Chapter 1
A/N: This story began as a revision of my 2015 NCIS story "The Graduate". Based off some feedback I got from VG LittleBear in particular, I started to make a list of improvements to make. Then I realized the list was getting so long, and I was getting so many new ideas that I decided to write a feature-length story and leave "The Graduate" alone. That story was hastily written, containing various plotholes and inconsistencies. The preparation of this story and its first chapter took two years.
I would also like to thank TheNaggingCube, DS2010, and Imill123 for their reviews of "The Graduate" back in 2015. Each one wrote some excellent, well-detailed feedback, and it is much appreciated.
Some names and details are changed from "The Graduate", including Golan's background, the name of battalion commander St. Esprit (Alexander Rosh instead of Adam Ryan), and the name of the boy from Charleston, South Carolina. The original surname is that of an old Charleston family that still exists, so I decided to change the boy's surname to that of one of the Old Families of the Terran Confederacy in the PC game StarCraft.
It is not specified in canon, to my knowledge, when Anthony DiNozzo, Jr. attended Remington Military Academy for his 12th grade year. But he was born in the late 1960s, 1969 I believe, and if he graduated high school when most do, it would have been in the 1986-1987 school year. Thus I chose to have the story start in 1986 and end in 1987.
One of the most memorable pieces of feedback I got on "The Graduate" was that Mark Golan and his friends go through life and, in time, unto death living their code and its virtues. They do not make them likeable. And in my opinion, they do not much try. They believe their code of honor and their values are self-evident in their worth, and anyone who does not walk the path of honor is making a mistake that they- the Honor Corps- need to correct. They do not ever stop to consider whether they are making themselves approachable to those who do not live their way, or to fellow cadets to whom their strict and narrowly-defined code may be as alien as walking on the moon. It is the way they are.
But this story is not just about Mark Golan and the secret cadet society he is a part of, Honor Corps, at Remington Military Academy of Tiverton, Rhode Island. It is just as much about the school and life there, and about our sarcastic and irreverent hero from NCIS, "Very Special Agent" Anthony DiNozzo, Jr. NCIS itself only briefly touched on what DiNozzo was like in high school and what kind of senior year he had at RMA in the 1980s. I have chosen to take on the task of depicting that myself. This is as much DiNozzo's story as anyone else's, and I hope to portray his 17-year-old self as accurately and fairly as Golan and his OC brothers in the Honor Corps.
Many times, I will reference Pat Conroy and others who have written about The Citadel, the Military College of South Carolina. I'll make other references to other works, and to real life. I'll also refer to my own experiences as a cadet at a military high school. For what it is worth, I will say here and now that secret societies are not as prevalent at military institutions in the U.S. as fiction makes it think. They do not exist at any of the schools I have any personal knowledge of. It's just good drama.
Conroy freely acknowledged that he had made up The Ten (a significant inspiration for my depiction of Honor Corps) and the rest of the main plot of The Lords of Discipline, his first novel, for dramatic purposes. I'm doing the same thing here. But writing this is closer to home for me than usual, and I can't possibly write this without thinking about when I was a cadet myself. I will do my best to keep things moving and balanced and not get hung up on old sentiments or resentments. I am also not going to make RMA a fictional copy of my school, or any other real-life military school.
This is a work of fiction. That is important to remember, especially where an elite, powerful, and none-too-friendly secret society of cadets (a major part of this story, as it was in Pat Conroy's The Lords of Discipline) is concerned. Remember that this is just good drama, good storytelling. Military high schools and colleges are rarely depicted in fiction, and when they are, it is almost never in a positive light. I am not in any way trying to further the negative image this gives too many people about military schools.
Again, please remember: this is a work of fiction.
As cool as it was in Cass in the morning, it was hot as crap by the afternoon.
Any work you did out of doors on a day like this was going to be hard, a real challenge, and honest. Straightforward, with no bullshit or gray areas in between. That was just how Mark Golan liked it.
It was getting close to five in the afternoon, pretty much the hottest point in the day, and Mark was busy throwing coal into the Shay No. 6 locomotive's blazing furnace, keeping the fire blazing and the steam engine's boilers hot. It was hard work, just like coal mining, the job many of Mark's male ancestors had spent a long time doing. Working on a steam locomotive was much the same; the work was tough, paid little, and left you dirty and tired at the end of a long day.
Outside the black engine's cab, it was eighty-five in the shade. Inside- well, it didn't really matter. Mark didn't give a rat's ass. It was just hot as crap. He was sweating like a bastard in these coveralls, and he couldn't wait to get out of them. He wasn't done yet, though, not just yet.
"Hey, Mark," Tommy Davis, chief engineer and 10-year Cass Scenic Railroad State Park veteran, called out from where he stood at the controls.
"Yeah?" Mark half-yelled back, talking over the noise of the chuffing engine and the on-and-off squealing of brakes.
"What was that big fancy military school you're goin' back to this year?"
Mark gave a shrug of his muscular shoulders and sighed. He reached up with a rag to try to wipe some of the grime off his forehead and mostly succeeded in smearing it around. "I know I told you, Tommy," he replied.
