Now was a weird time for an emergency meeting, especially because nothing was happening.

The past week had been a quiet one, as in the aftermath of the, well, clusterfuck— some people were calling it a showdown, but she preferred the term clusterfuck— over the Bering Strait, neither they nor the Feds really had enough intact and well supplied air power in one place to actually do anything. Newcomers to Armstrong had come and gone en masse, and rumor had it that the base was being geared up for a CIF strike on Magadan. Fuck, she shook her head in disbelief. Are we getting called up to go on the offensive? She glanced around the ping-pong table at the other five— no, wait. Four.

Zip.

Her uncle's story of losing his wingman hadn't exactly softened the loss of her squadmate, and Nicole couldn't help but think that Uncle Brian's chosen coping mechanism of spiraling into an alcoholic mess for a few years probably wasn't particularly productive, even if it was rather tempting. Much to her disappointment, though, there was seemingly no way to get drunk around here— that she could find, anyways— and she doubted repeating the liquor-fueled disciplinary screwups that earned her the callsign "I Require Intensive Supervision" would earn her any brownie points with the Lieutenant Colonel.

She caught a few wandering glances resting in the place Zip would have been standing, and like her, none of them let their gaze stay there very long. She offered up a silent prayer that someone would break the eerie quiet, and mercifully, the Major did.

Or at least, a Major did.

"I bet you're wondering why I called all of you here at such an early hour," the annoyingly smooth voice of the familiar AWACS operator prompted Nicole to look around the room in a confused daze, rubbing her eyes as they came into focus on one Matthew 'Bluejay' Hajj, rather than the expected Alana 'BASH' Hawthorne. Nicole raised an eyebrow and sighed. I'm too tired for this shit.

Dagger grumbled. "Look, man, I'm sorry—"

"You knew the terms of the deal, Ashido. Not my fault you fucked it up." The AWACS crossed his arms. "If Sergeant Wilhelm catches you, you're shit outta luck. Should know by now that she doesn't fuck around when she catches someone ratfucking the store room."

"Sergeant who?" Nicole cocked her head, an eyebrow raised in inquisition. "Keep in mind, I don't exactly know people around here. Even after they let me move freely, half the fucking base won't even look at me."

"Oh, they won't look at you? Then, my friends," the AWACS looked around the table. "I think we have our replacement."

All eyes were on her. "Replacement? Do any of you mind telling me what the hell is going on? I thought this meeting was an emergency, and all you guys are doing are rambling on about some kind of deal."

"No, Bluejay, I think you're right," Dagger said, tapping her chin in thought. "She's got the right skillset."

"Yeah," Burn added with a glare. "If the coffee raid is any indication, I think she'll be good at this."

"Motherfucker. You told him about the coffee thing?" She glared at Burn, pointing at Bluejay. Burn shrugged, and Bluejay held up a cheerfully colored can of Wired!® with a smile. "I already got my drink of choice. Secret's safe with me, Spook." She shuddered at the thought; the twisted psyche of anyone who actually enjoyed that drink— if you could even call it that— terrified her.

The others continued to ignore her. "Wait," Jackal gave Burn a light punch on the shoulder. "You want her to do it? Don't think she's gonna poison us or something?" Burn simply glared back, and grumbled.

"Then it's decided." Major Hajj broke into a major smile.

"What's fucking decided?" Nicole slammed her hands down on the ping-pong table. "For the love of all that's holy, will you assholes tell me anything?"

Dagger crossed her arms. "The mantle falls to you, o fucking new girl." A wide grin alighted on Lieutenant Ashido's lips. "The burden— nay, the sacred duty of Snacko is yours to bear, Spook."

"Snacko?" Nicole smiled. "Wait, so you're letting me go off base, go into town or something and get the snacks? I was Snacko for my old squadron, it was a pretty good gig—"

"What?" Bluejay laughed. "No. Hell no. We can't get into town. If we could get into town, your little coffee raid wouldn't be necessary. But the Feds and their strategic bombers had other ideas, and it's not like town is close, either. When the PX ran out of stock, we were stuck with whatever we could find in those cargo planes and what little came in with the weapons and fuel." The AWACS put his hands on the table, leaning in. "But you've all been paying attention, I assume? Things have changed. We've got a supply line again, the C/T-17s haven't stopped coming in since the whole… y'know. The party in our backyard. And right now, the only place with extra food… is the storeroom. There's your pile of treasure."

"Too bad there's a dragon guarding it," Dagger grumbled. "Now I'm stuck on latrine duty for two weeks, and she won't let me within spitting distance of the storeroom."

"That's where you come in, Spook," Bluejay stared her down, a shit-eating, Wired!®-drinking grin on his face. "If half the base won't look at you, let's hope ol' Tech Sergeant Grouchy won't, either. How'd you manage to get caught, anyway? She's asleep half the time."

"Oh yeah, Bluejay?" Dagger scowled. "Well, I'll have you know the other half of the time is whenever anyone is within a twenty foot radius of the supply room." She turned to Nicole. "Good fucking luck, Snacko."

"Uhhh…" Nicole raised an eyebrow in confusion. "...Thanks? But I don't entirely get what any of this has to do with Snacko duty."

"Well, since we can't make it out to town," Jackal chimed in. "What we've been doing is stealing just a little food from the storeroom."

"Oh, joy. Ratfucking." Nicole sighed.

"Funny." Burn chuckled. "A spook, ratfucking."

"Oh, fuck off, blondie." Nicole gave her fellow officer a less respectful type of salute.

"Kids, kids, calm down. I will turn this ping-pong table around." The AWACS held out a checklist. "Your mission, and you don't get a choice on whether or not to accept it, is to get everything on that list. Think you can do it, Snacko?"

"Uhh…" she read off the list. Jalapeño squeeze cheese, chocolate, potato chips… All stuff that could be found in the rations the storeroom would likely finally have in spades. "Yeah, I think I can do that."

"Good. You're on the clock, if you don't want to get caught. Wilhelm's shift starts in an hour. Get movin', Snacko—"

Burn cut him off. "SLJO."

"Huh?" Nicole raised an eyebrow, stopping her in her tracks as she glanced back through the doorway. "What was that, Burn?"

"We've been down one ever since…" He glared at her. "Zip wasn't the first person we lost. Last guy who was Polaris Six was our SLJO. Shitty Little Jobs Officer. Bluejay, I recommend we fold Snacko and SLJO into one position. For Spook," Burn smirked. "Maybe you'll work off your sentence."

"Motion seconded, Bernitz." The AWACS grinned, mischievously. "Have fun… SLJO."

"I don't get paid enough for this shit." Nicole mumbled to herself with a grumble and a sigh.

"Correction," the Major retorted with a light chuckle. "You're not getting paid at all. Now get a move on, ol' Bluejay's hungry."