Rule of Four (Damned of the 2/19th Novella)

Sweep

"God is a sweaty midget with a hard-on..."
-Weapon Brown

Barracks Area
2/19th Special Weapons Group Area
Secure Area
Alfenwehr, West Germany
22 November, 1988
2145

The Private followed me as I headed into the Third Magazine Records Office to check the windows. He'd started following me around for a few days. He'd taken my rules seriously, making sure to stay in the light and warmth. Like me, he slept with a nightlight.

"The Specialist said he doesn't like you carrying a knife," The Private said as I recorded the number stamped into the thin metal strip through the hasp on the door.

"Yeah, tough shit for him," I grunted, pulling out the knife so I could push the blade through the loop and wind the blade so the metal strip snapped. I pulled it out, sheathed the knife, and unlocked the door while the Private logged the time and date I unlocked the door.

It had been doing the same thing, day after day. We spent breakfast and dinner all four of us, but other than that, we didn't intermingle much. Me and the Private had night shift, the Specialist and the Staff Sergeant had Day Shift.

We'd fallen into a routine. Sweep. Eat dinner. Sweep. Relax. Sweep. Eat lunch around midnight. Sweep. Doublecheck fuel levels. Doublecheck heaters. Sweep. Bullshit. Sweep. Eat breakfast. Relax. Sleep. Get up. Swap with Day Shift.

"He said you've fucked up some people with that knife," The Private said.

I just shrugged, waiting for the florescent lights to fully buzz up.

"That true?" He asked me.

"Pretty much," I told him.

"How's you muck up your eye?" He asked me.

Well, it was that time. I knew he was going to start asking questions sooner or later. Guess it was that time.

"Last year I took a bad hit to the face. This summer I got hit in the eye socket with a chunk of metal when a trailer full of ammo exploded in a convoy of the new TOW-II's," I told him.

"Wow. That was an entire explanation," the Private quipped. "Can I ask you another question, Sergeant?"

I started checking the seals on the cabinets. The records office was a new thing. All records, including stuff in the in-boxes and out-boxes on our desks, were locked in the record offices after business hours or when we walked away.

Colonel Henry (NR) took security seriously.

"Sure, go ahead, Private," I said, recording the seal number on the cabinet full of records from Atlas and Perseus.

"Why do you think that Colonel Henry only sent four of us this year?" The Private asked me.

"It's an interesting idea," I shrugged. "Cut down on casualties, reduce the risk of deprivation induced insanity. Four people keeps it bonded without forming cliques, and keeps within the social dynamic math."

I finished recording the last seal and turned around to do the worst part of checking the offices. I moved up the curtains and pulled them open.

It was pitch black outside. Being a high security room, the windows were two inch thick, quarter inch pane termpered armored wire reinforced glass. An eighth inch vacuum gap in the center. Hardened case steel frame, quarter inch thick, four inch inset with ceramic limestone composite cores. Windows designed to handle up to 6.5 kPA overpressure wave. Hasps across the center car, the windows could open via the handles so that they opened into the room from the center or tilt from the top with a four inch gap. I had to check the hasp seals for the numbers.