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They slowed their approach, the jungle tightening around them, thick and humid, the scent of damp earth clinging to the air. Ahead, a dark outline lay just beyond the tree line. Brawler’s grip on his rifle flexed, muscles coiled, every inch of him primed for the fight about to go down.
Miguel "El Lobo" Herrera. The insurgent who thought he was untouchable. The bastard who had turned himself into the face of resistance, preaching revolution while funding his war with blood money.Los Hijos de la Sangre, The Sons of Blood. A network of ex-military defectors, cartel enforcers, and brainwashed recruits, all willing to burn Venezuela to the ground if it meant keeping him in power.
"To the people, he’s a hero,"Emma had said, flipping through satellite imagery of insurgent rallies."To them, he’s the only one with the balls to stand up to the government. The military brass calls him a radical, but in some areas, he’s more powerful than the government itself. He controls the food, the fuel, and the weapons. People don't have a choice but to follow him."
Mass executions. Bombings. The slaughter of American aid workers. His war wasn’t about justice, it was about power. He was about to lose some of it, and if they caught him inside…all of it.
Baxter wasn’t just some hostage. As a DSS agent, he carried intel that could compromise every US asset south of the border. The embassy’s defenses, counter-terrorism coordination, American informants buried inside the Venezuelan government. If Herrera cracked him, the fallout would be catastrophic.
That wasn’t happening.
Not on their watch.
"You think you can come into my country and kill my blood? You think you are untouchable? You are wrong. You are already dead…you just don’t know it yet."Emma’s words echoed in his mind.“We intercepted that transmission four weeks ago,” Emma had said grimly.“Two days later, an American journalist was executed in the plaza. Herrera’s men left a message carved into his chest.”Brawler had seen the picture. The wordsPerros Falderos Del Oeste, scrawled in jagged, uneven lines, translated toLapdogs of the West. There was no doubt that Herrara had done it when the poor bastard had been alive for maximum pain. Brutal. Condescending, the slogan dripped with Herrera’s arrogance. It made one thing clear. He saw SEALs as mindless, weak, and disposable.
A murmur had gone through the briefing room back in Virginia Beach. His teammates weren’t immune to the brutalities of the people they fought, but then every jaw hardened, every gaze spoke of a reckoning. Herrera had no idea who they were. That was his mistake, his mindset, hisfatalflaw.
Arrogant men toppled like Goliath did from David’s slingshot.
Herrera wielded his nationalist, anti-American rhetoric like a blunt weapon in an attempt to maim them. But he was all bite and no teeth. They had heard it all before, from cartel bosses, from warlords, from dictators thinking words could turn the tide.
Insults bounced off them like rubber balls. They knew how to handle balls.
They balanced them perfectly. Juggled them effortlessly. Made sure the rubber ones bounced and the glass ones, the lives, the mission, the brotherhood, never hit the fucking ground.
But Brawler’s job wasn’t just to protect his brothers.
It was to be their shield.
That’s why he handled the dog.
A dog wasn’t just a weapon, it was a guardian, a protector, a lifesaver. Special forces were a small, determined bunch, but they were a big, ugly, and blistering bunch, walking into warzones knowing the odds. Beast leveled the playing field. He could smell the enemy before they moved, could hear the sniper before he fired, could find the IED before it ripped them apart.
He saved lives.
Brawler’s fists clenched. That’s what Herrera didn’t fucking understand.
Herrera was fucked the moment he screwed with anything American.
Herrera had called them out after Ramos went down, swearing revenge, thinking he was coming for them.Hoo-yah!They were coming for him.
Brawler’s pulse stayed steady, his breath even. Beside him, Beast moved like a phantom, red coat blending with the shadows, black mask barely visible in the low light. He was laser focused, body taut, waiting for the moment Brawler would give the word.
Somewhere inside, Joseph Baxter was waiting for that promise made to every American: Sit tight. We’re on it.
Brawler glanced down, watching Beast scan ahead, nose twitching, body alert but steady. He was already processing this world, already locking onto scents and movements that no human could detect. When the time came, when Tex gave the command, there would be no hesitation.
Beast would search. Beast would fight. Beast would resolve.
They were getting Joseph Baxter back.
The jungle heaved around Dagger,that breathing, observant green monster now acting as their shield against the force that hid away in the jungle, so-called revolutionaries hellbent on taking over from a government they considered ineffectual. But to Dagger, they were part of the problem.
Dagger eased his grip on the M4 and glanced at Brawler’s retreating figure, recalling the determined set of the K9 handler’s jaw when he’d murmured, “Beast would find him.” The hushed jungle set them on edge, bracing for the coming conflict. The air was damp and heavy with the scent of wet leaves and churned mud. Even though the heat clung like a second skin, a trickle of anticipation ran cold down Dagger’s spine. Herrera’s trail had led them out here, to the outskirts of Caracas, to a rotting husk of a hospital that seemed to lurch from the darkness.
The facility, once called Hospital San Vicente, rose on the horizon like a dark bruise against the canopy. The few windows that weren’t shattered were boarded over, and vines had threaded themselves through the cracks in the walls. Dagger checked the perimeter through his NVGs. Minimal movement, faint signs of foot patrols or posted guards. An eerie quiet hung over the place, as though it breathed in shallow rasps.
“Brawler,” Tex signaled quietly, voice low against the constant hum of insects. Brawler nodded, Beast close by, his pink tongue lolling in the heat as he panted, alert for any threat. “Circle right, take Twister with you. See if there’s any back entrance. Dagger, Bondo, Easy, Flash, we’ll take the south approach.”