man, its been a while... so, here's this... :)
Monday morning rolled around too soon for Hermione who slammed a sleepy hand down on her blaring alarm clock. She groaned aloud as she lifted her head off her pillow, locks of curly brown hair falling in her face. She blew them out of her eyes as best she could before her head dropped back to her pillow.
Footsteps padded along the tile floor before lights suddenly came on, filling the room with a yellowish glow. "Come on sleepyhead," her roommate spoke in a voice much too cheery for the early hour. Hermione grabbed her pillow roughly and threw it in the direction of the voice before succumbing to a massive weight before her blankets were ripped off her bed.
She groaned once more, before slowly pushing herself off her mattress, the red lines on her alarm clock glaring, 4:33. The two women dressed in silence, changing into their PT gear, black and yellow shorts and shirt. Hermione quickly pulled her messy locks back into a ponytail before slipping her feet into a pair of tennis shoes.
"Ready?" she looked over at Hannah, who was pulling the sheets on her bunk tight, smoothing out a couple wrinkles.
Hannah stood up straight, admiring her work, before grabbing her water bottle and heading towards the door, "Yeah, let's go."
The two females headed out, pulling the door tight behind them and walking down the hallway, their shoes clicking lightly on the blue tile floor. The walls were mostly a pristine white, though there were areas where the paint had chipped, or been peeled off revealing a multitude of colors beneath. Patches of green, red, blue, yellow peeked out from various bricks, Hermione was sure that if all the paint would be removed the hallways would be at least two inches wider.
They opened the door at the end of the hallway, stepping out into a glass enclosure, the tile had given way to bare cement, their shoes now clicked louder and echoed in the small space as the descended the stairs, one dim light shone, housed in a yellowed plastic container, barely illuminating the space. They hurried down the stairs, being met with others from their unit headed out for PT, sleep still in their eyes.
Everyone was silent, a collective agreement that it was too early for this as they lined up in formation just outside the building. The training area was down the street yet but post regulations stated that any and all groups of three or more were to march in formation.
And so they waited, in a haphazard formation, until everyone from the barracks was with them. Those lucky enough to live in post housing with their families would meet them at the field individually.
Finally, when the entire group was present, the most senior among them, a sergeant who had just arrived and hadn't yet secured his own housing, took control of the group.
He centered himself and went to the position of attention before shouting his commands, "Group, attenTION!" They snapped to position, their shoulders rigid and hands at their sides, the only sound a clicking of heels on cement, he gave his next command, "Right FACE!" Another snap of heels as everyone turned at once. "Forward MARCH!"
And they stepped off as a group, right foot first, they made their way down the street towards the training field where they met up with the others. As the last rank stepped onto the grass, they began to mark time before halting as a unit, the newcomers joining their ranks as the others performed a left face.
The First Sergeant took command of the unit from the Sergeant who had led them down from the barracks, a salute between the two of them, they were once again called to attention before being directed into a PT formation, on the command Extend to the Left, the group raised their arms and let out an "Ahhhhh" in unison until the last person stopped moving, and they were directed to put their arms down, the distance between them was now a double arm interval. They did this once again as they were directed to face to the right and extend. Then the four columns were directed to count off before the even numbers could uncover, or take a step to the left.
They proceeded to stretch as a group, led through the different exercises before being told to form up again. Hermione groaned internally as this meant they would be doing a group run. There were three different routes they could take, and after her week of no PT, she really wished they'd go left and take the easy route, the other two were to the right and one was a long run on mostly flat terrain while the other wound its way through the hills, taking a scenic route. If they went left, they'd stay on the streets, making their way through the post briefly before returning to the field to cool down.
Upon being guided to the right in formation, she mentally cursed her luck. "Double time, MARCH!" Top yelled and the unit took off at a light jog, the guidon bearer running five steps ahead of the formation, flag held proudly across his body. Hermione did not envy him one bit, having to carry that flag everywhere was not her idea of a good time.
Moody began to call out, "LMTV Rollin' down the strip!"
The formation echoed.
"64 Legs on a one way trip!"
Hermione couldn't help but smile, this was one of her favorites.
"Mission top secret destination unkown!"
"Don't even care if they make it back home!"
Despite their push against suicide, they never avoided talking about death and the likelihood of dying in battle. They continued on, running down the streets, past a few other units, each calling their own cadences. Everyone yelled as loudly as they could, trying to best the others, the post was a cacophony every morning as each unit competed, screams could be heard from a distance as it was a matter of pride.
They continued on, moving seamlessly between cadences, "Mama, mama, can't you see what the army's done to me?"
They rounded a corner, reaching the home stretch, the miles had passed them by and every member of the unit had a nice shine to their skin, a thin coating of sweat trailing down their bodies. "My girl's a vegetable! She lives in a hospital!" They called out, getting their second wind. The morning dew soaked grass was just up ahead.
Their cool down stretches passed quickly before they were released for breakfast and personal hygiene. It was now almost 7 a.m. and the sun had risen, its tendrils of light had begun to illuminate their run, bringing with it an energy and readiness for the day ahead.
Hermione and Hannah went back to their room, hoping to beat Reveille, which would sound at 7 a.m. They had just made it to the door of their barracks when the bugle call began to sound. Hermione closed her eyes briefly, mentally cursing her luck once again as she snapped to attention and presented a salute in the direction of the music.
Hannah stood safely inside of the barracks, a shit eating grin across her face.
