Dinner was served at the headquarters, Charmaine was starving, and he still felt the run in his legs. He walked downstairs making heavy use of the rails, the rest of the floors were busy, the mysterious swordsmen were nowhere to be found. Finally he got to the mess line, chicken thighs and rice, comparably a 5 star meal considering their normal selection.
The cafeteria was crowded, Charmaine stood awkwardly, until a familiar voice called him out by his rank. It was Renka, and she sat with a group of snow leopards, all sharing similar builds, and scars. As he sat down he could feel the weight of 7 pairs of predatory eyes trained on him. He avoided all eye contact, but noticed that the others paused there meals as he took his seat.
He waited for a calculated second before taking his first bite, and realized what the others were waiting for. He bit into the chicken, hearing a very familiar sound as he did, forcing him to stop midway through. He lifted his eyes to the woman in front of him, who was waiting for his reaction to the sound. She smiled, bearing her canines, clearly satisfied with his reaction. As he took in her features, he mainly noticed the ears, and for the first time he looked at what cauliflower ear looked like on a Faunus.
As his eyes moved about the table, he took in each one's gaze. They were fascinated yet openly hostile towards him, like a prowler spotting their next meal, or a serial killer spotting another victim. He continued his meal, trying his best to ignore the noise. The others spoke to each other, during which he learned of a new operation heading towards a ghost frequency and later, a nuclear silo.
They had been receiving strange signals from the area, and wondered if the enemy may have camped out in the area. Charmaine could also continue his tasks of converting the frequency. He would also need to visit the armorer again, his weapon would not suffice for the mission.
The table had finished, the boy got up to put away his tray, but was stopped by Renka’s hand grabbing his wrist, “You’ll be in our truck, right?” The boy swallowed before answering, “Yes Ma’am.”
He returned his tray and went downstairs to the armory, seeing the back of the armorer. He turned around and the boy froze in fear, the armorer, he wasn’t wearing his mask, at least not the top part. From what the boy could see he had no skin on his head, instead exposed muscle tissue wrapping around two pearl white eyes stared back at him. He could make out white cheek bones that poked in and out of its muscle tissue wrapping.
He greeted the boy, while walking over his desk to put his cover back on, “Sorry about that, I wasn't expecting anyone.” The boy tried to show no reaction, instead simply asking if there were any other weapons available, he decided on a long range precision rifle. This weapon was similar to the ones he used in training, and also allowed him to work better alongside Ruby, should the need arise.
He wondered quietly to himself on how one would get that type of injury. It's not something that he’d ever seen before, it looked like it would take time to inflict. He wondered further as he walked up the stairs to the main room. He approached Sergeant Major, for more information regarding the operation. He learned of his billet, he was to head the comm/logistics platoon, which meant joining a unit he was familiar with. The idea somewhat excited him, he hadn’t seen many other radio workers since comms school.
Before he could leave, Caeldovan made a last comment, “One more thing, the amount of radio workers we have is rapidly depleting. Considering the situation and your experience, I’ve written you up for a promotion.” He slid the new insignia to him over the desk. His lower chevron would now bear a diamond in its notch. A First Corporal, the top Corporal in a company, he would have to look after the equipment and the soldiers, make sure they are all on the same frequency with the same breach protocols. There was only one thing that bothered him about his unit, it was attached to the leopard company, under Renka.
The boy left to find his unit, they lay in a tent outside the main several boys and a few grown men waited on him, all were similar in size, but bore a unique set of ears. “Looks like we’re in charge of comms for the operation, you guys know who I am?”
An older man spoke “Aye, Company First Corporal. The Captain says you had first pick of the loot after the fact.”
The boy thought about this for a moment, Renka would be sure to have him repay her for this service.
“Is it true you helped Ruby kill 7 mercs?” a rabbit eared girl asked, the others would chime in with there compliments, “I’ve been wanting to bag one since the war started,” an aquatic boy started, “but of course I got stuck in comms.” The older one spoke again, “It ain't as bad once the loot goes around, I got me a officers custom pistol,” He said, pulling out a pearl handled and silver plated revolver. The other ogled it, their faces covered in envy. “This operation is going to have a lot of it, they say the enemy is dug in on the end of the peninsula, if so they’ll be easy pickings.”
Within this unit, several fighters were under Charmaine's command, and several others were embedded with the other platoons. They would coordinate instructions and facilitate the assault, any issue or disruption in communication could risk the entire operation.
