Third Person - Complete

More Training

Roberts sat down, exhausted, on the log. He was covered with sweat, his mask carrier and LBE rubbing on him. He unlaced his boots to let his feet breathe, since they felt swollen and damp. He dropped his rucksack behind him, shrugging out of the straps, and closed his eyes.

They'd been moving constantly since morning. Up and down the mountainside, through the forest, crossing creeks and old dirt roads. They kept breaking into small groups to navigate to separate rally points. Each time the makeup of the group was different, and one time Sergeant Stillwater had taken the barrel out of the M-60, given it to Lewis, and had the two radiomen work with the "element leader" to coordinate a quicker meet-up so the M-60 could be 'brought back into operation.'

Roberts was annoyed at the fact that the Senior NCO's following the group would toss out an explosive and hose off a magazine of blanks into the air to get everyone moving, with the Junior NCO's leading everyone.

He'd barely gotten his wind after the run, barely managed to eat the breakfast that had been ladled out of mermite cans before having to strap on all the gear that Sergeant Stillwater seemed to hand out at random. After that they'd had explosive simulators thrown at them and been screamed at to move out under fire. Insult to injury, a soldier that Roberts didn't recognize had started tossing boxes off ammunition, supplies, rucksacks, and other gear out of the back of the truck as the smoke grenades had been going off.

That big NCO, Stillwater, had been yelling at everyone to "grab what you can! We're being overrun! BUG OUT! BUG OUT! FALL BACK PLATOON!"  They'd moved out, as a group, down the hill at top speed and into the woods on the other side of the road at the far side of the flat grass area at the bottom of the hill. They'd ran until everyone was ready to collapse, people who had been in the unit longer half-dragging the others.

After that the Senior NCO's and a couple of officers, apparently acting as observers and graders, had watched the Junior NCO's break everyone up into small groups.

Three of the medics had been carrying stretchers, and at that first rest break they'd loaded three men onto the stretchers, chosen six guys to carry the stretchers, and the medics had performed training tests under the watchful eye of the fat medic.

Just seeing her made Roberts stomach clench in anger.

Roberts hadn't seen any rhyme or reason to it, but right after everyone was grouped up, they'd moved out again for almost an hour before stopping again, everyone dripping with sweat despite the cold.

A quick class on landmark orientation to a map was given by the 'squad leaders', which Roberts only paid half attention to. He'd passed that course easily in Basic and AIT, a first time go on both tests. During the class he'd seen one of the officers pick up Newsome's M-60 and mess with it but hadn't thought anything about it.

When they'd been ambushed, it turned out the officer had jammed the M-60, forcing Newsome to try to fix it while grenade simulators and smoke grenades were being thrown at them. After that were classes on crossing the road.

It seemed weird to Roberts, and he resented being chosen to be the one who crossed the road. Basically it went that everyone would prepare for combat and one person would sprint across the road, diving to predetermined over and getting ready to shoot. Then people would move rapidly in pairs.

It should have been lowest ranking, but Lewis wasn't chosen because she was carrying the assistant gunner's bag and the ammunition for the M-60. She was considered 'trained in a vital role' so was not considered expendable.

Which Roberts thought was bullshit. He outranked her and all she'd been doing was carrying around some ammo cans and some belts of blanks.

Roberts looked over at where the medics were setting down the stretcher. The six guys carrying the three stretchers were covered in sweat and staggered away. The three that were laying on the stretchers got up. Baker was helping one of them, a heavyset guy who had caught his foot on a tree root and sprained his knee, over to a log.