Short Stories of a Frustrated Author

Chapter 8  Somewhere in Southeastern Oklahoma - Choctaw Nation 2005 0600 Just as the sun is rising Hushi Minko Tushka ran like he was born to it. His body moved with the ease of a man who had spent a lifetime on the land, his feet hitting the packed dirt in steady, rhythmic strides.  He ran with the land, not against it. His stride was fluid, measured, each step a conversation between his body and the earth beneath him. The morning air in the Atoka Wildlife Management Area was crisp, touched with the scent of damp earth and pine.  The trail wound deep into the woods, twisting through thick patches of blackjack oak and towering shortleaf pine. The scent of wet soil and cedar filled his lungs, mingling with the early morning chill that clung stubbornly to the air. A thin ribbon of mist curled low across the creek beds, breaking apart as his footfalls disturbed the stillness. The reservation lay beyond these woods, but in truth, this land had no borders—not to him. It was al...

Chapter 1 2005 Forward Operating Base Cobra Afghanistan – 0100 Hours Local Time The air inside the briefing room was stale, thick with the scent of sweat, coffee, and gun oil. The walls were bare save for a large satellite map pinned to a plywood board, covered in red markers, tactical notes, and satellite imagery.  Seated around the long table were six men—Echo Team, DEVGRU, Tier 1 operators who had spent years in the shadows, hunting the worst of the worst. At the head of the table, Commander Greg Harlan, their operational commander, call sign “Hardman”, stood with his arms crossed. Hard, weathered, no bullshit. A lifer in the SEAL teams, Harlan had run ops from Mogadishu to Fallujah and carried himself with the kind of quiet authority that didn’t need volume to be felt. To his left, Case Officer Nick Rossi, the CIA liaison for the mission, a civilian in a tactical button-down, sleeves rolled to his forearms. Rossi was agency through and through—sharp, cold-eyed, and built for di...