Tales Within the Chaos

Some Peace And Quiet

I ease back the trigger and feel the stock of the musket crash into my shoulder. The loud crack deafens me for a moment and I immediately look down range to see if I hit my target. A cardboard cutout of a man with a knife stands just twenty meters away, I missed it entirely. A loud crack rings out from beside me and the bullet crashes just off-center of the target's chest. My eyes wander over to look at the man who shot the bullet: Matteo Giordano. Tall and handsome, smart and strong, kind yet tough; he's an outstanding person. He must notice my stare because he turns and looks at me with an earnest smile.

"What?"

I smile back, my cheeks flushing red.

"Oh, nothing, good shot Matteo."

He laughs and points out it wasn't too good of a shot. He didn't exactly hit the heart or the hand so if it was real life, the assailant would still be armed and alive. I'm not buying his coy act, it was a solid shot and he should be proud of it.

"Hey, Matteo, I have something important to tell-"

My voice gets cut off when Instructor Vidal hits the back of my head.

"Cadet Sereno! Did I say you could slack off?! Start reloading, now!"

I frown at being cut off, but I have to listen. Reloading goes by slowly, I'm not in a huge race to fire again but when this ends, I'm going to continue what I had to say to Matteo. He fires another round, this time it hits the target in the head.

"Good! Move on Cadet Giordano!"

The Instructor shouts with her irritatingly brash voice, Matteo pops up and sprints to the next section of training. Crap, I need to hit this target and catch up to him. I aim, ease the trigger, and the shot goes right over its head.

"Sereno! You just killed a child behind him, good work. Reload now before I shove that rifle up your ass!"

It takes every bit of my willpower to not slap Vidal. Four other people come and go before I manage to land a good enough shot. Matteo was long gone by then and I didn't see him again until I managed to finish the drill.

It's early afternoon and we have some downtime, a perfect chance to tell him how I feel. He's over in the exercise area, Jean-Paul and Osborn are with him doing random workouts. When I walk up to the man of my dreams, my heart rate quickens. He's shirtless and glistening with sweat, his jaw clenched tightly as he finishes a pull-up.

"Hey, Matteo?"

I ask quietly, he doesn't seem to hear me.

"Sereno, watch out!"

Jean-Paul screams and I turn to see Osborn stumbling toward me. He must've tripped on weights or something, but regardless the idiot is barreling my way. I step to the side quickly but when I do so, I crash right into Matteo's waist. He goes flying off the pull-up bar and hits the floor with a loud thud. I stumble through and land atop him, I can feel the heat radiating from him as he breathes heavily.

"Holy shit, are you two okay?"

Jean-Paul asks, concern filling her voice. I shoot up to my feet and inspect him head-to-toe, first for my sake, second to see if he's alright.

"Osborn! What the hell?!"

Jean-Paul screams out while marching toward him.

"I fell, what's so wrong about that?!"

"You really could've hurt somebody!"

My stomach drops as I notice Matteo is knocked out cold. He's completely passed out and he hit his head hard on the dirt floor. Osborn and Jean-Paul quickly come over when they hear my gasp. After some more arguing, the two carry the larger Cadet to the infirmary. I was told not to follow and to go report to Instructor Vidal that Matteo was hurt. Great, there goes my chance to tell him again.