Chapter 1

I think I'm in the jungle; well it does look like a jungle out there where ever here is. I took a quick peak from my cell window in my prison for two. Well there were two; the other kid that was in here with me didn't come back. I didn't even know his name, not that I could have since he spoke in some foreign langue to me.

Even if I could escape, one I don't where the hell I am, two this place is crawling with armed to the teeth guards, and third they got leg and arm irons attach to me so running is out of the question. The one thing that I can make out on these guards was they were wearing all black uniforms with some red emblem on the right side of their chest. If I didn't know better it looked like some snakes face. Their faces where always cover with some silver visor. Thinking back up this moment seemed such a long time ago.

Shit all I know that I was living out on the streets at Silver Town Colorado. I was living in an orphanage called Novsky, till I decided that I had enough with those sadistic Priests and Nuns. It located Leads Idaho its run by a bunch of Russian Priests and Nuns who had no qualms about abusing the shit out of you. You where extremely lucky if you didn't get raped before age five. Once you turn eighteen though they either kick you into the world or you where sold into slavery. Either way was consider a death sentence.

But enough about that place, as I said before I made my escape from the orphanage at the of age seventeen. I venture my way across America down south till I landed in Silver town Colorado man this was a nice place it was nested in the middle of a rather large mountain range around it. It's green, clean and beautiful what could a kid want more. Oh yeah a place to call home.

Usually for me to get something to eat, I would do something rather childish like prank call orders for pizza at various places. Usually when the day ends they throw out their excess pizzas into the dumpster. So almost every other night I would have fresh pizza from the various chains around the town of 25,000.

Well all of that changed when I was approached by this lady with glasses and rather long black hair while I was walking down the street. She had like a strange accent like something from Europe I think. She was wearing a lot of black, I guess that hers favorite color because she wear its well. Black boots, black skirt, black button shirt, and black jacket.

She told me if I was looking for work that I should go to this place, which happens to be like a nearly vacant building. But who cares if I can get job, then maybe I can get my own place and stop eating out of dumpsters for a change.

So I made my way in only seeing a receptionist which happens to be a pair of gay looking twins who sported a facial scar on one side of their faces. They just tell me to go thru the door right behind them. So without question I just went thru, only to have some dude grab me from behind me and lift me up as they restrained my arms and put a black bag over my head.

Next I felt a prick on my neck and next thing I knew I was out.

So here I am in some place I never been or seen before. Every so often in the morning the guards come in gag my mouth, put a bag over my head and take me to some lab. Of course I can't see but I can still feel my way around. They would often make conversation about me at random. Stuff like "ah I see subject ten is still with us how fortunate."

Before the veil was taken off they had me strap to a chair so I can't slouch or move my head. In front of me was this camera looking thing that would project some kind of image stream to head. And every day they kept showing me the same images and videos over and over, Images of people getting killed by rifles. Lots of pictures of showing me how to use a rifle, aiming wise, cleaning and caring for it. I know for a fact that I never had used a gun in my life, not once. Even though I would close my eyes to keep myself from watching these images it felt like they were still getting thru somehow. As if it was penetrating thru my own brain.

This will go on for a while I suppose, I mean it's not like there were any clocks posted. They would also give me a couple of shots. Shit for all I know they were probably something to keep me from passing out. After each session I would just puke out my guts even though I wouldn't have much to puke out. My brain felt like it was getting bigger inside my own head. After which they would drag me back to my cell. After which I would take some time for my head to feel ok again.

It's not like this place is the some four star hotel. I mean I'm in a small cinder block cell with a small window in it and a bucket to shit in. Oh by the way did I mention that there was no plumbing in here so when I mean a bucket to shit in, I mean an actual bucket to shit in.

I take a peek out of the window to see that the sun is starting to set. I hear a slight knock on my cell door indicating that dinner is about to be served. Hmm let's see what's on the menu for today. The trap door starts to open up on the bottom of the door as they slide in a metal plate and a bottle of water. Let's see what I got for today, ok from the smell of it I think its spaghetti oh's and two slices of semi stale white bread.

