by J.M. LeDuc
Chapter 2
Brent felt someone kick the side of his paper thin mattress. The boot felt as if it kicked him directly in the ribs.
“Rise and shine, scum bag. Report with full gear and backpacks to the hangar in ten minutes.”
The four soldiers remaining in this ‘exercise’ stood in the only permanent building on the property: a cement block airplane hangar. Brent at just under six feet tall, was the shortest of them all. To his left stood Sergeant Malcolm Jefferson, a Sycamore of a man. Jefferson was at least six inches taller than Brent and weighed at least two hundred and seventy pounds with a seven percent body fat index. What made Jefferson appear to be even more menacing was the fact that he was as black as a moonless night. To Jefferson’s left stood Corporal Thomas Fitzpatrick. Fitz and Jefferson looked like unmatched bookends. Tommy was a bit shorter, six three, and weighed less, two hundred and twenty, but he too was all muscle. What made the pair such polar opposites was that Fitz being full blooded Irish was so white he was almost opaque. In the past weeks, the two had formed a close bond. Jefferson, the boisterous one, referred to the two of them as twin sons from different mothers. The other thing that made the pairing unusual was that as outgoing and boisterous as Malcolm was, Tommy was just as introverted and quiet.
To Brent’s right stood Private Jensen. When asked his name by the others during orientation, he only said Jensen. The others joked that he was so mean his mother didn’t give him a first name. Only later did they find out that his first name was Sherman. Jensen was about three inches taller than Brent and probably weighed as much as Jefferson. He too was all muscle, but his didn’t look natural: more like a product of modern pharmaceuticals. Jensen was very competitive and was the outcast of the group. He never engaged in conversation and always separated himself from the others when in the mess tent.
The four continued to stand in complete silence when suddenly they were thrust into complete darkness.
“The platform you four are standing on is about to change a bit,” drawled a voice they hadn’t heard before. “Last man standing wins the exercise.”
For the next six plus hours, the four men participated in a form of sensory deprivation training. They stood pat, in complete darkness while the platform under them twisted, rocked and spun in different directions. Just after six hours and twenty minutes, Jefferson was the first to fall. It was hard to keep all that bulk in one spot as the world turned upside down and inside out. Fitzpatrick went next. Brent knew that Jensen would fight tooth and nail for the win. The private had been coming in second to him during the entire training exercise.
The two glanced at each other momentarily. Brent saw the determination in Jensen’s expression. The private was about to say something when Brent suddenly stepped off the platform. The lights in the hangar came back on the second he stepped off.
“Exercise over. Congratulations, Private Jensen,” drawled the mystery voice.
Jensen, not one to be understated, jumped in Brent’s face and began to taunt him.
“Is that what they taught you in officers’ training school. How to give up,” Jensen growled. “Pussy.”
Brent didn’t bite at the bait. Instead, he congratulated Jensen on his win and turned to congratulate the others for staying ‘alive’ for as long as they did.
“You’ve got ten minutes to hydrate, put something in your gut and report back here,” came the voice. Hearing the instructions, Jensen began to take his gear off. “Your gear is to remain on, Private.”
The side of Jensen’s mouth started to quiver as his eyes squinted with hate.
In a control room on the other side of the hangar, a training officer spit tobacco juice into a Styrofoam cup. The side of his mouth turned up in a sly smile. I might just have to exploit that flaw a bit, he thought.
