predators in the night, stepping lightly over roots and ducking beneath hanging moss and sharp leaves that sliced their skin like razors. As they moved out in formation, the jungle was alive with insects, shrieks from distant fruit bats, and other nocturnal animals, letting them know all was well in the area.
I’m coming for you, fucker.
Tick fucking tock.
Your time on this earth is counting down…
Tick tock.
Tick tock.
CHAPTER TWO
The boat was late.Of course, it was freaking late. Everything on this trip so far, from the missed flight out of Atlanta and having to fly standby, to having to race across Charles de Gaul airport and still miss his connecting flight to Madagascar, had sucked.
Maybe the universe is telling you to take your butt home right now.
While he had seen some unexplainable things on various digs around the globe, none of them were enough to take away his desire for more—more knowledge, more understanding, just more. So here he was—barefoot, standing on the edge of a converted fishing boat that smelled like fish, diesel, and whatever had died in the bilge three days ago—watching an uncharted island rise out of the Indian Ocean like something out of a fever dream.
The presence of the markings he’d come to investigate suggested this island had been inhabited at some point in the past. But right now, to him, it looked too green and too still. The type of place nature had reclaimed so completely, it had forgotten humans ever existed.
Excitement bubbled in his stomach as he squinted through salt-streaked sunglasses. Dense jungle clung to steep hillsides, broken only by streaks of black volcanic rock and the jagged silhouette of the mountain in the island’s center. Birds wheeled overhead, and the surf crashed onto the rocks. The water slapped over the hull in a fierce display of the ocean’s power.
It’s almost like the whole island is warning me off.
He shoved his unease aside, refusing to allow it to psych him out of being the lead archaeologist to excavate a site that could turn history in the region on its head. “You sure this is the right place?” he called loud enough to be heard over the surf.
The boat captain yelled back, “Only one island in this stretch of water that eats GPS signals like popcorn. This is Saonae. You get off here now, so I may return home to my family.”
He wondered what local legends caused the hint of fear he could hear in the captain’s voice. “Thanks for the ride.” He waved at the captain, grabbed his rucksack, and hopped down from the gunwale into the warm, knee-deep water. He hissed between his teeth as volcanic sand slid into his boots. “You aren’t exactly welcoming me here, Saonae.” Dry heat, he could handle. Arid dig sites in Jordan? Child’s play. But this... this wet, sticky, relentless heat was horrible. It wrapped around his ribs like a slow squeeze and hadn’t let go since they left the Mauritian coast that morning.
