by Adam Sampson
“Strength,” said Frank and Chris.
“Speed,” said Yoon and Lola.
“Ha, sounds good. Frank’s squad you get the strength, and Peter’s squad you get the speed. Frank’s group pull up your screens and let me walk you through it,” said Rex.
As Peter’s squad stood waiting their turn, he turned to Yoon and said, “Why speed?”
“Speed will help us land hits on zerglings and avoid attacks. It is offensive and defensive. Strength has many uses, but it is mostly offensive. Speed is the better long term choice,” Yoon said.
Peter couldn't help but agree. Soon he would have to start making more of these types of decisions and he knew he had to think long term, plan out the best choices.
Once Rex had helped everyone make their selection he said, “These upgrades make you stronger and faster, but only by a little bit. You can also activate a stronger version when you need them. For example, if Peter’s squad ran a race against Frank’s squad right now they would be slightly faster. But if they intentionally tried to run the fastest they could, they would get a sudden boost of speed, lasting for a short while. This eats up your stamina quickly. Same thing for Frank’s team, you are now slightly stronger, but if you try hard, you should be able to lift an extra hundred pounds more than you could lift before. And of course, you can hit much harder too. Now, let’s go play,” Rex said with a smile.
To their surprise and delight, the two squads actually got to play. They went to a small field in between four buildings and just played games for two stans. They played tag, red rover, capture the flag, arm wrestling, and leg wrestling. That last one was particularly funny since the loser would often get flipped by the winner. They started to get the hang of activating their skills, using them at the right moments to win the game.
After Jonas was sent rolling by Chris after a bout of leg wrestling, Rex stopped them and said, “Two stans till lights out. Go ahead and head off to dinner. You are free for the rest of the night, but if anyone wants a shower, meet me outside the barracks with fresh underwear in hands.”
Needless to say, everyone showed up for the chance to take a shower. Despite their uniforms amazing powers, they still wanted to get clean all over. They were led to a nearby building, and everyone filed in for a shower. There were a series of shower stalls, men and women sides, much like the locker rooms for swimming pools back home. Once they were done, the squads walked back to the barracks together.
“Ahh I feel so much better, why can’t we have our own showers in the barracks?” Lola said with a sigh. Peter averted his eyes as she stretched exaggeratedly.
“No central water system. They don’t have plumbing on base, just in that one building,” Jonas replied.
“It is nice that we get a shower anyway. It is surprising what little things can become luxuries,” Yoon replied.
“Just you wait till tomorrow night, the luxuries are only just beginning,” said Rex.
“What do you mean, what is tomorrow?” Peter asked.
Rex just smiled.
“No, seriously, what is happening tomorrow night?” Simon pleaded.
But no matter what they said after that, no one could get Rex to explain what he meant.
The next day passed slowly. They ran, practiced Kobudo, ran some more, did an obstacle course, and ran some more. The only slightly interesting thing all day was practicing attacks on a wooden zergling. The American version was much simpler, it only moved a little and didn’t jump forward. Still, it was nice to use their new speed and strength to kill the wooden monster.
But then it was back to the grind, more Kobudo, some weightlifting, and more running. Through the boredom, Peter kept thinking forward to the end of the day, what were they going to do? So far life on base was all work and no play, hopefully Rex’s idea of a luxury is the same as a normal person’s. It was a risk to assume anything about Rex was normal, but Peter was hopeful anyway.
When dinner finally came around, Rex seemed just as excited as the squads for what was to follow. He clapped his hands together and said, “Weeks are eight days long around here, and tomorrow is the weekend. We get a half day tomorrow, no work till after lunch. That means you can sleep in tomorrow and tonight is party night.” He said that last part with more than a little excitement. “Alright, you got four options for party time, you can go to just one, or all, or mix and match. All the fun stuff is lit up and it changes a little each weekend. Tonight you have a saké bar in that direction, a fight club in that direction, holo movies over there and a dance club over there. Don’t wander off to the other sections on base, they are having fun too, but you are not invited to their sections.
“Can we drink?” Chris asked, gesturing to his brother and himself.
“Yeah, anyone can drink. If you are old enough to risk your life, you can drink. Just don’t go too crazy. Have fun, and I will see all of you tomorrow after lunch,” Rex said and then blurred away.
“Oh yeah, I know where we are going first!” Simon shouted and headed off to the bar.
“I guess I will babysit them,” Frank said with a smile.
Frank's entire squad ended up following him but Peter’s team still hadn’t made up their mind.
“I want to go to the movies, I haven’t been in forever,” Yoon said.
“Sounds like fun, I wonder what they are showing today?” Lola asked.
“Off to the movies,” Jonas said and held up his hand like he was leading a charge.
Peter laughed and followed them to the movies. As he walked he noticed that Emma was still with their group. “I am surprised you didn’t jump at the chance for your first drink,” he said to Emma.
She shrugged, “It wouldn’t actually be my first. My dad gave me my first beer on my last birthday. Maybe I will head to the bar later.”
“How old are you even? Fourteen?”
“Seventeen, thank you very much.”
“Oh excuse me, you are a sophisticated lady of the world.”
