by Kal Spriggs
Hargrave drove a fist at my stomach and I caught her wrist, clamped her elbow and rolled her forward. It was still an awkward motion that I had to think my way through, but I was getting better.
We went through a couple more iterations before he called a pause. “Alright, everyone, Commander Scarpitti has agreed to help me teach this next session.”
I restrained a groan as the chatty officer stepped into the gym. She'd come by the grav-shell practices a couple times since the crash and she'd told all of us how glad she was that none of us had been seriously injured. The way she went on, though, just left me irritable. Everyone was sorry that it had happened. Everyone was glad that none of us had been killed. I got very sick of hearing that, and she'd repeated the sentiment a lot.
“Commander Scarpitti and I have practiced a lot, so this demonstration is one where we'll be free to use some techniques that I don't want any of you to practice. Some of these, against an untrained opponent, will be lethal. Using them improperly will lead to your own injury. So don't try any of this until I give the go-ahead and walk you through it.”
He finished talking and stepped into the sparring ring. So far, I'd done a few rounds of sparring. Most of the time I either felt like I flailed blindly or I acted as someone's mobile punching bag.
“Begin,” Commander Pannja said.
Commander Scarpitti moved faster than I'd expected. The tall, blonde woman lashed out with a kick and followed that up with a series of punches, all of them at full force and speed. Commander Pannja sidestepped and brought his knee up into her midriff. As she bent forward, he started to bring his elbow down in a strike towards the back of her head, but she turned to the side and he missed.
Faster than I could follow, she somehow kicked his feet out from under him and then stomped at his face with her heel. He managed to roll to the side and sweep for her feet, but she jumped back. I couldn't believe how fast she moved on her feet for her size.
The two of them went back and forth, now and then a fist or elbow struck flesh with a meaty thunk and one of them would stumble back, but the sparring session didn't slow or stop. It went on for what seemed like forever and I actually began to feel worried as I saw Commander Scarpitti catch Commander Pannja a glancing blow across his jaw. As he stumbled back, he looked dazed, barely able to keep his feet.
She followed that hit up with an elbow that stopped just a few centimeters from his temple. “Match,” he groaned as he stepped back and then out of the ring. We all stared at the pair of them, both sporting bruises and a bit of blood running down out of the corner of Commander Pannja's mouth. I glanced at the clock and felt shock as I realized that less than two minutes had passed.
Commander Pannja seemed to need a moment to catch his breath and get his bearings. When he finally spoke, his voice remained unsteady, “That, ladies and gentlemen, is full speed, full contact. As you saw, neither of us had time to consider our moves. And let me assure you, neither of us was going for the quick victory. This was a demonstration, only. Were this real, it would have been two or three such strikes, only.”
“Two, in my case,” Commander Scarpitti grinned. Her friendly smile seemed off, after what I'd just witnessed. It was like she viewed dealing potentially lethal blows as being equally humorous as teaching us in class.
Commander Pannja gave her a nod of acknowledgement, his expression somber, “She's right. At any time during this demonstration, she could have bested me, and several of her counters would have been lethal had she not pulled the strikes.”
“How come she's not teaching the class?” One of the cadets muttered.
“I'm not as good at teaching,” Commander Scarpitti smiled. “And I can be a little less patient with new students than Commander Pannja. So unless you'd like to nurse some broken bones, I'd recommend you take his instruction.” She said it in such a friendly fashion that the words almost didn't sound like a threat. Yet, for me it was as if she'd pulled off a mask. She had no compunctions about violence. Her friendly, cheerful nature was only one facet of her attitude. I'd missed that, and I wondered what else I'd missed about her.
She was at the grav-shell race, I remembered. It was possible that she had been the saboteur. I dismissed the fears, though. I'd accompanied her, I would have noticed if she'd been the one to loosen the bolts... wouldn't I have?
“Now, then,” Commander Pannja said, “we'll return to your standard drills. You need to practice them until they become muscle memory. Commander Scarpitti and I will make corrections as necessary.”