A whistle sounded, and Charmaine was to report to his Captain. His organs twisted and crawled into his throat as he approached the tent. The different masses of muscle and aggression pelted him with backhanded comments and attempts at eye contact, he didn't return any of them. He climbed inside his truck and waited. Eventually Renka got inside as well, closing the door behind her, “Damn boy, I heard of your promotion, you know normally there’s an initiation for that rank?” she reeked of alcohol and carried something wrapped in tinfoil with her, shoving it into the boys lap. As he opened it, the scent of spice filled his nostrils, it was beef, a rare cut too, only two on each cow. It was an expensive cut, and the tenderness and juices filled his mouth as he took the first bite. As he chewed he caught Renkas eyes, locked on him, and he was still chewing as she leaned forward and pulled up his shirt, catching the boy off guard. She found what she was looking for, a carving of an “R” on his side, right on the oblique. “Ahh,” she brushed her thumb over it, “So you were the runt huh? I thought that was made illegal,”
Charmaine swallowed the bite he took, “I was- am, Ma’am, the hospital didn’t agree with the guidelines, said they were Atlas overreach, that they didn’t know what it took to survive as a faunus and had no business telling them how to operate, but the provincial guard raided the village before they could go through with it,” the boy stuttered through his wording.
“Interesting, and if they did, do you think that would affect the war effort?”
“I do Ma’am,” the boy responded. “Ahh,” she took her hands off, and leaned back, putting her hands behind her head, “you must think yourself a real underdog, huh?”
“No Ma’am,” the boy responded.
The truck started, and they were off towards the enemy. Renka wore an inner velcro belt, and attached the other belt as the truck moved, showing off a half foot long pair of curved trauma shears. She got comfortable in her seat as she unsheathed it, “You know I cut off a woman's nose with these? Screamed so loud it activated my ear-pro.” Charmaine didn’t want to, but felt pressured to ask, “Why?”
“We were on a patrol, and came upon a small farm. We went in to clear it, and one of my guys hit a trip wire, and bang… In his last moments he was trying to put out the fire that engulfed his legs, folded frontward right in front of him. The explosion came from behind, took out everything made of flesh. I stared at him for a moment, all the meat on his lower back was gone, I could see his exposed spinal column and even a bit of his ribcage. The craziest part was he didn’t whimper or cry, he simply looked around, and made eye contact with me, and asked me if I had seen where his rifle landed. I shot him, it was quick— or quicker. Anyways fast forward a few weeks and I have to inform his wife of her husband's death, and I walk in on her fucking a random mutt. She tried to explain to herself in a rather casual way, she laughed. That’s what made me know who I was, out of all the girls here, including the red one, only the leopards have a semblance of loyalty. While men are turned into snuff content online, their partners who they swore an oath to, party in night clubs, and will screw the bartender if it means free drinks. I took the nose off to make her hideous, so no man would ever look at her with the same gaze as her original partner.” as she finished, she opened and closed the sheers, snip-snip.
Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
The truck halted with a sudden stop, and it was time to continue on foot, they were behind several platoons of men advancing on the trail in front of them. A blinding snowstorm accursed the formation as they advanced, they could be watched by the enemy and not even know it. Charmaine switched on his radio pack fearing the worst. “We got a man down!” sounded one of the front units. Charmaine unhooked the phone, “What is the size and nature of the enemy? What direction are they attacking from?” he screamed into the speaker, as the other side responded, the calmness confused Charmaine, “No not like that, one of the guys fell in a trench, we can be sure if it's natural or dug out.” He and Renka looked at each other confused. They couldn’t have already met enemy defenses, right? Another radio transmission sounded, “We found an enemy, he seems, confused. Keeps asking us where the rest of the unit went, seems like he thinks we’re friendly.” and another, “We stumbled on a bunker of some type, like a breast work, can’t tell if anyones inside or not.”
“You smell that?” Renka asked, and he could, hot brass. He looked at the ground while advancing, eventually being able to pick up a spent casing. He examined its primer side, 9.3 APEX. He had never heard of such a round, but had heard of a trend in augmenting the size of projectiles, it made them hit harder, but at the cost of range, they were also quieter, easily suppressed as a result. He pocketed the cartridge. From what it seemed, the entire camp was abandoned, or sacked, yet all the key valuables were still in place. Either they left, or some kind of skirmish came about, and they lost.
The vacant camp was a 5 star hotel experience for the southerners moving in. Charmaine stayed with his own who had first dibs on the command headquarters, which were a well upgrade from the snowed-in trenches. There was even food left over, beer too, the nice ones with the champagne style cork. Even the water canteens left behind had Atlas issued flavoring for electrolytes. Charmaine took a drink out of one, and passed it around the other radio’s and jammers, and they spoke of stories of rituals and triumphs in their past. Eventually the canteen was empty, except for a rattle when shaken.
