I hate this place. It’s a hell hole. I hate the rain, I hate the mud, and I hate the bugs. Especially the bugs. Even the bugs have bugs. Why couldn’t I get a nice posting to an orbital station or a carrier? Been here only 18 hours and everything I own is already wet or muddy or both. The Cats can keep this place, hell I’ll pay them to keep it! Pfc. Zachary “Zip” Naguchi wondered why the Confed wanted this planet back. Sure, it had once been human but so had a lot of other places in the long war. As he glumly considered his rotten luck in getting assigned to this camp he trudged down the muddy path towards the mess tent.
Still being in the repo depot and not assigned to a unit yet he had just finished a job of helping unload a supply shuttle and restocking some of the defensive batteries with anti-personnel rounds. He was tired, sweaty, dirty, and hungry. Just then his foot slipped on a loose piece of packing material and next thing he knew he was looking at the grey sky. Which wouldn’t be bad, lying down, except he was in the mud. Again with the mud. This was my last decent shirt. Damn how I hate this place. Picking himself up he didn’t even bother to wipe himself off but continued resolutely towards the mess tent. At least he would be somewhere dry for his meal.
Stepping into the mess tent he looked around quickly, and not seeing much of a crowd and no one he knew, proceeded to the chow line. Grabbing a tray and silverware he shuffled quickly through the line trying not to listen to the sounds of congealed grey goop as it was dumped on his tray. Why would I ever leave home and Mom’s cooking for this? You would think the Corps would like to get some use out of me before they killed me with food poisoning or starvation.
Grabbing a seat at an unoccupied table Naguchi slowly began to eat, not really savoring anything, just eating because he had to eat. Somehow, someway, the cooks in the Corps had found a way to make all prepared food in the mess tent look the same three general shades of grey, green, or brown. Even the vegetables didn’t look right. It didn’t help matters that everything was plopped together in the same bin on his tray. Oh well, its all going to the same place in the end. Luckily, Naguchi’s father had been in the Confederation Army and had told him a little trick to make anything palatable. Even military food. Add tabasco sauce and never be without it. After a few liberal dashes of tabasco sauce the food at least had some flavor, whether it was supposed to be hot and spicy, only God knew.
Resuming his eating Naguchi looked around kind of hoping someone he knew from the shuttle ride down would walk in. So far no luck. Even though the shuttle had been packed most of the enlisted personnel had been specialists and more senior than him. Still any familiar face would have been welcome, even just to say hi. Not really paying attention too much to his surroundings he missed the person standing next to him. When the bench jostled with someone sitting down Naguchi looked over to his right.
What he saw nearly sent him into a choking fit. A Cat he could have dealt with. An officer he knew how to handle, a senior enlisted he knew how to respond to. But not this. It was the last thing he expected to see sitting next to him while he was filthy, tired, and not suitable for polite company. If Mom could see me know, she skin me alive for looking the way I do with this person sitting next to me. “Dress to impress” she would say. Reaching for his glass of juice he quickly drank some down, mostly to cover his stunned expression, but also to keep from spitting his food back up. That would not do. Definitely not do right now.
Part 5
Sitting next to him was another Marine Pfc. This Pfc. was in a set of clean, if comfortable and used looking, battle dress uniform like everyone else in the tent. Except this set happened to be clean. Which was one abnormal thing about it. The other, and as far as Zachary was concerned, the more important abnormal point was what exactly was occupying that set of clean battle dress. It was a woman.
Sure, women were in the Corps. Nothing wrong with that and they were among some of the best fighters and commanders in the Corps. No it wasn’t that. It happened to be the fact that this particular female Marine had sat down next to Zachary. And that she was the prettiest thing he had seen in a couple of months that wasn’t a hologram or a two-dimensional image. And the fact she was clean. He still couldn’t get over that fact. Everyone, from the highest officer in the camp to the latrine orderly, had some mud on them. Maybe not as much as Naguchi, but everyone had it. But not her.
