A Second Chance

"I know- I expect too much, and not enough, all at once!"

Mike's earbuds had been playing rather loudly in the back of the S.W.A.T (Special Weapons And Tactics) armored vehicle. When he turned to look at his team the leading officer made hand gestures, symbolizing to take out the earbuds for the mission. As Mike removed his earbuds the sound of the engine and the checking of weapons filled his ears once again, Fall Out Boy seeming to have become a distant audible memory. The officer nodded towards Mike and Mike responded with a similar nod, saying he was 'ok' and on top of it now.

The lead officer turned to the others and said,

"This is a simple hostage situation, we've practiced this over and over, it'll be a walk in the park."

The other members, including the officer, laughed and chuckled, talking about the first drink at whatever bar they usually talk about. As usual Mike just faded to his tactical thoughts, he thought about chemical components, how a gun fires, how a bullet kills or even how it maimes an opponent. He thought of all this while spinning a bullet up and down his fingers like a ladder. He felt the truck stop and tuned back into reality almost immediately, he could tell they had arrived because the energy in the air went from friendly to professional real quick. As he stepped out of the armored vehicle Mike took a look around to try to assess the situation.

Mike, instead of seeing a perfect police barricade, gazed upon a horrific image. Police officers on the ground wounded, they didn't even have enough body bags on site to cover the dead. Granted they only had about four or five, but that was four or five too many. Mike thought to himself, avoiding eyesight of the more mangled bodies 'so this is why the police barricade is a whole city block away'. Mike and his horror stricken team had moved from the on site medical area to the front line, trying to hide their disgust and fear, as it would be bad for morale, something the standard police officers desperately needed.

The team officer tapped the police leader on the situation and asked,

"What's the situation?" The team leader asked,

"Bad, really bad," The police leader replied, his face pale as he turned towards the S.W.A.T officers, "This isn't just criminal activity, this is a terrorist attack, they've got poison gas, tear gas, armor piercing rounds, and we can't identify them due to the fact that they're wearing these." The police officer, having finally calmed down to a bare minimum, handing their squad leader the white mask with a black leather strap.

The squad leader let out a sigh and returned the mask to the barricade leader, patting his back and holding it there for a second to show he feels sympathy for the leader, after all, he was the one who would have to report of the deaths,

"Don't worry, you did a good job saving who you could…" there was a long pause then the squad leader picked up again, "We're going in, push the barricade back another block to avoid civilian casualties and don't let them see the bodies for… obvious reasons."

The barricade leader nodded, gave the order over the radio and turned to the S.W.A.T leader, a bright but gloomy smile displayed before the S.W.A.T members,

"Just in case I don't see you again, thank you for the advice, I'll buy you a drink when you make it back."

The team members laughed at that and nodded towards the barricade officer, heightening the police line tape so the team members could get past it without entanglement. The team gave each other a nod of recognition and their minds molded into one, their actions became one, they had become one unit, imperfections and all. As they turned the block corner to enter the street of the warehouse they immediately came under fire from a mounted machine gunner position.

The captain yelled loudly as he rolled into an alley,

"Into the alley way! Dodge those light machine gun rounds!"

And the squad moved as ordered, swift and without hesitation for the sake of their lives and the lives of their squad. Mike headed towards the alley way, feeling bullets ricochet around him and watched as pieces of drywall flew off the buildings of the residential district. As Mike slid into the alley the mounted machine gun stopped firing and they could hear the sounds of a reloading weapon.

The leader stood up straight, lowering the mask which covered his face so Mike could see his mouth move,

"He's reloading, now's the time to str-" In that instant, Mike's adrenaline pumped into his brain and time seemed to slow for him, he saw the light glare off a rifle scope but didn't have time to react as the rifle fired, sounding like a cannon as the bullet left it's barrel in a fiery rage.

Mike yelled and reached towards the captain, but the words didn't leave his mouth fast enough, and he just wasn't quick enough. The bullet ripped through the back of the captain's nape and exited out where the adam's apple should be, barely missing Mike and creating a huge cloud of dust, dirt, and mostly blood. Mike's eyes widened in horror, his body unable to stop itself from moving. His captain's blood stained Mike's gloves and mask. Mike could smell the copper from the blood and taste the air of it in his mouth. It was revolting to the point where he almost threw up, he was pulled back behind cover as he watched the squad leader fall onto his knees, eyes wide and staring at Mike as he fell onto his face, a pool of blood beginning to form.

"The captain!" Yelled one squadmate,

"Leave him!" Said another, breaking down a chunk of drywall and entering the building beside them, "The machine gun was holding fire for the sniper, it'll rip us to shreds if we don't move!" He and one other jumped the drywall, entering the abandoned apartment complex and charging for good cover.

"Five hundred meters, no wind resistance." Mike muttered to himself, switched his rifle to a single shot and took aim, calculating everything on spot, he took the shot, heard a scream, saw a body falling from a building, and entered the complex. He was watching his team's rear as he advanced inside the building.

