Rome In The Sky: Daybreak

CH 9: A Proper Beatdown

LUKAS/AVA

"Wake! Up!"
Lieutenant Knight Naves shouted as he kicked open the double doors at the far end of the large bay that housed one hundred five Jury cadets. They were awoken by red strobes, blaring alarms, and a rain of arctic water from the ceiling that pelted them in their beds. Lute and another instructor they had not seen before followed, leaning over each bed and screaming unintelligibly in the student's ears as they rushed to respond or react to the environment.
The stupor of twelve hours of sleep quickly vanished in the way of confusion. Lou threw himself from his bed and stood by the foot, eyes darting back and forth, scanning his surroundings. Some cadets ran about in a panic, thinking that there was a fire. Others stood by their beds and covered their ears.
The ceiling of the room was high. Beds lined one wall, arranged with one against the wall and one at the foot of the first, with a small walkway between them and a locker beside each bed. The other wall, a good three hundred meters from the first, had nothing but a horizontal red line painted over it from end to end.
'Hauser wasn't lying.' Lou thought, searching for Ave, who stood a few bunks down. Chills were moving down their backs from the cold water. It poured into Lou's eyes, blurring his vision.
"Cadets, listen up!"
Naves was a middle aged man with a bald head, gaunt face, and eyes like coal. The instructors wore gray trousers, gray boots, and a gray short-sleeved shirts with a letter "I" written on the chest in yellow, and their rank and name inscribed on the left shoulder. Naves looked to be in his fifties or maybe sixties, but all the same, his arms were muscular and gnarled. Although alarms still blasted through the building, accompanied by the sprinklers, his voice rang loud enough to be heard easily.
"You will do exactly what you are told to do, when you are told to do it, yes? Sit down."
Cadets sat down, some on their beds, others on the floor, some didn't recognize the sentence as a command.
"Cadets, stand up. Sit down, stand up, sit down. Stand up. Turn around. Face forward. Sit down."
The students moved slowly, unsure. Some tried to follow, others stood frozen, some gingerly sat on the floor or a bed.
"Cadets, you failed to complete the given tasks in the allotted time. If you fail to follow instructions, there will be consequences, yes? On the other side of this bay, you will see a wall. On this wall is a horizontal red line. On the command of 'hit the wall,' you will have sixty seconds to run to this wall, touch the horizontal red line, and run back to your beds. Cadets, hit the wall."
All cadets took off, some slipping on the wet floor and falling over. One by one, they tapped the wall and turned back to their beds.
"Cadets. You were given sixty seconds to run to the adjacent wall and back. You are late by fifty seconds. You now have ninety seconds. Hit the wall."
Again, many already tiring.
Naves eyed his watch.
"You are late again, this time by nine seconds. You now have one hundred twenty seconds. Cadets, hit the wall."
Ave thought if they ran especially fast this time, he would let them stop, but Lou had a suspicion this was only the beginning of the instructor's fun. The twin's breaths came faster as their hearts thumped. Sweat had begun to roll down their skin and mix with water, and acid made their legs hot.
'Not your typical morning walk, is it.' Ave thought. She concentrated on her steps, trying not to slip. They had already run twelve hundred total meters.
"Listen, Cadets. Maybe I've been unreasonable. So we'll try one more time, yes? You now have two hundred fifty seconds. Hit the wall."
The clamor began again, with gasping, and groans of fatigue and pain.
They made it in the allotted amount of seconds this time, trying to catch their breath.
"I am an Instructor. You will address me as Instructor. The only words you should be heard  saying at this point are 'yes, Instructor,' or 'no, Instructor.' Turn around."
Everyone turned. They remembered.
"On your locker you will see a number. That number is your name. You will be referred to as that number. You will refer to yourself as that number, until we decide you've earned the right to go by your name. Do you understand?"
Silence.
Lute, who had been standing by with the third instructor, shook his head slowly.
"Instructor Naves is talking to himself, aha. Cadets, hit the wall."
The students ran down, woefully exhausted, ran back, and lined up by their beds.
"You have no rank, you have no name, you have no place of origin. You are here now, and you belong to us. Do you understand?" Lute barked.
A chorus of "Yes, Instructor," followed.
The third instructor threw their hands up in defeat.
"I couldn't hear you well enough. Your voices are too weak. You are slow to learn. But we will fix that, yes? Cadets, hit the wall."
Ave looked at her brother and rolled her eyes as if to say, 'here we go again.' He closed his eyes and sighed, clenching his fists. They ran again. Meanwhile, Naves sighed in exasperation, waiting for the students to return.