“Mind if I sit here?” she asked. Not getting a response from Naguchi, who had been staring at her with stunned silence, she asked again. “Private First Class Naguchi, mind if I sit here for lunch? I assume since you’re a Pfc. you can speak. Can’t you?”
Naguchi realized she had asked him twice now and he’d better say something before she got fed up and walked away or thought he was completely brain dead. Of course as good looking as she was she was probably used to this lack of verbal response from the male population. “Uh...Yeah...Sure. Make yourself comfortable.” he finally managed to get out just as it looked like she was reconsidering sitting there after all. “My name is Zachary Naguchi. Been on planet for just under a day.”
“Hi Zachary. I’m Traci Lee, but you can call me Dixie. I just got here and the 1st Sgt. in charge of our group told us to scrounge up some chow then report to the repo depot in an hour.”
“Well you haven’t missed much so far. Just your fair share of rain, mud, and bugs.” Noticing how unenthusiastic she appeared to be looking at her food, Zachary took his bottle of tabasco sauce and tapped her on the forearm with it. Traci looking up from where she’d been vainly trying to sort out her food into recognizable items, smiled and took the battle from him.
“Thanks, I have no idea where my gear is or I would have brought my own. Is the food always this bad or is this just special?” Saying this she began adding a large amount of tabasco sauce to each of her grey, green, and brown piles that were on her tray. Even the pile that looked like vegetables. If one closed their eyes and pretended they were green, orange, and other vegetable colors. “So what’s your MOS?” she asked trying to keep the conversation going and not look at her food too much.
Looking over at her again Zachary couldn’t help but notice how intently her blue eyes were studying him. They were the darkest shade of blue he had ever seen, so dark they appeared almost black, but it was like looking at a drop of oil. The way they collected and reflected the light he swore he could see a thousand different shades of blue in her eyes. It was like looking out on the night sky that very last moment before the last ray of light disappears beyond the horizon. He was still looking at her eyes, not having responded to her question, when some survival instinct kicked in and he realized he’d been quiet too long. “Uh...uh...” was all he was able to stammer before being interrupted.
“Hahahaha. Don’t worry Zachary, I don’t bite and I don’t kick little lost puppy dogs. That’s exactly what you remind me of at this moment and I’ve always had a thing for lost puppy dogs.” Traci replied in a lighthearted and friendly voice.
This just made Naguchi even more awkward but he realized he had to say something. Preferably the answer to her original question. If only she wasn’t so good looking. Her laugh is must be what God hears from the angels. I’m never going to live this down if I keep acting this way. At least my sister isn’t here to see this! Taking a discreet breath of air Naguchi gathered up his courage and will, which were somewhere in fantasy land, and issued his reply to her question. “My MOS is just your standard Marine grunt, one rifle and assorted equipment. My secondary is as a radio operator. This is my first tour out here on the front. What about you?” Well he managed to get it all out without stumbling over it like a drunken pilot.
“Ditto, for the primary MOS. Secondary is intelligence. This happens to be my second tour out here on the battle lines. My first was in Vespus helping to put down Kilrathi raiders in the system.” Traci studied Naguchi a little more closely and finally noticed that his entire backside of his uniform and head was still caked in mud. “So what happened to you there,” she asked indicating his uniform.
“Oh, nothing. Nothing at all. Just decided I would take an unexpected break and look at the sky for a minute or so,” Zachary replied in a light hearted manner and with a smile on his face. That had always been something he’d been good at, laughing at his little mistakes and quarks.
Just as he was about to shovel some more food in his mouth this horrible stench came wafting by him. Looking around quickly he noticed a small group of Marines, including a sergeant and two corpeals sitting at the table behind him and Traci. They looked like hell. Scruffy, even dirtier than him, if that was possible, all the men were unshaven, and they looked like they were going through the motions of being in the mess tent and eating. He noticed several others, Traci amongst them, studying the newcomers. Guess you can tell who the newbies are around here.
“Did you just get in from the bush?” Traci asked without a hint of fear in her voice. She’s braver than I am. I would have at least let them finish their meals.