He heard gunfire from the team's rear so Mike turned his head quickly to the front, only to see one of his team members trying to stop a suicide bomber at close range.

"I can't- Help!" Mike couldn't reach his team on time and the other member just stood there scared as the suicide bomber detonated.

Limbs flying in multiple directions and bodily fluids landing on the goggles of Mike, the other team member sent flying backwards from the shockwave. The only intact body was that of the other S.W.A.T member, and even he didn't survive. When Mike's head had finally stopped spinning and his ears done ringing, he began to take in his surroundings. He was thrown backwards, his back against a wall and in front of a staircase on his left. He felt his lower half of his body being weighed down so he looked downwards to see what was lying on him. He snapped back into the fearful reality when he recognized the charred skin and skull of his teammate, the body just sitting there in his lap. This time Mike actually did throw up, he fell towards his left and was down on all fours, vomiting from the smell and scene he had just witnessed. When he had finally calmed down he was still shaking horrendously, a step down from a seizure type shake.

He stood up, his legs still shaky and slowly began advancing. Unable

to even hold the weight of even his gun, he leaned against a wall for support and draw his pistol, feeling sick once again as his vision blurred in and out. As the adrenaline began to die he felt a strong sting in his right arm, to Mike's surprise he found the sniper's bullet had actually cut the outer layer of his muscles, creating a stream of blood, the cut started at his wrist and down to his elbow. He was barely able to break a window, after three hits to the window he could only stumble out of it, falling on his face and stomach and struggling to stand back up. When he finally did his back was to a chain link fence and he was breathing heavy.

A voice sounded over the radio in a Russian accent,

"This is team Rainbow-Six, calling to any survives near the warehouse, you have five seconds to reply, out."

Mike let a breath out relieved, he would finally be getting back up, he had never heard of Rainbow-Six but he didn't care at the moment. He picked up his radio shakely to respond but was soon knocked flat by one of the terrorists. This one was different from the others, he had a gray hoodie with ripped sleeves and a detached bayonet in his right hand, the terrorist chuckled and slowly approached Mike, playing with the bayonet in his hand,

"Five seconds are up," said the radio buzzing, too far for Mike to get to, "Ash, fire a br-"

"Hold it Glaz," Said another voice, this one American, "I'm getting a pulse, one's strong and one's weak, but they're definitely fighting, let me go in and check."

The Russian sighed and spoke some kind of Russian curse before he began to speak, "Three minutes."

"Got it, Pulse out." Said the American before the radio went dead.

'Help is coming, I just half to hold this guy off' Mike thought to himself, rather furiously. He had gained enough strength to the point he could break he man's thumb. He threw up his hand quickly, twisting the terrorist's thumb back which went along with a loud pop. Mike thought he had regained the upper hand, but instead he had only made the man furious. He slammed the bayonet knife downwards with such great force that it knocked Mike to the ground. Mike let out a loud scream of pain as the bayonet went far into his shoulder. The pain was even more when it touched the inner layer of bone. Mike continued his scream as pieces of bone were shredded off his inner shoulder blade. It was all Mike could do to hold up his oppressor's arm, preventing his attacker from impaling him and ruining his shoulder for good.

Mike let out another loud scream, to show his attacker he had the willpower, and to hopefully draw attention to his presumed saviors that were on the way. But he knew he was losing ground, he could feel the knife going just a little bit deeper every time the attacker pushed, causing excruciating pain. He could feel his strength seeping away, he closed his eyes and thought about his family, his friends, his teammates and reached for a grenade on his utility belt, searching for the pin. 'God' Mike thought to himself, 'if you're out there, if you exist, help me'. It was at that moment he had found the pin to his one and only frag grenade, ready to pull it. He closed his eyes tighter, about to pass out and then BLAM.

Mike opened his eyes a little bit to see what had just happen, to see if the attacker had arose and had shot him for a quicker kill. But, instead he saw his attacker, laying dead on his side and a man with black midnight sunglasses on rushing towards him. 'I didn't know you liked Oakleys, God' Mike thought to himself, confused and staying awake solely on adrenaline. Once the man got close to Mike he was able to see that the man had an American flag on his left shoulder, and it clicked for Mike. 'So God is an American ninja who likes Oakleys' it had made perfect sense to the delirious Mike. He said some things over the radio, he saw a flying silver bolt behind the man, and then a huge detonation followed by screams in Arabic.

The man presumed to be God checked Mike's pupils, hoping for a response. Once he confirmed a response and a pulse, he yelled over the radio so loud that Mike could almost hear it through his ringing ears. Mike just nodded in weary response, partly to look professional, and partly because gravity had brought his head down. The man in front of Mike had grabbed the knife and yanked it out hard, cause Mike to scream in pain and begin to black out, a rope ladder and a flat bed of cloth falling from the sky was the last thing Mike saw before he passed out into the unknown darkness.