Recruit (7 page)

Chapter 7

Ryck strapped on his armor.  Not the body armor they would be issued at the end of Phase 2, but plastic armor, gloves, and a helmet that looked like some old-time football gear.  This was pugil stick training, what some said was the highlight of Phase 1. 

Ryck wouldn’t call it the highlight, himself.  What was next?  Jousting? 
Sword fighting?  He thought in that in today’s Marine Corps, the weapons were just slightly more advanced than smacking each other with padded sticks.  It didn’t matter what Ryck thought, though.  For the Drill Instructors, this was life and death.  Competition between squads, platoons, and companies was the very lifeblood of the DIs.  Each unit had to do better than the rest, and the DIs held their recruits’ victories over each other.  The pugil stick tournament was the first major competition within the company, and the all the DIs were anxious for an early victory.

They’d been introduced to the sticks in the morning session.  There was actually some technique involved, but from what was the undercurrent
being discussed, the actual bouts were more like two recruits simply trying to bash out each other’s brains.

Now, after chow and after a class on first aid, which Ryck thought was appropriate just prior to the tourney, it was time to have at it.  It was First Squad against Second, Third against
Fourth.  The final platoon winners would go up against the other platoon champ in a death match at the end of Phase 1. 

Ryck figured he would be matched against Raj Simperson, the Third Squad leader, but the DIs chose No Initial as his first opponent. 
Ryck’s first reaction was
why me?
  No Initial was huge, but then as he thought about it, Ryck figured this would be a way for him to shine.  Ryck already knew that No Initial didn’t have stamina and that he was slow.  All Ryck would have to do would be to dance around, darting in and out, landing what blows he could until the big guy from Craxion 4 tired.

With his gear on and checked by Drill Instructor Lorenz,
Ryck joined the rest of the squad around the huge sawdust-filled circle just to the east of the obstacle course.  The circle was only used for pugil stick training. A recruit would think this was sacred ground. Woe and behold any recruit who happened to try and walk across it.  That had happened to Hodges when he was told to go back to the start of the obstacle course back on T4, or “Training Day 4,” and what happened to him was something Ryck never wanted to see again.  He thought Hodges was going to DOR right there, but somehow, the guy had stuck through his “motivational training.”

First Squad and Second were going at it.  Some bouts were quick, some took time.  Du Boc, a smaller recruit from Harmony, and Graeme Styles, a heavy-worlder from Rio Tinto, had an epic battle, with all the recruits and drill instructors cheering.  Du was quicker than the stockier Graeme, and he kept up a tremendous flurry of blows that the heavy-worlder absorbed as he tracked down his lighter opponent.  Heavy-worlder or not, though, Du was getting through, staggering Graeme twice.  Finally, as Du darted in for another shot, Graeme connected, almost sending Du down.  Somehow, Du stayed up as Graeme waded in.  Several blows hit Du from each side, yet he would just not give up.  His helmet was knocked askew, blinding him.  Graeme lunged forward to take advantage of it, but Du lashed out with a wild roundhouse swing, going yard
.  Somehow, he connected against Graeme’s head, and the Rio Tinto recruit almost went down. 

The rest of the recruits, even those in Third and Fourth Squads, were going crazy.  Just to his right, the Second Squad “coach,” Drill Instructor Mendez, was in full
apoplectic fit mode, screaming as it looked that Du might pull it out.

The recruits wore big, bulky gloves while fighting, and these gloves fit through the padding on the sticks to
allow a combatant to get a firm grip.  It was considered a coward’s loss to drop a pugil stick, akin to a Spartan coming home without his shield, so the gloves and handhold made it easier to hang on, almost locking the hand in place.  This didn’t make the gloves very useful for anything else though, and when Du removed one hand to try and twist his helmet back so he could see again, he couldn’t get a good grasp on it.

When Graeme’s next blow hit him, it smashed through Du’s ha
nd and lifted the taller, but lighter recruit up right off his feet to crash down in the sawdust.  Lying flat on his back, Du weakly lifted his left hand, which had somehow still retained its grip on his pugil stick.  This was no coward’s loss.