"When you respond, you will do so with fervor. When issued a command, you will execute with urgency. You were dragging your feet. If you get it right the first time, you won't be made to do it again. Cadets, hit the wall."
A few students collapsed on the way down. More collapsed on the way back. Ave looked at them in dismay. She felt a sensation in her chest as if something was squeezing it, her breathing too rapid to slow, but she had felt it before.
'It's fine, we're fine. It's just running, you've run before.'
"Yesterday, you were given a uniform. You were also given a collection of items that you will carry on your person for the rest of your time here. Cadets, you now have ninety seconds to don this uniform. Go."
The uniform was gray trousers, gray boots that came up to the ankles, a gray undershirt, and a gray collared jacket that buttoned down the front. The Jury crest, a yellow gavel, was on the right shoulder. The left shoulder, where rank was usually sewn, was blank. Cold fingers and tired legs made changing into the uniform far harder than it needed to be. Once most of the students stood fully dressed at the foot of their beds, the bald Instructor looked at his watch, waiting for the ones who had fallen to recover their breath.
"Cadets," Lute said. "You were given ninety seconds to don your uniforms. You were unable to complete this task in the allotted time. At the command of 'front' you will do push-ups. At the command of 'back' you will do flutter-kicks. At the command of 'down' you will squat. Front."
'It's a performance,' the twins mused to themselves, down on the floor.
"Back."
Ave resisted the urge to keep looking around.
'Don't gawk. It'll just make it worse.'
"Down."
Again, some slipped as they tried to get up and fell again. The water on the floor was about an inch high now.
"Cadets, stand up. Instructor Greysen, correct the deficiencies."
Lute motioned to the other instructor, who began walking down the line of bunks, screaming in the student's faces over the rushed way they had put on the uniform.
Lou stared ahead as Instructor Greysen walked up to the candidate beside him. He had in fact mistaken the instructor for a boy from afar because of her height, gruff voice, and aggressive demeanor. He caught a glimpse of warm ivory skin, sharp chin, narrow nose, scowling amber eyes. Her hair was short, almost a buzz cut, and platinum silver. He thought she looked like some kind of silver bird.
"Cadet thirty-two, why are your buttons uneven?" She asked quietly.
The boy started to talk, but Greysen kneed him in the stomach. He doubled.
"That was a rhetorical question!" She leaned down over the cadet, shouting in his ear. "You were told the only words to come out of your mouth were 'yes, Instructor,' and 'no, Instructor.' An explanation of why you are a sorry waste of sperm and an embarrassment to your fellow rodents would exceed your word limit, Cadet. Fix this shit, now!"
Greysen stopped in front of Lou, who continued to stare straight ahead. She said nothing, glaring at him. She was so close he could feel breath on his face. His heart beat out of his chest.
'She's gonna freaking hit me, isn't she,' he thought, bracing.
"Hm." The instructor scoffed, turned, and walked to the next victim. He breathed out, tension leaving his back and shoulders.
She continued her prowl, Lute joining in, and once they had covered the length of the bay, Greysen and Lute made their way back to the front where Naves stood.
"Cadets." Greysen called. "You have shown a lack of regard to my commands and a wanton disrespect to my fellow Instructors. You do not deserve the right to stand on two feet. You have the mental capacity of an ape. You will now place your hands down on the ground in front of you, and you will crawl, you will crawl, to the red line. Go."
Lou sighed heavily. His shoulders ached and his arms trembled by the time they were only halfway across. He could taste salt from the sweat running down his face. It got into his eyes, and stung. As the students shuffled back to their beds, heads hung, feet dragging, Naves issued another command.
"Yesterday you were issued a collection of items. You have sixty seconds to unpack said items and arrange them beside your beds in the order you were given them. Go."
A booklet, a lighter, a multitool, a compass, waterproof graph paper, waterproof pen, a watch, a roll of strong cord. The students arranged them as they were instructed, as best they could, but they were unsure of the original order.
"Instructors, correct the deficiencies."
They walked the length of the bay again with extreme amounts of animosity. The slow, or the clumsy, were met with quick blows to the softer, weaker parts of their bodies. By the time they returned, the cadets cowered, standing beside their lockers with their shoulders forward, their heads down, their eyes averted to the floor.
"Cadets," Lute said, "you have the dexterity of a worm. You do not deserve to crawl. You will lay prone with your stomachs to the floor, and like worms, you will slither, you will slither, to the red line. Go."