She opened the door for Hermione once the music stopped. Hermione's stomach grumbled loudly as the pair ran up the stairs and back to their room, wanting to head to breakfast as quickly as possible, the good stuff would be gone soon and they'd be left with the remnants of yesterday's meal. But neither woman could eat while dripping sweat and smelling themselves. They quickly showered and changed into uniform before once again taking off, this time towards the chow hall.
The pair sat across from each other at the table, their trays piled high, cups of coffee in hand, the news playing in the background. Conversation passing between the two, now no longer in a rush as they had another 30 minutes before they were expected to be at the motorpool. Hermione pulled out her phone as she absentmindedly chewed on a piece of toast, a smile spreading across her face when she saw she had a text from Fleur. It was simple, only saying good morning, but the fact that she had gotten a text from the beautiful blonde was what really mattered.
She eagerly texted back her own reply, asking what the French woman was doing up so early. When she looked up from her phone, she saw Hannah staring at her unabashedly, a questioning look on her face, "Who you textin' so early in the morning?" she questioned, raising an eyebrow.
"Uh, nobody," Hermione answered quickly, placing her phone down on the table and turning off the screen. She looked away trying to hide her blush, and regain control of her features. The other blonde took this opportunity to try and grab Hermione's phone, which she nearly did successfully, leading to the two of them fighting over possession of the rectangular object, a volley of "Give it back" and "No" between the two.
Hannah laughing uncontrollably as she fought to maintain control of the device, Hermione standing up from her seat, reaching over the table as her fingers continued to be repelled. Finally, with a huff she sat back, crossing her arms across her chest and rolling her eyes. The petite blonde, grinning with victory, leaned back in her chair, unlocking the device, eager to see what it was that made Hermione act like a lovesick teenager.
"Ooooh, Fleur" she said in a sing-songy voice, reminiscent of an older sibling saying she was going to tell mom, "someone's found themselves a pretentious French woman," she teased causing Hermione's blush to once again appear as the brunette sat, pouting in her chair.
Hannah leaned forward conspiratorially, her voice taking on a serious tone, barely above a whisper, "She good in bed?"
Hermione faked offense at being asked such a question and playfully reached across to slap Hannah's shoulder before turning serious, "I wouldn't know."
Hannah scoffed, rolling her eyes and throwing the phone back towards Hermione, it bounched on the table, its rubber case absorbing the impact, "You're no fun."
Hermione grabbed her phone and pocketed it as the two stood and grabbed their trays. It was time to head for the motorpool.
Their boots crunched under the gravel that covered the motorpool, vehicles lined up perfectly, uniform distance between them. A chain link fence topped with barbed wire circled the lot. A sergeant stood at the gate, clipboard and stack of paperwork in hand, giving a couple papers to each person to walk through. Every vehicle the unit owned was stored in this lot, and each needed to be inspected. Every Monday, the unit had to inspect every vehicle for any issue, though most of the vehicles hadn't even moved from the previous inspection. They could get through the PMCS fast enough, but it was expected to take an hour per vehicle. This meant that most of the privates stood around, joking, talking, playing games with each other, hands in their pockets until the day was up.
It was really a skill, to do nothing and make it look like something was happening every time one of the higher ups passed by. Hermione sat behind the wheel of a HMMWV, playing on her phone and adjusting the lights every so often, the manual open in the passenger seat next to her.
Hannah lounged across the back seat, PC covering her face, relying on Hermione to alert her to any formation or appearance of rank. When they switched vehicles, their roles would be reversed, they'd worked this system out months ago, using the free time to catch up on some needed sleep.
A few of the guys had popped the hoods of a few different vehicles and played keep away with a poor private's PC. He'd made the mistake of taking it off before sliding under a truck to inspect it for leaks. He jumped around haplessly in the middle of the group.
Hermione laughed and thought he'd learn soon enough before returning her focus to her phone, she'd been busy texting Fleur all morning, their conversation harmless enough. She didn't dare go into specifics yet, instead preferring to ask Fleur questions about herself, her family, what her day was like when she wasn't showing around hapless foreigners.
If the PT formation commands sound stupid, its cause it is. And every unit I've been in makes everyone scream "AHHHHH" as we all run sideways with our arms out. If you need a visual, sadly screaming as they move, but this is the formation: watch?v=2KdyljqBrmg&t=34s
And I've also described barracks I actually stayed in so, not an exaggeration, I once counted 8 different layers of paint for one section of wall and cannot verify if that was all the paint on it or if nobody had made it through to the next layer.
Regular march is 120, 30 inch steps per minute while a double time march is 180 steps per minute forcing it to be a light jog. Anytime an actual run happens its not in formation, a double time march is generally the fastest "running" speed that will happen as not everyone has the same speed.
Oh and, Hermione and Hannah will go pretty much everywhere together as (I'm not sure about foreign countries exactly) the army has this thing called battle buddies, which kinda is a joke in and of itself, but essentially soldiers have to have a friend with them to go anywhere, generally this rule is dropped inside of unit buildings but to travel between buildings or off post except for on leave, you have to have someone with you, in case anything happens. I can't say how often this is followed stateside, aside from my experience that's the rule used, and on deployments its used because its a war zone generally. But for being stationed in Germany, *shrug*.
PMCS- preventative maintenance checks and services, they're done weekly regardless if the vehicle has moved, there's actually daily, weekly, monthly, yearly and then before and after operation checks. i hate them, they're a pain.