Graeme strode forward, and for a moment, Ryck thought the guy was still in attack mode.  When the bloodlust was up, anything could happen, and more than once, DIs had to wade in to separate fighters.  Graeme was a heavy-worlder, too, and while Ryck had never really known one, he knew their reputation as undisciplined brawlers.  He was surprised, then, when Graeme merely bent over to help Du to his feet.  Graeme even held up Du’s arm in the victor pose.  The senior moved into the ring and held up both of their arms.  Winning was drilled into each recruit’s head, but it seemed that even in losing, Du had gained the DI
s’respect.

Despite himself, Ryck could feel his own competitive blood boil.  This might be antiquated, it might be useless, but Ryck was getting psyched.  He wondered what his chan
ces were to emerge as the platoon champ.  He was already a squad leader, but that was assigned to him.  Platoon pugil stick champ would be earned.

When
First and Second completed the first round, the winners were all taken to the side where they would await the winners between Third and Fourth.  Due to drops, the squads were not even, so two recruits from First had joined Third for their first bout.  If they won though, it would still be a First Squad win.

Drill Instructor Lorenz gathered them all around before they started their bouts.

“I can give you an ‘oorah’ speech, but frankly, if it isn’t in you, then I’m not going implant it into your heart with a 30-second speech.  This, recruits, is up to you.  No one else.  Yeah, I want you to win, because I’d love to stick it in Drill Instructor Temperance,” he said, holding one hand up as if it were in back of the neck of someone, then taking his right and driving it up as if thrusting a knife, then twisting it back and forth.  “If you lose, you’re going to wish you hadn’t, I promise you.  But that’s not why you want to win.  You should need to win because you’re the baddest, meanest motherfuckers around, and you want the world to know it.”

He looked around at the 18 of
the recruits in turn, catching each one of them eye-to eye, before saying, “OK, bring it in.  On three.  One, two three!”

“Fourth Squad
, 1044!  We bring it!” they shouted almost in uniform.

Then it was time.  Despite
himself, Ryck forgot about his previously-held notion that pugil stick bouts were a waste of time. He jumped up and down, shaking out his arms, feeling the aggressor in him surface.  He was going to kick some grubbing ass!  He didn’t lose that when the first two recruits in Fourth Squad fell quick victim to their Third Squad opponents.  He was going to break that trend.

“So what are you going to do, Recruit Lysander?” Drill Instructor Lorenz asked him as he gave Ryck’s equipment one last check.

“He ain’t nothing but a grub, Drill Instructor.  He can’t even run.  He’s got no heart, I’m gonna dash in and hit him, then I’m gonna . . .”

“Don’t give me all the details, recruit.  Just tell me what you’re going to do.”

“Uh . . . oh, I’m going to destroy him!  Oorah!”  Ryck shouted.

“OK, go do it.”

Ryck stepped into the ring and approached the center.  He and No Initial got there at the same time.  The TDI running the bouts started going over the rules once more.

I don’t need no
grubbing rules
, Ryck thought, tuning out the Green Shirt. 
No rules in war!

He looked at No Initial.  Ryck knew the recruit was stronger than h
e was, but Ryck also knew he owed Ryck.  Without Ryck helping him, he would have fallen out of a number of runs.  So Ryck knew No Initial wouldn’t go after him too hard.  And that was his Achilles’ Heel. 

Ryck has considered putting on his warface, the expression of determination and mayhem that most of the recruits had tried to cultivate.  But he thought it better to lull No Initial
by not seeming too aggressive.  Instead, he smiled and gave a shrug.  Just two friends who would do enough to appease the DIs, but not enough to really hurt each other.  No Initial smiled back.  He was copacetic with it. 

The Green Shirt was done and stepped back.  He raised the whistle to his lips.

Ryck tried to look relaxed.  At the whistle, he was going to spring before No Initial could react and knock the big guy on his ass for a quick win.  He almost felt sorry for him.  They had just agreed to an unspoken arrangement to take it easy, and Ryck was going to break that to win.  But Ryck was tired of carrying No Initial around, both literally and figuratively.  Better he learn his lesson here at the Depot then in combat.

The whistle sounded, and Ryck lunged.  He had his pugil stick swinging in an upper cut, ready to connect with No Initial’s chin.  He barely saw No Initial
’s own stick swinging, then he saw nothing at all.

