Later that evening...

Adam Higbee was in his hotel room, sitting back on the king-sized bed, half a pizza next to him, a rerun of Doctor Who playing on the TV, and a bottle of good whiskey on the bedside table. While several other people in the League invited him out for bar-hopping, drunken orgies, or crap like that, Shadow turned them down. When not at the gym, he preferred to spend time relaxing in solitude. Most of the pain he'd suffered at Cammy's hands had faded, but the bruises would remain for a while. Clad only in a pair of tree bark camouflage pants and dogtags, his mind began to temporarily be at peace.

"Well, ya got your wish, soldier," he thought to himself. Since joining the League, he'd wanted a chance against Cammy, to find out how many of the stories about this 'legendary soldier' were true. Now he knew. In many ways, she'd reminded him of his ex-wife, Stacy.

Captain Stacy Miller had been his hand-to-hand combat instructor during his time in the SASR, and he couldn't have had a better teacher. Not only was she one of the roughest instructors he'd ever had, but like Cammy, she was able to be a warrior without losing her hotness. 5'8", dark blond hair, and almost completely solid muscle, the attraction between them was almost impossible to ignore.

The marriage hadn't lasted long; just under two years. With their military careers, the duo rarely spent time together. On the occasions that they DID get together, almost all of it was spent fucking like bunnies, when they weren't eating or sleeping. Thusly, the divorce was mutual.

A knock at the door stirred him out of his daydreaming. Moving silently, he opened it to see Cammy standing there, a bag in her hands. Clad in a black t-shirt and jeans, several of the bruises on her face had begun to fade, but were still visible.

"Hey, Shadow. Just thought I'd stop by for the evening." Reaching into the bag, she pulled out a bottle of Smirnoff Ice. "Brought my Russian friend here as a peace offering, since I didn't know what your poison was."

"You can come in if you want, luv. I'm just relaxing with my friend Mr. Johnnie Walker." A glance over at the nighttable, and Cammy understood.

"Nice one, Adam." Sitting on the bed, the two soldiers poured themselves drinks in shot glasses. "Salud." They knocked back their drinks.

Half an hour later, the duo, slightly tipsy, were talking about their days as soldiers.

". . . So Jordan has the incendiaries set up near the groups' food shed. We figure, if they start to run outta food, they'll be tired an' unfocused. The problem? Apparently, he used a bit too much C4, so instead of a fire occurring that looks accidental, the bangs send wood and metal flying." The two soldiers laughed about it. Cammy turned away from Adam, revealing a nasty scar near her left shoulder blade. "Left me with this here trophy."

"Not bad. Well, at least you had a souvenir from the trip." Adam paused to pour a shot of vodka into a glass of soda he was working on. "So, you were a SEAL, right? I thought they was a boys' club only."

"Well, it helps to have friends in high places. So I'm always Ready to Lead, Ready to Follow, Never Quit. One o' my commanders made the arrangements. An' yeah, some of 'em gave me a hard time about it, but after I did my best impression of Vasquez from 'Aliens', they began to ease off. The training for that was brutal; made ancient Sparta look like kindergarten." Cammy stopped to take a drink from a bottle of water she'd brought with her. "Y'know, when ya first joined, Adam, I thought you were just a wannabe; just some martial artist with a Rambo fetish. Good to know your backstory checks out."

"Who Dares Wins. Besides, you can't possibly think the SEALs were rougher on you than the SASR was on me. Part of the training was marching forty miles in harsh weather in less than twenty hours carrying more than fifty-five pounds of weight, plus water, food and rifle. That's near barbaric, babe. If we made it through that, THEN we went on to survival training."

"Oh, is that all, boy? Try to swim 500 yards with a side stroke in under 12 and a half minutes, do at least 42 push-ups in 2 minutes, about 50 sit-ups in 2 minutes, a minimum of 6 pull-ups from a dead hang, and be able to run a mile and a half in boots and trousers in under 11 and a half minutes. And those are just the minimum requirements to be CONSIDERED for SEAL training."

"Fine, fine. Call it even on our schooling, then?"

"Deal." The duo clinked glasses.

"Well, at least it aint as bad as th' NBC training with live nerve gas, like the Russian Spetsnaz. That's what one of my ex-contacts, Sashenka, claimed he had to do during his 'initiation.' Could've been tryin' to play a round of 'tougher than you', though."

"Yeah, it's a crazy life, soldiering. When you're in uniform, you can drive armored cars, handle million-dollar equipment, eat stuff that'd make a billygoat barf -"

"Well, rattlesnakes and tree frogs ain't that bad," Adam replied.

"- and do stuff like dismantle and rebuild an M60 from memory. Back in the real world, holdin' down a regular job like a fry-cook or parking cars is almost impossible."