“Everybody who was over there knows what happened. Nobody wants to talk about it. Things got out of hand.”

“Like what, Starkey? How did it get this bad?”

“At first, there was a rogue platoon on the loose. That's what we were told anyway. We were sent to the An Lao Valley to stop them. To clean it up.”

“You mean murder our own soldiers? Those were your orders, Starkey? Who the hell is behind this? Why the murders now?”

I was going to die, but I still wanted answers. I needed to know the truth. Hell of an epitaph. Alex Cross. Died seeking the truth.

“I don't even fucking know,” Starkey hissed. "Not all of it. I'm not going to talk about it anymore either. Maybe what I'm going to do... is cut you into little pieces. That happened over there. I'll show you what was done in the

An Lao Valley. See this knife. It's called a K-Bar. I'm really good with it. I've had some practice recently."

“I know you have. I've seen some of your butchery.”

Then the strangest thing I could ever imagine happened. It blew my wheels off, completely blew my mind into a thousand pieces.

I was staring past Starkey. But something was different in the background. At first I didn't know what, then I did and my knees became weak.

Sampson was gone!

I didn't see his body anyway. At first I figured I was just disoriented. But then I was sure I wasn't. His body had been over there near a tall beech tree. Now it wasn't there.

No warnings, Alex.

No prisoners.

Do you understand what I'm saying?

I heard his words echo inside my head. I could hear the exact sound of it.

“Put down your guns,” I said to Starkey and Griffin. “Drop them right now. Now!”

They looked puzzled, but kept their guns aimed at me.

“I'm going to cut you everywhere,” Starkey said. “This is gonna take hours. We'll be here 'til morning. I promise.”

“Put down the guns!” I heard Sampson's voice before I saw him walk out from behind a tree. And the knife, Starkey! You're not cutting anybody."

Warren Griffin spun around. Two shots instantly caught him in the throat and upper chest. His gun went off as he fell over backwards to the ground. Arterial blood pumped from his wounds as he died.

“Starkey, no!”I yelled. “No!”

Thomas Starkey had raised his gun at me. Then he took one high in the chest. It didn't stop him. A second shot stung him in the side and spun him full around. A third blasted through his forehead and he went down for good in a bloody heap. His gun and K-Bar fell into the gully near my feet. His blank eyes stared into the night sky.

No prisoners.

Sampson was weaving toward me. As he came forward he rasped, “I'm okay, I'm okay.”

Just before he collapsed into my arms.