Chapter 8

“Doggie, check for the DIs,” Hamilton Ceres, the recruit squad leader for First said.  Hami
lton had gathered Doggie and the other three squad leaders, the platoon guide, the whiskey locker recruit, and the scribe for an impromptu meeting.  Doggie was the “house mouse,” the recruit tasked with cleaning the DIs’ office, so if he checked and a DI was still there, it should rouse no suspicion.

The seven of them, the entirety of the recruit leadership in the platoon, waited silently in the head until Doggie
came back with news that the DIs were gone.  They could get down to business.  Ryck already had a good idea on what Hamilton wanted to tell them.  Earlier in the day, Seth MacPruit, a recruit in First, had told Hamilton to fuck off, reminding the squad leader that Hamilton was a recruit just like the rest of them, and that he had no real authority over him.  Technically, that was true.  The recruit squad leaders were only acting squad leaders.  All authority was in the hands of the DIs.  If Hamilton was having a problem with Seth, then he could go to the DI and report the other recruit, but that would show a lack of leadership capability, and Hamilton could be stripped of his position right then and there.

Seth knew that.  Seth also knew that Hamilton couldn’t force him to comply with any order.  Seth was a Combined Martial Arts phenom, actually having fought in the Ultimate Warrior Tournament, winning his weight class at the planetary level before bowing out
.  He proclaimed this loudly and often from their first training day, and many of the other recruits, Ryck included, thought he was spewing so much BS.  But in the Marine Corps Martial Art class four days before, he’d taken on the instructor, a MCMA black belt, and handily beat him.  Seth was the real deal.

Seth was also an asshole.  Now that the others knew what he was capable of in a fight, he’d become
even more arrogant and unruly.  Telling Hamilton to fuck off was the final straw.

“So, I know you all know why I’ve called you here.  The question is what
do we do about it,” Hamilton told the group, keeping his voice low. 

The DI
s might not be in their office, but they had a habit of turning up anywhere at any time.  This meeting, after lights out, was against the rules, and recruits who broke the rules almost always wished they hadn’t after they’d been caught.

“Not much of a choice, as I see it,” John McGruder said without much emotion.  “We can’t let anyone flaunt our authority.”

“I hear you, Mac, but we really don’t have any authority,” Shaymall Cammille, the platoon guide said. 

The guide was the top recruit billet, naturally ass
igned to the recruit who the DIs thought was the strongest.  That opinion affected the rest of the recruits, and he was unconsciously considered the first among equals by the others.

“Bullshit, Shay-man.  The
Senior gave me this position, and that’s all the perking authority I fucking need.  Ham, you need to call this perking arsehole out.  Now,” Mac said.

Hamilton visibly blanched before stammering out, “I can do it,
I mean I can call him out, but shit on me, you saw him with that DI.  He flattened the guy.  A MCMA black belt!  I’d only last an ant’s heartbeat.”

Mac rolled his eyes, but Ryck answered for him, “Not just you, Hamilton.  You call him out, but all of us take care of him.  You bring him in here, and
we’ll be waiting.”

The thought had obviously never occurred to
Hamilton, and he seemed to think it over for a moment before asking, “But what does that say about me?  That I can’t handle my own problems?  And is it fair, eight against one?”

“Stick it, Ham,” Mac told him.  “All’s fair in perking love and war.  We love that arsehole as a fellow Marine recruit, as a platoon mate, but this is war when he thinks he’s too perking special to follow the rules.  And when he tells you to fuck off, he’s telling all of us to fuck off. 
So all of us need to give him a little ‘extra instruction’ on following orders.  A beasting he’s asking for, and a beasting we’ll give him.”

“You mean a ‘beating?’” Ham asked
, obviously confused.

“What?  No.  Don’t you speak Standard?  This is a ‘beating,” he said, mimicking the pounding on a drum.  “This is a ‘beasting’” he added, pounding one
fist into the his other open palm.

Hamilton
took in Mac’s meaning before looking at each of the others in turn.

“Do you all agree with that
?”

Each one of them nodded, even if Doggie’s nod was late and without enthusiasm.

