PLANET: ASCUNA - DATE: 28 MARCH 2167

"Count cadence delay cadence count cadence sound off!"

"One!"

"I can't hear you!"

"Two!"

"Better do your best!"

"Three!"

"'Fore you find my foot!"

"Four!"

"All up in your chest!"

"A- one, two, three four, what the heck we here for? We like it here, we love it here, we finally found a home!"

"A what?"

"A home!"

"A what?"

"A home away from home!"

The cadence drew to the end but the steady beat of marching continued. Syarrhe called out left, left, left right, right-oh-left! as needed while thinking of another cadence. Her trainer had been trained by Americans, and they used American cadences, mostly. She thought of a good one.

"Mo-tivation, check!" She called out.

"Hoorah!" They called back.

"Mo-tivation, check!"

"Hoorah!"

"Are- you- motivated!"

"Motivated, motivated, downright dedicated! You can check us out, you can check us out, hooah!"

She started another, and kept them going. The singing didn't stop until they had reached the end of the three-kilometer track, and Syarrhe called them to a halt. Sweat pooled on her bronze skin, and on theirs as well (except Twel'Kijo's, since Skydians didn't sweat). Everyone was out of breath, their shoulders weighed down by fifty-pound sacks, and she called them to face her. They stood at attention, posture skewed some by heaving lungs, and she nodded once.

"Alright," she said, "I noticed yesterday that the twelve of you didn't seem to group together much in the Mess Hall. I know we can't all get along, but I want to see some of those separate groups join up tonight. You need to know each other, because none of you will trust a stranger with your life when the time comes. Now," she planted her hands on her hips, "For the rest of the day, the thirteen of us are going to have a little quality bonding time. I hope you'll enjoy it as much as I've enjoyed planning it out."

Half an hour passed, and they were out beyond the jungle that bordered Nafrorix, in the golden field beyond. A deep canyon cut across part of this field, with a fifty-foot-drop to a deep blue river. A rope bridge had been strung across this canyon. A series of empty ammo cases sat in stacks fifty feet from the rope bridge on this side, and a number of sawhorses were on the other, placed in a circle. In the middle of the sawhorses were a heap of sandbags. Syarrhe faced her formation, who had just moved back to a platoon formation after moving single-file through the woods. She eyed them; everyone was sweating, and still carrying their backpacks. A water-buffalo, a large cylindrical structure on the back of a motorized vehicle, sat not far off.

"When I say fall out, I want you to drain your canteen, drink all the water, walk to the water-buffalo, refill your canteen, drop of your pack next to it, and then return and form up once more. Understood?"

"Yes, Sergeant!"

"Platoon!" She watched the anticipation glimmer in their eyes. "Fall, out!"

They all stepped back, pivoted, and strode away, forming the same clusters from the night before. Her hope was that those clusters would change after today. They had all chosen field artillery, had all survived their initial training, had all been ordered onto this mission- and now would all suffer the same torments, far worse than anything she'd done so far.

She waited in the same spot, taking long pulls of water from her canteen, while the troops glugged down their own water, refilled their canteens, dropped off their packs, and fell back in. Within five minutes of the sergeant yelling at them to hustle, they were back in formation.

"Next time, I want it to only take half that long!" She barked once all twelve were back in formation. She saw the reddened cheeks of the last private to fall back in, Carrhe, and narrowed her eyes at the girl for a moment. Syarrhe came to stand before all twelve and folded her hands behind her back.

"Today," she began, "You will be completing an obstacle course."

She saw their expressions bleeding through composure; they thought this would be nothing.

"If you fail," she then continued, "You will die."

(They wouldn't, of course, but the fear now entering their eyes reassured her.)

Syarrhe began to pace. "You see those ammo cases? And the sawhorses? You all need to work together to get the ammo cases into the circle of sawhorses. If you each try to carry an ammo case across the rope bridge, you will fall into the canyon and die. So I hope you can come up with a better system than that. You have one hour to transport fifty ammo cases; if you can't accomplish this, then you will be cleaning the mess hall together for the next two weeks, as well as performing night PT. I hope you can do it."

She snapped to attention. "Platoon- fall, out!"

The next hour passed with considerable hard work and effort and lack of regard for the instructions. More than once, a troop fell, their hand barely grasping the rope as an ammo case tumbled freely into the canyon below. Another person would pull them back up, and they'd scramble precariously across the wavering rope bridge back to solid ground. Syarrhe watched as twelve troops made repeated trips back and forth across the rope bridge; Private Katya tried to make herself heard as she suggested they form stations and train the cases across the canyon, but she was drowned out by the more rowdy troops.

The hour ticked by, cases slowly trickling into the sawhorse circle. A number of them had already fallen into the canyon, meaning it was impossible to get all fifty in the sawhorse circle. Though Syarrhe knew they had already failed, she still commended their persistence.

"One hour!"

She called, and then had them form back up in front of her. They waited anxiously as she, too, crossed the rope bridge, and then approached the sawhorse circle. She looked in and counted quickly.

Thirty-seven.