I just gobbled it all up literally licking the plate clean. When I first got here the other kid that was in here was a picky eater and would often not eat anything either by doing it by defiance or he might have been some spoiled kid. But where I'm from and have been living on the streets when you're hungry you'll eat just about anything to keep yourself alive.

Also on the first day when I got here, you learned to keep your mouth shut. That kid that was in here would often mouth off in some foreign langue to the guards to the point where they would come in and smack the kid around for a bit to get him to shut up. Those same guards would look at me as if they where daring me to say something. I would just hold up my hands nodding my head no to let them know that I was going to behave and survive.

Finally its night time nothing but peace and quiet, and my thoughts till I go to sleep. I'm just sleeping here very quietly till I felt a little bit of a rumble; I thought it was my stomach at first due to the lack of food and hospitality here. So I just ignored it and tried to go back to sleep.

Five minutes later my entire bed shook and now I was fully awake. I went to get a peek out of my window to see what was going on. The very first thing I heard was a loud ass siren going off, which got these guards on the night watch all alert.

The weird thing was that certain ones that were by themselves got taken out by something, because they would just fall down into a heap without making a noise. Something was going down, because the next that happen was that there were a lot of explosions everywhere.

I was still looking out of my window when I saw one of those black guard dudes getting into a jeep, trying to take off at full speed, till he was coming in my direction." OH SHIT", I just got out of its why as fast as possible by lifting up my cot out of the way and standing in the corner of the small cell.

Next thing I know a large crash of metal and cinder blocks litter my tiny cell. Apparently the lights to jeep were still on. And also there was one of those black guard guys who went right thru the windshield. Good god his face was completely bloody, looking at his body trying not to puke I did see a rather large hole in the center of his forehead.

To make my escape I got on top of the jeep kicking the rest of the windshield down. I crawled into it carefully trying not to cut up my exposed hands. I tried to no avail to find something that can cut these shackles off.

I quietly exited the out of the jeep. I hold my leg chains up so that I can walk and scuttle a bit quicker. By this time there was machine gun fire everywhere. So my first objective was to stay alive and tried not to get killed. I slowly walked to area ducking for cover I made to this area with a lot of crates.

Theses crates where tall enough to the point where I can still stand up. So I leaned against one trying to plan for my next move. I thought it would be a good idea to wait here till I saw a clear path to get to the jungle, till I noticed this red dot on my brown jumpsuit.

This red dot was near my chest. So I put my hand over it only to see that it was now on my hand. It didn't take me long to put two and two together that someone was targeting me. I quickly put my hands up showing that I was surrendering to whoever was trying to kill me.

The small red light did flicker against my wrist shackle chains for a slight moment, when I heard a zip noise pass down near my right ear. I looked over to see one of those black guard guys fall down like right behind me which caused me to jump up a bit.

Low-Light comes on the com to alert everyone that there was a civilian running about the Cobra base. "Low-Light to Duke Do you copy?" the com comes on to Dukes position where Low-Light can hear heavy gun fire in the back ground. "This is Duke go on Low-Light" "Just to give you a heads up that there is a civilian prisoner running around on the base; he appears to be in some shackle restraints." Roger that Low-Light, we'll keep an eye out." "This is Duke altering all teams in the area we have a civilian prison running around the area be sure to keep a look out." A slew of Rogers could heard throughout all of the radio traffic on the comm.'s

As the battle is just continuing to go around me I just try to get out of here as fast as possible. So I ran to another area or at least try to run with theses infernal chains on. I made it behind these barrels, for minute I thought this was a good hiding place, till I accidently knocked one of them down and something started to pour down out of them.

