10
Emily found Sergeant Kee Smith sitting on the lip of the helicopter’s cargo door, her feet hanging out but not touching the ground. Her clothing looked stiff and uncomfortable, caked with brown stains that had started out red. Her head hanging down. Her hair a knotted halo around her face.
The Hawk shone in the morning light. Emily would wager that not one single stain of blood, which marked Kee so darkly, remained on the Hawk itself. The ground team reported that she’d threatened murder when they’d arrived to do the cleanup themselves.
The girl presented a puzzle. A top gunner, she’d turned in range statistics like few in the history of SOAR. Her ratings were universally high as a soldier. She earned top marks, even from the commanders who had thrown her in lockup for fighting. She
