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RP: 4th Fleet (NSN) [Mission 2.1] Hiking

"I guess I'll have a drink." Avel said, walking over to the cooler and grabbing a bottle. Then she reached for a second one. "Does Phaedra drink?"

So far, in her opinion, this trip had been a waste of time. All they had done so far is hike through the woods and climb a rock wall. Somehow this qualified as training. Maybe there would be target practice later on?
 
Arieg was sitting down with his pack and gear leaning against the shack next to him when something caught his eye. He was facing away from the group looking out over the firing range, something was moving. Quietly he stood up and picked up his IBR, bringing it into his shoulder. He slowly and quietly walked off out of sight and into the all consuming darkness. A few minutes later a trio of shots rang out.
 
"Just once I would like to have a night out that does not end in shots being fired."

"Yeah, yeah, this is why we can't have nice things, get off your lawn, ect." Harm said, pouring shots for the group and then placing the filled shotglasses into the ice to keep them chilled. The first one she'd hand out to Wazu, the second would go to Avel, and the third and fourth would remain in her hands,

"Lets get this started!" Harm said.
 
Cedric shrugged, "Well Admiral, we wouldn't be Marines if we didn't shoot somethin' by the end of the day."

Fishing a bottle of beer from the cooler, Cedric snatched up a second in his other hand for Sawyer. Heading over the fire, the first of the icy brews was placed in Sawyer's lap as he sat by the fire. Moments later, Cedric took a seat, and cracked open his own bottle before taking a satisfying drink of it's contents: followed by a long sigh of satisfaction after a long day of running and physical exercise. He leaned forward, enjoying the warmth of the fire as Harm declared that they should all start sharing war stories. Cedric looked over the members of the squad. Many of them probably didn't have many "war stories" to share with the rest of the group.

Phaedra, Matteo, Harm, Wazu, and Avel: for sure they had stories to tell. Each one of them had been in the unit longer than Cedric (or any of the green-horns) so he was willing to bet that they had plenty of battle scars to show off. Cedric had . . . one. Laura matched his record in terms of tales to tell.

'Well, that's not exactly true.' He thought to himself with a glance down to the beer in his hands, 'One that I can remember, anyways. I've got at least one other on her.'

Then there were people like Bernhard or Sawyer: new arrivals who had arrived in the unit just in time to see it come back from it's most recent mission. So the most that they could probably tell the squad would be stories from basic training. Cedric let out a short sigh, which was followed by another sqig of beer.

"So since I had a bad case of dead at the last op: anybody want to tell me what happened?" Cedric asked.
 
Phaedra accepted one of the drinks Harm had poured, nodded, and then sat down by the fire. Most of the squad had also found their way to the fire and sat down around it. Phaedra sniffed the chilled drink curiously when shots rang out in the dark. She jerked in the direction the shots came from and changed her eye implant to thermal. Arieg had apparently gone off into the dark and to shoot at something, and Phaedra sighed and returned her left eye's vision to normal.

"That Mercenary is lucky we are on leave..." thought Phaedra.

Phaedra sipped her drink and cautiously decided she liked it, whatever it was. Knowing how she reacted to alcohol, she mentally prepared herself for retelling the story of how she got her scars.

"So since I had a bad case of dead at the last op: anybody want to tell me what happened?" asked Cedric.

Phaedra glanced at Harm and Wazu, as they had the best perspective on Cedric's sacrifice. She set her drink down and prepared her datapad with the footage from the W3301.

"Note to self, 'Jaguar' fitting moniker for the W3301."
 
Harm laughed, “IT IS OK GUYS, I GOT THIS!”

She then downed her shot and quickly poured herself another, her neko body would break down the alcohol much faster than her human counterparts. The whisky itself was 25 years old, much older than she was and it qent down smooth with only a hint of burn at the end of the drink… but that would be something she could enjoy in detail at a later time.

“So we got to spend some time in a casino, spending the old man’s money while he went to talk with the local black syndicate leader only it turns out that Fhion was already there and had set us up to look like the badguys. Huge clusterfuck, Pheadra’s shooting people from the roof, Cedric’s getting stabbed, Avel was injured pretty bad, and Wazu here went and got himself shot.

Fast forward a bit and Cedric has blown a hole in the wall while I am expertly fighting off Fhion and her minions. While we’re leaving through that back door the syndicate’s armored soldiers are charging in the front so Cedric decides to buy us some time with the whole noble sacrifice thing. He leads them off in another direction while the rest of the squad hops into a halftrack for a get away. After the hurt Pheadra laid down on their vehicles, they weren’t looking to give chase.”

