A little summary so you don't get lost:

They were 7 soldiers fighting in Afghanistan and all died over there, except for Jay and Mouse (I explained it in Chapter 4 with Mouse and Jay at the bar). They were best friends. They are all mentioned in Jay's flashback (I'm writing them in Italic). You will learn in the next chapters how they all became best friends, and how they all died. Well maybe not all of them... you'll see the how and the why.

However, this is just the beginning of Jay's nightmare. Remember, his past come back to haunt him and he will not be the only victim. I don't want to spoil you so I'm gonna stop here. Oh and for the Linstead fans, don't worry, I'm a Linstead shipper too, all the way… but I don't want to be that easy between them. I kinda like when it's complicated but in the end, they would do every thing for each other, even when they "hate" each other. So yes there are some unspoken feelings but they are not ready do accept it. They will have to overcome some obstacles.

Just know that I have a lot of plans for this story and I know I'm not updating very often but I promise I'll do my best.

They've been walking for a day now. It was getting dark, they were exhausted and they needed to sleep. So they found a safe place to spend the night. They lighted a fire and all sat around. They all talked about their past, why they decided to join the army… They also laughed, a lot. They were all very nervous about this mission and all they needed was to think about something else, take their mind off for a while. Logan and Matt were making jokes, while Mouse, Jake and Ryan were laughing.

As for Jay, he shut himself away to write a letter to Allie. He had beside him a picture of her. The one he always brings when he was on this kind of mission.

"Writing to a girl huh?"

Jay looked up and saw Mark sitting next to him.

"Yeah" he smiled looking at the picture.

Mark looked at him and then looked at their squad. They were laughing at some stupid Logan's jokes. He smiled.

"You know; I don't want you guys to have false hopes… I don't know how this mission will end. I'm not as strong as you guys think. I'm just a soldier who managed to stay alive."

Mark turned his attention to Jay and looked at him speaking. Jay looked at him back.

"All I'm saying is that I'm not some kind of hope that will take you all out of there, alive. I'm afraid to! So don't think I'm the bravest one…"

Mark didn't reply first.

"Sometimes people think brave means not being afraid, which of course it doesn't mean that at all. It means that you're afraid, but you move past that and do your job anyhow, do what you think is right. That's what courage is. That what the captain meant when he told us you were our best hope. You fight at any cause, no matter what, you don't give up" Mark replied staring into emptiness.

Jay was about to respond at this but he heard something. So he and Mark got up to have a better view but it was all dark.

Suddenly they were attacked by machine guns by insurgents. But they saw nothing. The sand blinded them and it was dark. All they could hear were gunshots in front of them. They all lengthened behind rocks and began to shoot.

"Matt, Ryan go on the left while Mouse and Logan you guys go the right. We have to surround them. They can't see you we are on the dark but be careful. Jake and Mark… stay here with me. They all nodded. Mouse, Logan, Matt and Ryan began to run on each sides while the others stayed and continued to shoot.

Mark and Jay were the best snipers. So they position themselves in strategic locations and began to shoot back while Jake shot with a machinegun-gun. 5 minutes later, Matt Ryan Mouse and Logan were on the right and left sides. They surrounded them and began to shoot them.

After what felt like an eternity, the shots stopped. Mark, Jay and Jake stood up. They could hear one of the guy yelling. So they all run in their direction. It was Logan who was yelling at the only insurgent left who surrendered himself. Next to them Mouse and Ryan were taking care of Matt who waslying down, shivering with pain and anguish, after being shot through the right side of the chest. Fortunately, it wasn't on the heart side, but still he was bleeding a lot. Jay looked at them and then around him. He was kind of overtaken. His heart was beating. He tried to hide his shaking hands.