"I keep forgettin' the name, you know I forget the names of some of them big fancy schools up North."
"It's Remington Military Acad-"
The steam whistle blast cut him off. It drowned out Mark's voice, and as a matter of fact, it drowned out pretty much the whole rest of the world from where Mark stood in the cab. Mark looked up at Tommy and saw him and the other engineer, another old timer and mountaineer called Jim Smith, grinning at the young man in front of them. They hadn't needed to pull the whistle that time. This was on purpose. Mark's short temper flared up and he started shoveling coal while telling them off, yelling and protesting and just really letting them have it. Tommy didn't lay off the whistle until Mark gave it up.
"So what was the name of that school?" the old railroader asked, as soon as Mark could hear again.
"I said-"
And the whistle went off again. And Mark yelled again. And the whistle drowned his words out just like before.
Mark talked, thought, moved and reacted fast. He had no tolerance for bullshit or anyone wasting his time. A fighter to the core, he seized any problem he encountered, any situation, and did not let go until he'd won. Thanks to that drive, there were very few who could rival him academically, militarily, socially, or athletically at the Remington Military Academy, and those few who could were largely Mark's friends.
Being so driven and focused could make you rather humorless at times, something Mark was not immune to. So, naturally, his friends all poked fun at him for it, and the men on the railroad here at the state park in Cass were no exception. These two old boys knew Mark hated it when anyone interrupted him, so they would deliberately ask him questions while they were on a run, and fire off the locomotive's steam whistle right as he tried to respond.
"Hey, Mark," Jim asked when the whistle stopped again, "I heard you was thinkin' of becomin' a Democrat."
Mark's impolite response was lost amidst a third blast from the whistle. The two old boys driving Shay No. 6 were laughing so bad they were leaning against the left and right sides of the cab. The blond teenager tried to act fierce and be angry with them, but he liked them and it showed, so he didn't do a very convincing job of it. The two old engineers went on laughing, enjoying their joke.
Even though he'd been working on the railroad here in the park since he was fourteen, and had been riding the trains and talking to the crews well before that, Mark was the young pup and he got made fun of all the time because of it. The guys driving the trains and doing all the other jobs around the train shops and the railroad here in town all knew Mark and liked him, which was why teasing him was such a popular thing to do. To be fair, they played games with each other all the time as well.
Mark had helped Jim prank Tommy last week, and now the two of them were teaming up on Mark. And yesterday all three had set off a firecracker behind Robbie Smith, Jim's brother and a law enforcement ranger here in town, and generally scared the crap out of him. A lot of this they had to do near the shops, when the train wasn't full of tourists. It was too bad, because tourists were the best prank target of all, and hundreds of them visited Cass every year. But they were off limits. Mom would have killed anybody among the park's staff if she found out they were messing with the tourists, and that included Mark himself.
It was hard for Mark to believe this was gonna be his last full summer working here at the park. Last one for a long time, anyway. After this year, if all went well- and Mark absolutely knew it would- he would be attending the United States Air Force Academy at Colorado Springs, Colorado, and during each of the four years he'd be there, Mark would have summer training to do. He and the other nine boys coming to town to see him today had all made a pact: all of them would earn their airborne and air assault wings while in college, no matter what school they went to or what branch of ROTC they chose.
All in all, it didn't look like Mark would be spending a lot of time at Cass for a while yet. There was too much to do, too many places to go. Mark had been trying to avoid thinking about that. He didn't like the idea of leaving this town. It had been nice getting to know it, getting to have an anchor in the world even as he grew up on a succession of military bases, constantly moving as Dad's career in the Air Force had demanded.
Cass had been home even before he'd moved here. Mom and Dad had brought him here every chance they could. Mark had never forgotten the wholesome simplicity of life here, the honesty and good cheer of the handful of full-time Cass residents and of the state park employees. There was stability here, a sense of permanence- not something Mark had known well as he'd moved from one Air Force base to another.
The Shay pulled to a stop at the water tower, and Mark scrambled atop the cab to make sure the water pipe was positioned right to pour into the locomotive's tank. He stayed there for a few minutes while the thirsty, 100-ton beast drank its fill, then got back inside as the train backed into the station at Cass. The engine huffed and puffed, spewing black smoke into the air, and- unfortunately- raining cinders and bits of leftover coal down on the roofed but windowless cars.
The tour guide was no doubt reminding everyone to keep their heads inside the cars over the speakers right about now; people tended to forget about that as the train returned to the station. This was the end of the long run up to Bald Knob, too, an hours-long trip to the third-highest point in West Virginia. Some folks were eager to start getting up and sticking their damn fool heads out of the cars, anything to be moving around after so much time on those stiff wooden benches.
As the enormous locomotive, biggest in the whole stable here at Cass, braked gently to a stop, Tommy held out a hand. "Gonna be real sorry to lose you after today, Mark," he said.
"Thank you," Mark said solemnly, putting his filthy hand in the other man's. "I've loved this damn job. Everyone should work a summer like this."
"Makes a man outta ya, don't it?" Jim asked.
"Sure does," Tommy answered. "Just look at Mark here. The Air Force better watch out, they don't know what they're gettin' themselves into."