“Funny,” Wazu said, taking his shot and putting the shot glass down by his side, “I see to remember you getting your throat torn out,”

“I hardly use it, I’m not as frail as you are,” Harm ribbed, "Oh, and in case you're wondering Cedric, you got shot. Double tap to the chest and one to the head. Not everyone in the syndicate is bad at their jobs apparently.

Now...

Pheadra owes me a story if I recall correctly."
 
Naomi had been quiet thus far, letting everybody else speak while she had run, climbed, and then hiked along with the rest of them. She had little desire to speak at this time, having been unexpectedly overtaken by a pressing melancholy, and memories of days of the past. Being in a big fight in a casino had not helped, but she supposed it was really just her mind being a bitch, because it could.

Her first real interaction came when everybody had set up their kit and moved in around the campfire. She had quickly gone through her kit, to make sure it was all as desired, and then moved to join the others quietly.

Her eyes were on the .45 SS Special in her hands as she listened to all her squadmates going on about this or that. Unlike the others she wore her basic uniform of cargo pants, boots, t-shirt and green pullover, and her beret was packed in her bag. Apart from the things she was issued upon enlisting, and some things from the casino work, Naomi Scroggins really owned very little.

Hell, it was all meant for military use anyway, so it had to be rugged to last very long.

Her hands worked silently over the weapon, polishing imaginary dirt and mud from the silver-reflective surfaces of it.

"Well," she said calmly and without looking up once Harm was done. "At least we know Harm's one mean story-teller, so there's that."
 
"Now...Phaedra owes me a story if I recall correctly," said Harm, looking at Phaedra intently. Phaedra realized that all the eyes in the camp were upon her, and there was no shrinking back from it this time. She cleared her throat and stared at her cybernetic left hand.

"What I am about to tell you does not leave this camp," she said, looking around the camp to meet eyes with the rest of the squad.

She looked back to her left hand and clenched it into a fist.

"It was just a training mission," she began, her tone solemn.

"Live-fire simulation with power armor; drop in, destroy the strongpoint, eliminate the automated enemies, get back out. Simple, right?"

Phaedra leaned forward and placed both hands around her glass.

"Well, something...more correctly, everything went wrong. I was on point, with four squadmates on my six. We approached the bunker from the rear through a thick forest...eliminating any defenses before an alarm could be raised. I entered the small clearing between the woods and the bunker and then..." Phaedra's remaining eye seemed to glaze over. She swallowed and took another sip from her glass.

"And...and then, everyone was screaming. Whatever they got hit with hit me too; all the scopes and sensors were dead...I couldn't eject...black smoke was everywhere...I..."

Phaedra paused for a moment before continuing.

"Somehow I got out of my armor, but by that time my skin was melting...one of the coolant lines ruptured and sprayed my whole left side. I've never felt such agony..." Phaedra's face was drained of color and she looked ill.

"I can't even remember what happened exactly...I just remember waking up in the med bay, barely conscious from the pain. My left side was...gone," said Phaedra, drawing a line from her left eye down to her left leg. She glanced at her glass and slammed the rest of the drink down. She clenched the glass tightly in her left hand.

"And the best part was, the IPG just covered it up. They blamed me for whatever had happened, and I accepted it; what else could I do? I was the only survivor from my unit. I led my friends into an ambush; on a training mission."

"I do have my theories as to what really happened; I was supposed to be dead."

"What better way to test out a new weapon then to use it on your own people. I guess they didn't count on someone surviving..."

The glass that Phaedra had clenched in her left hand shattered under the pressure from her cybernetic fingers.

"I...I've said too much. Excuse me," said Phaedra, rising to her feet and retreating into the darkness away from the fire.
 
"Hey wait up!" Avel said as she got up and chased after Phaedra into the woods. She would quickly catch up to her, reach for her shoulder to turn her around and began speaking.

"You think you have it bad? At least you actually remember what happened and still have all your freedoms. Me, I have a years worth of memories missing, my career in the marines has been one gigantic disaster, I've been demoted to P4C AND NOBODY HAS EXTENDED THE COMMON FUCKING CURTSEY OF TELLING ME WHY!"

Avel forcibly calmed herself before she went on a massive psychotic rant.

"The important thing is you can quit the army whenever you want. I doubt you will seeing as you actually have something to show for all your hard work." She said reaching for her pistol and holding it up near her face.

