keep me breathing - john price x oc

4. monsters

 Flashback

2018

You were nervously tapping your fingers on the hardcover of your book, waiting eagerly for the final test in your analysis training. You knew from other recruits that this usually was an old mission report, which either was laced with riddles or had nothing to show at all - you'd just have to find out which one it was. Usually it was the ladder or there was fake information to test your skills.

"Lawrence?"

You heard your name and your head snapped up to look at a man in a simple uniform. You let go of the book you were holding to stand and salute. Suddenly your heart was racing like you had run a million miles, a feeling of drums pounding against your rib cage as nervousness washed over you. Now was the time for you to show off everything you had learned throughout your training. And even if you got tons of praises and kind feedback so far, it felt absolutely worthless right now.

"Yes, sir." You answered, lowering your arm and smiling at the man.

He nodded towards you and gestured for you to follow. "Colonel Smith. Follow me, we have a task for you."

You were led to a familiar room that resembled a classroom, where you had most of your theory lessons. One of the tables was filled with manila folders and a data pad, as well as everything else you would need to take notes.

The colonel pointed to said table. "This is a case that happened a few years ago, you have 120 minutes. Anything you can find, write it down." His hands made a small gesture as if he was writing something down himself, then pointed at the stack of paper for you to use. He had a small stopwatch in his other hand. "Even if you think nothing is suspicious, your thought process is important here." You kept following his hands that he used to speak with as well, as he was raising his finger to emphasize that this was very, very important.

You nodded. "Yes, sir," then took a deep breath. This was it. The next big step. Whatever the outcome, you couldn't go backwards, at least. But you were determined to go forward, through the ranks, to assist bigger teams in the field with your intelligence analysis. This was something you had strived for from the beginning since you decided to join the military. So here you were, about to change the next part of your future.

The colonel smiled at you. Then moved backwards towards the door. "Good luck." he said on his way out, the stopwatch now counting down its first few seconds.

You immediately sank into the work. It was a case about an operation called "Serpent Strike", chasing someone who called himself The Cobra. You checked everything, twice, five times - nothing seemed out of the ordinary. As if this was supposed to be a trick. But since you've heard of this before, cases uncovering nothing being part of the test, you didn't let it distract you. You were going to pretend this was an ongoing important mission, and your team needed information. There was no place for giving up easily.

And there it was - you saw something odd. First it was digits of milliseconds being off, which seemed unimportant at first, but then you noticed satellite image timings had transposed numbers in them. It is not easy to spot if you'd just scanned over the report.

But that wasn't everything. The weapons accounted for, the weapons that went into battle and the weapons that came back out, totally didn't match. There were no casualties listed in the official report. So why did fewer weapons come back?

With the data pad, you began digging.

All of these little things seemed to pile up, and they weren't just small errors. This was evidence that had been tampered with after the mission had concluded, that was as clear as day to you at this point. You felt sick. Was this for real, or just fake information?