Mark laughed and shook hands with Jim, then nodded to them and hopped down from the cab. After punching out in the office and doing a little end-of-the-day paperwork, it was done. Mark's four-year tour with the railroad here at Cass was over.
It's okay, Mark thought. Finish one thing and start another. Don't look back. Keep moving forward.
XX
Mark knew just the vehicle he was looking for, and just the guys, and he spotted both quickly out in the parking lot. There was a new-model Oldsmobile Custom Cruiser wagon, blue inside and out with vinyl wood paneling running along the sides, that had a handful of athletic-looking, handsome Caucasian boys hanging around near it. Every single one of them was in excellent shape for their or any age. Every single one wore a yellow gold Remington Military Academy, Class of 1987 ring on his right hand. And even though they were dressed in various civilian t-shirts and shorts, they all had strict regulation buzz-cuts and clean-shaven faces. People sometimes mistook them for soldiers already, noticing their regulation grooming and military bearing.
The tallest boy in the group, Alexander Rosh St. Esprit, IV, was the king of the Brotherhood of Arrogant Bastards for good reason. The son of a three-star general and Medal of Honor recipient who was currently Superintendent of the United States Military Academy at West Point, St. Esprit hailed from a long line of soldiers and had always believed it was his destiny to follow in their footsteps. Clumsy as his name was, St. Esprit was already being hailed as a military prodigy; his brilliance and charisma had prompted his fellow cadets to nickname him "Alexander the Great", a nickname he loved. His blond hair shone in the afternoon sun as he leaned against the side of the wagon, a pair of sunglasses concealing his eyes.
Right now, St. Esprit was listening to a joke being to him by the sophisticated and oddly-named Henry Arnoldus Moultrie D'Arbanville. The only child and heir to one of the biggest fortunes and most historic names in South Carolina, the silvery-blond, pale-faced youth was Old South royalty. He was intelligent, athletic, well-spoken, and deeply devoted to traditions and a way of life most now thought were history. Someone had once remarked he could have played Ashley Wilkes without needing to memorize any lines, prompting his closest friends to occasionally call him "Wilkes" or "Ashley".
Christian Scott Marshall, son of the division sergeant major in the 2nd Marine Division at Camp Lejeune, was the most easygoing of the group, and one of only a few who didn't come from old money, or a distinguished military family. He and his brother, a captain in the Marines, were extremely close, and got along well with everybody in this little group. Like the others, he was a natural athlete. All of the guys were ladies' men, but Chris was in a league of his own. Behind his Boy Scout exterior he was the horniest guy Mark had ever heard of.
David Jason Cadez of St. Augustine, Florida was leaning against the Oldsmobile wagon, reaching into his pocket and assuring himself the pack of cigarettes he always liked to keep in his jeans was close at hand. His father was a brigadier general in the Marine Reserves, running a dress clothes and tailoring business, he had founded after twenty-five years on active duty. Cadez had dark hair and one of the shortest haircuts at school, even within this group. In the fall he played varsity football, and in the spring, he was an enthusiastic hockey player. In either case, Cadez could take it and dish it out quite well, spoke Spanish and English with equal fluency, and was a superb surfer.
Pierce Thomas Chandler, V, from Huntsville, Alabama was the son of real estate magnate who'd been highly decorated during his time with the 82nd Airborne in Vietnam. His family had featured prominently in Alabama's role as a Confederate state, like D'Arbanville, and like that other boy, Chandler was blond, handsome, well-spoken and deeply traditionally Southern. He was also a broad-shouldered, highly-enthusiastic football player and wrestler, so anyone who disliked his views tended to keep a respectful distance.
Charles James Edwin, III, from Providence, was the only Rhode Island native within this group. Like the others in this bunch, he kept his dark-brown hair well within Academy regulations, relaxed still from the harder times of the 1970's, required him to. Edwin was also a kind of long-lost brother to Marshall, sharing his exuberant nature and his irrepressible sense of humor. Many pranks whose culprits had never been discovered were the result of Edwin & Marshall's handiwork.
Matthew David Park, Jr., was sitting behind the wheel of the Olds wagon, dozing behind his pair of stylish sunglasses. Hailing from none other than New York City, he kept insisting that Park Avenue was named after his family, toward which his friends in this little club maintained a certain skepticism. He owned a black Ferrari Testarossa and didn't mind saying so. After RMA, he planned to follow his father to Cornell, and keep chasing his dream to compete for the United States in the Olympic Games as a swimmer.
Then you had Joseph William Carroll, Jr., and Tanner Mark Heisler, the auburn-haired boys from Chicago who were meant to be twin brothers but by some injustice had been handed different faces and different parents. They spent most of their time playing football and messing with people. They weren't stupid, though, as evidenced by their numerous victories as leading members of Remington's Speech & Debate Club. Carroll and Heisler were dependable friends and never hesitated if it was time to get something done.
"Hey, General," Mark called out to St. Esprit, "you gonna just park that rustbucket Olds on my Mom's nice parking lot?"
St. Esprit turned to look at the blond athlete approaching him. "Yeah, about that, I talked to one of the rangers and he said this suspicious-looking red truck was parked in the park director's driveway. Said he was gonna have it towed."
