[ReCap]Book Of Blood: Episode III - Q-Tip Combat

"Lead me, Sergeant, for there is no heart more loyal than that of a true American Soldier."
-Para. 1,Line 2; Soldier's Prayer

Part I: What Makes The Green Grass Grow?

Pugil training, the most brutal, violent, non-destructive training exercise we'd participated in since we started BCT. Pugil stick fighting is an event where soldiers bout in pairs, one against another with heavy padding, and large sticks with padded rounds on either end, very smilier to Q-tips worthy of Thor's ears. Today however, we wouldn't be using actual pugils, instead ...we'd use something a little more dangerous, something which was what the pugil training was for in the first place-- Bayonet-fitted M16s. We'd attach real life bayonets to our rifles, and parade around, brandishing the rifles in the organized manner of barbaric combat we'd come to know so well as strike-range combat, one of the three engagement ranges.

After being assembled on the drill pad, issued our Bayonets, and instructed on how to fit them to the rifles (simple process... so simple, a caveman can ...oh wait, wrong subject.), we where spread out, and given repeated lessons on the various strike "series" types and moves which we'd stand with our rifles up like Roman warriors, and re-iterate for hours until it was either burned into our brains, or our muscles burned like no other, at least. Me personally, I had no real problem with playing air warrior until my muscles could take no more, because I wanted to make sure I was going to beat whoever it was I was going to be fighting the next day until they couldn't stand, I just wasn't too sure that exact place of events was going to happen. Anyway, I still got my PT out of it, and I got to know the many strike maneuvers which I also knew I'd forget within the next couple of months.

...I just hope Thor doesn't own the next pugil I see. Not really sure why though.

~Ollie (Sayin)

[ReCap} Book Of Blood: Sub-Episode I

"Flight was a remarkable feat. Sustainment was another. Recovery
over love? ...a feat not yet accomplished."

"Rock Dirt"

Today was the first, and best sunday we had ever seen-- the first sunday of Area Beautification. By now, I had gained a couple of friends, one in particular I will call Gecci. Now, Gecci is an Americanized Jamacan, living in South Carolina, somewhere south-east of Camden. This particular area I know quite well because my aunt lives somewhere near there-- it's ghetto, and country as hell. This fact now being obviously said, you would notice he and myself find alot in common, me being born of this kind of neiborhood, and he living there most of his life. Personally I find him hillarious in many ways because he's a joker in all manner of ways including when he's being serious. Today, we were tossing jokes after being released from formation to re-dress into our PTs and work gloves... this of course we do every day because we have nothing better to do with our lives 80% of the day that's left when we aren't getting smoked or taught something, so he comes up with the grand idea to bring his shovel (aka E-Tool) along with him.

Personally, I could've cared less what he did or why he bought it to this nice little trek back to the drill pad for our brefing, but it did interest me that he was the only one with an E-tool but I didn't bother to mention it because it seemed the Cadre cared as much as everyone else did-- very little or none at all. So we got brefied on what would be known as Area Beautification, the process of doing demenial tasks to include but are not limited to; picking up tall grass and laying it with small grass, seperating rocks from the sand, raking the PT field (sand and grass with no trees, so we were just raking straight lines the entire length of the field), and even moving pebbles from one spot to another ...far across to the other side of the company area, oh and don't let me forget our favorite one, picking up any and every peice of trash, big or small, all around the company. So, being this the one sunday of many more later on which we'd get our hands full of sand, trash, grass, and rocks, Gecci and I start conversing about how sucky our current mission was, and just so happens our DS walks by. Usually, when an NCO or something of high enough rank over you to gain your immediate respect passes, you'd show the proper respects, and sound off with something, be it a "hoah", or your motto, ours being "Rock Force". So when he passes, we both snap to attention, then parade rest, and sound off... sounding something like this;

DS walks by...
Me: Hoah Drill Sergeant!
Gecci: Rock Dirt, Drill Sergeant, rock dirt!
Me: ...(thinking "what the fuck?") *tries to hold on to dear life, avoiding busting out laughing*
Drill Sergeant: Ah shutup.
Me: Hoah Drill Sergeant! (thinking "had to get that last word... had to get that last word...")

