The End of the Beginning

Sirens and flashing warning lights started to sound as the doors rolled open, revealing a town behind them. The smell of morning dew and propane from the fire effects reached William’s nose. The light outside was still very much low; it was only 7:29 a.m.

Square buildings up to four stories high with flat roofs were in the simulated town ahead to the south, maybe 200 feet, with a two-lane road marking the town’s edge. Trees made out of metal, with dark trunks and branches that had burn marks, made up the eastern corner of the town. A dike wrapping around six, one story homes was in the western corner. There was a main street, alleys, side roads, everything one would see in a real town. One building was a collapsed parking garage, another a collapsed hospital. William saw a school, a church, and even baseball field with bleachers, dugouts and all.

As the newly formed squadrons began jogging away behind their group leaders, William was stopped by Hammond abruptly, so much so that Vega and Seong nearly ran into him. Hammond stared at William intently.

“Go ahead of me guys,” William directed to his squadron. “Lieutenant Jeon, take point ’til I catch up.”

“Y-y-yes, sir.”

The team flooded around William, Hammond, and her three guardsmen like water. Hansen looked on from the front and ignored the hold up.

“Is there something you need, ma’am?” asked William, agitated.

Holding her hands firmly in front of her, she looked William up and down. “I just wanted to wish you good luck, Captain. So far, I’m hearing all good things. Keep pushing that dare.”

“Thank you, ma’am,” said William. “Why so many guards, ma’am? You weren’t on the list.”

Hammond took a deep breath and stiffened her body. She tilted her head slightly and began to back away. Her gazed was bitter cold now. The public had been told all base commanders had received threats.

“You best be going, Captain. Your team needs you. Those thick trees can be… unforgiving. They can expose all sorts of unwanted faults.”

William swiftly nodded as he turned away to start his jog. “Just like warehouse shelving ma’am,” he said, just loud enough for her to hear.

William never looked back. Hammond glared at the rising sun as an uncertainty swept through her. “Damn him,” she whispered.

To the west of the town, snuggled up in the very western corner of the BLOC Section, was the simulated mountain. The trainees turned its way. Sculpted concrete and bushes made for a very realistic look. Small trees surrounded its base with a road running along one of its sides. A waterfall was running across it amid some fallen rocks and downed trees. Near the peak of its fake slope was a metal platform that had three zip lines running off of it that went down to the east towards the town and ended on one of the taller buildings. A group of people were on it, exercising a self-rescue, pulling themselves up the wire, releasing and stopping, then doing it all over again.

William jogged over the gravel below his feet, shouting to his squadron to pick up the pace and to stay together. Mamedov was straying behind but William, with some colorful adjectives, made him rejoin the others. At the other end, however, was Sergeant Horbert who William had to tell several times to actually slow down. Looking over his shoulder he saw a quadcopter watching over them, recording their garage exodus.

Out in front of the group the major could be heard, shouting curse words and demoralizing slurs that made their way through the group like pinballs. The gravel roadway they were on was just one of a series of pathways that meandered around the Yard, taking one to anywhere they wanted to go either by foot or vehicle. Other groups had now joined them from other garages, making the jogging mass look like a marathon run. As the mountain grew closer, they laid eyes on the obstacle courses behind it for the first time. A young forest of pine with unnatural structures throughout was soon above them.

Vines of rope and steel cables hung from wooden poles, trees, and planks anchored to platforms that made up a system of rope bridges and free swinging crossings, each of varying heights. Orange safety lines above all this insured safe passage through the courses, which were generally two stories off the red mulch ground, at their lowest.

Hansen and other group commanders stopped at a concrete staging area just before the courses and turned to see the groups come jogging in and separating out into their squadrons. Blazers that had been parked in the garages arrived, one carrying Hammond and her guardsmen.

“Fall in! Fall in!” yelled Hansen.

In the sun Hansen’s red skin transformed into a rather appalling shade of purple.

