Quinn said nothing. How do you explain someone murdered your parents the day strangers kidnapped you? That a stranger discovered you, naked, alone and afraid on a lonely country road? That the one person you had left for family suddenly denied you and left you at the not so tender mercies the state? You can’t. You never can, and Quinn didn’t even try.
He waited for the DI’s punishment. Twenty-mile run in full field pack? One hundred push-ups? Not a problem. He did that before.
But the DI curiously did not render a verdict. The silence hung between growing thicker with tension as each second passed.
“There isn’t a damn thing I can do for you,” said the DI finally. “So, there is nothing else to do. Report to the base shrink immediately for evaluation.
“Sir?” said Quinn. This was a nightmare. The last thing he wanted or needed was some headshrinker poking around his skull.
“You’re relieved of duty until the doctor says you are fit to return.”
“But my training? We graduate in a week.” One final test, the Crucible hung between now and graduation and he looked forward to it and graduating.
“Yeah, the platoon will. But you will pick up on your last mod if the doctor clears you. I’m not taking any more of your shit. A Marine has his units back not ride it. That's my job. Get dressed and get over there. Dismissed.”
The DI turned on his heels with military precision and walked out of the squad bay.
Relieved of duty. The words stung more than a slap in the face.
Quinn swallowed hard. He thought the Marines would be one place that would appreciate his tendency to hit first and ask questions later. He was wrong. They wanted men that could hold up under the stress of battle, not lose their cool at the first provocation.
Fuck. There was no place for someone just out of the foster care system with only a high school education, no money and no prospects other than the service. He had to get his shit under control because he couldn’t afford to get kicked out. He had nowhere else to go.
Quinn walked into the medical services department. All he had to do was give his name. The DI apparently already alerted them. The receptionist told him to take a chair and wait.
He could do that. Waiting was one of a Marine's first lessons. He doesn’t even poke at the tattered magazines on the table next to him. He’s surprised. Marines are obsessively neat and such a thing a tattered magazine would get trashed. An hour goes by. He looks at the receptionist that has her head buried in her work. What work can a receptionist have?
“Excuse me?”
“Yes, private?”
“If the doctor doesn’t have time-”
“He told you to wait, soldier. So, wait.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said. He wasn’t sure why he called her ma’am. She was a receptionist, a private like him.
Another hour passed, and now he was getting agitated.
“Is he going to see me, or what?” snapped Quinn.
“Cool your attitude, Private, or I’ll call the MP’s.”
His muscles bunched and foot tapped on the floor. Quinn rifled through the magazines then slapped them on the table. What the fuck? He stood, not sure what to do. But he didn’t like waiting, couldn’t stand the emptiness of time passing without purpose.
Quinn was about to say “fuck it.” Let them drum him out. He was too impulsive, too on edge to make a good soldier, let alone a Marine. He stood.
“Private Morgan,” said the receptionist. “Captain Hibley will see you now.”
Quinn stopped in mid-step. “Where do I go?”
“Just follow the hallway to the end. Take a right and go to end of that hall. It is the last left-hand door.”
When he reached it he put his hand on it, but stood a minute wondering if this was worth it. He didn’t want to talk to a shrink. But who was he kidding? It was this or the streets, and he didn’t want to do that. Not again.
He opened the door. A man with graying hair sat behind a desk. He looked up as Quinn walked in. At the side of the desk sat a beautiful young blonde that flashed a smile at him that took his breath away. She was full figured, but Quinn liked that, loved the roundness of her breasts curving beneath her dress.
“Yes,” said the man.
Quinn snapped to attention.
“Private Quinn Morgan reported as ordered.”
“At ease, Private. I’m Doctor Hibley. And this is Dr. Dana McGarrity. She’s heading a research project for Kaur Industries. She’s sitting in on this session.”
Quinn felt his mood lighten when he looked at the gorgeous doctor. Yes. He wanted very much to talk to Dana McGarrity.
CHAPTER THREE
Dana
Dana couldn’t put a finger on it, but Private Morgan reminded her of someone she met. The cut of his jaw sparked a frisson of a memory. But she couldn’t place who he reminded of her of, so she put that thought away. He moved with confidence, but guardedness hung about him too.
“Please have a seat, Private,” said Doctor Hibley who spoke in clipped military tones. A captain in the Navy as well as a psychiatrist his job was to oversee her handling of the troop. However, against Dana's wish, he hijacked an active role.
“Why you are here?” Hibley said.
“The DI sent me here. Said he could do nothing more for me, sir.”
“So you are a screw up?” asked Hibley harshly. Dana shot a glare at him. She did not want to alienate Private Quinn Morgan.
“Sir. No, sir. I got top marks on all my training.”
“And yet, you are here,” said Hibley sarcastically. “Why would that be?”
Morgan locked eyes with Hibley.
“I don’t tolerate bullshit, sir.”