There were several bodies, lying, lifeless. Some of the body had bullets in their cheeks, eyes or chest… Jay continued to look at them and then stopped. He found a 12-year-old boy, dead, with a bullet in his neck. There was blood everywhere with deep wounds. It was abominable… Jay felt the sickness coming up so he looked away, afraid that he might throw up. He walked away, hide himself behind a rock and vomit. Once he was done, he sat, leaned his back against the rock and banged his head against it. He began to cry. He bent his knee put his elbow on it and then put his head in his hand.

After a minute or two he stood up and saw Mouse and Ryan, still taking care of Matt. He was bleeding a lot and, well... matt was the only one with medical skills. So nobody knew what to do.

"Okay Matt tell me what to do" Mouse asked.

"y… you… you have to take out the bu…bullet"

"Okay, okay wait a sec…" Mouse stood up and open Matt's bag. In there he took the medical stuff and sat back next to Matt.

"Do you s..see the bottle w…with the orange red… liquid?" Matt moaned in pain.

"Yeah I got it…"

"okay spread it… generously on my wo…wound." Matt said as he leaned his head on the ground closing his eyes.

Mouse did so.

"Okay what's next?"

"now you…you have to open me…" Matt opened is eyes and caught Mouse's panic glance

"come on Mouse… You're a soldier and you're afraid of little blood?" he laughed but quickly groaned in pain. "Just do it" he added.

Jay looked at them but felt useless. So he looked back at Logan who was still punching the insurgent.

He walked toward him and caught his wrist. "Stop Logan"

Logan looks at him with confusion.

"What?! He shot our guy who may not survive! And you want me to cuddle this son of bitch?" He yelled at Jay.

"I said stop it" Jay repeated calmly. Mark put a hand on Logan's chest to make him back off.

Jay took the insurgent by the arm and held him thigh. He wasn't gently either. He put a fabric around his eyes to blindfold him. Logan was reloading his gun thinking Jay wanted him to shoot the insurgent.

"you will walk a thousand steps. Then you'll be allowed to remove it. We will be gone since"

When he heard Jay asking the insurgent to walk away, Logan dropped his arms.

Jay pushed the insurgent away violently, making him to fall on the ground.

"Thank you so much" the insurgent said in the emptiness since he was blindfolded.

"Don't thank me." Jay snapped "I'm not doing this for you. But know that, if I ever saw you again, I'll personally put a bullet in your head"

The insurgent nodded and began to walk. He put his hands in front of him because he didn't know where he was going. The team could hear him counting.

"You've gotta be killing me?" Logan asked aggressively looking at the prisoner go away.

"we can't let him leave!" Ryan stepped forward.

"We can't take him with us either. Beside he is in enemy territory… soon or later our guys will pick him up…"

"yeah only if he doesn't get picked up by his little friends and thrown back into circulation" Logan declared. Jay didn't respond. There was a silence for a moment. By the time the insurgent was already far. Logan looked at him and then looked at Jay.

"I'm sure it was the decent thing to do, right?"

"Get your gear and let's go." Jay responded.

"No! I'm done with this mission." Logan claimed. "I don't wanna risk my life for two men, who, we all know, are dead! I want to fight war like a real soldier instead of wasting my time with this mission." Logan started to walk away but it was to much to hear for Mark. So he caught up Logan "don't walk away from your mission or your squad! Get back in line" he ordered as he pointed the rest of the squad. Jay wasn't saying anything. He didn't care if was leaving or staying. All he wanted to do was to complete the mission and go back to his fiancé as fast as possible.

"I said I'm done with this bullshit" Logan repeated as he resumed his walk.

So Mark, sick and tired, put out his gun and pointed it toward Logan. He knew he shouldn't do such things but he didn't care at the moment "I'm not gonna ask you again"

"you're going to shoot me because I have the six sense that these two men, we are looking for, are dead?" he looked at Mark full of calm.

"No! I'm gonna shoot you because I don't like you" Mark smiled sarcastically.