“And none of you think I’m wimping out?” Hamilton asked.

Each head shook in a “no.” 

“OK, then.  So I guess it’s now or never.  Let me go get him and bring him back here,” he said as he left the showers and made his way into the darkened squadbay.

The s
even recruits moved closer to the entrance to the showers so they wouldn’t be seen when Hamilton and Seth walked up. 

“Shit, shit, shit . . .” Doggie whispered to himself, fear evident
in his voice to those who overheard him.

Ryck sympathized, but he was not going to voice that.  Even with
eight of them, Seth was a grubbing monster, and there could be some serious ass-kicking going on—not all of it on Seth.  He swung his arms back and forth, trying to get ready, only stopping when he heard murmuring as the two recruits approached.

“I gotta give you props.  I never thought you had the balls to call me out.  It ain’t gonna make any difference ‘cause I’m still gonna to take you apart, but I gotta respect your effort,” Seth said as they walked into the showers.

He stopped dead as the seven recruits waiting moved to surround him.  Hamilton stepped back to join the circle of recruits.

“Hey, what’s this bullshit? 
It jus’ me an’ fuckhead here.  This is between me an’ him,” Seth protested.

“Well, you see, Mac-Pisshead, it’s like this.  When
a chav like you goes and disrespects one of us, you disrespect all of us.  So we all need to sort of, you know, show you the error of your ways.”

Seth stood there looking at them, hands on his hips.

“What a bunch of fucking marigolds.  My great-granny’s got more balls than you, an’ she’s been dead for two years,” he said with a sneer on his face.  “I guess I’ll have to show you the fucking error of
your
ways.  You don’t mess with me!  Which one of you pussies is first?” he asked getting up on the balls of his feet, fists raised.

Mac rushed him, head down, arms outstretched.  Seth’s foot caught him on the chin, folding him in a heap on the tile deck.  Seth somehow kept his foot going, bringing it to his right, connecting with the side of Du Boc’s neck, sending him to his knees.  At that moment, Ryck
’s fist connected with the back of Seth’s neck, right below the skull.  Seth staggered forward, clearly stunned, and Shaymall’s fist came up in a picture perfect-uppercut, catching Seth on the chin.  He went down hard, head bouncing off the tile.  Despite Seth being down and out, several more punches and kicks were thrown at his unresponsive body, the last by Du after the recruit squad leader got back up to his feet.

Ryck’s heart was pounding.  It had all happened so quickly.  His fist hurt, but the adrenaline kept most of the pain at bay.  He had to concentrate on calming down.  Taking care of Seth was only half of the equation.  Now they had to get back into their racks before there was a bed check.

Shaymall was checking on Mac, who was just coming to.  Ryck joined him as they pulled Mac into a sitting position.

“Mother fuck!
  What train hit me?” he asked groggily.  “What about Mac-Pisshead?” he asked, trying to see around the two other recruits.

“Lesson learned,” Shaymall said. 
“He was too busy with you, so we got him.”

“
Copacetic!  Figured that would work.  That perking arsehole knew I was the harry von bad one, right?  Knew he had to take me out first, right?” Mac said, his words only slightly slurred.

“You were right, Mac,” Shaymall answered.  “Think you can get up?  We need to get back in our racks.”

“Oh, sure, man,” Mac responded.

With a little help,
the two of them got Mac out of the showers and up into his rack before going back and helping carry the limp body of Seth to his rack, an upper bunk.  They had to push him up, stepping on the rack below to get him in.  Ryck stepped on Seth’s bunkmate in the process, but that recruit never said a word.

The seven of them got Seth up and under his sheets, then scattered for their own racks.  Ryck had just gotten in and pulled up his sheets when the front hatch opened.  A flashlight pierced the darkness and
swept over the sleeping, or at least prone, recruits. 

“All quiet, fire watch?” the unseen DI asked the recruit standing at the fire watch podium at the front of the squadbay.

Recruit Dixby Zeller, who had observed everything except for what actually occurred in the showers, said, “All quiet, Drill Instructor!”

“OK, carry on,” the voice reached out to them. 

The next morning, despite two recruits with very visible bruises, the DIs seemed not to notice that anything had happened during the night.