"This is the only way I'm ever going to get out of this. Had I known what kind of future was in store for me, I would have done it a long time ago."
 
Cedric seemed to be stunned in to silence.

When it first happened, it had been because of how casually Harm informed him that he had died. Of course, that wasn't so shocking that it would have kept him in silence the whole night. After all, for somebody who had just died: he felt incredibly healthy. However, what really hit him was Phaedra's story. As Harm had finished up, she had addressed Phaedra about a story due, and he couldn't help but watch their squad leader in patient silence as she started her story. He listened closely, seeming to totally forget the beer he still held in his hand, and watching her as she went on with her story. It was a shocking one, to be sure. However, he was soon torn from his silence as he watched her (followed moments later by Avel) go bolting off in to the darkness. Dropping his beer on the ground, he rose up, and went after them just behind avel.

He arrived just in time to see Avel holding her gun up to her face. He hadn't even heard what she had said.

Cedric reacted on what he saw, "Private Sitkeas! Put. That. Gun. Down!" He ordered as he approached.

Cedric looked to Phaedra, "Sergeant, are you okay?" He asked.
 
Seeing three people go bolting off into the wilderness was just that little extra tap that Sawyer needed. Grabbing his DM rifle he got up and silently followed into the woods to see what in the world was going on. He got there in time to see Avel with her gun up pointing at her face, SSgt Cedric yelling at her to put it down and Sgt Phaedra standing there impassively looking at Avel. 'Well looks like this little training exercise is getting weirder and weirder as time goes on' Sawyer thought to himself as he walked forward, finally breaking the concealment offered by his hand made ghillie suit. "Well then P4C Sitkeas, considering everything I'd think you would at least want to try to make some friends to improve your personal life but it seems that you just keep pulling yourself down and that's a bad sign. Hell I'm no doctor but even being from the ass end of nowhere and a simple mechanic, if one damn thing is not working witht he others it throws everything off. I mean I've tried to strike up some sort of conversation with you so that we can at least make some sense of a friendship so that you have some form of solace in a friendly companion" Sawyer said as his accent thickened.
 
"I just want to know what happened." Avel said plainly while taking the pistol from the front of her own face and letting it drop by her side. "Not asking for much here."

"I've already figured out that all this misery is my own fault for allowing myself to be suckered into signing up for something I probably would have said 'hell no' to if I actually thought about it."

"Now that I am thinking about it, I probably could have pressed legal charges against those scientist bastards and lived out the rest of my days in luxury. But I was stupid as hell and did this instead."

At this point Avel was visibly forcing herself to continue speaking and looked to be on the verge of a violent mental breakdown. She then gave an incredibly wrong looking 'cheerful' smile.

"So why don't you tell me what happened. I'm sure it's absolutely hilarious and laden with complex ironies."
 
"So wait, you're saying that your memory loss was caused by some mad scientist type shit? Is that what I'm hearing? Now I've heard some strange things but that takes the cake, sounds to me like you definitely need someone to talk to who isn't a whole shitload of ranks above you and can at least try to just talk about random shit. You've obviously been bottling up a lot and now it is all coming out all at once, this is a not good thing" Sawyer drawled as he looked at Avel with a rather concerned and empathetic look on his face.
 
"It wasn't because of 'mad scientist shit,' Private. Aubrey." Cedric snapped, speaking over his shoulder to the green-horn, "It's a simple medical procedure. Scans of your brain are taken every time you visit the medical bay, copying your memories, and all of that stuff down. If you die, they clone you based on the most recent scan, and everything before that is lost: like with me."

One hand rested very lightly on his still holstered HHG, watching Avel's movements very carefully. Her smile was most certainly not comforting at the moment . . . and she still had a loaded gun. Cedric eyed her cautiously as he took only one more step forward. He glanced to Sergeant Phaedra as he did so.

"Private Sitkeas, put the gun away." Cedric repeated, "Calm down. People don't like to tell their life stories when you've got a loaded gun out. So just put it away and if the Sarge wants to tell you, she can tell you." He glanced once more at Phaedra, "Right now she's dealing with some tough memories. Just let her relax for a bit, Private."
 
Phaedra took a moment to gather her composure before she addressed Avel.

"Firstly, Avel, holster that weapon. Now!" ordered Phaedra. She turned to Sawyer.

"Private, return to the camp right now; we will handle this," she said, then turned back to Avel.