By the time he'd passed, I could no longer hold it, I was damned near on the ground laughing at Gecci in disbelief that he'd just said what he'd said and I wouldn't have belived it had I not been standing right beside him when he did. Somehow, after I started BCT, the most simplistic stuff caught my attention, and the smallest things entertained me, maybe it was the showing of my dangerously-lowered standards, or maybe it was just because I had alot of unknown stress built up from BCT alone to cause me to exert it in any way possible, this I wasn't sure of, but I could assure you it was funny as shit to me and from then on, every sunday until graduation, I'd sounded off with "Rock Dirt" after the brefing formation after lunch before we started our detail of area beautification.

So what of this nice little phrase he'd created for a reason which I never really asked? never really know, I guess... but then again, who knows what may happen next time, huh?

~Sayin (Ollie)

[ReCap] Book Of Blood: Episode II

"No matter what people think, everyone has a weakness... wether it's been found, or waiting to find them."

Part II: Idolism

It had been atleast two weeks since Part I, and honestly I was starting to get the hang of the random smoke sessions, the unfair treatment, and most of the bullshit the Drill Sergeants were feeding us as a way to "thicken our skin". Now today was an interesting day, specifically the most interesting Tuesday that I'd seen since I left home. Why? because I'd caught a glimpse of that one DS, you know, the ghost that was supposed to be our Senior Drill Sergeant? Yeah, well I'd seen him around the company area, so I figured he was on his way back, and with our other cadre telling us some stories about him, I couldn't wait to see what he had to bring to the table. Later on, after standing in formation in the hellish sun for at least an hour with the rest of the company for no real reason, he, which I will refer to as DS BlackOps showed up, calling us into the barracks for a more in depth introduction. So we passed the torch after he gave his intro, introducing ourselves to him possibly giving everyone a more easy feeling about him, but not taking too much away from it seeing as he still had his DS hat sitting right beside him, and the DoD emblem on the front of it attracted more attention than he himself did. There he proceeded to tell us stories about the group before us, adding details which called most to gawk in awe and amazement at the kind of stuff he does, but only causing me to aim to out-do him. I'm not sure why I felt this way, but the more he spoke of, the more I felt I had to find something to do better.

There was still a high percentage of civilians in the company of basic trainees that plagued Alpha 3-34 for at least two and a half weeks now, but they were more hardened, though still looking to the drill sergeant for everything, only two days after this ghost of a Drill Sergeant showed up. Suddenly, the DS' bring up the idea of a “PG”, or "Platoon Guide" (One responsible for taking the place of the acting platoon sergeant/drill sergeant as a student rank), drawing question marks to the entire 1^st platoon, which I’d been previously assigned and sure I could get the job. Sadly, I had one thing standing in my way of being “all I could be”, and it’s name is to be known as Ms. Applesauce. The one E4 with enough skill at kissing ass to make three people feel it at once, she easily became the one female that stood above the rest, and the one soldier to stand above the platoon in DS BlackOps' eyes.

This female in particular, aside from the rest, had the inept habit of nit-picking with anyone she could about whatever they could possibly be doing wrong, or out of her own standard, and ran to the Cadre about it, this of course causing a multitude of issues with the rest of A 3-34. Not only was her persuasive methods working on the Drill Sergeants, apparently they were working on some of the civilians-now-turned-military, me personally giving their little clan the title of "Ms. Applesauce, and the Fuzzy Patch Brigade" simply because of their need to be "Fuzzy Patch E5s" and above (PV1s who try to act far above their ranks). It only took probably three days before she was all over the PNN, (Only those who went through BCT know what the PNN is) and being appointed PG, due to an incident she alerted higher about, which accumulated with all the useless stuff she'd been transmitting from the barracks to the CQ office where they made their stead, among other places. Next thing I knew, she was appointed as our PG, the day we got smoked nearly to death for something I can't even remember, simply because she held up longer than two of the people nearby her...

Anyway, it led to more complicated days, and less un-eventful nights when girls started trying to do very dangerous things to themselves and each other because they couldn't take listening to her, and weren't being allowed to do anything about it.

Sayonara, until next time.

~Sayin