Chapter 2 - The Support Specialist
At ten thousand feet, the Hindu Kush punished pride as quickly as weakness.
The air was thin enough to make trained men breathe harder than they wanted anyone to notice. Loose shale shifted beneath every boot. Jagged rock tore gloves and knees. One careless step could break an ankle. One loud movement could reveal a position to fighters who understood the mountains better than any satellite image ever could.
Jenna Lawson moved with the reconnaissance element without complaint.
She was five foot four, one hundred twenty pounds, and attached to the SEAL team as a signals intelligence specialist. Her official assignment was to monitor enemy communications, translate fragments of radio traffic, and alert the team if local fighters began coordinating against them.
The men saw headphones.
A radio.
A woman carrying less visible muscle than they did.
Chief Petty Officer Ryan Carver made the expectations clear during the briefing.
“Lawson stays at the observation post,” he said, tapping the map. “She monitors communications. If we move fast, she does not slow us down. She stays off the net unless it matters.”
Jenna nodded.
She had heard the speech in different forms throughout her career.
Nobody said she did not belong. They simply spoke around her, carried the heavy equipment before she reached for it, and explained basic field procedures she had already performed in harsher conditions.
Marcus Webb was the least subtle.
“Must be nice,” he muttered one afternoon, “sitting with headphones while everybody else does the real work.”
Jenna checked the battery level on her radio.
She did not answer.
Marcus interpreted silence as embarrassment.
May you like
It was not.
Jenna simply had no interest in explaining herself to a man who had already decided what he was seeing.
