Prologue

Ryan Cole had killed men in several countries. He had captured over twenty high-value targets in his 12 years as a Delta Force operator. He thought he had seen everything.

He was wrong. He never expected Delta to be easier than his next life.

Inside the hangar, Ryan stood with his teammates around a sand table. "One more time. Intelligence said there are four to five military-age males on site. Our HVT is here." He pointed a stick at the 5th floor of the building.

"Easy in, easy out," Hernandez said as he checked his magazines.

"You boys ready?" The commander walked over to the table.

"Yes, sir," the 6 men said in unison.

"Good." The commander walked up to Ryan.

"I've got a nice whiskey and some wagyu I got from the CIA guy for when y'all get back." He put a hand on Ryan's shoulder. "Slow is smooth."

"Smooth is fast, sir." Ryan looked at his teammates, guys he's done hundreds of missions with over a decade of being in Delta. "Let's get 'er done, boys."

The men sat in the chopper quietly, as they had always done. From the hangar to the target, they never said a word. It was ritual at this point. If someone spoke, it made them all feel as if everything was about to go wrong.

Through their headsets, the pilot's voice crackled. "Sixty seconds."

Ryan looked at each of his men, and one by one, they nodded back.

Hernandez, twenty-six, married with two kids back home who still called him every night before bed. Smith, thirty-seven, three ex-wives and nothing left to lose but the men in this chopper. Jones, thirty-five, Ryan's best friend since Ranger Battalion, the closest thing to a brother he had. Eckle, thirty-three, the newest addition to the team, still learning to trust that these men would come back for him. Garrett, forty, fifteen years in Delta and three demotions for insubordination, the best operator Ryan had ever seen, and the only man alive who scared him a little.

Ryan nodded back to all of them.

"Thirty seconds," the pilot spoke again. Every man checked their nods and rifles. Did one last pat-down to ensure everything was in place. The chopper hovered over the target building. 2 long, thick black ropes were thrown from each side of the chopper. The men grabbed on one by one and started to rappel down. As the last to go, as always, Ryan grabbed the rope to go down. He turned his head as he saw a man on the building about 200 feet away with an RPG on his shoulder. As the rocket was fired, Ryan screamed, "RPG!"

Ryan watched the rocket fly towards the helicopter, almost in slow motion. He looked down as the other men were touching foot on the roof. When he looked back up, the rocket exploded on impact and sent him flying off the rope and down to the roof below.

As Ryan landed, the men watched the helicopter crash and explode against the building across the street. They rushed to Ryan. "Top, are you okay?"

Ryan stared at the men. "I-I can't move my legs." Before anyone could reach him, gunfire came from the rooftops next to them. Hernandez dragged Ryan behind a large metal box on the roof and sat him upright. Ryan watched as his men fired back, each of them taking turns covering and reloading like they trained.

"Fucking hell, we are pinned," Jones said. "What the fuck are we supposed to do, Ryan?"

Ryan raised his arm and pointed at the door that led to the stairs. As bullets rang against the metal box they all took cover behind, Ryan said, "We need to get inside. We are sitting ducks here." Jones stood and fired more suppressing fire. Then silence hit. Hernandez peeked to the other roof where the enemies had just been firing at them. "Umm... guys, they are gone."

"Fuck... they are coming to us now. Get ready." Ryan turned his head to his men and smiled. "Boys, I love you guys." As he said those words, the door to the stairs was blasted open by a grenade as enemy fighters poured from the stairs onto the roof. The men, including Ryan, who still couldn't move, fired every last round they had through the doorway.

The enemy fighters didn't stop. They poured through like ants from an anthill. Ryan turned his head and watched Jones take a bullet through his Kevlar, then another and another until he was on the ground choking on his own blood. The others' fates were the same. They all had stood in front of Ryan, shielding him from the enemy as they poured through. Each of them killing as many as they could and taking bullet after bullet until they fell. Eventually, the sound of gunfire stopped. Ryan lay staring up at the sky as blood covered his uniform. He looked left and right to see his men all lifeless, full of bullet holes. "If there is a god, now would be a good time for a miracle. Or, ya know, take retribution on our behalf on the motherfuckers who set us up." Ryan tilted his head as the enemy fighters walked towards him. He raised his weapon to fire. CLICK. His magazine was empty.

One enemy fighter laughed as he pointed his rifle at Ryan and shot him again in the stomach. Ryan flinched and put his hand over the new wound. He looked to the sky once more. "I knew there was no such thing as God. Fuck." He looked at the fighter who shot him and smiled. Ryan reached up with his left hand and pulled a string that released the spoon of a grenade. The spoon flew and landed at the fighter's feet. The enemy bent down and picked it up. As he stood and showed it to his friends, Ryan stuck his hand in the air and flipped them off as the grenade exploded, killing himself and every enemy fighter that was near him.

All that remained was darkness. No pain, no regret. No ringing ears. The weight of a war-torn body was gone. Just quiet, the kind of quiet he hadn't experienced in his 17 years of war and combat. He didn't know how long the darkness lasted. It could've been a second, or a millennia. Then there was a bright light, searing straight through him. A loud voice spoke, although he couldn't understand what was said. Then more voices came, each layered on top of each other in a language that meant nothing to him. He tried to move, but his body wouldn't listen to him. His body that he spent decades training wasn't responding. Instead, it was replaced by something small and weak, flailing around uselessly in the air. Panic hit him before any understanding did.

What the fuck is this? Where the hell am I?

He tried to speak. Tried to demand answers, tried to ask someone, anyone, what had happened, where his men were, what this place was. What came out instead was a wail, loud and high-pitched. Then the voice of a woman spoke, soft and warm, saying something he didn't understand. Then his vision finally stopped being blurry. He was in a room that didn't look like any hospital he had ever seen.

First Sergeant Ryan Cole, a Delta Force operator, dead on a rooftop in Syria... looked down at his tiny, useless hands in front of his face and understood with a horror worse than any mission or battlefield had ever given him exactly what had happened.

He was a baby. And wherever the hell this was... it wasn't Earth.