“It says here,” said Hibley looking at his set of the files on Morgan, “that your drill sergeant has had to discipline you eight times for fighting. Is that true?”
“Sir. Yes, sir. Like I said. I don’t tolerate bullshit.”
Hibley sucked his teeth in an annoying manner.
“In other words, you have no impulse control. Do you agree with that assessment?”
“If the captain says so, sir.”
Dana didn’t like the automatic and rote way with which Morgan answered Hibley. She couldn't establish a rapport with this man if Hibley kept riding him.
“I do say so, Private. The question is, can you be valuable to this study?”
What the hell? Hibley didn’t have any say in the study participants. And she had her own set of instructions.
“What Captain Hibley means to say is that we’d like you to participate in a study that can benefit not just you but your fellow soldiers.”
Morgan’s blue eyes turned to her and looked at her with curiosity.
“How’s that ma’am?”
“Dr. McGarrity,” said Hibley seizing control of the conversation again, “is performing a baseline study on PTSD, starting from boot camp and following soldiers through the field. The hope is to determine from start to finish the development of PTSD.”
Morgan’s face grew harder, but Dana read disappointment in his eyes.
“I’m not sure what use I can be to you,” said Quinn.
“How’s that?” said Dana.
Dana studied Quinn as he raised his head. She sensed he knew Dana and Hibley studied his records and the background check gathered on him before he reported to the enlistment depot.
“Because my case is so well known I had to get clearance from a shrink before they took my enlistment. But obviously, I’m not a fresh slate.”
He was right.
It was encouraging to find him more than a grunt in a pair of boots. Perhaps he could help her figure out why Kaur Industries was so interested in him. It might lead to clues as to why they were interested in her. Though thrilled to land such a great post doc, it wasn't the type of job her qualifications usually garnered.
The notes she received on the study suggested she seek him out to include him. She thought this was odd even after she read th
e rest of the notes on the private. But just as she was plucked out of a pile of names for her role in this study, so was Private Morgan. This made her curious. Why did Kaur Industries find him necessary to the study?
As for her? Ryan Kaur’s assessment of her brilliance did not quite measure to reality. Anyone who achieved a doctorate level in psychology did so taking a mass of personality and intelligence tests. Dana knew from the objective evidence that she had superior intelligence but not a genius. She had flashes of insight but these did not equal brilliance. Most likely she would obtain a nice teaching position when the time came, but she hardly had a mind that would produce stunning insights into the workings of the human mind.
“The study” said Dana, “can use someone like you as a measuring stick. Plenty of people enter military service with some form of trauma. It would help me to have someone with your known background to help form judgments on other participants.”
The Private lowered his eyes, clearly unhappy with this assessment.
“I see,” said Quinn frostily.
“Do you have a problem participating?” said Hibley.
“As I said, sir, I’m not sure I can be of help to you.”
“As it stands,” said Dr. Hibley, “your service record demonstrates that your hair trigger temper makes you unfit for service.”
Dana nearly winced. Hibley was leaning hard on Morgan and she didn’t think it necessary. It was if he was trying to trigger a response so he had an excuse discharge Morgan. But the soldier didn’t lose his composure though his eyes clouded as Captain Hibley suckered punched him.
“I figured,” said Quinn.
“Tell us what happened as a child,” urged Dana. She wanted to steer Hibley away from his trajectory of inciting Morgan.
“All the papers carried the story and I’m sure it is in the report you have on me.”
“Yes,” said Dana. “But I want to hear it from your perspective.”
“It’s not something I talk about.”
“Private,” ordered Hibley harshly, “answer Dr. McGarrity’s questions.”
Morgan gripped his hands, and Dana noted that as one of his responses to stress. He took a minute to speak up, and she was afraid he wouldn’t.
“I was eight. My mother,” he swallowed hard then, “my adoptive mother told me to hide. I tried, but the men found me anyway. They put me in a wood box. It was very small, just enough room to put me in but not big enough to move in. Later they buried me in the ground inside the box. They put in a pipe to give me air, and then they left me alone.”
“That sounds frightening,” said Dana.
He leveled a cold gaze at her. “I was eight and taken from my home, buried in the ground and left for dead.”
“And how,” said Dana softly, “did you get out?”
“I don’t know.”
“You were found wandering on a country road far from any houses,” said Hibley with a hard edge to his voice.
“I had no control,” said Morgan darkly, “They buried me.”
“Of course not,” said Dana gently. “But the lid to the, the box was shattered. How did that happen?”
“I can't tell you.”
That’s it. Just a flat denial. But he was there. Morgan must know how he gained his freedom.
“Do you mean you have no memory of the event?” said Dana.
He gave her another cold look like she was trampling on something he buried deep within himself. Maybe he was. This was part of the story that didn’t make sense to anyone.
“No. It means it doesn’t make sense, even to me. I must have been hallucinating from a lack of water or food.”
