6: Phantom

     “Unit One is more than a branch of the SDC at this point, it’s a sigil: a flag on the battlefield. And no matter what the cost, that flag is going to fly, no matter how many times it has to be plucked from the blood and mud.

     “A character in a video game I play said that. I just swapped in ‘Unit One’ and ‘SDC.’ Cool, though, right? I like the sound of it.”

         - Unit One Sgt. Alec Jefferson “AJ” Moore

     AJ lay with one eye partially open, high as the Horus Bank tower on a cocktail of painkillers. He hadn’t the strength to turn off the TV, despite being trapped in an infinite loop of Spanish-language reality television. The tim...

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