Mark went right up to St. Esprit and stared up into his face. "The way you strut around the campus up there in Tiverton, hotshot, it's like you're the next Douglas MacArthur."
"If your mouth was as quick as your brain, hot shit, you'd be a fuckin' cadet general by now."
"Damn, it's good to see you, Alex."
"Whaddya mean? I didn't miss you for a minute, Mark!"
The two boys grinned and hugged each other at the same time, and in moments all the other members of the clandestine brotherhood within the Class of 1987 were gathered around Mark, shaking hands, hugging him, and otherwise saying hello.
Well, except for two boys.
D'Arbanville held back, wrinkling his nose. "Ugh, you smell like a coal mine, Golan. So sweaty and uncultured."
"I got your culture, Darby, right here," Mark said, and he embraced the scion of one of Charleston's oldest and noblest families, getting sweat, grime and coal dust on the other teenager's immaculate jeans and white t-shirt. Before Mark got to him, D'Arbanville looked like he'd walked off some fashion magazine's cover. Once he did, not so much.
"Leggo!" D'Arbanville protested. "These- these are new clothes! Come on!"
"Take it easy, man," Mark said, stepping back and rubbing a dirty hand in D'Arbanville's hair, setting off a new round of protests. "You're in West Virginia now. There's no royals here, just people."
"God, isn't it wonderful?" D'Arbanville burst out. "I get to come up here and actually be a human being for once. No debutante balls or big society functions, no dinners where I have to listen to some judge or senator drone on about budget proposals or rulings in the state supreme court. And Father's running for Governor, so it's only going to get worse."
"Poor little rich boy," Marshall said, shaking his head, unable to keep a smirk off his face. "Had to settle for an Oldsmobile to ride up here, too, and not his own Rolls-Royce car."
"I'll throw you in that river, Marshall," D'Arbanville threatened.
"Oh, what, not gonna have your butler do it for you?"
"He would if he was here, and I told him to."
"But he isn't here. Oh, looks like you gotta do something yourself!"
"I just told you I would."
"Gentlemen," St. Esprit broke in, "Golan's been shoveling coal in the heat all day."
"I'm sorry," D'Arbanville said at once, his customary drawl fully in place. "I had no intention of comin' up here and offendin' you, West Virginia boy."
"The sincerity," Park laughed. "I can feel it."
"Damn good to see you guys," Mark said, looking around. "Come on. Drive yourselves up to the house and let's help Mom get dinner ready."
XX
The two big cars really filled up the driveway, added in with one big car and a truck already present. The ten boys filled up the house even more, though. It wasn't even the fact that all of them were enthusiastic, incurable jocks. Their forceful, energetic personalities were what really took up space. They were as intimate and as fiercely competitive as a pack of wolves, constantly testing themselves against one another in battles of wits, strength and skill, yet ready to unite in an instant. Mark went to shower and change into a plain white t-shirt and pair of jeans while his friends got everything ready.
As they prepared, the ten boys amused themselves by playing all kinds of grab-ass games, messing around, laughing their asses off. When Laura Golan walked into the house, though, they got it together in an instant. Mark's mother was almost six feet tall, and ran her home and park with a firm but fair hand. The ten muscular, brush-cut teenagers greeted her with such a flurry of "Hello, ma'am," and "Yes, ma'am" that she soon dropped the stern, almost imperious persona she frequently maintained at work. Laura Golan laughed, and said, "Okay, boys, you've made your point."
"Yes, ma'am."
"Sure hope we have, ma'am."
"Anything to help, ma'am."
And so on.
Laura Golan took off her plain work boots and looked at her only son fondly, shaking her head. "Did you put them up to this?"
Mark looked back at her with an innocent expression. "I didn't do anything like that, Mom. I also didn't tell them to get the silverware and plates out and get some pots ready so we can have some of your famous spaghetti for dinner. Ma'am."
"So my son was behind all this?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"He was, ma'am."
"All his idea, Mrs. Golan, ma'am."
Laura Golan laughed. "Okay, you've done plenty to get things set up, boys. Take your seats and I'll get the pasta and the sauce going. And boys- better thank Mark for also having nothing to do with the kitchen being so well-stocked on pasta shells, noodles and on sauce. He made a drive to White Sulphur Springs and back the other day so you all wouldn't eat us out of house and home."
"Aw, well wasn't that nice of you!" D'Arbanville drawled, deliberately exaggerating his accent.
The other eight boys all crowded around Mark, playfully slapping at his close-shaven head and poking and prodding him, all the while enthusiastically thanking him. They proceeded to needle and tease one another mercilessly during dinner- or at least tried to. The generous portions of delicious spaghetti and sauce began to slow them down, and after they'd all had a plate or two, the ten-man brotherhood was vastly more subdued, sitting around with their hands on their stomachs and goofy, dazed smiles on their faces.
Yet when Laura Golan asked if anyone wanted ice cream, they all sat up and clamored for it like a bunch of little kids. When it was time to clean up, each one hurried to do his share and then some. There was no dishwasher in the house, so they worked as a team to get the dishes done. Like anything they did as a team, they did it superbly and in astoundingly little time.