They spluttered as they inhaled the water that had accumulated on the floor. Ave motioned to Lou, trying to get him to slow down and rest a little, to slow his breathing. Shaking his head, he dragged himself swiftly and begrudgingly across the cold floor.
"Cadets, stand up." Naves said.
The red lights ceased, the water stopped, the alarms fell silent.
"Walk back to your beds, and stand at ease. Feet shoulder width apart, thumbs interlocked on the small of your back, palms facing rearward."
Lou struggled to his feet.
A handful of cadets remained on the ground, unable to move or rise. Ninety eight returned to their beds and stood as they were instructed to, not moving, not speaking, not looking around.
Presently, another instructor walked in.
"Bay, attention!" Greysen's voice shocked the standing cadets to attention.
He was a unit of a man, about as tall as Lute and about as sturdily built as Naves. His skin and hair were a deep brown, his eyes dark and smoldering. He did not wear the gray outfit of an instructor: instead, a crisp black uniform without a wrinkle on its surface. He moved in a calm, methodical manner and Lute, Greysen, and Naves remained still as stone and silent in his presence.
"On behalf of the prime commander of the Jury, Premier Mikkelsen Astergaard, welcome to the Fort Gall Induction Center in Claire, St. Oracle. My name is Arch Knight Arthr Burgess, commander of this battalion. You have seen me once today, and you will not see me again until you have completed this course. You will find the next thirty days painful. However, if you make it to the end, you will be among the most elite soldiers in the known world. How will we teach you so much in such little time, you may ask? We will immerse you in exercises and simulations and drills until you can perform them with your eyes closed. It is repetition that will build mastery. Once we are finished with you, those of you who remain will be able to shoot, move, and communicate like well oiled machines. You will have attained the ability to move freely and pursue dreams. The freedom from the shackles of your former occupation or class. Your reward will be a new brotherhood in which the confines of the everyman no longer control you."
Burgess turned slowly.
"Conduct bay maintenance and personal hygiene. Your Instructors will be back in two hours with further instructions. Ad Victoriam."
"Ad Victoriam." The instructors echoed.
The last of the water swirled down the drains at the center of the room. Fans began to blow from the ceiling, drying the tops of the lockers and the beds, which had no blankets on them, leaving Lou and Ave shivering, clothes soaked to the skin.
As Burgess left the room, Greysen called, "Bay, attention!" and the students just barely managed to stand quickly with their aching bodies. The four instructors followed them out.
"As you were." Burgess called out over his shoulder, and the cadets collapsed onto their beds, some sighing, shaking, some crying.
Lou scrambled over to Ave amid the din of all the students clamoring throughout the bay trying to gather their bearings. He sat down beside her. Her head throbbed. She held it in her hands.
"Hey," he said.
"Oh. Hey. That was a proper beatdown. I thought it would never end."
"Well, it had to. Eventually. It helps if you think of it like that," with a shrug.
"Hmm. Aren't I usually the one being optimistic when shit hits the fan?"
"Usually. But I dunno, I'm feeling kinda hopeful."
"How so?" She shoved an elbow into his shoulder. "Don't tell me you've bought into ARK Burgess's whole speech about us joining a new brotherhood," putting up air quotes, "and being free and all that...nonsense. He's clearly lying. All they do is lie, especially if they're that far up the totem pole."
"Not a chance in hell. I'm-I was just thinking. You see how Hauser is. He was put through the same thing we're about to go through, but he turned it in his favor. Aren't you tired of leaving the way things go in everyone else's hands? What if we followed his lead? We gotta do something to subvert the trial. If we don't, they'll find her guilty whether Hauser makes her stay in prison comfortable or not. You realize that, don't you?"
Ave clenched her jaw.
"It would take us so...long."
Lou looked up into space.
"Maybe...but these trials are just a farce. They always have been. They'll wait and wait and let her rot in there, and then they'll turn the lights out on her, Ave, because that's what they always do. So I'm willing to play this game for as long as it takes. I don't know how yet, but we're gonna get her out. We have to."
"Yeah." Ave said quietly. "Yeah, we gotta." She shook her head. "It won't be easy but it's gotta be possible."
"We'd have to impress them. We'd have to move up the ranks. We'll probably have to make them think we're just like them. Are you up for that?"
"We'll be together. Always, together. Just remember not to lose yourself, ok?" She turned to him, placing her hands on his shoulders.  "We can't let them draw us in with their fancy clothes and special privileges. Remember that. We can never truly become...like them."