Okay, so I was reading an amazing story yesterday called 'Substance is not enough, accident is also required' by Lauradaexplorer and a damn plot bunny decided to drop itself on my head. I apologize (gasp, broke a rule) to readers of my other stories because I haven't updated in a while. I've had a bit of a dry spell- and NO IT IS NOT WRITER'S BLOCK! Anyway, this is basically going to be a Tony/OMC fic unless I decide to become evil and change it. Please enjoy and please please PLEASE, for the sake of my sanity, review. I don't care what kind of review or how long, it just gets me eager to continue. Without further ado, I give you the prologue! ~Callum!~

17 July, 2002, 150 miles outside of Kabul, Afghanistan.

First Lieutenant Declan Del Rossi couldn't help but grin at his friend's crazy antics, despite the fact that he was drenched in ice-cold water. Ross Karamavot's smile faded as he saw Declan pick up a jug filled with water from the river about a mile off.

"Come on, Del Rossi," Ross tried to reason while backing away slowly. "It was just a harmless prank… Dex?" Ross suddenly found himself flat on his back, soaked in water that had who-know-what in it and smelled worse than the latrines. Declan's grin widened as he dashed away and joined the rest of his platoon in playing a game of football.

An hour later, they were due to move camp about fifty miles north. Driving in the lead vehicle, which was the most dangerous position to be in because it was the most open to roadside bombings, was Karamavot, Del Rossi, Austin Tanner, and Samantha Walsh. Almost twenty minutes after they left, Tanner told Walsh to stop driving.

The four of them filed out of the Humvee and Tanner pointed out what made him stop. There was a suspicious-looking mound of sand a few yards ahead: a bomb placed by the Taliban to kill off troops.

"What do we do, Dex?" Tanner asked quietly. He was a new recruit on his first tour. The Marines wasn't exactly how he had anticipated it would be.

He was about to answer when he was blinded by a flash of brilliant white light and thrown backwards against the side of the Humvee by an unnatural force. The only thing he knew for almost five minutes was darkness and pain- excruciating pain all over his body. His chest and shoulder felt like they were burning and Dex could swear that there was something protruding from his arm that should not be.

The next thing to come back was his sight. He saw twisted metal bits strewn across the ground along with- though he tried not to think about it- various body parts that once made up Samantha Walsh. Tanner was on the ground beside him, clutching his abdomen in agony. There was blood everywhere; it was dripping down across his eyes and stinging them, it was gushing out from his arm and Austin's stomach, even more was soaking into the hard-packed sand. Dex could feel it dripping down his chin and realized with a start that there was no sound. It wasn't an eerie quiet-after-disaster type of thing, it was absolute silence. There was no yelling from the rest of his platoon, even though he was well aware that they were doing their best to help them. There was no echo off the distant mountains and he could not hear Austin's pained moans.

Even more startling was that he could not find Ross among the others. He knew that the man was not injured (it was just something he knew in his gut) but there was no trace of him. It was as if Karamavot had vanished along with the sounds Dex had been so long accustomed to.

Two women were getting Tanner onto a stretcher as a man crouched beside Dex. He was mouthing words, a hand on the Lt.'s good shoulder, with worry written plainly across his face.

Dex concentrated and saw the words 'help' and 'way' before his eyes drifted shut and sent him into a pit of unconsciousness.