Primary Target - Джек Марс The Forging of Luke Stone

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surrounding mountains, just coming into view as the day brightened. It was really a pretty day. This was beautiful country.

      How many more were out there? How long before they came?

      He shook his head. He didn’t know. It didn’t really matter. Any at all would probably be too many.

      Martinez was sprawled on his back nearby, low in the trench. He was crying. He couldn’t move his legs. He’d had enough. He wanted to die. Luke realized he had been tuning out Martinez for a while now.

      “Stone,” he said. “Hey, Stone. Hey! Kill me, man. Just kill me. Hey, Stone! Listen to me, man!”

      Luke was numb.

      “I’m not going to kill you, Martinez. You’re gonna be all right. We’re going to get out of here, and the docs are gonna patch you up. So give it a rest… okay?”

      Nearby, Murphy was sitting on an outcropping of rock, staring into space. He wasn’t even trying to take cover.

      “Murph! Get down here. You want a sniper to put a bullet in your head?”

      Murphy turned and looked at Luke. His eyes were just… gone. He shook his head. An exhalation of air escaped from him. It sounded almost like laughter. He stayed right where he was.

      As Luke watched, Murphy took out a pistol. It was incredible that he still had a gun on him. Luke had been fighting with his bare hands, rocks, and sharp objects for…

      He didn’t know how long.

      Murphy put the barrel of the gun to the side of his head, eyes on Luke the entire time. He pulled the trigger.

      Click.

      He pulled the trigger several more times.

      Click, click, click, click… click.

      “Out,” he said.

      He threw the gun away. It clattered down the hillside.

      Luke watched the gun bounce away. It seemed to go on for longer than he would ever expect. Eventually, it slid to a stop in a scree of loose rocks. He looked at Murphy again. Murphy just sat there, looking at nothing.

      If more Taliban came, they were done. Neither one of these guys had much fight left in them, and the only weapon Stone still had was the bent bayonet in his hand. For a moment, he thought idly about picking through some of these dead guys for weapons. He didn’t know if he had the strength left to stand. He might have to crawl instead.

      A line of black insects appeared in the sky far away. He knew what they were in an instant. Helicopters. United States military helicopters, probably Black Hawks. The cavalry was coming. Luke didn’t feel good about that, or bad.

      He felt nothing at all.

      CHAPTER THREE

      March 19

      Night

      An airplane over Europe

      “Are you men comfortable?”

      “Yes, sir,” Luke said.

      Murphy didn’t respond. He sat in a recliner across the narrow aisle from Luke, staring out the window at blank darkness. They were in a small jet that was set up almost like someone’s living room. Luke and Murphy sat at the back, facing forward. In the front were three men, including a Delta Force colonel and a three-star general from the Pentagon. There was also a man in civilian clothes.

      Behind the men were two green berets, standing at attention.

      “Specialist Murphy?” the general said. “Are you comfortable?”

      Murphy slid the window shade down. “Yeah. I’m fine.”

      “Murphy, do you know how to address a superior officer?” the colonel said.

      Murphy turned away from the window. He looked directly at the men for the first time.

      “I’m not in your army anymore.”

      “Why are you on this plane, in that case?”

      Murphy shrugged. “Someone offered me a ride. There aren’t a lot of commercial flights out of Afghanistan these days. So I figured I’d better take this one.”

      The man in civilian clothes glanced at the cabin door.

      “If you’re not in the military, I suppose we could always ask you to leave. Of course, it’s a long way to the ground.”

      Murphy followed the man’s eyes.

      “Do it. I promise you’ll come with me.”

      Luke shook his head. If this were a playground, he would almost smile. But this wasn’t a playground, and these men were deadly serious.

      “Okay, Murph,” he said. “Take it down a notch. I was on that hill with you. Nobody on this plane put us there.”

      Murphy shrugged. “All right, Stone.” He looked at the general. “Yes, I’m comfortable, sir. Very comfortable. Thank you.”

      The general glanced down at some paperwork in front of him.

      “Thank you, gentlemen, for your service. Specialist Murphy, if you are interested in being discharged early from your obligations, I suggest you take that up with your commanding officer when you return to Fort Bragg.”

      “Okay,” Murphy said.

      The general looked up. “As you know, this was a difficult mission which did not go exactly as planned. I’d like to take the opportunity to familiarize myself with the facts of the situation. I have the records from the mission debrief when you both returned to Bagram. I gather from the testimony, and the photographic evidence, that the overall mission was a success. Would you agree with that, Sergeant Stone?”

      “Uh… if by the overall mission, you mean to find and assassinate Abu Mustafa Faraj, then yes sir. I suppose it was a success.”

      “That is what I meant, Sergeant. Faraj was a dangerous terrorist, and the world is a better place now that he’s gone. Specialist Murphy?”

      Murphy stared at the general. It was clear to Luke that Murphy was no longer all there. He was better than he was the morning after the battle, but not by much.

      “Yes?” he said.

      The general gritted his teeth. He glanced at the men to his left and his right.

      “What is your assessment of the mission, please?”

      Murphy nodded. “Oh. The one we just did?”

      “Yes, Specialist Murphy.”

      Murphy didn’t answer for several seconds. He seemed to be thinking about it.

      “Well, we lost nine Delta guys and two chopper pilots. Martinez is alive, but he’s scrambled eggs. Also, we killed a bunch of children, so I’m told, and at least a few women. There were piles of dead guys on the ground. I mean hundreds of dead guys. And I guess there was a famous terrorist there too, but I never saw him. So… about par for the course, I guess you’d say. It’s kind of how these things go. This wasn’t my first rodeo, if you know what I mean.”

      He looked across the aisle at Luke.

      “Stone looks okay. And speaking just for myself, I didn’t get a scratch on me. So sure, I’d say it went fine.”

      The officers stared at Murphy.

      “Sir,” Luke said. “I think what Specialist Murphy is trying to say, and you’ll see from my testimony that I agree, is the mission was poorly conceived and probably ill advised. Lieutenant Colonel Heath was a brave man, sir, but maybe not a very good strategist or tactician. After the first chopper crashed, I requested that he abort the mission, and he refused. He was also personally responsible for the deaths of a number of civilians, and likely for the death of Corporal Wayne Hendricks.”

      Absurdly, saying the name of his friend nearly brought Luke to tears. He choked them back. This wasn’t the time or the place.

      The general glanced down

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