“Son,” a gruff voice said from beside me.

“Sarge.” I looked up at Lewis. His face was fucking devastated too.

“We need to airlift him out. It’s urgent.”

“Okay.” I leaned forward to kiss Dev on his head. “I’ll catch you soon, Dev, yeah? Hold on.”

Releasing his weak hand, I placed the picture there instead. Dev’s fingers held onto it as tight as they could. As the medics lifted him, I said, “Don’t let him lose that picture. Make him look at it if things get bad.” My voice was barely there. The medic assured me he would.

“Outside, son.” Lewis indicated for me to leave the room. I did as he said, walking like a damn ghost through the hallways.

All I could think of was the state Dev was in. His missing fingers, his knocked-out teeth, the knife marks, the bullet wounds, and his fucking tear-filled eyes when he saw me . . . when he saw the picture of his son.

Those fucking cunts. What the fuck had they done to him? Hacking him up, starving him, making him lie in his own shit.

Motherfucking cunts!

I came to a dead stop when I heard a noise to my left. The muted sounds of the insurgents came from behind a nearby door. I listened to their fucking muffled voices and felt my blood boil.

They had hurt my brother. They had touched Dev.

I looked at the closed door, and my feet moved without thought. My hand reached into my pocket and took hold of my knife. I didn’t even look back as I entered the room and shut the door behind me. Three men looked up at me. Three men who were tied up and sitting against the wall.

From behind their gags, they started spewing some babbled shit at me, but I couldn’t understand a word. And even if I did, I wouldn’t give a fuck. I just saw their corpses in my head. I saw their blood pooling beneath them on the floor.

I tightened my grip on the knife in my hand. My feet moved forward, and red misted over my eyes as I came to the first man. He started shuffling on the floor, trying to get away. But he was mine and going nowhere.

I raised my knife and sliced it through his thigh, making sure to hit his femoral artery. I slashed the blade across his stomach and smiled as his innards spilled from the wound. I struck again and again. Blood spattered my face as I moved on to the next man, slashing his throat and hearing him gargle on his own blood. Then the third. I hacked away at their bodies, causing them more pain than was possible in the short time I knew I had, and all the time, I did it with a fucking smile on my face.

“Xavier!” I faintly recognized Bones’s voice, but I didn’t stop. Nothing would stop me now.

“Deyes!” a louder voice boomed, then someone grabbed me around my waist, yanking me off my kills. I fought whoever pulled me back until I was restrained on the ground, my knife ripped from my fingers. I looked to the side and smiled wider when I saw the corpses slumped against the wall. Corpses that barely resembled humans anymore. Fuckers that had paid for taking my brother.

“Take him!” Lewis ordered, a note of panic in his voice, and I was carried outside. Blood from my kills covered my hands. I was thrown into a small shack. The door slammed shut behind me. As I sat in silence, I looked down at the blood on my hands and felt nothing but pride. But it wasn’t long before my steady hands began to shake. Wasn’t long before thoughts of Devin and the state he was in hit home. Wasn’t long before the tears came thick and fast, adrenaline fading and reality hitting me.

The door opened and Lewis stepped inside. Sergeant Lewis—Devin’s closest friend and my superior. He began pacing, losing his shit. He kept looking down at me then shaking his head, repeating, “Shit!”

I watched him, numbly. They could lock me up. I didn’t fucking care. Those fuckers were dead. That was all I gave a fuck about right now.

“Here’s what’s gonna happen.” Lewis stilled. His face was red, and his eyes darted from side to side like he was debating something in his head. “All those fuckers were killed in the raid. No survivors.” I blinked, unfeeling and uncaring as he crouched before me. “What the fuck were you thinking, X?”

“They hurt him,” I snarled. “They needed to die.”

“Your brother is the best fucking Marine I know, and, more than that, he plays by the rules, has honor in the flag. He would never have pulled a stunt like that if your roles were reversed. You know what could happen to you if this is found out?”

“I don’t care. They fucked with him. They deserved to die. Don’t give a fuck about what happens to me now.”

Lewis ran his hand down his face, exasperated. “Clean up. I gotta figure all this shit out. We all gotta get our stories straight. Forget this ever happened. Yeah?” I got to my feet, not saying shit. Lewis grabbed my arm and wrenched me back to face him. “Dev saved my ass more times than you’d know. That’s the only reason I’m going against every ethical and moral code here, X. I owe Dev, and after what’s happened, I’m sure as shit not gonna have you court-martialed.”

I stormed through the door, only to see the building that had held my brother on fire, flames licking high and smoke tunneling into the air. “Fuckers lit it up when we arrived, but we managed to get our men out first,” Sergeant Lewis said from behind me. I knew that was the cover they were using to hide my crimes.

But as I washed off the blood from my kills in a nearby stream, I couldn’t help but feel pride at the deaths. Those assholes had deserved to die. And if I’d had more time, I knew I would have done much worse . . .

I gasped awake and shot upright. I looked at the end of my bed. There they were. Lined up to visit me again. The fucking insurgents, dripping in blood, their innards falling out and throats slit. They stared at me with black voids for eyes. “Go away,” I ordered and scrambled to the head of the bed. But they didn’t move. They just stared. They always just stared.

And then I saw them come up behind, ripping my heart in two. These ones I cared about. “No,” I begged, arms outstretched. “Please. Please don’t come to me again . . .” My voice faded to nothing as they took their usual space beside the insurgents.

They all stared at me with dead eyes, their skin gray and crepe-thin. “Please.” I felt the last of my resolve, my strength, break. My cheeks grew wet as I faced them all, the terrors that hadn’t left me in years. My guilt come back to life. “Leave me alone,” I screamed. “Please . . . just leave me alone,” I croaked, no energy left, and tried to breathe.