Every body began to be on the edge and to get agitated. Mouse quickly bandage Matt after removing the bullet and stitching him up. Once he did, he began to walk toward the agitation. Ryan was trying to calm Mark down, while Jake was trying to make Jay react due to his lack of reaction. In fact, he was looking at the emptiness. "Jay, do something! They're going to shoot each other". Jay closed his eyes and took a deep breath before getting up. He walked toward Mark and Logan who were violently arguing. He put a hand on the barrel of Mark's gun and lowered it. Mark caught Jay's glance and understood Jay was taking care of the situation. Then Jay began to talk at all of his army pals. "It's been 4 months now since I left my home, to come fight here. And I know I've changed… Sometimes I wonder if I've changed so much… my fiancé is even going to recognize me, whenever it is that I get back to her. And how I'll ever be able to tell her about days like today. I don't know anything about these two guys. I don't care. They mean nothing to me. But if... You know if going to this village and finding them so that they can go home... If that earns me the right to get back to my fiancé, then that's my mission."

Jay looked at Logan "You want to leave? You want to go off and fight the war? All right. All right. I won't stop you. I'll even put in the paperwork. I just know that every man I kill, the farther away from home I feel."

Jay looked him right in the eyes. After a few seconds of silence, he turned around and started walking toward Matt and bent his knees in front of him. Matt seemed better with the bullet out of his chest.

Logan was looking at his squad who was walking toward Matt to, leaving Logan alone. So he began to think. Did he really want to be this man? The kind of man who abandoned his friends and gave up a mission? He looked at the direction he wanted to take so he could walk away and then looked back at his squad. And of the two, he took the most loyal one, and return were he belonged, with his friends.

Present time

"That wasn't the plan! We never agreed to kill someone in the process, especially if it is him!" Logan said angrily as he pointed Jay. He was nervous about the situation. He didn't expect to see his once best friend hanged up and unconscious.

"let him go and we'll do everything you want! Just let him go." Mark asked more softly.

Mark's always been the wise one, even if he had done some mistake in his life. He always took the responsibility of his acts. When he came back from Afghanistan, it was very difficult for him but less than the others. In fact, he quickly opened up to his entourage who all supported him in his dark times. Now, even if what he's been through changed him, war isn't a taboo subject anymore. He's very smart, passionate, admirable, compassionate and trusting. He's always been a model for everyone. The one that you can rely on. Physically he has dark hair, and green eyes. He is tall and broad shouldered.

Logan is… well he's quickly irritable, he is very mysterious, he has difficulty to talk about what he's been through in his life. He prefers to burry his anger and sadness and fears deep inside him (on this one he is very similar with Jay). Logan is independent, he's doing whatever he wants and doesn't care about what people think about him. If he wants something, he takes it. He's silly, seductive, charming. But beyond this bad boy appearance, he's loyal, honest, protective and generous. He just has this hard shell that no one managed to break. And because of that he never really had serious relationships with any woman. Physically he has light brown hair and green eyes. He had the beginning of a beard. He has long hair but not too much with just a little lock that fall into his forehead.

"You want me to let him go? He's been investigating on us, thinking that there will not have consequences? Hell no! It' not gonna happen. Now you will do what I said or I'll put a bullet on both of your head. And don't try to do anything silly. Remember I have this little toy". He pulled out from his pocket a command key with only one button. The button that, if you press it, will reduced the casern on dust. They looked at each other and then back at Henry. They nodded. They hated this but they didn't have the choice.

Jay was beginning to wake up, once again, weaker. He groaned silently and start to look around him, trying to remember where he was and why was he here. But it was still a little fuzzy in his mind. His thoughts are spiraling around his head, bouncing into each other, choosing random paths that make it impossible to catch them.

Then he froze as he saw mark, Logan and Henry talking at the other side of the room.

Suddenly, he saw Mark looking at him. Jay's heart beat faster and faster. No he wasn't hallucinating. Mark and Logan were still alive. At the instant, multiple questions crossed his mind. How? Why? Even where?