“Welcome, Delta Group,” he said standing on a wooden box. “Squadron by squadron, we will run this course.” Hansen pointed to the first set up of obstacles in the foreground. “Each of you must complete it in under six minutes. If the person in front of you falters, leave them behind and move on, that is their fault. Safety harnesses can be found in a storage locker atop the first platform in the course up there. Put it on, attach yourselves to the safety line, and then run like hell. Group commanders will be present along the way to… motivate you.” Hansen laughed a sinister laugh when he said that. “The record is five minutes, six seconds. Beat that today and you have the rest of the day off. We will run this until you no longer can. Let’s get started! SAR Squadron 3, you’re up first.” He gestured for William’s group to make their way up to a wooden ladder where the course started. “As for the rest of you, drop and give me thirty. Now!” William waited for his team to gather around the ladder in a single file line with himself and Hansen at the front. The other groups were doing various other workouts, along with pushups. Others were preparing to run different courses interlaced amongst the forest behind the one William was going to dash through. Base Commander Hammond stood by her Blazer with her guardsmen watching a ways off, watching William.

“Time begins once you clip in up there, Emerson, and you’re going first,” said Major Hansen, pointing to the platform.

“Yes, sir.”

As William started to climb, Hansen stopped him, putting his big hand on William’s shoulder, bringing him back down so that he could whisper into his ear.

“You know, Emerson, I tried to give you the best on your team, what I thought at least. That way you wouldn’t have to work to hard. We wouldn’t want you working too hard now, would we? Might panic a little, yeah? See a few dots of light here and there. I think you can do this though. It’s not as high as Incheon was. But please, in all seriousness, try and give me a reason to cut your scared ass from this program today. There is no room for a woos in our business. Thanks, mate.” Hansen ruffled William’s hair and then stepped back, waiting for William to move. That son of bitch of a major. He actually took pleasure at William’s misfortune, but William was determined to not feed his appetite for failure. Failure was not an option.

William turned and looked back at his team. “Alright, once I’m up there and clipped in, start coming up, stay right on me. Remember to push each other through. Encourage one another. Six minutes, people, now come on!”

And with that, William climbed the ladder, put on a harness, and readied himself to snap onto the safety line. On the platform, the course looked taller and longer than from the ground, but he was okay with that. He was not afraid of heights. Down below, he could hear group commanders screaming at their groups to work harder, faster, while some were already up in the course waiting for him to come by. His vision narrowed in on the first obstacle ahead, a fifty-foot-long cable bridge with free-swinging circular wooden platforms no bigger than a dinner plate.

“Let’s go, Emerson, we don’t have all day for you to admire the course. Start the goddamn thing!”

Shut up, Hansen. William reached up to the safety cable, pulled the clip back, put one foot in front of the other, then closed the clip on the line. Then he was gone.

William quickly, yet precisely placed each of his feet on the wooden platforms that pivoted violently as he crossed them, holding on to two guide wires on either side of him for stability, letting his speed judge his steps. Within a few seconds of starting, he had crossed the first obstacle and came to the second platform on the other side.

This one led to a set of wooden two-by-fours that were perpendicular to his position with curved wooden humps, making it difficult to balance. He slowed considerably to make the trek across. Each of the boards was held up by cables at either end, like a swing set. They swung even more than the last obstacle. Tree branches had to be pushed out of his way, cutting his face as he went but he kept going, accelerating on the second obstacle as he became more comfortable with it.

The third platform touched his feet. Here, William had to unclip and then re-clip onto a new safety line as the course turned inwards towards the trees. In front lay a series of X-shaped two-by-four platforms, four in total. They pivoted at forty-five degree angles when one’s weight was placed at one end. William had to jump on each of them, trying to land near their centers, while holding onto the two guide wires at his side, thirty feet in the air. Each jump was calculated and executed carefully. His hands hurt from the rough metal lines he was holding on to.

“Move your weak ass, Captain!” shouted a group commander standing on the fourth platform, waiting for William.

