Grunt Work

The New Hire In The Trenchcoat

Training is a lot of fun. It's basically Fetch.

It's exactly like Fetch.

It's Fetch.

I've got really good at driving Mr Huggles; it's basically like driving a car, only with up and down, and they have us chase after this ball that flies above the pool and we have to catch it. Since Mr Huggles has eight tentacles, it's not really a problem. But it can zoom about all over the place, making it much harder and, worse, sometimes it zaps us with an electric taser gun thing, which isn't so good. Especially in the water. The shit stings.

I was headed to the infirmary after getting zapped on my leg when I ran into the new hire.

Now I'm not one to judge, but he's a little bit weird.

I was limping along - not really paying attention, to be honest, on account of the pain - and I turned a corner and bumped into this really short fella wearing a fedora and a trenchcoat. When I bumped into them, they let out a couple of really loud squeaks.

'Sorry about that, bro,' I said. 'Didn't see you there. I was just, erm,' I stopped because I'd accidentally knocked their hat off and got a look at their face. It was a raccoon.

Which is weird. We don't have raccoons in New Zealand.

'Perfectly all right,' said the raccoon in a deeply deep voice. Weirder still, it had one of those fancy British accents. I thought raccoons were from America. Could have moved to live abroad, I suppose. There was a sound of squeaking from under its trenchcoat and something was moving around under it. I saw a paw poke out, holding a bag. 'Give that back!' said a higher pitched voice. 'It's mine! I stole it!'

'Well now it's my turn to steal it,' said another squeak.

The raccoon's head that poked out from the top of the trenchcoat disappeared. 'Will you two be quiet?' said the deeper voice, 'I'm talking here,' and a moment later the raccoon reappeared from out the top. 'Forgive me,' he said. 'My stomach just won't shut up today,' his right arm reached up and tipped his fedora to me, and I noticed the hand was a robot's hand. Which is really fucking cool, it's amazing what they can do with prosthetics these days. Makes my foot look pretty basic, to be honest.

The raccoon passed me by and I stood there for a bit, thinking things over. Now I know I haven't exactly been a grunt for long, and I kinda skimmed guard orientation and training in favour of being beastmistress and all, but I'm pretty sure that talk of stealing wasn't on. But I didn't really know who to report it to? I thought about following them, but my leg was aching pretty bad, and they'd already disappeared around the corner at the end of the corridor by the time I'd thought to go chase after them. I decided that I'd tell a security guard on my way to the infirmary, if I passed one.

The infirmary was pretty quiet, it was just me and someone who'd got separated from their arm, so it was a bit of a wait to get my leg seen to, but eventually a friendly nurse popped by my bed and took in my details and gave my leg a quick look. 'Oh that is a nasty wound,' he said.

'I know,' I said, 'it's going to be a cracking scare, I reckon.'

'You can't give me a robot arm!' said the other patient, so loudly that I heard them from across the large room. 'It won't match my other one!'

'They've got a fair point,' I said to the nurse, who nodded as he took my blood pressure, my arm tingling a bit from the wrapping thing.

'Now, then, what do we have here?' the doctor appeared suddenly to my side. I hadn't noticed them walk up to me, and I fancy I'd been keeping a good eye out.

'Hiya Doc,' I said, then looked at their nametag to see 'Dr S Mairon, M.D., They/Them'. The name rung a bell but I couldn't place it. I pointed to my leg. 'Hey Doctor Mairon, just got a bit zapped in training today. I was wondering if you could have a look at it?'

'Of course,' they said quietly, leaning close as if it were a secret or something, which I didn't really get. But they looked at my leg thoroughly enough.

'Hey, since I have you here,' I said to the two as they looked over my wound, 'I ran into this weird fella on the way here. He was a raccoon.'

Doctor Mairon stopped their examination to look up at me. They seemed a little bit worried; definitely paler, at least. I didn't think my leg was that bad.

'Best to let it slide,' the nurse said.

Mairon nodded. 'Besides, this leg needs a good rest.'

'Oh I couldn't do that, Doc,' I said, horrified. 'I have to get back to Mr Huggles.'

'Mr ...Huggles?' Mairon asked, frowning.

'You know, the Kraken?' I explained, confused how they didn't know. 'He's not just my work partner. He's my mate.'

'Yes. Yes, of course,' said Mairon, though I had a feeling that they didn't get it. 'Well, the nurse here will treat your wound. It looks superficial but I'll have it scanned for a possible fracture, just in case,' they smiled and stepped away from the bed. I looked to the nurse to watch him walk off to get some supplies, and in the second I looked away Doctor Mairon had completely disappeared. I looked all around the infirmary but couldn't see them anywhere. The nurse came back and began fussing about my leg, gave me an injection to numb the pain. I tried asking the nurse more about the raccoon, but he didn't answer, and eventually I just gave up and settled back in the bed. Might as well have a quick nap.

It must have been a long one because I woke up halfway into an MRI machine. It wasn't a great feeling, to be honest. I wasn't claustrophobic or anything, but I'd had enough of those things from my time in the military hospital, and was happy to be out of it. I was happy to be out of the infirmary completely, after that, and when the doctor told me that I was fit enough to leave, after a brief period of observation, I shot out of there as fast as I could.

I was a good few levels away before I stopped to think. I didn't really give any thought to which way I'd been going, so I got out my tablet with the cracked screen, brought up my map app, and checked where I was. Then I checked where Security was. It was a few levels up, and quite a trek, but I figured it was worth it. Besides, my leg was still numb from the injection so I felt up to it. I made it up there in only twenty minutes or so.

Security was quite a large room. Aside from the hundreds of screens taking up one of the walls and the rows of countless desks with computer monitors on top of them, the place seemed darker than usual - and having been working at the secret lair for a couple of weeks, now, I'd got pretty used to the dark, so this must dark must have been very dark. I could only see the security guards at their desks thanks to their silhouettes blocking the glare from their monitors. I wondered how they could stand to look at such a bright screen all day, then noticed that they all wore those thick skiing goggles with the dark tinted glass. That'd help, well enough.

I walked up to one of the desks. 'Excuse me, mate. Could you happen to point me to the direction of your boss? The head honcho? Oh, the Chief, I think that's what it's called?'

The guard at the desk turned their head to look up at me. Even while looking away from the screen, they kept on typing. I'm not really sure what or why they were typing, and it hurt to look at the screen to make it out, so I didn't. The guard didn't say anything, just nodded to a door at the back end of the room, opposite the wall of screens.

'Cheers, bro,' I said cheerfully, and made my way to the door. I knocked on it.

'Enter,' said a deep voice from inside.

I opened the door and stepped inside - then paused. Behind the desk was the raccoon.