Episode 9: The Ghost Marine

They called it a quarantine op. Civil unrest.

That’s the lie they tell soldiers before sending them to hell. We were headed to a school—Lincoln High School. We had reports of civilians inside. Maybe survivors. Maybe supplies.

There were neither.

Just teeth.

We thought we were ready. Sealed suits. Gas-fed rifles. Motion sensors. All the toys the dead Pentagon left behind.

But you can’t shoot what you can’t scream at.

They came from the walls. They came from the floors. I saw Sergeant Yates get dragged into a ventilation shaft. Heard his boots scraping steel. Then nothing.

I made it out because I always make it out. That’s the worst thing about being the one who survives.

You remember all the screaming.

And you remember who didn't scream.

Because their throats were already gone.

I drove home with blood in my gloves and silence in my head.

The front door was open.

Not broken. Not kicked in. Open.

There were bodies.

My wife. My daughter. Even Chief, the dog, shot for barking.

Still warm. Still bleeding.

And two men with backpacks laughing over my silverware drawer.

They looked up at me like I was the punchline.

I didn’t give them time to stop laughing.

Something broke that day. Not like a bone. Like a window. I didn’t even scream. I didn’t cry. I just cleaned my weapon and started knocking on doors.

The gang that did it called themselves “The Lake Dogs.” They thought the world had ended, and that made them gods.

But gods don’t bleed that easy.

One by one.

Basement to attic.

Alley to rooftop.

They stopped barking.

It took twelve days to find them all.

One begged. One ran. One offered me money.

I buried them all in the same pit.

That was my first exorcism.

People talk about the Ghost Marine like I died and came back wrong.

They’re half-right.

I stopped wearing insignias. Stopped speaking unless it mattered. Found others like me—survivors with training, nothing left, and no reason not to fight.

I trained them personally. No recruits. No weak links. You break, you leave. You steal, you vanish. You hesitate, you die.

We didn’t protect the living.

We avenged them.

The gangs ruled everything the cannibals didn’t.

Highways were toll roads for rape.

Towns were turned into meat markets.

They gave themselves names like warlords.

The Pike Kings. Zero 66.

Grinning knives and rusted guns.

They acted like the apocalypse made them kings.

I reminded them the Marines don’t take orders from kings.

We moved at night. We painted our faces in ash. We used their radios against them. We took over prisons, malls, radio towers.

We freed civilians and hung warlords in the squares they claimed.

When the survivors saw us, they didn’t cheer.

They saluted.

Because we didn’t come with promises.

We came with order.

I called it the New American Armed Forces because hope is a thing people need. Even if it’s dressed in bones and gunpowder.

We fly no flag.

We print no money.

But the trains run again.

There’s water.

There’s power.

There’s law.

My law.

They ask why I hate gangs so much.

Why I won’t negotiate.

Why I call them subhuman.

Because they killed my daughter.

Because they stood over her corpse and laughed.

Because there’s no treaty with fire.

People tell stories now.

They say if you see a soldier with no name tag—run.

If your camp breaks the rules—hide.

If you take what isn’t yours—pray.

Because the Ghost Marine doesn't knock.

He enters.

And he doesn’t leave until it’s quiet.