"Okay," Mark announced, when he saw the cleanup was all done, "who wants to go up the mountain?"
Nine enthusiastic voices answered him.
"Mark," Laura Golan said, "I want you guys back by ten. Just because there'll be no tourists up at Whittaker Station or Bald Knob doesn't mean you can hang out there all night."
"Yes, ma'am," Mark said obediently.
"And while you're up there, pick up any trash you see. It'll save the maintenance rangers some trouble tomorrow."
"Yes, ma'am."
Mark headed for the door, pulled his shoes back on, and headed for his Chevrolet truck with the best friends he'd ever known. The ground was still soft from yesterday's heavy rain, and though some of the heat of the day remained, it was fading into a pleasantly temperate evening.
The blond adolescent pulled open the driver's door of the fire-engine red truck, decked out in chrome like something from the 1950s, and got inside. Silverado, best of the C/K trim lines. In Mark's opinion, best of any pickup trucks made by anyone, anywhere.
"Move it over, Marshall," St. Esprit said, shoving the red-haired teen to the middle of the bench seat.
"Go jump in the Greenbrier River, Alexander the Great," Marshall shot back.
"Hot as it's been today, that doesn't sound so bad."
"Then go do it in full dress uniform."
Mark got his keys out and glanced at them. There were two that had the emblem of General Motors on them; one went to the truck's doors, the other to the ignition. Mark stuck the correct one into the ignition slot, gave it a moment, and pushed it forward. The Detroit Diesel engine kicked over and started growling, making a pretty decent racket at idle for a truck that was still almost new.
There was some thudding as the boys riding in the back began pushing and shoving. Mark reached for the sliding piece of glass in the back of the cab and shoved it aside. "Hey! You guys wanna walk to the top of the mountain, that's fine with me!"
"Listen," D'Arbanville protested, "how come I have to sit back here? This is so low and common. Me, riding in the back of some truck? Next thing I'll have to go to school with ni-"
"You do have to go to school with niggers, D'Arbanville," Marshall reminded him.
The boys in the truck bed all laughed. "I ain't believing Marshall just said 'niggers'," Chandler laughed.
"Christ, will you people keep your voices down?" Mark hissed. "This is 1985, not fucking 1955."
"Shame," Chandler commented.
"Aw, who cares," D'Arbanville said dismissively. "People can scream about equality all they want. It ain't gonna make any of those people as good as any of us."
"You're a racist, Darby," Edwin told him.
"So what?"
Mark shook his head and gripped the gearshift lever, fixed to the right side of the steering column. The truck's menacing growl dropped a note as it shifted into reverse, and Mark backed it out of the driveway. He drove downhill past the jail and mayor's office on the right, and the park office and town store on the left. Crossing over the railroad tracks, Mark drove the K20 Silverado onto the gravel road that led to the shops the locomotives were serviced in, giving a casual wave to the handful of park employees he passed along the way.
The back roads that led up toward Whittaker Station and Bald Knob were tough to drive even on a dry day. They had so few signs and so many turns and sharp curves and steep grades, it was easy to get lost. The gravel quickly gave way to dirt, and in some instances mud. Mark worked the truck up each grade and around each corner, thankful many times that this was a four-wheel-drive truck. Out here, it made little sense to own any other kind.
Riding in the cab got a little rough here and there, and at one point St. Esprit and Marshall yelped as their heads knocked together. The truck's rocking side-to-side had the seven teenagers in the back tumbling around, and there were some disparaging comments about Mark's driving ability and questions about where he had obtained his driver's license.
The drive smoothened out as he drove past a hillside horse pasture, with a spectacular view of the mountains as the sun continued to set. The guys all quieted down, captivated by the sight. Mark slowed as he passed that point and any others that looked especially good. Even after years living out here, he had never gotten bored of those wide-open views of West Virginia and its mountains.
XX
After a childhood spent moving from one Air Force base to another, having no real permanent place to call home, getting to call a place this beautiful home was really something. It was hard to compare it to anyplace else. To Mark, Cass held more appeal than all the glamour of New York City. The only thing he loved more than viewing these mountains from the ground was seeing them from the air.
The air…
Mark hadn't flown in over a month. His plane, the one his grandfather had given to Mark even before he could fly, was grounded while Granddad worked on it, and Mark was too busy working on the rails to have time to visit neighboring Greenbrier County often anyway. But now, with his working obligations over…
"You'll be up there first thing tomorrow, fighter pilot," St. Esprit said, looking over at Mark. "It's just a few more hours."
"Going without flight is worse than going without sex," Mark declared. "You can't keep me on the ground, man. You just can't. It's not right."
"Tomorrow," Marshall said. "Just wait till tomorrow. Until then, keep your eyes on the dirt roads so we don't fall off a mountain and die screaming like little girls."
The guys all cracked up at that one, and Mark had to stop the truck for a minute. "Goddamn it, Marshall, you and your friggin' jokes," he said, shaking his head.
"Don't take the Lord's name in vain," St. Esprit admonished him.
