Prologue

Detonation

I frowned as I peered through the optics of my mask, seeing the cone shaped artifact being carried into the south side of the temple by handcart.

The handcart was being pulled by a couple of young men and escorted by half a dozen militiamen carrying AK-47's, all of whom wore simple clothing one would expect from the denizens of the Yucatan peninsula, undershirts and jeans.

Not what I would exactly call low profile targets.

However, in the jungle where the vegetation provided plenty of concealment and the humidity and temperature was uncomfortable to say the least, I couldn't blame them for not wearing any camouflage or body armor.

After all, It wasn't like anyone was stalking them, as far as they were concerned.

"Wolf, did you get a final count of guards on the north side of the temple" I asked as I spoke into the radio on the side of my head, all while ignoring the sweat running down my face.

"I count 8 guards, all maintaining a slow patrol," a young woman's voice replied. "All of them have AK's, though they don't seem to have anything more than that. They don't have any sort of protection on them for that matter."

"This is Badger, second that observation from here. These guys have their guard down, if the smoking and lax patrolling seems to be offering us some sort of clue" another feminine voice piped in.

I grunted and focused back on the magnified view my mask was currently offering, getting a count of the "guards" from my side of the temple, some 50 meters away from my position on the border of the jungle.

"Right, well, I count two groups patrolling, three in each, with a mounted LMG in a fighting position covering the entrance." I said.

"Combine that with the eight guards on the north side of the temple..." I said, trailing off in thought.

"And the 3 patrols out circling the perimeter..." Wolf quietly said.

Badger finished the thought for me. "That's a total of 32 militiamen, give or take, in the vicinity of the temple."

My mind had already sped through all of that. A useful symptom of ADD, given enough training and experience. What I was currently trying to focus on was what would happen after contact was made.

The pyramid temple sat in the middle of a larger circular grass field, no cover and little concealment.

The 14 exposed militiamen around the temple would be no problem, so long as none of them made it to that position where the LMG was positioned. The patrols that were out in the jungle behind us could prove troublesome, as they could flank my team if any of the guards were able to make to the position and hunker down.

No, the real problem was the QRF some 4 clicks to the east.

Making it into the temple and securing the artifact would hardly be troublesome.

But getting out of the temple? Well, there was only one entry point and as far as I was concerned, it was the only exit. If the QRF got here while we were inside the temple, all they would have to do was siege us down.

And if my team managed to get out quickly, we could find ourselves exposed on the grassland.

The .50 caliber machine guns on the back of those jeeps I had seen earlier looked mean and ready.

Time was the real opponent here, and speed with, at the moment, surprise our only real friends.

But, it could be a lot worse.

"Right, here's what we are going to do." I began.

Fifteen Minutes later…

The sun finally set and jungle quickly went dark. It was time.

My breathing slowed, and my training took over. I pulled on the string of my compound bow, drawing it taut as I targeted the center mass of my first target as my fingers held the broadhead arrow. I spoke into my radio and gave the word:

"Alfa, go."

A split second later, I smoothly let the arrow fly, hitting the target dead center in the chest. The first one went down, and I shifted my sights to the second target in the group, who seemed to just barely register what had happened to his buddy.

I shot the other two targets, silencing them quickly before shifting my sights to scanning the grounds around the west side of the temple, where I saw two guards sprinting in my direction, away from the ambush Wolf had commenced on the north side. I could only assumed they were rushing for the LMG position, or the inside of the temple.

A fatal mistake, I sadly thought.

I was never one to have enjoyed the act of killing. Life was sacred as far as I was concerned. But war was a matter of kill or be killed. And I believed that one of the best ways to defend whatever it is you need to fight for was to go on the attack.

In a couple of minutes, the fourteen guards around the temple were down. Badger and I immediately rushed to the entry of the temple, with Wolf relocating to the west side of the jungle facing the temple to provide overwatch.

As I ran with Badger, I put the bow over my back and pulled out my Folded blade, whipping it out like butterfly knife, the 50 cm blade popping out of the handle resting in my left hand. I then closed my eyes and let the Void fill me.

The glyphs on the back of my left hand and palm of my right tingled and I opened my eyes, looking into what had been the dark entry of the temple.

Now, I could see six militiamen rushing and yelling down the corridor, their outlines in red on a blue background of what should of been a black, light less world. Badger, a couple of feet in front of me, was shrouded in green.

We both stopped and pulled out our pistols, taking down the militiamen who were running at us. As I shot the last guard down and proceeded down the corridor into the temple, I noticed something and frowned.

Why had they been yelling? And where were their rifles?

I was interrupted with the voice of Wolf yelling into the radio, gunfire evident in the background "My position's compromised and the QRF is already getting closing in. I'm headed into the temple with you guys, see if we can get ourselves hunkered down."

My thoughts raced furiously as I turned around in the corridor to see Wolf beginning to enter the temple.

It clicked.

"NO!" I yelled..

One of the reasons me and my team existed was to deny terrorist groups assets of any sort. In this case, the cone shaped artifact we had been tracking down for the last four and a half months was rumored to be an ancient weapon of some sort, even a weapon of mass destruction.

Which seemed absolutely ridiculous, until you considered how much blood, effort, and fighting had been shed over possession of this artifact.

The same artifact that had been brought into this strange, almost alien temple by those militiamen…

The same militiamen who, until just recently, had been running away. In terror.

So sudden was the light that filled the corridor and heat going through my body, that as I quickly fell unconscious, all I could think was how thankful I was to be able to die a quick death.