by Brent Meske
***
Glen, Marc and Colby knocked and peered into Scope’s room.
“He’s dead,” Glen whispered, and laughed at his own joke. Nobody else laughed.
They pushed past him with hardly a movement, barging into the room.
“Heard you got your ass kicked at the range today,” Marc said. Scope didn’t move, just grunted.
“That was a yes,” Glen said. He giggled again, a little less this time.
“Go to hell,” Scope said into his pillow. He tried to ignore the science book digging into his hip as he lay on his bed. He’d get Glen to do his lab if he had to shove the paper down the little weasel’s throat.
They all laughed.
“Go…away…” Scope said, loud and slow. He figured at least one of them might understand if he used single syllable words.
“Now would your squad mates do that to you?” Colby asked, sarcasm keeping his words afloat. “We’re here to help you in your time of crisis, good buddy. I mean, we have to be the best of the best, right?”
Marc nodded. Glen just grinned and looked back and forth between them.
“We know his name,” Marc said in a polite whisper. Scope’s head snapped up.
“Don’t lie like that, that’s not funny.”
“No lie. He’s part of Snow’s squad. Tripp.” Scope’s eyes glittered. Tripp.
Monica meandered into the room, weaving past Glen and the rest. She held her Biology book in one hand.
“Hey Scope, I heard you got nine out of ten today. Good work. Did you work on the lab yet? I’m having trouble.” Scope extracted his book from under his body.
“No, but I need to do it.”
“You feel like working on it?”
“It’s a plan,” he grinned at her. “But I have to kick the rest of these guys out before I can leave.” Nothing registered except shock for a few seconds, before they filed out, staring at him.
When he got there, the door was open and she was sitting on the bed waiting for him. She looked up and smiled.
“Come in and sit down,” she said in her soft melody, patting the place next to her on the bed. An hour later Marc burst into the room.
“There’s a new kid,” he said. “He’s going to be in our squad. Ross.”
Monica and Scope looked at each other.
“We’ll check it out in a little bit,” Scope said.