"Boss I managed to triangulate the signal" Mouse said as he walked toward the printer and got out a map. Voight walked out from his office.

"This is the best I could do" he put up the map on the board while they all positioned themselves in front of it. All looked at the map and try to set where Henry could have brought Jay.

After a moment Ruzek broke the silence.

"the warehouse?" he suggested

"No! to small… beside they said it would be the biggest hit ever" Erin rejected still looking at the map. Ruzek took a red pen and crossed off the warehouse place.

"the hospital?" Atwater submitted.

"To much people… they wouldn't take that risk". Antonio replied

Ruzek crossed off the place. "so we can cross off the 51"

"yep…"

"leave us with not much…" Ruzek declared.

"Mouse are you sure this is the right map?" Erin asked

"a 100%" he confirmed

Some of them continue to look at the map while others tried to make research on the different places that could be potential ones. Erin felt something vibrating on the back of her jeans. She pulled out her phone and noticed Kelly's name. She winced and answered. "Hey Kelly… I can't really talk to you right now…"

"you forget?"

"forget what?"

"well, that we had dinner? It's my day off remember?"

"Wait we are Monday… aren't you suppose to be on shift tonight?" she asked still looking at the board.

"I told you the casern was on renovation so we have 3 days off"

"Oh yeah right… well I'm sorry I… wait what did you say?" she turned red and could feel her heart beating.

"We have dinner tonight, I reserved to…"

"No not that!" she snapped "The casern! Nobody's working tonight?" she asked, making every one to look at her, understanding that they might finally found Jay.

"No I told you we are on renovation…"

Erin hanged up. Every one stood up form their desk and began to head for the stairs. They all suited up and got into the cars.

Henry noticed that Jay was wake up so he starts walking toward him, followed by Mark and Logan.

"How's my favorite soldier?" Henry asked smiling. Jay couldn't stand his stupid face. He was consumed by his rage. And the fact that his two best friends betrayed him, made him even more angry. Where did he go wrong so that his friends turned their back to him? He didn't understand. It couldn't be possible. The only option was that Henry was blackmailing them or frightening them.

"What does he has on you guys?" Jay asked weakly, nearly possible for him to hold his head straight. Henry laughed.

"I have nothing on them. They are just gonna help me a little bit. But no worries, we're gonna make it really quickly." Jay looked from Henry to the both of them with confusion and sadness in his eyes. Logan looked down, ashamed of what he was gonna do while Mark looked one last time at Jay.

Henry nodded to the two of them. They nodded back and walked out the casern to go take the gasoline cans on the car's trunk.

Henry looked back at Jay. "It hurts huh? Knowing that the most important persons in your life that you trusted once, finally turned up to be totally strangers to you?"

"Go to hell" Jay clenched his jaw.

Henry stared at him before walking away, laughing in his way out. Jay followed him with his eyes and when saw him outside he quickly looked up to his handcuffed hands, but more specially to his watch. He knew his team was searching for him but he also knew that when they will find him, they would be in serious danger. Henry had the power of blowing up this place in a fraction of second and from what he's seen, Henry is more than a psychopath. He wouldn't hesitate before pressing the button. He had to warn them. He couldn't see clearly, due to his blood on his face and the perspiration which was blinding him. So he tried to remember the exact position of the applications on his watch. But he couldn't. All he was doing was pressing on the wrong spots. But he didn't want to give up. So with all of his strength left in body and legs, he managed to get up. He leant over his handcuffed hands so he could have a better idea of what he was doing. He looked behind him to make sure no one could see him. He pressed the message application, then new message and enter Erin's contact. He used the dictate text to send the message and began to talk: "I'm at the casern. Don't come inside. Call a bomb disposal expert. Mark's alive" and then pressed send. The message took a little bit longer than he thought to send itself. Fortunately, his watch was connected to the Wi-Fi of the casern. Jay came here more than once before, for several cases, or even when he was dating Gabby.

Once the message was sent, he sat back and waited for the others to come back.