"Sorry," Mark said contritely.
"Goddamn right you're sorry!"
Mark looked at his friend, rival and classmate in disbelief. "What was that?"
"I said fuck you, Golan!"
"See that, guys?" Mark said, speaking to the other boys as the Chevy growled and grunted its way up the twin ruts dug by the passage of various work trucks over… who knew how many years. "Son of a fuckin' twenty-star general and war hero gets all of you together, drives up here, gets me driving my own damn truck up the side of a damn mountain, all so he can tell me 'fuck you'! Can you believe that?"
"From the Great? You bet I would," Marshall replied, not missing a beat.
"Listen, Air Force," St. Esprit said, "you just drive the damn truck and let the Army do the thinking."
"Would the Marine Corps be willing to do the Air Force a solid and throw the Army outta my truck if he doesn't stop mouthing off?"
"With pleasure," Marshall said, grinning.
"Never thought I'd see the flyboys team up with the fucking jarheads," St. Esprit grouched.
"That's it," Mark said pleasantly. "Mr. Marshall, please show the Holy Spirit the way out of the cab."
St. Esprit and Marshall immediately began wrestling over access to the door handle, and Marshall narrowly managed to win it just as Mark pulled up on one of the wide, grassy fields beside the tracks at Whittaker Station. After a fifteen-minute, exceedingly thorough policing of the area, the boys piled back into the Chevrolet and Mark made the rest of the drive.
They arrived at Bald Knob, the farthest trip possible on one of Cass's trains, as the amber sun was beginning to set. Mark drove as close as he dared to the wild shrubs covering the edge, shifted into park, and turned off the truck. As the diesel growled down into silence, Mark opened the driver's door, not even bothering to take the keys. He normally didn't even in town. This wasn't New York City, or Boston. It was Cass, Mark's reward for a childhood of getting dragged from one Air Force Base to the next.
Mark had finally gotten to be the West Virginian his parents had always wanted. Like he'd always wanted. For generations, both sides of his family had called it home. Mark loved it here. Wordlessly, he got up on the warm hood of the truck and leaned against the windshield, his superb vision allowing his eyes peer out across miles of the Appalachian Mountains.
Marshall climbed into the bed as St. Esprit, that magnificent, arrogant bastard, sat down on the hood beside Mark. The red-haired boy called out, "So who wants a beer?"
Instantly, all the guys milling about, picking places to sit, turned his way, stunned. Marshall just grinned at them. "What, did you think I was kidding about that? Brought it up in my bag, hid it in the ice cooler around the back of Golan's house and stuck it in his truck's big, shiny toolbox before we left."
"Marshall," Mark said, "you are a goddamn marvel."
"First Sergeant's just looking out for his guys," Marshall said, as the other boys all laid on compliments of their own. He handed out the beers, even pulling the caps off as he did so. Then they all stretched out in different spots around the truck and waited for the stars to come out.
"That's a hell of a view," Park said.
"Don't see that in the city," Carroll added.
"If looks were money, noplace'd be richer than West Virginia," Mark said.
"I gotta say," St. Esprit said, "my exec sure knows how to pick 'em."
"Listen, we were both majors last year. What makes you think you're gonna beat me to the three diamonds this time?"
"Well, once OCS starts we'll just see. Won't we?"
"And may the best man win," Mark agreed.
"Guys," Cadez said, "we're the best out of five hundred guys going to Remington this fall. We got picked out of all those other guys. Every one of us is the fucking best."
"That's right," Heisler said enthusiastically. "There's nobody better than us."
"Every one of us could uphold the standards and traditions of Remington all by ourselves," St. Esprit said, in a voice that would brook no argument. It was the voice of the great leader he was already becoming, containing hints of the even greater leader he wanted to be. "Every one of us could walk into the barracks and start kicking ass and taking names. We were chosen to do that as a team, and we're part of a brotherhood, the best graduates our school has ever produced. I'm loving summer break, guys, but at the same time, I can't wait to get back to school this fall."
"Spoken like a Commandant," Carroll said admiringly.
"We're athletes, cadets, and soldiers," Mark, the Master-at-Arms, said. "We're fucking good at every one of those things. The guys in the Class of '86 picked us to be next year's Honor Corps. I just feel sorry for anyone who crosses us."
"To bad they'll never know our names," D'Arbanville, the Secretary, drawled.
"They'll know better than to fuck with the Honor Corps," Marshall said. "We're here for when the rest of the system fails. The buck stops with us."
"Nobody'll know we're the ten guys the last ten picked," St. Esprit acknowledged. "But you men remember this: we're the finest in our class. They'll know us for that as individuals. And as for the Corps- the people who deserve to know, will know."
"To the Corps," Mark said, raising his beer.
"To honor," St. Esprit responded.
"To South Carolina," D'Arbanville drawled, and they all chuckled.
"To this," Marshall said, gazing out at the mountains from the third highest point in West Virginia.
The small band of teenage boys drank their beers and watched the sun set, feeling like the kings of all creation. They were immensely proud of all their achievements so far, of having done so much at such an early age. At everything they did, these boys excelled like there was no alternative- and to them, there wasn't. All of them would soon return to Remington Military Academy for their fourth year, and for some, their sixth. Academically, athletically, and militarily, they were each the highest-ranked cadets in their class. Every one of them was a volunteer; every one of them was at RMA by choice.