Hargrave and I went back to our spots and began to practice our take-downs again. I felt slow and useless as I did it. What use was such a thing if everyone here was better at it than me? It seemed as if I were getting worse as I practiced. As Hargrave threw another punch at my midriff, I botched the block and caught the blow right in the sternum. I bent over, coughing and trying to breathe for a moment.
As I straightened, Commander Scarpitti stood over me. “You're off balance, Jiden,” she said, her voice gentle. She repositioned my rear foot and then grabbed my shoulders and shifted me backwards slightly. “There, always keep your center. You're low to the ground, which means you have a lower center of gravity. Use that.” She stepped back, “Now, try again.”
Hargrave punched at me again and this time I blocked and went straight into the take-down. And this time, it worked, it felt like everything flowed together and this time it was Hargrave whose face bounced off the mat. I helped her up and gave Commander Scarpitti a nod, “Thanks, ma'am.”
“Of course, Armstrong, keep it up, you'll get better,” She nodded at me and turned to the next set of trainees.
We went back to practicing. The shift to my feet and change in my posture helped tremendously, but it didn't stop me from feeling every bruise and ache. I was tired. I was tired of hurting, tired of crawling into my bunk for two to four hours of sleep every night. I was tired of classes, tired of drills.
As Hargrave threw me face forward onto the mat again, some part of me wondered if this was really what I wanted for the rest of my life.
***
“Move, move, move!” a voice bellowed in my ear.
I didn't know who was shouting. I didn't care. I scurried down the trench and into my position, just as explosions began to go off all around us. They were deafeningly loud. Trask had called them “arty-sims” and they gave off ear-rupturing shrieks just before they went off, to simulate inbound fire of some kind.
All of us were in position, though, so none of us were flagged as casualties from the simulated bombardment. A moment later, a group of opposition force emerged from cover and charged our line. I opened up as they passed the engagement marker. My target went down, followed by a second and third, and then, before I knew it, the assault broke off.
“Counter attack!” I heard called out over our fire team net. I was up and over the barricade before I'd really processed the words, running forward, pausing every third step to bring my rifle up and fire at one of the retreating enemy. As we reached the spot they'd retreated to, I heard calls of “LOA,” which signaled we’d reached the limit of advance. I stopped running forward, dropping to one knee and then taking cover behind a convenient body.
The “casualty” snored loudly, tranquilized from the training rounds. I almost envied him, but for now I rested my rifle across the unconscious opposition and scanned my sector. A moment later, I heard, “Armstrong, Takenata, search.”
I rose up to a crouch and fell in next to Ashiri. We moved from one enemy casualty to the next, checking them for booby-traps and then rolling them over to check for anything of importance. Weapons and equipment we threw to the side, papers and datapads we piled up for retrieval.
“Withdraw,” Cadet Third Class Trask ordered over our team net and we all moved back to our positions in the trench. Ashiri and I brought back our cache of items, while Trask threw a smoke grenade on top of the pile of captured weapons to mark them as destroyed.
I took a moment t
o suck down water and try to replace some of what I'd sweated out in the near-summer heat. This is the third time today. This drill, like the last two, had gone smoothly and efficiently. I felt almost like a robot as I carried out my activity. Then again we hadn't messed anything up, so I felt a lot better about myself.
“End exercise!” A voice shouted over the net. “Exercise complete, all cadets report to their ready rooms.”
I looked around in surprise. We hadn't had an exercise end before mid-afternoon in weeks, maybe months. Normally, even if we did our role well, then we'd remain in place while other teams across the campus went through their drills until they got them right. It wasn't really resting, not in the intense heat, but it was better than going through the drills over and over again until we collapsed.
I stood up from my position, looking out I saw some of the training cadre dragging away the unconscious bodies of our opposition forces. I half expected an order to go assist them, like we'd had to do during other drills, but Trask just waved at us to head back to the ready room.
Sand Dragon's ready room was crowded. This was the first time we'd all been in the room. I saw all the plebes, all the third classmen, second classmen, and even the cadet officers. I was honestly surprised to see everyone. Something is up, normally there'd only be the people under review.