“But of course. This lady is very sophisticated, I put my pinky up when I drink and everything.”
They both laughed and hurried to catch up with the group.
When they got to the holomovie, it turned out it was one Peter had seen. The Darkwing, a mostly silly horror movie, but with several jump scares. He sat between Lola and Emma. Peter hoped to show Lola how brave he was by not reacting to the scary parts since he had seen it before. It mostly worked. Lola jumped at all the scary parts and so did Emma. At one point, both women grabbed his arm in the dark. They looked at each other and both let go and ignored Peter for the rest of the movie.
It was awkward. Peter realized the inherent problems of romance in the military. He might have a crush on Lola, but it looked like that might cause a problem with Emma if he did anything about it. He decided to use his favorite problem solving technique. Ignore it and hope the problem went away.
Next they went to the saké bar. They met up with the very drunk Simon and Chris, and the moderately drunk rest of Frank’s team. Everyone planned on staying here to drink for a little bit and then move on to the fight club. They certainly wanted to see what the fight club was like, it was certain to be entertaining to see a fight with the awesome powers that the cuff granted. But they ran into a serious problem that prevented them from leaving the bar.
The drinks were free. It was an open bar and no one had to pay for anything. There wasn’t even a tip jar on the bar. There was a slight wait to get their drinks, but other than that, the drinks kept flowing. Soon it was very difficult to convince anyone to leave. Yoon taught them a Korean drinking song, and they were doomed. In short order, Dima taught them a Russian drinking song, Lola taught them a German drinking song, and even Emma taught them a song that she swore Texans always sang, Red Solo Cup. Peter had never heard of it but was soon singing along. The night quickly disappeared and the barkeeps were kicking them out two stans after their normal bedtime.
As a group, they all stumbled back to the barracks. They san
g parts of the drinking songs they remembered and generally sounded terrible. It was not far, but it took a while because whenever someone fell behind, Simon would shout, “No man left behind!” and attempt to help them along. But Simon was so drunk that he often caused them to fall, causing giggling fits all around.
Chris insisted they all stop and stare at the sky at one point. The Omicron night sky was actually interesting. In addition to all the unfamiliar stars, it had an enormous moon taking up a large part of the sky. They all stared at it for a while before Simon fell over again.
It was shortly before lunch that Simon and Chris finally woke up. The rest of the room was looking at them in interest, wondering how bad their hangover would be. First time drinking and a bottomless bar was bound to produce a whopper hangover.
“How are you feeling?” asked Frank.
After a moment of reflection, Simon replied, “Bit of a headache, but mostly fine.”
“That's just not fair!” Frank said and threw up his hands in disgust.
“What was that all about?” Chris asked as Frank walked away.
“All of us remember the horrible effects of our first hangover. My first time I spent all day crying in bed. It seems like the cuff has allowed you to skip the worst of a normal hangover,” Yoon replied.
“Heck yeah! Cuffs for the win!” Simon said. He turned to his brother Chris with his hand up for a high five. Chris left him hanging and walked off laughing.
After lunch they met up with Rex and resumed their training. After a round of running and Kobudo Rex brought them to an indoor shooting range. It was a nondescript building with a bullseye inside the blue star. A line of metal targets were strung across the back wall. Behind the targets were sandbags, piled up against the back wall as a backstop. Unlike the other buildings they had been to, the interior of this building was lined with thick sheet metal. It made their voices eco slightly. A counter stretched across the front of the room with dividers, enough so that eight people could shoot at once.
The range master gave them a safety course that lasted half a stan. He covered basic safety rules, much like a gun range on Earth, but also additional information like crossbow safety, sling danger zones, and inspecting quarrels for warping before they were fired.
“All right, before we break out your weapons for today, any questions?” The range master asked.
“Why don’t we use guns? I know handguns aren’t much use against the zerglings, but why don’t we use larger calibers?” Dima asked.
“We do use guns actually. In certain situations we use very large caliber sniper guns. And depending on the situation we use cannons and missiles. But your real question is why do we use crossbows instead of rifles, right? Well, this crossbow here uses an all-metal design and that combined with the metal quarrel ends up delivering twenty times the kinetic force than even a large caliber rifle can deliver. And that doesn’t even take into account what we can do with enchanting. It comes down to a cost-benefit calculation, and we would be silly not to take advantage of the increased strength that comes with the cuff. I can send twenty quarrels downrange in less than a minute, and I can recover almost all of them reliably. There is very little ongoing cost there. A gun may be able to shoot much more in the same timeframe, but the ammo cost really racks up,” he said.
“Anyway, it is time to put your training into use, I will place crossbows for you on the counter, and twenty quarrels each. Remember the safety rules and do not kill anyone, even if you really want to,” he said that last bit looking at Rex.
Frank’s team loaded and cocked their crossbows without too much trouble using the attached handle. However, Peter’s team couldn't, they just didn’t have the strength. They had to use a cocking device, which looked like bicycle pedals and gears. For each shot they would have to pedal along for about thirty seconds.
