The Master Sergeant and 1rst Sergeant make their way across the glade and as soon as they are at a distance, where they are certain their talk is private, the Master Sergeant asks the 1rst Sergeant, “Hey La Fonte, what do you think of this?”
The 1rst Sergeant, La Fonte, has a face of indifference, looking straight forward, making his way to the end of the glade. “Think about what?”
The Master Sergeant takes a look at the glade, and the forest they are going into. He waves his hand, “This. Like what do you make of this? Middle of nowhere, unknown location. No backup, no support. And in charge of six men, and having to take care of maybe a hundred people, where, who knows how many more will come through that beam of light.”
The 1rst Sergeant takes a few steps before answering, “Nothing. It is what it is. There’s nothing we can do about it. I can’t really think any more about this than you can.”
The two men are silent as they continue walking, having nothing to say and nothing more to think about, their boots making brushing sounds as they step over the grass of the glade, their stride slow.
Then the Master Sergeant notices something. Something about the shade. The color of the grass. That grayness over an object when it is in the shade of something. He looks at the source of the shade, the mountain wall looming over them from the east. Then he turns and looks west in the opposite direction. The shadow of the mountain wall passes over the entire glade and beyond into the forest. The Master Sergeant looks for the sun. The sun can’t be seen. It’s behind the mountain wall. The 1rst Sergeant is still walking, only a couple of steps ahead,when the Master Sergeant calls out, “Hey, wait, what time is it?”
La Fonte stops, turns, and looks back. “Why?” As soon as La Fonte asks, the Master Sergeant puts his hands in his pockets to grab his phone. While the Master Sergeant is getting his phone, La Fonte then answers, “ My phone says it’s half past 1200.” La Fonte looks curiously as the Master Sergeant checks his watch and his phone.
“My phone says it's 1100”, the Master Sergeant pauses as he takes a look at his watch, “and my watch says its 0800.” The Master Sergeant glances at La Fonte, who now checks his own watch.
“0600”. The silence is deafening as the two men scramble their brains around this new information. Now they have questions.
“The fuck is going on? Our phones and watches don’t match.”
The Master Sergeant has an irritated look on his face as he seeks to understand his confusion,“I thought it was 0800. But that sun isn’t rising. It’s setting. The shadow has been growing, not waning.” He points at the mountain wall. “THAT is not east. THAT is west.”
“Why the fuck did we assume that it was east?”
“Hell if I know. Check the compass”.
La Fonte crouches down, kneeling on one knee as he takes off his pack and takes out his compass. “My compass says that what we thought was south is actually our north.”
“Well. There we go”, The Master Sergeant shrugs his shoulders and raises his arms, before he drops them as if in defeat.
“Shit.”
“I mean if that was our east”, the Master Sergeant gives a short stab with his index finger towards the mountain wall, “ and it was half past 1200 - WHERE’s the fucken sun?! The sun is in the wrong place.”
“So what time is it actually?”
“Looks like 1500 to me. Judging from the shadow of that wall. IF that is our west.”
“It’s fucken three? I’m not going on recon when it’s three.”
“Yeah, same. Let’s go back.”
La Fonte puts the compass back into his pack, slings the pack back onto his back, and the two men walk back across the glade in the direction of the Sergeant and the Corporal, their strides changed from previously slow and easygoing, to more determined and with purpose.
The Sergeant and Corporal turn towards the two men marching over to them and they exchange a look with one another. The Corporal raises both his eyebrows as he tilts his neck and the Sergeant prepares for what seems to be a serious encounter.
“Sergeant”
“Yes, 1rst Sergeant.”
“Check your watch.”
“1rst Sergeant?”
“Check your watch. And your phone. Tell me what time it is.”
The Corporal stands rigid and at attention as the Sergeant looks at his watch, then at his phone. He looks at the watch again, then again at his phone. He then looks up at La Fonte with a very surprised expression, eyes wide, mouth slightly open as if they were saying the words ,”Oh”.
“What do you see, Sergeant?”
“That’s some fucked up time I see, 1rst Sergeant.”
La Fonte turns to the Corporal, “Corporal, what time is it?”
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“I don’t know 1rst Sergeant.”
“ You don’t know?”
“Yes, 1rst Sergeant. I don’t know, 1rst Sergeant.”
“Where’s the sun, Corporal?”
The Corporal shifts his eyes and meets La Fontes eyes for a moment, before his eyes shift away and they look for the sun. Not being able to find the sun in the sky, since the sun had fallen behind the mountain wall, the Corporal answers, his face taut, his eyes wide, spit spraying out of his mouth, “I can’t see the sun, 1rst Sergeant. It looks like it's behind the wall.”
“Yes, Corporal, the sun IS behind the wall. What time is it?”
“Well- that is- it’s-”, the Corporal stammers before finally turning his head to face La Fonte, “0900?”
“No, Corporal.” La Fonte turns his head back to the Sergeant, “Sergeant, based on the shadow coming from that mountain wall, what time do you think it is.” The Sergeant just stares at La Fonte.
La Fonte sighs, shakes his head, “Both of you take out your compasses”, and the two men comply with a loud, “Yes, 1rst Sergeant”, before dropping their packs and pulling out their compasses.
La Fonte’s tone has become slightly patronizing, as if a parent is scolding and teaching their child, “Now, in what direction is the mountain wall, to my right? Is it east?”