At the forefront of their ranks was Alexander the Great.
For as long as Mark had known him, Alexander R. St. Esprit, IV had labored under the weight of his father's name. He had memorized his father's battles and campaigns, his medals and ribbons and the story behind each one. He had spent his childhood growing up in the shadow of a military giant. Arrogant and pushy and self-obsessed as he was, Mark knew the fear and sense of inadequacy that Alex struggled with, the feeling that he could never live up to his father's achievements. The worry that he might never step out of his father's shadow and be allowed to have a life and career of his own.
Mark, the tough-as-nails descendant of generations of coal miners and citizen-soldiers who took no crap from any living man, made an interesting friend for him. All his life Mark had wanted to fly. The Air Force had been the only thing he had ever wanted to do. His father and mother had worked to make Mark love the ancestral home, West Virginia, and love it Mark did, but ever since he'd been a small boy he had walked the earth with his eyes pointed skyward. And so they were now, as he scanned the sky and talked with his friends and thought about flight, and all the planes he had flown, and the indescribable joy of flight, and the endless freedom of the sky.
XX
After a six-mile run the next morning, they all got in the Custom Cruiser and drove to the airport in Greenbrier County. There, Mark returned to his first love, the Zero. When Mark saw the A6M5, he felt his heart skip a beat and then double its speed. Decorated in the dark OD green and white-and-blue roundels of the Republic of China Air Force, she sat poised on the ground with her nose tilted skyward, her glass canopy slid back, waiting for a pilot. Waiting to fly.
In the hangar with her were a Piper Twin Comanche, marked as a plane of the West Virginia Wing of the Civil Air Patrol, and an A-24 Banshee dive bomber, the OD green dive bomber most historians knew as the SBD Dauntless. Mark's paternal grandfather, Charlie Golan, had manned an antiaircraft gun at Hickam on December 7, 1941, and then flown an A-24 at Midway in June of 1942. He'd flown a series of missions with the Royal Australian Air Force, and moved on to fly the P-40 Warhawk, and remained a fighter pilot for the rest of the war. Then in 1946 he began an exchange tour with the Republic of China Air Force, helping salvage captured Mitsubishi Zero fighters and teach Nationalist Chinese pilots to fly them against the Red Chinese.
That fight had been lost in the end. The Communists had overrun mainland China, and only the island of Taiwan and a few smaller ones nearby remained in the Republic's hands. Charlie Golan had mourned the loss of that country to Communism, and the same for Vietnam when that nation had finally fallen in 1975.
But Charlie Golan had not spent any time moping about how things should have been. He came back to the United States, married Mark's grandmother, transferred to the Air Force Reserve and joined the Civil Air Patrol and the local volunteer fire department. He visited Pocahontas County and Greenbrier County schools as a guest speaker, and encouraged people to vote and get involved in the community. He and his wife Betty were immensely respected people in this part of West Virginia. They had lived and continued to live amazing lives, and Mark felt privileged to know them.
Mark started grinning like a little kid as he and his friends pushed open the hangar doors, and he caught sight of his grandfather, already there, mechanic's coveralls on, oiling up the Zero. He was a handsome man, even in old age, and he continued to perform much of the service done on his own planes and cars. He liked driving here from his home in White Sulphur Springs in the copper-and-silver 1957 Chevrolet Nomad he had parked outside, as sure a sign as any that he was here at the airfield.
"Hey, Granddad," Mark said, giving his grandfather a hug.
"Well, hey there, Mark," Charlie Golan said, moved, as he always was, by the presence of his grandson, the soldier-boy and flier. He flashed one of his brilliant, charming smiles that seemed able to light up a room- or a hangar. "I see you brought some friends."
"They were hoping they could get a ride in the Banshee or the Twin today," Mark said, smiling back.
"If they behave themselves," Mark's grandfather said with a wink, "maybe the Golan boys will indulge 'em."
"Maybe we will, Granddad," Mark said, grinning.
Charlie Golan patted the lightly-armed, sleek side of the A6M5's fuselage. "I had a feeling there was someone else you wanted to say hello, first. Just got an engine overhaul done and I think she was waiting to get back into the air."
"If she wants to fly, Granddad," Mark said, his eyes already turning toward the beautiful, slender plane, "I think we should let her."
Mark's friends just stood politely by, watching all this. They were old faces at this airfield, at this hangar. They knew what this all meant to Mark. They would've had to have been blind and stupid besides not to.
"Well, don't just stand there, zip up in your flight suit," the 67-year-old pilot and former park ranger, forest marshal, and volunteer fireman said, and Mark hurried off to the small storage room to get changed. Then he looked at the other nine boys, each one sporting broad shoulders and buzz-cuts like his grandson, and said, "You boys want to take a ride up today?"
They all grinned. "Yes, sir," they said as one.
"Then let's get this Zero rolled out. Mark's not gonna wait very long."
