Title: Blood On The Leaves
Summary: "You know who's been following us, don't you?" "It's more of a case of "what", rather than of "whom"." Fact: Everything you do in the field can get you killed, including nothing.
Genre(s): Action/Adventure, Drama, Humour, Horror.
Warning(s): Violence, gore, coarse language, mature subject matter.

Murphy's Law of Combat: The easy way is always mined.

Prologue: The Assignment

Date: 3 June, 2006
Time: 13:35 PM

"For the last decade or so, the government has been keeping track of a series of murders. I'm sure some of you recall the brutal murders out in the rural areas of Brazil near the Atlantic coastline a year ago during that heat wave. The victims were found by the locals, all strung up in the trees, skinned, and often beheaded..."

Several men and women in the briefing room nodded their heads grimly. They remembered. How could they forget? It had made international news, especially when the local police sent into the jungles to investigate were often found strung up beside the victims themselves. The victims were all male, all members of a "local" guerrilla force, and all were within the age range of nineteen to forty-five. Give or take a few years for the latter end of that range. The few policemen that had survived had concluded that whoever the murderer was –although it was suspected that there was more than one- he or she was doing to those guerrillas what many hunters did to their own kills. Staff Sergeant (SSgt.) Dagny Sakariasen could remember one reported explaining that "It was the same as stringing a deer up, skinning it, removing its head as a trophy"... Dagny shook her head. Militant animal rights groups had been –and still were- suspected as the perps, but nothing could be proven. All evidence had been destroyed, and few witnesses, if any, surv-

-The moron was talking again. She should have been paying attention. Silently, she berated herself, cutting off her own train of thought and returning her attention to the man at the head of the brightly lit room.

'Focus, Dag. You might miss something.'

"... Explanations as to the situation down in Brazil, and why you've been called here today. I believe this video will help you understand."

The thin, middle-aged man at the front of the room adjusted his tie, turned, and pressed a button on a nearby remote control. The projector beside him suddenly came to life, infrared images of a satellite surveillance camera playing out on the wall on the other side of the room. The lights were shut off, and everyone turned to view the images. Dagny turned as well, but somehow she already knew what they would see.

She heard her team's Sergeant First Class (SFC) beside her grumble and wasn't surprised when she got a better look at the video. The surveillance footage was terrible, but it was easy enough to see the several women and children, apparently bound and gagged inside of what appeared to be rudimentary hut. It was difficult to tell with the infrared skewing all other details except what was hot, what was cold, and what looked vaguely like the shape of a human being. The women and children were probably from a nearby village, Dagny assumed. Hostages, being held either for money, or supplies.

Dagny paused, realizing that that did not fit with the profiles of the murders. Perhaps, they were being held for information. That made more sense than the hostages-for-money/supplies theory. The women and children would be released in exchange for information... But about what? About the murders? That fit. The guerrillas wanted to know who was killing them off. The local villages would be the obvious places to find information... Especially if the local villages were the ones who hired the murderer. A sense of foreboding settled in Dagny's gut. If that were the case, those hostages would not get out of the camp alive. Or in one piece...

Abruptly, the video and audio recording stopped. The lights came back on. The room's occupants blinked rapid, eyes reluctant to adjust to the sudden change of lighting. They turned to the moron –also known as the none-too-popular Sergeant Major Bartleby- once more, all frowns and scowls.

Bartleby adjusted the collar of his uniform, coughed, and said, "Obviously, the guerrillas have been kidnapping women and children from local villages all around; probably hoping to exchange their lives for information about the murderer. They've gone and kidnapped the daughter of one of the most influential politicians down there, now. The Brazilian government is torn. Those that support the girl's father are refusing to act –a death threat was issued, apparently- while the other half of their government is baying for blood. As for the guerrillas... They got a little break during the colder months, but now the bastard's back again." –Dagny nodded to herself, her suspicions confirmed- "Unfortunately, the guerrilla's plan backfired; none of the locals have any information at all. They didn't hire him –or them, as the case may be- and they certainly don't want him anywhere nearby. Lately, it's not just the guerrilla's that have been picked off recently, but the villages' men-"

"I take it we can no longer suspect a militant animal rights organization, then?" Major Jacob Langdon, a tall, weathered-looking man with a more than his fair share of scars and a scowl that could strike terror even the most thick-headed private, interrupted mildly. Quite why there was a major with the teams for this briefing, Dagny honestly couldn't say. Usually, a captain led a team, and, while subordinate to a major, rarely worked with majors on assignments such as this. Perhaps the "higher-ups" just wanted a little extra manpower –or person power as some of the more feminist soldiers would insist.

"Definitely not." Sergeant Major Bartleby agreed. Coughing again, –this appeared to be an odd habit of Bartleby's- the man continued where he left off. "Your assignment is to get the hostages and get out of there, to be rather frank. The murderer, whoever the hell the bastard is, is still hanging around, the guerrillas won't thank you for taking their bargaining chips, and the locals are starting to get a bit cagey."

"When do we leave?" Captain Marcus Martinez and several others, wanted to know. Dagny took a moment to look her team's captain over. A short man, in comparison with other members of their team, with a tanned skin tone that clearly displayed his Hispanic heritage for anyone who cared to look, and probably what was once wavy, dark hair. Now said hair was peppered with grey, cut short and kept short. Somehow, it made the man seem older than his thirty-seven years of age. He'd be retiring soon, most likely. A pity, Dagny thought to herself. Martinez was one of the better captains she'd worked with.

"Tomorrow, at 01:00 hours."

Beside her, SFC Zuberi Kaye, a tall, dark man with a heavy Jamaican accent and a body built to resemble a tank, scowled. Dagny understood why. Three days would have been better. Four days? Wonderful. Five? Too much to ask for, but one could always hope... But one day? That was borderline obscene.

Dagny sighed inwardly and rubbed at an old scar at the back of her neck absent-mindedly as they were dismissed. Mentally, she made a checklist of all of the supplies and equipment she'd need as she left the room and headed to the barracks. She'd need to clean and check her rifle and her handgun, the ammunition and food rations were supplied, –no worries there- as were the combat knife and Kukri...

But, given SFC Kaye's tendency to get shot combined with Sgt. Jansen's proclivity to use tracers just a tad too often, –usually resulting in the SFC getting shot- she planned on packing a shit load of medical supplies.