The two men, the Sergeant and the Corporal hold up their compasses, looking at it. Neither one says a word. They just look, blink, and continue looking. There is a mixture of emotions running on both men’s faces. The Sergeant has a frown, the lips on his mouth pressed together firmly, his jaw slightly clenched. The Corporal’s eyes are moving rapidly scanning the compass, as he swallows, his Adam's apple bouncing. The Corporal looks up, finally making sense of something, showing his surprise. The Sergeant, too, slowly looks up, frowning, eyes squinting.
La Fonte shows a slightly satisfied expression, “In what direction is the wall on my right?”
The Corporal remains in unease, and the Sergeant slowly answers as he raises his face meeting La Fonte’s eyes, “West.”
“And the sun rises from where and sets where?”
“The sun rises from the east and sets in the west.”
“Where is the sun?”
“Behind the wall.”
La Fonte’s expression of satisfaction fades away as he adopt a more serious expression, the smile fading away. “What time is it?”
The Sergeant looks away, raising one eyebrow, looking at the shadow cast over the glade, then to the peak of the wall; noting the glare of the sun peeking behind it, before looking back at La Fonte, “1500”.
La Fonte immediately takes a step back, and raises his watch and looks down at it, readying his right hand near the watch, as if he was about to wind up his watch. Jose raises his watch as well, and readies his right hand.
La Fonte, his gaze now on the watch says, “We are now going to fix our watches to 1500–Now!” Both La Fonte and Jose start tapping their watches with their fingers and the Sergeant and Corporal follow suit to do the same. After a moment La Fonte has finished and he waits until Jose and the two other men finish as well before continuing, “Tomorrow we are going to tune our watches once more,WHEN the sun is directly overhead, not behind the wall or below the wall, but overhead, directly above us and we will again tune it to 1200. Understood?”
“Yes 1rst Sergeant.”
“Dismissed.”
The two men walk off in different directions, and even though they weren’t given additional instructions, as if knowing what they are supposed to do, they walk up to the posts manned by Privates to instruct them to re-tune their watches.
The Master Sergeant watches as two privates fix the time on their watches, with either Private having the Sergeant or the Corporal hovering over them. He turns his gaze towards La Fonte, “Did you have to be so harsh with them? You could have just walked over to them and all friendly-like instructed them to change the time and why they had to change the time.”
La Fonte turns around and faces the Master Sergeant, “Harsh conditions call for harsh measures. I don’t really like this situation we are in. When we first came out here it was all good and dandy, some grass, a forest, and no hostiles. But now -”, his neck moves from left to right as he slowly scans the area, “ What happens if there is a hostile situation and we are just as clueless as we were? It’s better if we start acting like this is a hostile environment than to later get fucked in the ass with our pants down. We were about to go recon with only a few hours of daylight left, with no proper night recon equipment.”
The Master Sergeant leans on one leg, his arm resting his rifle slung on him. He shrugs and his mouth curves. He gives it a serious thought before replying, “Yeah, yeah I get you. But they are in the same situation as us. Just sayin’”.
La Fonte walks past him, “And I’m sayin’ that we are in the same situation too. Don’t need dumb fucks fucking us over and us ending up dead. We’re saving everyone’s asses by being harsh.” The Master Sergeant shrugs again and follows La Fonte.
[T: 5 Hours]
The spectacle showcased by the 1rst Sergeant had not gone unnoticed. People have remained relatively calm, although anxiety has started to settle in. But the disciplining by the 1rst Sergeant has made it clear that this is no laughing matter. Already people can see that there isn’t enough military personnel to protect them and they feel unease by this fact. Now it seems that not all of the military might be competent. Groups start to form. Those who feel more aligned with one another unconsciously stay close to one another. Across the glade, a man in a red shirt and red baseball cap has been watching the various interactions between the 1rst Sergeant and Master Sergeant. He turns to his group and points out the interaction, asking them, “What do you think of that?”
Next to the man wearing Red, a young asian man wearing a black baseball cap, sits with a sort of unimpressed grimace. “Military antics. Big dick show to show us who is boss. Trying to make it so that the masses listen to them better.” Next to him a young asian woman, also wearing a black baseball cap says nothing. A man in the same group, blonde, with a circle beard disagrees with the young asian man, “No, I don’t think so. Those two Sergeants went towards the woods, then it looked like they found something out and came back to discipline the other two men. I don’t know what it is, but it looked pretty serious.”
The young asian man scoffed, “Hah, yeah right.”
“The gold-haired man looked at the young asian man with a sort of confidence one has with experience, a sort of indifferent, matter of fact expression, “I was with the military for a few years. I think I know.” To which the young asian man snorts to.
In another part of the glade two gangs sit eyeing each other. One composed of black men, the other gang composed of hispanic men, both recognizing tattoos on the others bodies. There is a small tension as either gang don’t know what to make of each other.
[T: 8 Hours]
The Obsidian Skeleton has wandered the halls for hours. It does not sleep. It does not eat. It roams for an unknown reason. It searches every room, every wall and every furniture. It checks everywhere within the labyrinth, a maze of multiple structures, all connected by long passageways. All the structures have no windows and so the outside cannot be seen.As the Obsidian Skeleton finishes searching the entirety of one structure it moves on to the next, its purpose unknown.