A moment later, Cadet Commander Givens stepped into the ready room. “Sand Dragon Company, congratulations on completing your drill to standard.” She said it in a clipped, professional tone, but then she smiled, “As usual, Sand Dragon never disappoints.”
“Hooah!” Cadet Commander Mackenzie grinned, “Thanks, Givens, always good to hear it.”
I hadn't realized that Cadet Commander Givens was from Sand Dragon. She adopted a more serious expression. “Now, there's still room for improvement, but I can say with confidence that all of you, plebes included, have reached an acceptable level of training.” She nodded at Cadet Commander Mackenzie, “And just so you know, Sand Dragon scored second-highest, overall in this series of drills.”
I saw Mackenzie's smile waver a bit at “second.” I didn't get that. Second place was still pretty good, in my book. But then again, I wasn't up on all the points ratings. Is the difference between first and second on one drill that big a deal?
“Well, thank you Cadet Commander Givens,” Mackenzie said formally. “I appreciate the good news. We'll conduct a review and we'll see if we can get better for the next set of drills.”
I let out a groan at that and I wasn't the only one. Next weekend was supposed to be Parent's Weekend. Everyone's parents would show up. We'd hoped to have that Saturday to show our families around the grounds and maybe to get off campus with them. I wasn't looking forward to being exhausted, sweaty, and covered in sand instead of hanging out with mom, dad, and Will.
“Now, then,” Cadet Commander Mackenzie swept his gaze around the room. “Let's break this exercise down by the numbers...”
***
“I don't see the big deal,” I said to Ashiri a few hours later after we finished cleaning our weapons and gear and we both pulled out our datapads to start on homework. It was ridiculously early in the day. In fact, I actually thought I might get to bed not long after sunset. I wasn't even certain I'd be able to sleep that early, not anymore, but I wasn't going to complain. “What's wrong with second place?”
“Are you kidding?” Ashiri asked, looking up from her paper.
I gave her a level look. I'm not stupid, I just apparently don't get the secret undertones for how to get through this place.
She read my look and rolled her eyes. “Look, Jiden, it goes back to the point system. If we got second place as a company, then as our company commander, Mackenzie gets a percentage based off second place. But that means someone else got first place.”
“Yeah, Tiger Company,” I nodded.
“Right, so Cadet Commander Argunpet, gets the bonus points. The company commanders for the other companies may be further behind, outside of direct competition. And remember, not all the companies are in the standard path, Ivy Company is medical track, for instance, so it's not really second place out of twenty, it's more like second place out of ten... which percentage wise would put him in the top twenty percent, not the top ten percent. Mackenzie is on space tactical track, he's just under the top ten in his class right now, and seven of them are in regimental command slots, so there's no way he's going to even catch them unless he gets a regimental officer slot next semester...”
I shook my head, “Why would he leave Sand Dragon? I mean, he loves it here!” The very idea of Mackenzie leaving our company left me uneasy.
Ashiri gave me a level look. I glared back at her, daring her to say something. I wasn't doing anything inappropriate. It wasn't like he treated me any better or anything. There wasn't a relationship. I just really liked him. I felt a flush climb my cheeks as I realized just how much I'd come to like him. Stop that, I told myself, you do not have a crush on him.
Fraternization was against the rules. I could be kicked out over it. Worse than that, I didn't want anyone to think that he had given me any kind of favoritism. I'd worked hard for everything I'd done. And yeah, I do kind of melt when he flashes that smile at me.
“Anyway,” Ashiri rolled her eyes, “Regimental Officer positions, especially Regimental Command positions give major points, with an overall rating based off performance. Normally the first semester is the easy bet, it's based off improved performance. Second semester is the complex training scenarios, from what Alex heard, some of those exercises are really brutal. So that's a risky proposition. If you get unlucky or if you're not at the top of your game, you can actually lose out pretty bad.”
I shook my head, “All of this sounds like gambling. I don't see how it benefits the Militia to have so much determined by luck.”