“Its the salt tablet, must’ve not fully dissolved,” said an older radio man,
“Nah I think Atlas canteens have a small ball in them for mixing.” said the one holding it as he tilted it upward to take it out. Holding up a faunus canine after the fact. The room fell silent, the radios took a moment to look at eachother, and Charmaine spoke.
“Hope they got dental.”
The night continued, and they defaulted on what they always did, stories of rituals and hazing, the older one spoke first, “Back in the day for selection for special forces, they walked us out in the blazing sun in the August heat, mosquitos and all, naked. I remember being at attention for half a day, being looked over by guys that were covered in netting, it was humiliating, but it was meant to be humbling, not like what they got today.”
Charmaine spoke next, “Y'all ever heard of a fullpress hang?” The younger ones gathered around to listen to him, “Yeah if you screwed up at Camp Callus you were made to hang from the inside of your fullpress, by the sharp triple bent metal edge.” He showed them the scars on the inside of his hands.
The rabbit went next, “I was in an infantry regiment, and one day at night the D.I. just pulled us out and lead us to one of the buildings were they gave us glow sticks and and those simulation handguns that shoot the pepper spray balls. He just told us to go inside, and play hide and seek with the others. So me and my squad were in the basketball court with like 6 other squads, and then all the glowsticks went out, and a 10 second countdown started. Next thing you know were wondering around paranoid with 6 groups of grown men and women all hunting each other.”
“Who won,” A cheetah faunus asked, “Well, not the guys who didn’t have night vision.”
“Lucky,” the kid said, “you got the fun hazing, I was in Rader Prep, and we had to do what was called a dehydration exercise, still not sure if that's a real thing. They had us doing half mile sprints, and kept giving us liquor instead of water, by the end I couldn’t even open up my own hand without help from the other, some of us were using the ground to pry them open.”
“That ain’t nothin,” said the amphibian, he held up his hand, wiggling his digits, “Before I joined the Marine Corps, I used to have webbed fingers,” the group looked at him shocked, some spat out their drinks. “Yeah,” he continued, “It was a few months into basic infantry school, and all the aquatics were rounded up by this one officer chick, a lot kinder than most. I still remember her showing us to a room. We didn’t know what awaited us there, but before we went in, she spoke to all of us. “If you don’t want to do this, you are NOT cowards.”” The boy made his best impression of a kindergarten teacher trying to inspire a child.
“You see we couldn’t hold a standard issue rifle correctly, and the ones with the trigger guard that went over the whole hand were being sent to the front. So we entered the room to find a bunch of expensive liquor, and a bag full of box cutters.” The room fell quiet, letting him finish, “The first of the kids went, one of the smaller ones who wanted to prove himself, downed half of one of the bottles, and cut away the skin between his thumb and index. Screamed real loud too, and the next kid went, we made a whole drinking game out of it. Of course it was only near the end of the process that an NCO came in to see what the fuss was about, and only then were we informed that we were supposed to sit on our hands for about an hour to numb it down so we wouldn’t feel anything. That is uhh— one of the memories of all time.”
The Major and his Corporal walked through an improvised and snowed over path, speaking casually as they did. “You have a girl back home?” the Major inquired, he walked in front with his rifle at a casual low ready. “No Sir,” said the Corporal, “I was hoping the uniform would help me out with that, but the girls back home, they uh — aren’t really into short guys.”
The Major took in the information, “I don’t have one either, guess they never really paid any attention to me, was never really sure what led to that kind of relationship. Felt like such an impossible feat growing up, yet so many others had their engagement rings wrapped around their boots.”
“I understand,” said the Corporal, “I stopped pursuing that kind of thing last time I was in the big city. I asked this one girl out, all she managed as a response was a chuckle. Never really felt the same after that, honestly feels like I’ve been taking up deployments as a way to avoid going back home, to many judgmental eyes.”
“Ah,” the Major started, “I feel the same way, mocked for the one thing that supposedly still had merit, by a population far removed from the consequences. I remember reading about soldiers in ancient times, given all the honor, all the praise, before getting sent off to the battlefield. Then after the fact, hundreds of the same people who wrote and spoke this praise, many of the girls that threw flowers at them, poured into fields, to pull out their teeth to sell or to make dentures out of. They did so because healthy young men would provide the best quality product, and all that praise, well, then it meant nothing.”
