Ocho spun Ghost to face him. Looked him in the eye. “I’m trying to keep you alive, soldier. If people think you’re unreliable, they’ll kill your ass. Won’t even think twice. That castoff ain’t anything. Just a piece of meat. Like a cow or a pig or a goat. We all got past lives. Things you might want to think about. Things you might pretend you can get back to.”

He gripped Ghost’s shoulders tighter. Got his face in close. “Don’t you think about any of that! You focus on your job, soldier. You think about your brothers. You think about us. About keeping all of us alive to fight. You think about Army of God and how they’ll do us all if we lose focus.

“Now get out there and stand patrol. We got a war on.” He shoved Ghost out the door. Nodded at Stork.

“Keep an eye on your warboy. Make sure he don’t forget who he is.”

Mouse stood outside, shaking. Mahlia was there. Right there. If he was brave, he could just walk in and—

And what? Shoot everyone? Kill Stork and Ocho and TamTam and everyone?

Stork came outside. He took Mouse’s elbow and tugged him down the floating boardwalk. “Let’s walk, soldier.”

“I—”

“You can’t go back, you know.”

“I wasn’t…”

“Sure you were.” The tall black boy smiled slightly. “Everyone thinks about it sometimes. I even tried.” He glanced at Mouse. “After I went full-bar, I tried. You can’t go back, because they know. They know what you are now. They know what you done.”

He spat into the canal. “They don’t want you. It’s like you’re bad meat. Civvies smell you a mile away, and the only thing they want to do is bury you. You might not like it, but without your squad, you’re nothing.”

He fished a hand roll out of his pocket and lit it. Took a deep drag and handed it over to Mouse. “After a while, you figure out the only people who got your back is your squad. We got you safe. We’re your brothers. We’re your family now.”

He took the hand roll back and puffed again, before nodding down the canal. “Looks like the LT found us a barge. Time to get to work.” He jerked his head toward the building. “That girl, she’s just some civvy. If she knew what you done… how much you killed… the girls you done, the bad shit you been up to…” He shrugged. “She’d rather puke than look at you.”

“But she was coming for me,” Mouse said. “She said she was coming for me.”

“Nah. She was coming for some civvy she called Mouse.” He flicked the last bit of cigarette into the green waters of the canal.

“She don’t give a damn about Ghost.”