Unseen by either of them, Rex, the R2 unit that Norrin had helped earlier in the day, stood in of the exitways regarding them silently. After Norrin hit the ball, it turned without making a sound and drove down the hall.
#
The next morning at chow, things were a bit subdued for each of the four flights in the 180.
“You see how everyone is?” Bondo said. “I think...think that every flight got it - trouble- from their commanders. Some a lot, some not so much.”
Dav looked around. Sure enough, at least half the cadets at each of the long tables seemed subdued, broken, as if they wanted to crawl into holes and die. Or at least not be noticed.
“Hey, everybody!”
Heads turned. Slak had just joined the table, looking perky and well rested.
“You’re looking pretty chipper for a guy who got his chronometer cleansed yesterday,” Norrin said, spooning the food into his mouth from his tray. “Aren’t you still sore from that beating Hublin gave you, and the workout Solo gave you after that?”
“That was yesterday, shromp. This is a new day, a fresh new day without any mistakes in it.” Everyone around Slak was quiet as he sat down and dug into the food on his tray with the zest and gusto of a condemned prisoner enjoying his last meal. They either didn’t know what to make of him or were too concerned his cheerfulness would draw the wrath of a grouchy commander like the wrath of an angry deity.
“What? You call that a beating? That was just a short shock. I shrugged it off like a dreelb flicking off a flea. Not a problem. Not on my end, anyways.”
Bondo alone saw Slak wince a bit when he turned in his seat at the sound of an unpleasant voice behind them.
“Oh, look. It’s the gang from Four Flight.”
Dav looked up. It was Freddik, the blond fellow from One Flight, holding his tray and looking at Dav in front of the others.
“How are you, Dav?” he asked, smiling.
“Great. You?”
“Never better. Let me know how you do in the sims today!”
“Sounds good,” Dav said, but Freddik had already moved on, dropping the tray with the others into the dishwashing line.
The table was silent again. Now, everyone was looking at Dav.
“What?” he said.
“Watch yourself,” the chubby fellow Dav had talked to the day before had said. “You know who that is?”
“Freddik. His dad’s a corporate something or other, on one of the worlds that...well, they build stuff, I think.”
“That doesn’t matter. Look at who he is now,” Slak said. “See how the other folks are following him? He’s gonna be the flight leader, or whatever they call the little glory-sniffer in the group. And since he’s gonna be top in One Flight, that’s gonna make him top in the squadron. You’re only here a day and some, Cadet Cityboy, and already you’re making the right kind of friends. Congratulations! Keep playing your cards right, and you might just ditch Four Flight altogether, way before the end of flight school.”
Dav couldn’t guess if Slak were being serious or sarcastic.
The buzzer sounded through the speaker system- almost time to form up for the next thing on the list! Slak, the last to sit at the table, quickly shoveled in the last of his food and stood up.
“Button up, Slak,” Jada said. Slak had left his tunic’s top button undone when they’d changed back from sports.
The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
“Aw, Sandflea,” Slak said, “you want me to look my best?”
“No, nerfhearder. I just don’t want the whole flight doing pushups when Solo sees what a slob you are. Now button up! Look at Eccles here, and...”
Jada stopped talking. Medea walked by, he face puffy, and her right eye swollen.Medea glared at Jada, and kept walking to the station where trays were dumped and everybody moved to the next appointment on the schedule.
Jada tried not to think about what the Grey room was- why did everyone but Jada seem to know what those things were but here? The chubby guy from Beltine said it was because most folks had relatives, seen holovision shows or otherwise had at least heard tales about life as an imperial pilot.
“What-what’s next?” Bondo asked as they all left the meal hall and entered the hallway.
Norrin checked his datapad. “We’ve got...class. Looks like we’ve got a lesson on Battlefield Ethics next.”
Slak looked puzzled. “Battlefield what?”
#
The classroom was spacious, big enough to hold at least fifty people if need be. For now, it only needed to hold the thirty cadets of Four Flight.
Dav had decided he liked and trusted their instructor in the first five minutes of the class, when he brought up a large display on the holovid projector in the middle of the room.
“ROOM!” shouted the cadet closest to the door when the instructor entered. They all sat at attention, backs straight in their chairs with their heads and eyes to the front, arms pointing straight down with their hands in fists.
“At ease, relax,” the instructor said, not even pausing as he strode to the front of the class. “Cadets, I am Captain Beade,” he said, “and I am the most decorated pilot in this Emperor’s Navy you’re likely going to find in your short careers here.”
He was portly, balding, and commanded the room’s attention in the first ten seconds. “Who,” he said, eyeing the thirty young people in front of him in their smart, crisply ironed tunics, “who here can tell me why you people are here? What is the purpose of an imperial pilot?”
A fellow with pale skin and some kind of ethnic ponytail hair named Gaab raised his hand. “To bring order to the galaxy, sir?” Gaab said, hopefully.
“Wrong,” said Beade. “Anyone else?”
“To serve the Emperor?” said Porkins.
“Close,” said Beade, “but too vague. Even the Emperor himself wouldn’t give you any points for trying to flatter him that obviously, cadet. Anyone else?”
No one else raised their hands.
“To meet girls!” Slak blurted out, to everyone genuine laughter.
Even Beade smiled at that one, looking over at Jada, the lone female in the Flight. “Really, Cadet? And how is that little ambition working out for you these days?”
Slak looked over at Jada and winked. “Some days better than others, sir!”
“Good answer. No, cadets, you are not here to bring order to the galaxy. That's the Emperor’s job. You are not even here to serve the Emperor. That’s my job, and you won’t get it for a while, if ever.
“Your job,” he continued, ticking points off on his sizable fingers, “as a combat pilot in the Imperial Navy, is simple: You are here to kill, and you are here to break. An army’s job is not to bring order. In fact, the job of an army is the exact opposite. You bring the wrath of the Emperor down upon those who would oppose him. And you do that by killing his enemies, and by breaking their things, leaving a place in disarray so that it cannot be used again.
“However, the majority of Imperial Combat pilots in the Clone Wars had a staggeringly high death rate, even when compared to the mobile infantry. A typical flyer would be rendered combat ineffective, or, in civvie speak, dead, within their first five engagements. Think about that, people: clones, who’d spent their entire lives training for battle, died within the first five times they entered battle. Do you think you’re going to do better?
And uncomfortable silence settled in the room. No one liked to think of their own deaths, especially if they were younger males. Death was something that happened to minor characters on holovid shows, not to themselves or those they knew.
“If war does break out, most of you in this room will die in space against our enemies. That is the reality. Our job is to hit hard and fast enough that our enemies will not go to war, and thereby spare their lives and yours in the process.”
Beade let that sink in. On the holovid, a phantom TIE fighter, drawn by lines of green light, faced a ship that was differently constructed. Dav now remembered it’s make; a single cockpit flanked by two long engines that doubled as torpedo tubes, it was commonly referred to as a Y-wing fighter.
“There are a number of ways that you can engage your foe in any vessel dedicated to combat,” said Beade, standing a foot or two from the holovid and pointing at the globe of green light.
#
TO BE CONTINUED...