"That,” said Hibley, "is something you pieced together later so that it made sense to you.”
“I don’t understand what you are getting at. I said I didn’t know and I don’t. I said it didn’t make sense, and it doesn’t.”
“Private,” said Hibley in a warning tone.
“It’s okay, Captain,” said Dana. “This is something to get at another time. I’d like to get to my hotel and settle in soon.”
“As you wish,” said Hibley, though he sounded unhappy. She imagined he was. Dana, who was obviously much younger, and not part of the armed services, was lead researcher on this study. In his militarily precise way he acted in a condescending, paternalistic manner, as if he had to make sure she didn’t screw things up.
He was a jerk, and she’d be glad when she moved onto the field portion of this study.
“But don’t think we aren’t going to help you,” said Dana. “I have some experimental drugs that may alleviate your symptoms which we’d like to test.”
“What kind of drugs?” The private sounded suspicious and she didn’t blame him. The military did not have a squeaky-clean record when it came to testing drugs on its personnel.
“Mood stabilizers,” said Dana. “They are very advanced, but testing so far shows them to be non-addictive. They should give you an edge in keeping your cool so you can complete your training.”
“Complete it? Like graduate with my class?”
The doctors glanced at each other.
“No,” said Hibley. “You’ll repeat the last portion of your basic while we watch how you adjust to the drugs. We have your scores up to now. We’ll be measuring your performance the second time around as well.”
“And if I don’t agree?”
“We want your agreement, of course,” said Dana trying to reassure the skittish soldier.
“But we don’t need it,” said Hibley, “as long as you are in the service. The question is whether to cut you loose now? Or give you a chance with these drugs to make something of your Marine training?”
Dana’s heart broke a little when she saw the look in his eyes, as if everything in his world was in danger of being ripped away. She imagined it would if he didn’t agree to participate in the study.
“What’s it going to be, Private?”
CHAPTER FOUR
Quinn
Quinn looked at his hands and considered his options. Questions swirled through his mind. He didn't take help from others. Heck, he spent his whole life trying to prove his self-sufficiency. It was why he swung first and asked questions later. Sometimes he wished he could step back and look at a situation before reacting to it. He’d seen some of his platoon do that, and hell, if it didn’t work out for them. Quinn wasn’t sure a drug could change his nature, but maybe they'd teach him things to help control his knee-jerk reactions.
And hell, one thing he learned in the Marines he had to rely on the guys in his unit. This was a difficult lesson for him to swallow, and the only thing about being a Marine that he hadn’t mastered. Perhaps these people could help him learn this critical lesson with or without drugs.
“Okay,” he said. He lifted his head and looked both the doctors in the eye. “Do your worst.”
“Trust me, Private,” said Dana. “We will help you.”
“Yeah,” he said. “That’s what the DI says when he makes me do a hundred push-ups.”
“Okay then, Private,” said Hibley. “Clear your gear and report to the EHP.”
EHP? The Evaluative Holding Platoon? Where they stuck the misfits and the people that didn’t adapt to the training? That made him seem unfit, and he didn’t like it one bit.
Still, an order was an order.
“Yes, sir.”
Dismissed, Quinn walked back to his squad bay very annoyed. He looked forward to graduation and being shipped out for his MOS training. Now he had to repeat part of his training and get stuck in a platoon that been working together for weeks. It ground Quinn they shuttled him to EHP like a Pvt. Schmuckatelli, a fuck-up.
The squad bay was empty. Quinn grabbed his uniforms and his dress blues out of his locker grumbling the entire time and tossed them on his bunk. The unnatural quiet because his platoon out on the last days of training got to him. He looked over the empty bunks, every blanket securely squared in military position, not a wrinkle in place. Q
uinn appreciated the regularity and order of Marines because his own home life turned out extremely fucked up.
Everything from his locker, his extra boots and dress shoes he put in his footlocker. The uniforms he carefully folded and placed in the locker because it would be a hike to the EHP towing the locker.
Under unrelenting the heat of the South Carolina sun, he cursed. Quinn passed the trees dripping with Spanish moss, dragging the damn locker and holding his dress uniform on his shoulder. Even though he marched with a ninety-pound field pack, it was awkward handling both the locker and the uniform he did not want to mess up.
Finally, he arrived to the EHS and checked in. Once again, he waited before ordered to the Drill Instructor who said little but brought him to the squad bay and assigned him a bunk. He squared away his gear still feeling sour.
Quinn had his total attention on the task so he didn’t notice the DI until the man was nearly on top of him.
“Is this the kind of slop I’m to expect from you, recruit?”
Quinn stood ramrod straight not sure if the DI wanted an answer. But one thing he learned, they would tell him when to answer so he said nothing.
Adored by The Dragon: (The Dragon Lord - Book 3) (The Dragon Lords) Page 2