Arizona Desert

Michael and Marcus took their positions. A third of the way down an elevated terrain feature, Michael set the legs of his bipod against a rock and got his view through his scope after having set his drag bag in front of his position to reduce muzzle wash. Marcus set his equipment up in complete cover behind a larger rock, unpacking his surveillance equipment.

"I miss having air support" Marcus muttered as he adjusted the tripod of his spotting scope.

Michael rolled his eyes and laughed softly. "so do I."

Several hours went by.

They finally saw movement on the route. A heavy duty van was being escorted by a pair of Chevy gun trucks. The van was noticeably bogged down from being loaded over capacity. It stayed on hard packed roads while the trucks stayed to the sides, further off the road to keep more area covered for the cargo. They looked like potential pros.

"twelve hundred, you won't hit that shit" Marcus said as he lased with his rangefinder, "you should have brought a fifty with ya."

Michael watched through the scope as he made an adjustment. He noticed that the van was moving at one fixed speed, possibly cruise control. The wind was not moving yet, but he knew that at any given second the wind would pick up and start chopping randomly. He shifted and took his shot.

A few seconds later, the van began to lose control and veered into a rock. From the drivers perspective, he simply had a flat tire at the worst possible time. From reality, Michael had done exactly what he wanted.

The gun trucks slowed down and started to circle the van while the gunners looked around. After a few minutes of searching, they drove over to the van and kicked out their teams. These trucks were four door cab models, each having four passengers inside the cabs with equipment, practically forming the minimum components of an infantry squad. The passenger from the van stepped out and started pointing at different places, which the dismounted men began moving to and setting up a perimeter.

Michael watched as they set up some of the best security he'd seen a non-military entity perform. He turned to Marcus and said the one thing he wasn't expecting to be told; "Pack your shit."

Marcus looked at Michael with confusion and near disgust. "You do got something in mind, right?"

Michael packed his AR10 back into the drag bag and set his 25 round .308 magazines in the pouches, while grabbing out magazines of .300 Blackout and filling the empty pouches on his vest. "You're fuckin right I have something in mind," Michael said through loosely held teeth. "I'm gonna go see where they got that training from."

"By your damn self!?" Marcus couldn't believe he was hearing his fellow veteran and brother send him away before wading into a firefight, by himself.

"Staff Sergeant," Michael said sharply as his eyes narrowed, "what the fuck am I?"

Marcus stared at Michael like he had just been slapped in the dick. "I know you didn't pull retirement rank on me," he said as he sat up away from his rifle. "But if you were a Marine I'd have called you Gunny, ain't that right?"

Michael smirked, "Not my rank, Recon," Michael said as he began to chuckle, "What did I do all those years?"

Marcus took a slow sigh, conceding to Michaels mostly valid point. "You were a Wolf Operator,"

"Lone, a Lone Wolf Operator." Michael interrupted.

"Yeah, a goddamn solo act," Marcus barked back, "There's too much open space, You won't get close enough for that little ass gun of yours." He said as his face gradually revealed his worry. He picked up his AKM and grabbed a second drum out of his kit. "You gonna do some dumb shit, fine. Do it right."

Michael paused, looking at the rifle. He knew deep down that Marcus was right. He was carrying a rifle with ammunition that had the flight ballistics of a two handed pistol, at best. He wrapped his support hand around the front of the receiver and nodded. "Thank you Marcus," He said softly.

Marcus nodded and released the weapon from his own grasp, letting Michael wrap the sling around his torso. "Those are armor piercing," He said as his near sorrowful expression shifted to a grin, "And I'm not leaving, I wanna watch you fuck these guys up worse than Venezuela."

Venezuela, Marine Recon mission gone bad, a rescue operation, many dead on both sides before intervention. The first time the project had been put to use with an adjacent unit. Rescue operation. A delay in the fall of the Maduro regime. Some men's nightmare.