My Marine Brother Threw My Visitor Badge Into the Gravel and Mocked Me in Front of His Entire Unit / Chapter 22 / 53

Chapter 22 - The Midnight Docks

A blinding array of high-intensity maritime searchlights exploded to life, washing the pier in blistering white radiance.

Mia and Dylan dove behind an industrial steel forklift just as a hail of automatic gunfire tore into the concrete, throwing up clouds of pulverized gravel and metal sparks.

"Suppressive fire on that forklift!" a voice shouted from the ship's gangway.

"Stay down!" Mia shouted, leaning around the wheel to return three rapid bursts, dropping a deckhand who was attempting to set up a light machine gun on the railing.

From the bridge wing, fifty feet above the water, stood General Marcus Vance. He wore a crisp service dress coat over civilian tactical gear, his silver hair neatly combed, completely unbothered by the gunfire around him. In his hand, he held a satellite communication uplink.

"David was always a sentimental fool, Mia!" Marcus called down through the PA system, his voice dripping with condescending arrogance. "He believed in God, country, and the Corps! But the Corps doesn't pay pensions when you're crippled by sixty! The world is changing! Power belongs to those who control the flow of iron and technology!"

Dylan fired two rounds toward the bridge wing, forcing Marcus to take cover behind the reinforced steel ballistic glass. "You killed your own cousin, Marcus! You tore our family apart!"

"Your father tore this family apart when he refused to take his share!" Marcus barked back, laughing coldly. "He chose an anonymous grave in Afghanistan! And now, both of you are going to share the very same fate!"

From behind them, the heavy metallic thud of boots slammed against the asphalt.

Mia glanced behind the container. Four more armored hostiles were closing in from their rear, cutting off their only retreat path back to the industrial gate.

They were pinned between the ship's elevated gunners and the sweeping flank from the yard.

"Mia, we’re out of cover in thirty seconds!" Dylan shouted, his slide locking back on an empty magazine. He dropped the mag and slammed a fresh one home. "What’s the play?"

Mia looked at the crane controls twenty yards away, then down at the heavy fuel lines feeding the ship's auxiliary turbine from the dockside storage tank.