Chapter 2

Tardy

"Corporal! You are late!"

Randel hunched further and cast his eyes downward. She was right. He had spent longer than he meant to feeding his cats, and so had come in late. Sublieutenant Oreldo was already there when he arrived, and that meant bad things for him.

"Uh, sorry, Lieutenant..."

"Don't 'sorry' me! Explain yourself!"

"Well, uh, you see..."

"Speak up, Corporal!" she whipped her dagger from it's sheath and stabbed the desk beside him. Exactly where he had been looking. She was good.

"Well," he shifted, "I was f..."

"Oh, leave him alone, LT." Oreldo stood, lithe as always, and slapped his shoulder. "It's not like he comes in late all the time-"

"Unlike some people," sublieutenant Martis muttered.

"-after all. Can' you cut the big guy some slack?"

Randel appreciated the help, but there was no question of Oreldo's winning smile working on the Lieutenant. She turned that fierce gaze on the shorter man and yelled at him instead. Randel appreciated that, too.

"Of course I can't 'cut him some slack', you idiot! All soldiers of the Imperial Army should be punctual! It shows our pride in our military and in our unit!"

Oreldo waved a hand at her and sat back down. Martis, too, turned away and resumed whatever paperwork he had been working on when Randel entered the room.

"Ma'am?" Randel tried, but the meek tone wasn't working on her any more than sublieutenant Oreldo's smile.

"Don't 'ma'am' me, Corporal. For your tardiness you will be in charge of getting the supplies for tonight's ration drop. Do you understand?!"

"Ma'am!" he snapped a salute.

She turned her back to him, seeming to forget his very presence. He knew that wasn't true. She was a soldier, a fighter, and a good one at that. She would never forget he was there. Her instincts were superior to almost anyone he had ever come across. But she was determined to ignore him.

He wanted to reach out. Put his hand on her shoulder. He wanted to speak, to call her attention back to him. He hated when she was mad at him. Hated when he did something wrong; hated when he made her yell.

But … but there was also some pleasure in it. Those clear, blue eyes. Piercing. Certain. She never seemed to see what was in front of her, but instead projected her vision of what should be on the world. Each irregularity was stamped out with the swing of her blade and the sharp lash of her tongue. She would set the place to right. He had faith in her.

He followed her order, going to requisition supplies for the ration drop they had planned for the night. It wasn't easy for him; the supply unit was still very uncomfortable with having him near. The more physical soldiering teams were quick to stand up to him and prove they were undaunted by his bulk, but that wasn't so with the more civilian-style departments. Requisitions and even some of the hospital staff were still cautious in his presence, so he ended up trying to make himself even smaller than normal. Hunching his shoulders and twiddling his thumbs until he nearly folded in half. Not looking a single one of them in the eye and speaking only in low mumbles.

It had been getting better, or so he thought. But he came back from the last mission and his battle with 919 in bad shape. Worse even than his confrontation with any of the tanks. Worse than when 908 turned that flamethrower on him. He had been in the epicenter of an armory explosion, and that had left a mark or two.

The shoulders had popped right back into place. The broken right shinbone splinted, the hole in his lung patched, the blood replaced, the ears stuffed with cotton. All of it came out alright in the end. Except for the fact that his face was more of a mess than usual.

The entire left side of his face was burned raw. Nurse Rosetta had kindly made sure that ointment was applied and a new bandage was secured every day, but that hadn't fixed the problem. The scars, Randel knew, scared people as much as his size. Cats didn't mind the scars, and they got used to his body after a time. People took longer. A lot longer. The young men and women working in supplies still had a long way to go before they would be able to deal with him without terror.

He didn't like scaring people, but he would do anything the Lieutenant ordered. She didn't seem afraid of his face. Only sad. She was often sad when she looked at him. He wished that she wouldn't be sad. Those eyes that looked on most of the world in a way that demanded work and betterment, only saw him as a thing to be pitied. He didn't like that.

He wanted her to look at him and see something worth fighting for.