The man kept shouting as William stopped on the platform. A knotted rope in front of a cargo net dangled in front of him. He unclipped quickly and had to jump without any safety line. If he fell, he would fall into a channel filled with cold water below. William jumped and grabbed the rope, clung to it and started to swing back and forth until he had enough momentum to reach the cargo net. One arm came out and grabbed the net. Using only his upper body strength, he climbed down the net, legs dangling. The net was in a backwards-arch shape and led to a lower platform about ten feet off the ground. William swung his legs up onto the platform then wiggled his upper body on. No more than a minute had gone by, by his estimate.

Another clip-in brought him to perpendicular swinging logs, twenty of them, that were extremely hard to control under his legs. Each one clanked against the next one as he crossed them moving forward and backwards, keeping his core tight to control his legs and the logs.

Behind him was Sergeant Horbert, who was catching up to his obstacle. In response, he went even faster, slipped, caught himself, then continued on. Another cargo net was his next challenge but this one was horizontal over the ground. He had to cling to its underside over a pond fifteen feet below, no safety clip for this one either.

Vega was at the log obstacle already. William only had a few left to go. Upon completing the horizontal netting, he let himself go over a platform and landed hard on his back, turned over, clipped in and set about to the next obstacle. It was a tunnel in the air supported by cables that had a clear plastic bottom.

Inside it was wet, hot, and barely big enough for his shoulders to fit through. It was at least sixty feet long. As it wobbled about, William became very disoriented and had to keep his eyes fixed on the ground below to get a bearing through the clear bottom. A group commander was yelling down from the other end of the tunnel to look straight ahead as he crawled. Shoulders and elbows pounding, he crawled with his head looking straight ahead towards the end of the tunnel, light growing as he neared the shouting.

Three-quarters of the way down the tunnel, it began to rattle so much that William had to brace his body with his hands against the walls to keep himself up. He put his head between his knees to look back and saw Vega crawling down the tunnel towards him. This woman was unbelievable. She was so strong and fast and persistent; she was going to pass him if he did not hurry. So he did, and like a cannonball being shot out of a cannon, William raced out onto the tunnel’s end wooden platform, feeling winded but still focused.

Green branches, sweat, bruises, and some blood was all William remembered of the next few obstacles, gaining ground on Vega and not looking back. His heart was pounding against his chest, which was sore and wet. His eyes burned from salty sweat on the humid morning and his legs started to cramp but he kept going and going and going until there were only three obstacles left. William thought he had already missed the six-minute mark but, despite the pain, he kept going faster.

A thin pine tree with a wide wooden platform stood in his path. The safety line ended, clamped around the trunk going no further. Ninety feet down the course he could see the finish line, which had looped back around to the where it had started.

“Captain, you better jump! Jump down now! Hurry, you gotta get your ass moving!” yelled a group commander.

Hearing that, he looked down to a dirty, muddy looking pond that was the length of an eighteen-wheeler, covered over in barbed wire except for both ends. One of the group commanders continued to yell up to him on the platform. William had to jump from three stories up, directly down into the pond and swim across under all the wire and come out on the other side in order to make it to the last two obstacles.

He closed his eyes and jumped, making his body as thin and pointy as possible. Air rolled past his face as he waited for the impact, which took longer than he thought. With a splash, he was down and under the water. Visibility was zero under it. He pushed off from the bottom and came up to breath, oriented himself, then went back under to avoid the wire, making his way to the other end.

Another splash behind him told him Vega had just jumped down and was still close. Despite keeping as low as he could, a barb cut his forehead but he did not feel it; he was too focused on making it to the end. Once he did, he pulled himself out of the pond and then climbed another wooden ladder to a platform where he clipped in again and made his way across the second to last aerial obstacle, a series of separated logs running parallel to the platform that he had to step across, placing one foot over the other as there was only room for one at a time, as if in a sobriety test.

