Cancer's Curse (The Zodiac Book 4) by Sating Paul

Author:Sating, Paul [Sating, Paul]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Paul Sating Productions
Published: 2020-10-01T04:00:00+00:00

10 - Baghdad

"Let's go, girls," Sergeant Rogers shouted to the twenty–man strong platoon itching to hit the streets of Khadra once more.

"Arrogant ass," I grumbled to myself.

Bilba snickered. "Patience. We still have a long time to go with him."

"Don't remind me." I threw the two ammo buckets to Ralrek, who loaded them into the Humvee. I climbed into its cramped quarters.

Two weeks had passed since we were kicked out of the field hospital by the angry doctor and her pint-sized horde of bullies. During that time, we patrolled enough blocks of western Baghdad to put a nice wear pattern in the heel of my boot that ensured I walked with a slight tilt now. And since being scared by one-hundred-and-forty pounds of the meanest medical practitioner I'd ever met, we became intimately familiar with the city and her mortals. I'd learned a lot about the Baghdadis and saw how they struggled because of the military presence. My empathy grew by bounds.

Maybe it was the comfort I felt from my new knowledge about these humans and their home that I was looking forward to patrolling the doctor's neighborhood again.

Two weeks. That was all it took to open my eyes.

Two weeks and we were fully in our independent rhythm, enough to consistently be ahead of schedule. A well-oiled machine.

We waited for the human clock—I really wish we could get satellite signals through the Earth's bedrock so Hell could enjoy the pleasure of accurately synchronized time—to inch its way to our departure hour. Finally, it came, and we pulled away from the Baghdad international Airport safe zone and headed northwest, catching Highway 11 and heading east into the city.

"Remember to keep your heads on a swivel," Sergeant Smith said through his heavy southern accent. "Been some rumors that we might have friends in the neighborhood."

'Friends' meant the Russians, or one of their allies. Word around post was that they were leveraging relationships with a local terrorist cell who operated swiftly and secretly. Small but mobile, they could hit us and scamper away before we knew what was happening. Only once had that happened, not on a patrol I was on, and the damage was minimal. Minimal, but very real.

The Russian influence was growing, but until we saw something, I wasn't going to get myself spun up about it. We had a long deployment ahead, and I didn't want to wear myself out. Plus, thinking of the 'what ifs and maybes' led me straight into the possibility of angels fighting for the Russians. And that led me to thinking about the gorgeous angel Cassie and if she might be in the Overworld again. Then she would distract me, dull my edge, and put me at unnecessary risk.

Best not to think about Russians.

On our left, we passed a mosque. A group of men outside stopped chatting to watch our convoy. I watched them back, silently thanking them for not making any suspicious moves that necessitated evasive action on our part. Or something worse.

The street teed off at an intersection just before an elementary school.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.