None of that came close to explaining precisely why he now had a sword strapped to his back, however.
Looks like that same blade he showed up with after the last mission we worked on together, Hawk mused as he mentally moved on to the next and last two men being considered for the team.
These two came as a duo, apparently, according to their files. Mack Turner and Derek Hayes, assigned to Team 3 when they pinned their BUD. Both petty officers, both the only survivors of a debacle that had actually made the nightly news. No names, of course, but that was still a no-no in the Teams. If people knew what you were doing, you’d messed up spectacularly.
On paper they were all screwballs, the kind of guys you didn’t want on a team. The kind of guys you probably didn’t want anywhere near your professional life at all, if you could help it. Heck, they were guys you didn’t want in your personal life either. This, when combined with some other information Rankin had dug up, told Hawk that they were exactly what he was looking for.
It took a special kind of person to cross the veil and live to talk about it, even if only for a short time. It was an experience that marked a man in so many more ways than one.
“Seven of us, then,” he said aloud.
“Eight if Alex ever shows up,” Rankin offered from the corner.
“He’ll be here,” Hawk replied. “So eight.”
“Nine.”
The room turned as one to look at the female captain who had appeared in the doorway, her eyes focused on Masters as she took a step inside.
“And you are?” he asked calmly.
“I’m your liaison to Naval Intelligence, Captain Judith Andrews,” she told him.
“As I was saying, that makes eight.” Hawk turned back to the men sitting around the room. “Seven SEALs and one consultant.”
“You’re assuming a lot,” Robbie Keyz said, throwing a smirk in the direction of the overtly fuming captain. “You haven’t even told us what this is all about.”
“You’re here because you all have something in common.”
“They’re all misfits who shouldn’t even be in the navy, let alone the Teams,” Captain Andrews growled, stepping toward Masters. “And I’ll thank you not to ignore me.”
“Look, lady, I’m a misfit who shouldn’t be in the navy,” Hawk Masters told her in no uncertain terms, “but Admiral Karson still shoved my commission back down my throat in order to get this party rolling. You have a problem with that, take it up with him. Please.”
Then he turned back to the assembled men. “As for what this is all about…you all know what it’s about. You’ve crossed a line that shouldn’t be crossed, seen things you can’t unsee.”
The hardened operators shifted a little, looking uneasily back at Masters.
“You’ve all found out that there are things in this world that shouldn’t exist, that don’t exist for most people. But now that you’ve seen them, they can see you,” Masters said challengingly, looking from man to man. “Tell me I’m wrong.”
No one spoke.
“When I first crossed over the line, all I wanted was a chance to kick ass on a new playing field. Sitting around, waiting for them to come get me wasn’t in my playbook. Over the years, I learned a new playbook,” Hawk admitted, looking down for a moment. “But that’s over now. Alone, we’re dead. Together—”
“We’re still dead,” Derek Hayes said flatly.
“Yeah.” Hawk nodded, much to the apparent shock of Captain Andrews, who didn’t seem to be following the conversation at all. All the better for her. I may be chauvinist, but I’ve got no love for seeing women torn to shreds and left as bloody smears on the ground. That’s the fate the rest of us are riding toward, like as not. “But maybe we take some of them with us. Maybe we take a lot of them with us.”
Silence reigned for a long moment.
“Sounds good to me,” Keyz admitted quietly.
“Yeah.”
“I’m in.”
Murmurs of assent passed back and forth, and Hawk found himself almost smiling. These were his kind of men. They didn’t ask for much, just a fighting chance, even if all it meant was inflicting some pain on the enemy. They didn’t need victory, or even survival, though he knew they’d give everything for the former, and damn near everything for the latter. Sometimes, though, all you really needed was to know that there was someone else by your side, no matter how bloody the future was going to get.
“All right,” he said, nodding. “Here’s the proposal.”
Captain Andrews pulled him aside after the others had shuffled out and only Eddie was left in the room. Masters just shook his head slightly and the master chief nodded in return, following the rest out.
“What the hell was that all about?” Andrews demanded, eyes blazing.
She was pretty, he decided, in a stern sort of way. Short-cropped blond hair, sharp nose, striking eyes. It was a nice package, or would be if she didn’t look like she was smelling something particularly nasty with every breath. The uniform probably didn’t help her with that, making her seem even stiffer than she was. He appraised her with unabashed intensity for a long moment, then just shrugged.
“What was what all about?”
“Don’t bullshit me, Commander,” she practically snarled. “I should put you up on insubordination.”
“For what? Not including you on my team? Pardon me, ma’am, but last I checked they hadn’t repealed the Ground Forces Exclusion Law,” he told her calmly. “Besides, you’re here to liaise. So liaise. Tell the admiral that we’ll need training facilities for a squad, and help me requisition the squad’s equipment.”
She glared at him. “I want to know what the hell you were talking about, mister. Crossing lines, taking ‘them’ with you? Who the hell are were you talking about?”
“Ma’am, if you have to ask, you aren’t ready to know.”
Then he shrugged past her and into the hall, nodding at Eddie, who was waiting just out of sight. Behind him, Captain Andrews stared in fuming fury at his back, something he patently ignored as he made his way back to his office.
Leland shifted the Tahoe into four-wheel drive low, cursing as he steered it around a sinkhole that had swallowed the road. Unusual for this time of the year, but with all the thaw and freezing they’d been experiencing lately, it was an impossible chore to keep the roads in one piece. The damn things kept popping up everywhere.
His Chevy made short work of the detour, however, and he pulled back onto the paved surface a little ways along before accelerating again. The V-8 roared as he pointed it at the closest oil field, and he settled back in the seat, his mind working a mile a minute.
He didn’t know what the hell had happened to Mitch, but whatever it was had spooked the man bad. He’d dropped him off at a nurse’s office and hit the road before they could tell him anything about the man’s condition. Nothing he could do there, but whatever the hell had happened to Mitch…well, that was his jurisdiction.
The oil fields weren’t far from town. Mostly they had private security, but assault was a matter of the law.
As he got close, Leland let up on the gas, waiting for a security man to step out. When no one approached him, he started to get more than a little spooked. There was always a guard at the gate, and the gate was always closed. Now it gaped open, and there was no one in sight.
He drove through it at a crawl, head on a swivel as he looked for any signs of life. The whole place looked about as empty as the rest of the state, and that was saying something. He pulled to a stop outside the local headquarters, putting the Chevy in park, and just sat there for several long minutes as he looked around.