The wheels of the armoured personal carrier, or battle bus/battle taxi depending on who you ask, chewed up the desert terrain as it rolled along the sandy roads warmed up by a fiercely blazing sun.

It's wheel rolled over a large piece of jagged shrapnel, piercing a tyre and disabling the vehicle as the crew inside it groaned, their breaths steaming up the already hot, sticky air that reeked of thick sweat.

"Sorry guys looks like we might be here awhile," the driver sighed over the communications system.

"Fucks sake," Briggs groaned.

"Fuck me is it boiling in here," Ghoul said as he squirmed in his sweat soaked seat, "why can't we go to war with Ireland again? I'm sweating my bollocks off in this heat."

"We all are, it's what we signed up for," Smith snapped brutishly, "get used to it now and quit bitching."

Captain Riley decided to put the virulent Lieutenant in his place, "anyone of us could get heart stroke in this climate, they need time to adjust."

"If I wasn't mistaken Camp Winston was the adjustment period," Smith spoke in a tone that was dripping with sarcasm and spite as he looked down his big nose at Riley, "now we're on our way to war, and we can't have our soldiers throwing their toys out of their pram because they got a bit sweaty."

"This heat could very well fucking kill them. I want my team alive, as should you. So cut your own bitching and do what you signed up to do-be someone the team can look up to," Captain Riley flared up, immediately silencing his subordinate.

"Can we at least get out of this damn coffin?" Roach moaned.

Riley nodded, "can we?" he spoke into his comms system.

"Let the LMG'er (light machine gunner) scope out the place first," the driver answered.

A sweltering minute that felt like an eternity passed before the LMG operator gave them the all clear and the unit stepped out, their combat boots crunched on the dusty gravel.

"It's barely any cooler out here to be fair," Heaven chuckled lowly.

Meanwhile Riley's eyes scanned the surroundings, squinted and hyper focused, sweeping his rifle in an arc to follow his eyes as he done so. They looked to be in the middle of nowhere, nothing but a barren wasteland, barring one crumbling and worn down white house about two hundred metres out.

"Eyes on," Riley said wearily, pointing from his eyes to the house. The team eyed the house with suspicion, letting it linger in their vision before turning away.

"I don't trust the atmospherics," Riley grunted, "don't turn your back on that house-".

He was cut off by a volley of AK47 fire ripping out from the barrel, the recoil making the rounds fly everywhere.

"Cover, contract two o'clock," Riley boomed as the LMG rattled, returning fire, the team piled behind the other side of the vehicle, where the bullets could not touch them, some consumed by the panic of being under direct fire for the first time, "what a warm welcome to an even warmer country," Riley quipped dryly.

The pale Cermac was hunched up next to Riley, where he could feel the heat and smell the sweat of his body, "sad boy, get out from cover-you might get the sweet release of death you crave," he kidded.

"Maybe you should jump out first to give me a demonstration," Captain Riley said in a sly voice.

"You fuckin' wish mate," Cermac chuckled.

And just as quick as the fight had begun it was over.

"Clear!" The LMG operator called out, and the commandos slowly left their cover.

"Nice shooting!" Roach yelled up to the gunner, as he did on the horizon the Captain saw a Land Rover speeding along the open road.

"That should be the engineer," he said.

"It's the engineer," the driver spoke over the comms.

"Well well well what do we have here?" the engineer announced as he pulled up his vehicle, jumping out and eyeing the punctured tyre as the driver got out to explain the situation.

"We rolled over some old shrapnel, burst the tyre. It bloody boiling and we just wanna get to where we're going," the driver said in a tired tone. 

"Let me see what I can do," the engineer said cheerily as he got to work.

And soon enough he'd patched up the wheel so it was back to normal.

Dusting off his hands and grinned at the driver, "good job sir, your vehicle is operational once more."

"Cheers mate, you really saved our bacon," the driver said before everyone loaded up in their allocated vehicles and the battle bus rolled out, healing towards FOB Whiskey.

"How's it feel to be under direct fire?" Riley asked the team.

"I could handle it," Wilson said as he scratched an itch on the back of his neck.

"Bollocks. I saw that look on your face, you were scared shitless," Riley commented, earning a laugh from Ghoul.

"Don't laugh, you were just as scared," Riley said as he turned his attention to the honey coloured eyes solider, silencing him immediately with embarrassment.

"But it's okay. First time is always scary. But once you've popped your cherry you learn to just focus on eliminating the threat," Riley explained before he scanned the faces of his team, some were stoic whilst others were blank and more than a few had the blood drained out of their faces in an adrenaline rush that left their hearts racing and limbs shaking.

"You're commandos. The best of the best. You have nothing to fear, because we're trained to handle whatever trick the enemy pulls. We're one step ahead, always, have faith in your brothers and remember it's all in your head. The difference between cowards and warriors is only mental. And let me tell you this, despite the fear of just now you're all warriors. Being a commando isn't not feeling fear, but using fear as a motivator to protect your brothers. Because at the end of the day we are all we have," Captain Riley explained as he wore a serious, yet oddly empathetic, expression.

Soon the battle bus arrived at FOB Whiskey and the team loaded out of it, they were greeted by the Colonel of the base, a man with short auburn hair that was thinning and receding and a face full of moles and bright green eyes the colour of pines, he approached them with long strides of his long legs.

"Welcome to FOB Whiskey Alpha Two Zero, I'm Colonel Neil Simpson. I took over from Colonel Jade Pierce," he said, noticing his rank the entire unit saluted the towering, imposing Colonel.

"At ease," the Colonel said, the team relaxed.

"You have one job, hold this ground," the Colonel explained, "spec ops (special operations forces) cleared our most of the enemy presence and you're all here to make sure they don't rear their ugly head again."

"Think you can handle that?" the Colonel asked.

"Yes sir," Riley nodded firmly.

"Good. Dismissed."