"Secondly, I apologize for withholding the information from you up until now. I had hoped that you would like to hear the information away from the scrutiny of the squad. It was my fault for not telling you sooner."

"Thank you, Cedric. I can handle it from here," said Phaedra with a glance. She turned and looked Avel directly in the eyes and placed her right hand on her shoulder.

"You are a good soldier. You fought in several battles and earned the respect of your comrades. But the trouble started when you suddenly collapsed after returning from one of our sorties. You were unconscious for two days." Phaedra straightened and crossed her arms across her chest.

"While we ate in the mess hall you sat beside our Master Chief at the time, Fian. I cannot recall the specifics of your conversation with him, but I remember being shocked at your utter disrespect for a superior commissioned officer. The Master Chief ordered Chief Ran to escort you to the brig until after the promotion ceremony we were about to have."

"Due to your collapse earlier, I had a feeling you were not completely in your right mind, as you ignored a very basic rule of military conduct. But after you were escorted out of the mess hall, I then heard a gunshot. I ran out into the corridor outside only to..." Phaedra gulped.

"You attacked the Chief as he escorted you brig," said Phaedra, her hands now on her hips.

"He was forced to retaliate to subdue you, and then you escalated. One of our teammates at the time, Sam, drew a bead on you with her HHG and fired. She fired a RED round at you; what the hell she was doing firing a RED round inside a ship I have no idea. But after you were hit by that round there was nothing left but meat," said Phaedra.

"Believe me when I say that no one was happy with the way it ended. You wouldn't have been demoted, nor severely punished after your time in the brig. But you attacked and injured a member of the Corps, a rather treasonous and rebellious act. That, is why you were demoted after they revived you, Avel. It was a combination of circumstances that resulted in the most terrible of endings." Phaedra put both of her hands on Avel's shoulders.

"I am sorry to have kept you in the dark Avel, it was not intentional on my part. I have told you the truth; accept it, and overcome it. I know you can."
 
When Phaedra finally told Avel what had happened her expression turned from that of rapt curiosity to complete and utter horror at what she was hearing. When Phaedra finally finished, she stood there in complete silence for a few moments as she tried to process what she had just heard.

Then something in her head snapped and she couldn't take it anymore.

"I have to admit, I am impressed in a way." She began, her expression lowering into a frown. "Even when I expect nothing but the worst you still manage to surprise me!"

"You not only got away with murder but made it look easy." She reached up to take Phaedra's hands off her shoulders. "A lifetime of constantly trying to please you people and you blow me away at the first sign of trouble."

Avel's eye twitched as she continued. "But in the end I have nobody to blame but myself. I made the mistake of caring about what others thought, signed up for something I didn't want and was blown away for my troubles. This ends today."

Taking a few steps back, Avel raised her gun and placed it against the side of her head. trying to will herself to do the one thing that would end her misery.
 
"This ends today." said Avel.

"Dammit, somehow I knew it would come to this," thought Phaedra.

When Avel took a step back, Phaedra stepped forward. As soon as she saw Avel raise the gun, Phaedra attempted to grab her by the wrist to pull the gun out and away from her head. She then would then attempt to disarm Avel by twisting her gun hand out and away from her body.
 
"Aye, aye; sergeant" Sawyer replied as he turned and faded back into the underbrush; from there he simply called out and said "well if what they just said about the whole cloning thing is real then killing yourself won't help, you'll just come back in the same shitty ass condition that you are in now."
 
Cedric nodded to Phaedra, his hand leaving its place at his HHG. He had been about ready to turn around and head back to the camp when Avel suddenly put the gun to her head. Suddenly . . . everything stopped. Even Cedric's heart quit beating as he watched her. He moved towards her, but Phaedra moved first. As she went for the gun hand, he was still lunging forward. The only thought in his mind the entire time this was happening?

'If there is a god out there, then don't let it happen.'
 
Avel made little effort to resist Phaedra's attempt to disarm her, she was too mentally exhausted to even show any outward reaction and simply dropped the gun when it was pulled from her head.

"Knowing my luck, the gun probably would have shot confetti instead of bullets anyways." She said, reaching into her pocket with a free hand and grabbing her data jockey.

"Here." She handed it over to Phaedra. "It was supposed to be my suicide note explaining the whole sad pathetic story so people would know why I put a bullet in my head. You can read it now I guess. Things can't get any worse at this point."

"Now if you'll excuse me I'm going back to the ship. I need to be alone and think about some things."

With that said Avel would attempt to remove her arm and take off into the woods at full speed.
 
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