Judging for the noxious smell it was none other than gasoline. Oh shit this must be some large fuel dump or something. I knew by instinct that fire and gas do not mix so I just started to get away from here as fast as I can. Till I hear bullets ricocheting off the barrels. Apparently whoever it was they were using something much stronger, because I heard a loud boom from something big hitting the gas barrels.

Even though I was like twenty feet away the blast alone lifts me off of my feet. It wasn't anything like the movies. This shit hurts so bad that I could feel my insides rattling. The force alone pushed mine like fifty or hundred feet forward into large puddle of water. I basically belly flopped into large mud puddle and face planted into it. Everything was starting to fade into black at this point; if I was going to die then I would have gladly accepted it since whatever it is everything hurts.

Thirty minutes later the fighting started to die down. In five minutes what was left of the defending cobra forces started to surrender. Lots of Joe's started to come out of their fire positions to take prisoners and secure the area for demolition or possible evacuation.

One of the Joe's namely Angela Baker goes by the code name First Strike, was wandering around near the area which was the fuel dump. She is rather stocky built Joe with a tone built of muscles and with blonde shoulder length hair with a fair complexion. She's been on the team for about two years her primary function is a regular infantry where as her secondary would be in explosives. She always went into battle with her trusty FN-SCAR personally modify of course. Usually with a laser sight attach and a tactical flash light to say the least.

As she was walking by she heard a moan in the distance. Immediately she got into her covert tactical stance walking carefully as to not make any sudden sounds ready to go off on a moment's notice. As she advanced closer the moans got somewhat a little bit louder. When she felt she was close enough she switched on her tactical flashlight on her rile scanning the area.

With a small reflection in coming from the light, she knew someone was near. She got closer to see that her light was reflecting off of something rather shiny. Apparently it was some kind of chain and upon further inspection she found that it was in fact some kind shackles that were in fact attached to someone. She mutters to herself, "I guess this must be the civilian prisoner that Duke spoke of earlier."

She just blurted out loud a few times, "I need a medic over here!" in just a couple a minutes tunnel rat showed up. "I called for a medic and they send you."" Hey don't worry strike life line is on his way." He said to her in a joking way.

"So is this the mystery civilian?" "I think so; I mean this guy has some leg shackles on." "Did you check to see if he was alive?" She protested a bit about, "you know how life line is about us moving injured people, not to mention civilians about the possibility of liability law suits."

"Well I'm sure that if you just check his pulse that he won't chew you out for that." Angela finally caved in a bit, "fine I'll check his pulse." She kneels down check his pulse on his neck area." Well he does have a pulse so I guess he's alive."

Life line finally comes in going immediately to work on assessing the injured civilian. "Well he is alive, but just barely; his right ankle could be sprained."" Without an x-ray available I can't be certain."" You two help me move up to his back side." Both tunnel rat and first strike ready themselves to move the civilian." Ok let's do it, but easy ok."

When the three of them finally moved the civilian to his back side, both tunnel rat and first strike let out a rather small gasp. "It's just a kid," tunnel rat said in a confused tone." He couldn't be older than sixteen or seventeen." "What could cobra be doing with child prisoners?"

Just then Duke came on strikes com asking for a status update on the civilian prisoner. "What's the status of the civilian strike?" "Well Duke, Life line says he's alive but just hanging on barely with a possibility of internal injuries and….." "And what else strike?" "Well Duke you're just going have to come here and see for yourself, also Life line needs a gurney."" Roger that I'm on my way."

Five minute later Duke shows up with a gurney in tow. "So what's all the fuss about our civilian here?" he looks down a bit to see a teenager lying on the ground with leg and arm shackles. "Is that a kid?" The other Joe's just remained silent, but just nodded in yes to him. He finally refocuses back on to the important stuff. "We'll just have to take him along back to the Pit."" We are evacuating out here in five."" Then the bombers are going level this place."

All of the remaining Joe teams including the teenage civilian are loaded on to the gun ships. They lift off to fly back to their base when they hear the loud soaring of heavy bombers coming in to reduce the cobra base into rubble.