“Yeah what of it?” a scruffy looking corpeal replied. Naguchi could see his name tag said LeHavre on it. The man appeared OK but there was something about him that just put Zachary on his guard. It was the eyes. They were normal, non-descript brown, standard brown, a thousand other people on the base probably had the same color. But there was something in them and they never stopped looking around the mess tent. They never stopped looking around the mess tent, just kept roving from one point to another, always looking for something and not seeing it. It was a little bit disturbing.
“Just curious, could smell you guys before you sat down. How long were you out there?” she replied evenly, again without any fear in her voice. Naguchi wished he was anywhere else but here at this moment. The way the five of them were staring at the two privates made Zachary feel like he had a target painted on his body. Zachary did not want the sixth guy to turn around. He was one of the largest Marines he’d seen. He had to be at least 2.2 meters tall and weight close to 225 pounds. He just sat there with his back to the two newbies but it was like having a grizzly bear right in front of you. Any second you expected your head to get taken off.
The man slowly turned around and looked both Zachary and Traci over. His gaze, while not as cold as LeHavre’s still sent shudders through Zachary, lingered on their name tags. Pulling a piece of old fashioned paper out of his pocket he looked at it, then at their name tags again. “Oh shit” he muttered. “They had to stick my squad with two babes in the woods pogies. Well if this ain’t great for you.” Looking back up, like he hadn’t spoken he continued to look the two privates over. “You two Pfcs Traci Lee and Zachary Naguchi?” he asked in a neutral voice.
“Correct Sergeant. Neither one of us have been on planet long. Anything we can help you with?” Zachary managed to get out. No sense in letting Traci think he was afraid of some dirty Marines.
“Wellll...for starters you can get over here. Bring your trays. If we like you enough we might let you eat your meals.” saying this he waved them over and gestured to empty spots on the bench. “I’m Sgt. McKenneth, this is Cpl. Angelos, L.CPL.. LeHavre, Privates Trayzk, Shelly, and Baradai. We are the 2nd squad of the 1st platoon. And you’re our new squad mates.”
Zachary and Traci both stopped where they were, not quite in but not quite out of their seats while they digested this piece of news. The reaction from their new squad was less than enthusiastic. “Shit! Sarge, why did we have to get them? There has to be some more experienced people out there we can tap?” Pvt Shelly asserted and pleaded at the same time.
“Yeah Sarge. I’m with Edgar on this one. Why these two? We saw the replacements coming in when we landed, someone must have more experience than these two.” Pvt Trayzk chimed in with his opinion.
Cpl Angelos jumped into the conversation right on the heels of Trayzk’s comment, “Sarge, look at her. She’s not even dirty! She can’t have been on planet more than an hour. And him!” She pointed her finger at Naguchi like she wanted to impale him on it. “He looks like he sleeps in the swamp! Can’t even keep his uniform decent here at base camp! What’s he going to be like out in the field?”
“Stow it. I have my orders and so do these two. They are now part of our squad. As such you will at least maintain the fiction of common courtesy amongst you.” Sgt. McKenneth had laid down the law and he expected it to be followed. “Ms. Lee, says here you worked as a spotter for a sniper back on Vespus?” McKenneth waited for her to reply before moving on.
“Yes Sergeant. We had 22 confirmed kills there.” Traci replied with a hint of pride and satisfaction in her voice.
“Mr. Naguchi, you’re some hotshot radio operator according to this piece of paper but without actual extensive training. Is that also correct?”
“Yes Sergeant it is. My parents run a small electronics and computer supply company back home, its always been a hobby of mine. I guess the Corps figured I didn’t need more than the basic course on military equipment and procedures.” Zachary replied promptly to the question. The sergeant didn’t seem like a person one wanted to keep waiting if one liked breathing.
McKenneth merely grunted at each of their answers. “Well finish your meals. You’ll be boarding with us in our shelter so grab your gear from the repo depot. I’ll introduce you to our Lt and company CO after you’re squared away.”
“Got it Sergeant.” both Traci and Zachary replied on top of each other.