Disclaimer: I'm not making any money off of this so I don't need a disclaimer.

I can't help but wonder if this has ever been done before, I see High School drama type of stories but this is going to be different, A LOT different. No superpowers in this one, no fancy costumes or anything like that, just a bunch of normal people. This chapter is going to be a smidge on the short side, just a warm up.

Chapter 1: Enlisting

The past year had been cruel. His internship with a local, medium-sized shipping company had fallen apart when one of the shift managers framed him for a screw-up involving a shipment of radioactive material that resulted in the death of a truck driver and the quarantine of thirty or so innocent bystanders. His girlfriend left him after the incident and his school expelled him, he was cleared of any wrongdoing after a months-long investigation but the school would not reverse their decision and his ex had already found someone new. The catalyst however, was only four days ago: His parents and older brother were killed in a terrorist attack. The four had agreed to meet at a casual restaurant downtown, Richard was running late so his family decided to wait for him on the sidewalk when a white box van parked near them and exploded. The intended target is believed to be the courthouse across the street, the building was damaged and several people inside were injured, but the only fatalities were to people on the street, the Grayson's and five others.

Richard was laying awake in bed in the midst of the transition from sorrow to anger when he heard a knock at the door of his small, one-bedroom apartment in the lower-middle class suburbs. He ignored it at first, until he heard a male voice: "Mr. Grayson, it's Officer O'Toole, we have new information about Tuesday's incident."

That got his attention. Richard got up and answered the door wearing only pajama pants. "What is it?"

"ISIS claimed responsibility, we think the guy who did it was a sympathizer but hadn't taken any formal training." Richard stared at him blankly. "The bomb was essentially home-made, a plastic trash can full of black powder, he probably threw a lit match in there or something and closed the top." A staring contest ensued between the two, after nearly a minute of awkward silence the Officer spoke again. "Mr. Grayson I'm very sorry for your loss, I can't imagine the grief you must be going through and I won't insult you by saying I understand because I don't... But ultimately there isn't much else we can do, the guy who did it is dead and his leaders are half a world away, but you can take this number and call it anytime day or night if you need to talk to someone" he handed Richard a business card for a grief counselor. "Don't hesitate to call that number sir, try to enjoy the rest of your day" and with that the Officer left.

Richard managed to get himself dressed and stumble out to the nearby park. He walked for several minutes before sitting down on a bench, it was a warm day but not hot with a mild breeze out of the southwest, scattered clouds and moderate humity, the fresh air was doing him good. He lost track of how long he was sitting there, but eventually he saw two men dressed in the distinctive Marine dress uniform walk by slowly. They were chatting about their recent graduation from basic training, one of them made an offhand comment that caught Richard's attention... "My brother tried to get into the SEALs but he couldn't do it, BUD/S was too much for him, didn't have the motivation."

The other Marine chimed in "Navy SEALs are no joke man, one SEAL takes out more ragheads than our whole platoon ever will" the two moved beyond earshot.

One thing Richard did have going for him was he was in shape. After the fiasco at his internship his time freed up and he spent most of it at the gym, while not quite at Iron Man level, he was head and shoulders above most of his peers in terms of physical conditioning. He let out a heavy sigh, pulled out his smartphone and googled "Navy SEAL requirements." After about twenty minutes of research, the twenty-two year old put his phone away and headed for the local Navy recruiting office across town.

Rachael was on a high, she had just turned nineteen yesterday, she had been given a car for her high school graduation four months prior and she was about to go on her third date with a guy she liked a lot. As she was putting her last bit of makeup on her father, Travis, appeared in the doorway to the bathroom. "I take it things are going well with this new guy?"

Rachael let out a small chuckle "Yes dad, things are going very well" she put her cosmetics away and headed to her bedroom.

"Have you told him yet?" Travis asked, following his daughter.

"Nope, going to tell him today" Rachael replied, picking up her purse and going through it.

"Is he going to be okay with it?"

She paused for a moment and looked at her father, "why wouldn't he be? And if he isn't then what am I supposed to do about it?"

"I think the question is more what is HE going to do about it."

Rachael gave a smug look, "dad, you didn't raise a victim" she said as she placed her Beretta Nano into the concealment pocket of her purse.

Travis smiled and turned to leave "have a nice night" the retired Marine Sergeant said before disappearing down the hallway...

... The date went well, a casual dinner with pleasant conversation and a few laughs, the quintessential good date. They had just ordered dessert when Rachael decided bring up the topic she and her father had spoken about earlier. "So I have some news" she said cheerfully.

"Oh?" her date asked with a smile.

"Tomorrow I'm going to enlist in the Army, I'm going to be a pilot!" She said, grinning ear to ear.

Her date's smile faded quickly. "What kind of pilot?"

"Helicopter, Going to fly those Apache's!"

The man on the other end of the table sat back. "So you want to kill people?"

Rachael flinched at the comment and looked at him quizzically. "They're the ones trying to kill us, they're the ones who declared war on us..."

"Because we antagonized them" the man interrupted, "If we just reasoned with them and treated them with respect instead of slaughtering them in droves we wouldn't be having this problem."

Rachael paused, then got up from her chair. "You want to reason with them? Go ahead, you'll be the next star of an execution video on the internet" she left, highly offended.

Travis was watching TV when Rachael came in. "You're home a little earlier than I expected."

"Yeah well, things went unexpectedly" Rachael said.

"He didn't like you going into the Army?"

After a sigh, Rachael replied; "Nope."

Travis paused and thought for a moment. He was unsurprised at what had happened but didn't stop him from feeling bad about it. "So what now?" He asked.

"Same as before, he's just not in the picture."

"So you're out looking for some payback then?" The Navy recruiter queried.

"You could say that" Richard replied.

"And you think you can pass the PST?"

"I know I can" Richard said with the utmost confidence.

The recruiter smiled smugly. "Then just sign these forms and we'll get you started."

"That's a tall mountain to climb miss Roth, are you sure you're ready for it?" The Army recruiter asked.

"I was born ready" Rachael replied.

The recruiter retrieved papers from a filing cabinet. "If that's the case, there's some extra paperwork to do, once you complete basic training you're going to have to take our rotary wing flight training, you're not going to see deployment for a while."

"I understand."

The recruiter smiled, "great, then let's get started..."