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immolated. If anyone could, it would be them.
    But then she squinted into the darkness and realized it was actually Jake. Unlike the others on the team, he didn’t carry a SCAR, but rather what had looked to Kate like a heavily customized M4. But now she realized it only looked like an M4 – when he started putting out rounds and she heard the crushing boom of its report. Out just beyond the burning hole, she thought she saw a black-hooded head disappear entirely.
    Holy shit, she thought. What the hell is that?
    She could see now that his barrel was much bigger than it should be, and as she followed behind, she toed one of his empty casings on the ground with her boot. It was fifty-caliber. Then she remembered hearing about the .50-cal Beowulf – a custom receiver and barrel for the M4, and mags that held ten of the giant half-inch slugs. And those rounds could shoot straight through engine blocks. She also remembered someone telling her that when you put all ten rounds out of that thing, you had half a pound of lead heading downrange.
    At the time, she’d thought this was just more stupid-ass macho gun porn, and of no practical value on the modern battlefield. Now she reversed her verdict – very pleased to have this level of absurd firepower between her and the nightmare figures out there.
    Looking around, Kate could see sections of pre-filled HESCO barrier being ferried out to the breach by the Bobcats, two of them working in tandem. Most of the combat engineers were definitely in their damned pajamas or Ranger panties, some but not all wearing helmets, or else Kevlar vests over bare torsos. It was like a bizarre sleepover in combat engineering hell. These guys were the real deal – they could pour level concrete and pull electrical airing while under a mortar barrage. Everyone respected the hell out of them, and now Kate saw why.
    She moved up to try to support Jake and Elijah.
    Her teammates.
    * * *
    None of the insurgents had any kind of suppressor and it was full-on night now, so whenever any one of them fired, he helpfully identified his position for the rallying and regrouping Americans.
    Kate remembered to take a full breath, release half of it, put the target reticle of her ACOG sight just above the muzzle flashes… and squeeze not jerk the trigger.
    The flashing stopped. She’d add that to her tally: one.
    But as she looked up over the top of her sight to regain situational awareness (SA), she realized she could see other figures moving out on the street, in the background, and none of them visibly armed – at least not at that moment. Unit commanders? Suicide bombers? They didn’t seem to be moving stealthily. They were actually moving kind of strangely, kind of lurching around.
    Kate realized this meant she had to assume they were civilians, non-combatants. And she had to check her fire and watch her backgrounds. They couldn’t save East Africa by shooting everyone in it to death.
    Then again, they were currently facing an existential threat to the base.
    Kate saw a squad-sized group of their own guys start to maneuver, pushing out toward the left edge of the gap in the fence. She rose and moved up to keep them tied in, but as soon as she got up— she was buffeted by another explosion. She managed to keep her feet this time. Maybe she was becoming an old hand already. But this one had been smaller, albeit closer, and now she felt herself up for shrapnel wounds as she crouched down, catching her breath. She felt something hot on her lower leg, and surmised that shrapnel had creased the inside of her calf. It didn’t appear to be bleeding, like it had been cauterized.
    Kate’s first hours in her new unit were turning into, far and away, the most intense and dramatic scenes of combat of her entire military career. You just never knew when it was all going to kick off.
    She was rising to move out again when a strong hand grabbed her and yanked her back. After changing mags without looking, Jake pointed