“Luck is a facet of warfare,” Ashiri shrugged. “Luck has lost and won as many battles as strategy. Sometimes it's better to be lucky than good.” I shrugged. I didn't feel all that lucky. In fact I felt pretty darned unlucky. After all, I had people trying to kill me.
“Anyway, second place in one of the last drills? That's got to hurt, especially since Cadet Commander Argunpet of Dust Company was just ahead of him. That means he's a little further back.”
“But what's the difference between ten and eleven?” I shrugged.
“Would you want to come in top ten or top twenty?” Ashiri replied.
“Top ten,” I responded.
“Exactly,” Ashiri nodded. “He's trying to make the cut-off. You have to keep looking the next ladder rung higher, all the time. Sometimes that's just enough to keep the person behind you from taking your spot.”
“Seems pretty cutthroat,” I said nervously. I could imagine that if someone really wanted to, they could sabotage an event to bring down someone's score. Especially since commanders seemed to have the highest risk.
“It can be, but at a certain point, we're all expected to behave appropriately,” Ashiri shrugged. “I mean, there's the honor code, there's regulations... and it's not like Mackenzie or any of the others up at that level hate one another. They're just jostling for position, you know?”
I considered it. I tried to think about how I'd feel if Sashi Drien or Bolander were just ahead of me. I couldn't imagine doing that, especially not over something as simple as a class ranking. But what about Bolander? What about Sashi Drien? Would I trust them not to sabotage me?
I'd have to watch my back, I supposed. Then again, I had to do that anyway.
***
Chapter Fourteen: It’s Good To Get Some Recognition
“Wake up, on your feet!” A voice bellowed, seemingly in my ear.
I rolled out of my bunk, dropping to the floor even as someone bashed two metal trash-can lids together out in the hallway. “Get up, get up, now! Get out here, get out on my line, now!”
I recognized Cadet Salter's voice and for a moment, I felt a trill of fear that I was back in Academy Prep School. I w
as out and on line, haphazardly dressed, braced at attention. Some of my gear was still damp from cleaning and the awkward weight of my rifle seemed to drag at me even more this morning. The lights were on and I blinked tiredly, trying to figure out if this was some kind of drill or something.
“Plebe Armstrong!” Salter stopped in front of me and leaned over me, “Do you know what day this is?”
By my best guess, it had to be sometime around two in the morning. I'd finished my homework and with the early end to the drill on Saturday, I'd gone to bed around sunset. “Ma'am,” I replied, “Uh, Sunday, ma'am?”
“No, Plebe Armstrong!” Salter shouted. Her serious expression faltered, “It's Recognition Day!”
I stared at her, not really understanding for a long moment.
Then Cadet Third Class Trask slammed his metal trashcan lids together just down the hallway. “You heard her, plebes, this is Recognition Day! You survive the day and you'll never be plebes again!”
None of us knew how to respond to that. Before we could come up with anything, they chased us down the corridor and out onto the parade field. All across the space I saw former Cadet Instructors lining plebe sections up into formations. We barely had time to fall in before I saw the Regimental Training Officer stand up on his platform. “Class of Two-Ninety, congratulations! You have finally earned the right to prove yourselves to the rest of the regiment! If you survive today, you will no longer be plebes!”
All this talk of survival had me feeling nervous. I hadn't really heard anything about Recognition Day, not beyond the fact that we'd be Cadets Fourth Class afterward. I wondered just how arduous this was going to be. “Company Training Officers, take charge of your companies!”
Cadet Lieutenant Webster stepped in front of our formation. “Section, left, face.” He snapped. “Forward, march!” Before I could even get my bearing, he brought us into a run. Our former Cadet Instructors fell in around us, yelling at us to run faster.
I felt disoriented and confused. We ran up the ramp and then out onto the surface. The night was dark, a haze over the stars and we stumbled over the uneven ground. Cadet Lieutenant Webster ran us past our section's fighting positions and then out into the desert. We were running at what amounted to a sprint and I gasped for air as we continued to run.