XX
The original engine of the A6M5 was still mounted; it was kept running through the same extraordinary resourcefulness that had let Granddad return from the other side of the world with the plane it was powering. There were few aircraft like it anywhere in the world. With Nationalist China defeated and increasingly forgotten- known to most only as Taiwan- it was surely the last of the ROCAF Zeroes, those strange and beautiful planes that were made by Japan and used by Chinese to fight other Chinese.
Mark completed the pre-flight checks and made sure none of his damn fool classmates were standing near the white-painted, three-bladed propeller. He glanced through the cockpit's gun-sights, still perfectly calibrated even though no ammunition had been loaded in the guns or cannon for years. Then the blond teenager went to start the engine, and it kicked over immediately, a lighter, more buzzing sound than the Banshee's deeper, more heavy-duty growl.
Once he was cleared, Mark taxied out to the runway and halted, revving up the engine. Almost as an afterthought, he reached up and slid the cockpit glass shut. Then clearance came over the radio to begin takeoff. Mark radioed his sincerest thanks, and opened up the throttle with his left hand. The sound of the Zero's motor quickly swelled to a roar, and the indicated airspeed climbed swiftly. The nose dropped as the Zero raced down the runway, and soon the wheels of its landing gear left the ground as its wings generated enough lift to take off.
By sacrificing armor and a better ammunition capacity for maneuverability and speed, the aircraft engineers of Mitsubishi had crafted for their Emperor one of the swiftest and most graceful fighters ever made. Mark adored the Spitfires and Mustangs he had seen at air shows, which he had even from time to time gotten to sit in, then fly. He loved the F6F Hellcat, that big, fat American fighter that could match the Zero turn for turn and did so with heavier armor and bigger guns. But the Zero was the one he had loved from the moment he saw it at not even six years old. It was the one Mark had never been able to keep his hands or eyes off of. It was the one he found truly irresistible, ahead of all the others.
The Zero! What a name for a plane. During the war the United States had named it the Zeke, but in the end, they'd called it by its real name, too. Mark would have loved it if they'd called it the Stink Bug or the Big Ugly Fat Fucker, the Mudhen or the Hog. Such a plane, shaped as if a poet had been asked to describe it first and the engineers had simply gone with his ideas, would have been as thrilling to fly by any other name. Once he'd climbed to over a thousand feet, Mark banked the Zero, turning to do a fly-over of the airfield.
The A6M5 responded instantly- just a flick of the wrist and she was gone! Mark forgot about the friends he had watching from the ground, forgot about school and the Air Force Academy application and everything else, and just flew.
Mark stood the Zero on her tail, slid off into swooping turns and dives, grinning with delight as he thought yet again that no roller-coaster in the world could be anything like this. It was a feeling you couldn't describe unless the other person had experienced it, too. Blue sky above and green earth below, the nimble Zero's stick in his hand, Mark Golan was drunk with the air again.
A/N: 6-2-2017. I did it. I finally did it. Chapter 1 of "The Cadet" has at long last been written. This chapter serves as an introduction; it is meant to give us a basic acquaintance, and hopefully better than a basic one, with Mark Golan and the other members of the brotherhood he has joined at the Remington Military Academy. I set the very beginning of the story in the summer of 1986 rather than the fall when Anthony DiNozzo, Jr. arrives there, because I wanted readers to see the boys of Honor Corps as friends, fraternal brothers, and above all as human beings, before you see them in uniform and at work. The human element will be there then, too, but here, without all the trappings of the military academy and their big ambitions in life to get in the way, you can see these guys as people.
Mark Golan is the only character in this group that is canon, the only one that is actually named. Cadez *technically* is. I read his name off of the nametag of one of the other Honor Corps boys who confronts DiNozzo in the basketball gym in S12E14. It was Cadez or something similar. All of Mark's characteristics- apart from a hard-driving, relentless personality, a single-minded sense of purpose- are made up by me. Golan appears so briefly in "Cadence" that we get no information on who he is, where he is from, or why he is such a hard-nosed individual as a cadet. I came up with my own explanation. He comes from a military background, has a short temper and takes his problems, any problems, head-on. Mark Golan in my depiction is a fighter. He can be a nice guy, as we see here. But he is almost tailor-made to dislike the irreverent, sarcastic Anthony DiNozzo, Jr.
Mudhen, BUFF, Stinkbug, and Hog are all nicknames for the F-15 Eagle, B-52 Stratofortress, F-117 Nighthawk, and A-10 Thunderbolt.
Some of Mark Golan's thoughts and POV on the Zero and what it is like to fly are based off of quotes from the real-life Zero pilot, Saburo Sakai. Mark Golan's infatuation with the Mitsubishi Zero- despite it being an aircraft his own grandfather flew against during World War II- is based off of my own, though I am no pilot myself. The Zero remains one of the most beautiful aircraft I have seen, and it comes from a time when beauty seemed the rule for Japanese aircraft, all of which were designed under a philosophy emphasizing speed and maneuverability over all other virtues.
UPDATE:
-11-23-2018: Changed D'Arbanville's first name from Ryan to Henry, did some editing that included restoring the original opening scene to the chapter, at the request of VG LittleBear.