At first, everyone was terrible, rarely even hitting the target. But after a stan of practice, they were only horrible, randomly getting close to the middle sometimes. The range master offered tips and tricks on how to improve, but it was obvious to everyone that this is a skill that would take a long time to master.
As Peter was pedaling away furiously to cock his crossbow, Chris turned and laughed at him, “I bet you wish you had picked strength, huh?”
Lightning fast, the range master took the crossbow away from Chris. Chris hadn’t been paying attention to where he was pointing his crossbow and it had drifted to point at Peter. Without a word, the range master carefully removed the quarrel and stored the crossbow away.
Then he turned to Chris and with a swift chop, broke his upper arm. As Chris cried out in pain and writhed on the floor, the range master said, “I bet you wish you had paid attention to where you were pointing it, huh?”
Rex helped Chris to his feet and walked him out of the range. Through the closed door, everyone could hear Chris’s cries and Rex berating him. After a few minutes, Rex must have healed him since the crying stopped.
This put a somber mood for everyone the rest of their session. Chris never did come back and no one made any idle chatter. When they were done, Rex sent them ahead to the field while he stayed back and talked with the range master for a bit.
“Are you ok?” Simon asked his brother.
“Yeah, Rex healed me. I shouldn’t have pointed the crossbow at Peter, I could have killed him,” Chris replied morosely.
“Yeah, that was a mistake, but he didn’t have to break your freaking arm did he? Holy cow, is everyone insane and cruel here?” asked Simon.
“Their methods do seem harsh,” Dima said.
Jonas shrugged, “It is tough to say they are going too far when they can just heal you after the punishment.”
“No, man. That shit is cruel and unusual. They can heal you, but you still remember the pain. It ain’t right,” Simon said angrily.
“Pain is a valuable teaching method, it is the only motivator that everyone understands,” said Rex, who had just recently appeared out of nowhere.
“I am sorry, I... I didn’t mean that,” stammered Simon.
“Yes you did, and that is ok. The training methods I use are cruel. I honestly wish I didn’t have to resort to them. But people have tried kinder methods, the polite teaching. And those students didn’t work as hard, and some of them died. I have to be cruel because I refuse to risk your lives by being nice,” Rex said.
“Are you trying to say you are being nice to us by torturing us to be our best? Sounds like justification to me. The worst men in history always argued that the ends justify the means,” said Lola.
“It is what it is. All any of us can do is what we think is best. Off to dinner with you, tomorrow is a hunting day and you will need your strength. Meet me outside one stan after dawn,” Rex said seriously.
Chapter 11
The next morning was cloudy and dark. It was the first day of bad weather they experienced since they had gotten there. Chris didn’t want to go outside because he was sure that the clouds would drop acid rain. His brother tried to convince him that it was fine, they would have been warned about acid rain if it was a possibility. But Chris refused to leave until he was the last one left and Rex was waiting on him. Fear of punishment finally got him moving.
“Ok folks, we are hunting first thing today. Just like last time, nothing special except that the other new squads will be there too. We are headed for the west gate, and that takes us through the Indian section of the base. Please remember to be respectful, and get out of the way of anyone who looks like a jerk. Off we go,” said Rex.
As they ran along, they passed a few squads that looked at them with a disdainful eye. These squads walked in perfect step and obviously had more expensive weapons than their English speaking counterparts. Their swords glinted bright, mirror shines on their spear tips and crossbows with gold filigree on the stock. Each time the Indian squads would stare them down and refuse to move even slightly out of the way. Thankfully there was plenty of room around the sides of the path and
Rex led them around.
They ran up to the gate and got in line. Rex motioned them to stay silent, apparently the Indian squads around them didn’t take kindly to their talking. Even though most Indians on Earth could speak English, they only heard the squads talking Hindi. Once outside the gate, Rex pulled them off to the south and stood with the other English speaking squads. It looked like half of them were there now.
While they waited for the rest of the squads to arrive, it started to sprinkle. A soft rain, of entirely normal water descended on them. Chris sighed in relief as he realized that no one was melting. The dry earth soaked up the rain quickly and no streams or rivulets formed.
Once everyone had arrived, Thor got everyone’s attention. “Heads up, everyone. We are going hunting in D 11, a safe valley not too far away from here. The trip there isn’t exactly safe, but your trainers can easily handle everything this planet can throw at us. So we are going to run in a column six wide. Your squad will be your row. You will have trainers on either side of you, protecting you from the dangers of the journey. Do not leave the path, do not leave the column, and do not freak out. It will be fine, let’s form up,” Thor said with a flourish.
After an entirely too long time to get a group of people to form a simple line, they were on their way. The barren ground around the gates gave way to a field of steel blue moss. That transitioned to a bushy hill, and after the hill, a forest of blades started. The sapphire blue tree-like plants had enormous leaves shaped like long spear blades, always coming to a sharp point. The forest of blades started at about twice their height and was somewhat sparse.
There was a well-worn path through the forest, large enough that the column of soldiers could run along it, but their trainers on either side had to move through the forest itself. Watching the trainers to either side, Peter wondered how they were able to keep pace with the group even as they wove through the branches. It was like they just poured through the gaps in the branches, never touching them.