With no problems, he was across and onto the final leg of the course, a huge, shallow A-frame monkey bar system that spanned a gap between two platforms over water; at the other end, three poles to slide down and cross the finish line on the mulch ground. William unclipped one final time and jumped up to grab the first bar. There were three rows of bars to choose from; he took the middle one and swung across like he was born in the trees.

Vega caught up and jumped up to the left bars, starting her crossing as William reached the center of the frame. He was so shocked by her performance that his left hand slipped, momentarily making him hang on just one arm. He regained his grip and continued. Legs free but stiff, he kept swinging for the last few bars. Three bars, two bars, one bar, then he jumped to the end and rushed over to the three poles. Again he chose the middle one and with a screech of his wet cloths sliding down the clean metal pole his feet hit the ground.

William sprinted the last ten feet of the course to cross where the group commanders were waiting for the trainees to finish but slipped on a wet patch of mulch. Vega came down hard on one of the poles, rolled, then also started to sprint. William regained his balance as Vega stepped up next to him.

They ran side by side for a few seconds then she took the lead and finished with William just inches behind her. William hunched over, out of breath. Vega stood straight and caught her breath quickly, as if she had only just finished their jog out to the course earlier. Both were bleeding in various places, sweating, wet, and filthy. Hansen got someone to take his place at the start and came over to find out William’s time, hoping it would be over the six-minute requirement.

He patted William on the back and said, “At least you finished, Emerson; most fall on their outta shape asses on the first go. Same goes for you, Horbert. What’s their time?”

The group commander that was keeping track of times looked at his glass tablet. A laser tracking system was assisting in timekeeping and was accurate to within milliseconds. It worked in conjunction with everyone’s glass tags. Once a trainee’s glass tag crossed the start and finish lines the system was triggered to begin timing. Other trainees in William’s squadron started coming across the finish line including Seong who collapsed once he did. A few of the group commanders and other trainees gave him assistance.

“Captain William Emerson,” said the timekeeper, “your time was… was…”

“Major James, what was the captain’s time?” asked Hansen again, annoyed at the delay.

“His time was five minutes, four seconds.”

Hansen squatted down to meet William’s eyes. “Shit, mate, you beat the record. Son of a bitch. Captain, I don’t know whether that was goddamn luck or your legs are as fit as a kangaroo’s, but shit boy, you did it. You may even get laid tonight for that.” William did not look up from his panting. He smiled at the ground.

The major turned his attention to Vega. “What was the sergeant’s time?”

“Sergeant Horbert’s time was… five minutes… five minutes one second.”

William’s smile grew when he heard she had beaten his time. He already knew she did but it was nice for Hansen to hear it.

Vega put her hands on her hips and awaited for what was next, having already caught her breath, staring at William, looking like her accomplishment was not something impressive at all.

“Tired?” she asked him, with the smallest grin he had ever seen on a persons face. Her deeper voice had some kind of Middle Eastern accent.

“I’m not allowed to be,” William groaned, falling to the mulch.

“Well, hell Captain,” pointed Hansen, “you just got beat by a sheila with a harder dick than yours. You didn’t do shit up there, Captain. Get the rest of your team together and get you’re bloody asses back on that course now! Sergeant Vega, if you wish to return to your quarters you may do so for having beaten the time.” “Thank you sir, but with all due respect I would like to run the course again and try and improve my time.”

“Well, shit, Emerson,” Hansen laughed, walking back to the courses start, “looks like you have a showoff to deal with. Sergeant Horbert, you may stay if you like, God knows your team probably needs you to carry them, and its leader.”

“Do not bother with his insults,” encouraged Vega, extending out her hand to William on the ground. “They waste both your and his energy.”

William took her hand. She pulled him up. “Thanks,” he said, staring into her green eyes for a little too long. “Umm, what’d you do before this to be able to conquer that course so well?”

“Unit 669,” she plainly said, jogging away.

“Israeli, huh?” whispered William.