Chapter XXVIII: Combat Fatigue.
1300hrs, 19 November 2013, "Top Secret" Medical Facility, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan
"When we know our own strength, we shall the better know what to undertake with hopes of success…" John Locke.
"I'm tired, Colonel. I've had all of this army and all of these officers…all of them, the whole bloody lousy rotten mess of sick-brained, pot-bellied scabheads that ain't fit to lead a johnny detail, ain't fit to pour pee out of a boot with instructions on the heel." Private Joseph Bucklin, Gettysburg.
"God fucking dammit!" Col. Iwasaki screamed at Serena, Raye and Lita in his office on the third floor of the medical complex. "What the fuck happened out there?!"
"He got away, sir," Serena said back. "There was nothing we could do about it!"
"Like hell! You have the best training, the best equipment and the best resources bar the US Special Operations forces and you let some NOBODY get away from you?" Iwasaki snapped.
"That 'nobody,'" Raye objected, "Ran right into an entire battalion of PRC Soldiers and we didn't want to spark another international incident!"
"That doesn't matter! Orders were to kill the man, and two weeks' time, you couldn't even do that." Iwasaki was livid; he was beyond mad at these girls at their inability to complete some petty job that the PM wanted done. How was he going to explain this to his superiors?
"Sir, our operations have compromised security throughout East Asia, and even though most of them have been classified as accidents, security has been tightened especially in the PRC," Lita protested, crossing her arms over each other.
"Stand at attention, like you've been trained," Iwasaki ordered. He was obviously not in a good mood, and more insubordination from these girls would be the end of him.
"Make me, fuckwad." The response from Lita was a nasty one.
"What did you say?" Iwasaki said, his voice growling in frustration. He knew exactly what Lita had said, but he had to make her bend to his will…or at least try.
"I said, make me, you fucking prick," Lita snarled. She was also not in a good mood to be talked to like that, and she didn't really care what the consequences were.
Iwasaki took a deep breath, trying to hold in his anger. If he snapped, Lita would send him flying across the room into his prized cherry oak bookshelf, piled high with classic Japanese literature and treaties.
"That's all for now," he said, gritting his teeth together. Next week, the dentist would tell him that he needed to cut that out because it was going to severely affect the enamel on the front row of teeth. "You three are confined to quarters until we can get this all settled out. Get the fuck out of here." Of course, the girls wouldn't just stay in their rooms, but it was all he could do to assure himself that he was in control.
"With pleasure," Serena snapped back. She and the other three girls left the room in a huff, with Lita slamming the door extra hard as she left, rattling all the picture frames in Iwasaki's office.
"I can't believe the gall of that man," Serena said, walking down the hall to her room. "Why are we doing this again?"
"We don't have much of a choice," Raye replied dryly.
"Oh, thanks for reminding me," Lita said, rather sarcastically. "I'll be in my room."
"Have fun cleaning!" Raye said, returning Lita's sarcasm.
"Yeah, whatever."
Lita ran off to her room, trying not to be mad at everyone at the moment. It had only been an hour since they had gotten back from their failed mission in China, and they were already in deep shit. She hadn't felt this way since…well, since she had gotten word from her grandparents on that day.
The phone was ringing in the apartment. Moving quickly, Lita ran to get the phone; the only person who ever used that phone line was her grandparents, too stubborn to get a mobile.
"Lita…"
"Hey grandma, what's going on?"
She had just gotten back from school, in the last year of junior high. She was still a rabble rouser, and got into trouble sometimes, but it wasn't all that bad. Her boyfriend had been going steady now for a couple of months, and everything seemed to be a-okay.
"It's your parents."
"Yeah, they're going to be flying in today from their vacation in Hong Kong."
"Um…" Her grandmother's voice trailed off. "Lita, I don't know how else I can put this, but your parents…they…"
Lita didn't even hear her grandmother finish her sentence. She didn't want to believe what she was telling her. There was a television remote nearby, and grabbing it, she turned on the TV in her apartment kitchen.
"A JAL 747 flying from Hong Kong to Tokyo went down over the Taiwanese Strait today, killing all five-hundred passengers and crew. The Japanese government, along with the Taiwanese government has blamed the PRC in shooting down the airliner, increasing tensions in the region. The Prime Minister stated that…"
She cried for days after that. The police and some reps from JAL came by and told her what she already knew, and she had to move out of the apartment and live with her grandparents for a little bit. But she couldn't live with them…she didn't want to be dependent on anyone anymore.
Lita moved back into the apartment, still a minor but managed to pay the rent with the settlement money that JAL had given out to all of the surviving relatives and family members, plus the life insurance that her father had taken out. She was set for a very long time, but it didn't matter. All she wanted was her family back. Lita fought at her new high school with anyone, everyone; teachers, bullies, the class rep, even the principal himself had been a victim of Lita's haymaker before being kicked out and going to Azabu Jūban. And there she met Amy and Serena, along with their friends Mina and Raye…
"Goddammit Lita, open this door!"
Kobayashi and crew were standing outside the room, knocking on the door.
"How long has she been in there?" Nurse Kuroi asked.
"I don't know, a couple of hours or something like that," Iwasaki said, looking at his watch.
"You did tell them that they were confined to quarters," Kobayashi pointed out.
"I didn't think they'd actually listen," Col. Iwasaki replied. "Those two didn't."
"Lita, please, it's important." Still no response.
Finally, Kobayashi got the keys to her room out and opened the door.
Lita was lying there on her bed, half-asleep, half-undressed, in tears, and in general, a complete wreck.
"Christ," Kobayashi muttered. "Kuroi, check her out."
Nurse Kuroi moved over to her bed, making sure to be extra careful in approaching her. Lita's strength caused problems if she got angry, but they also didn't want to remove her prosthetics, which was a painful and humiliating process.
"Lita…Lita," she shook her gently.
"Wha…what's going on?"
"We're here for a quick checkup, that's all."
"I don't want to see a doctor," she replied, trying to force her away. "I'm fine."
"Please, we need to do this," Kuroi firmly said.
"Uhhnnn." Lita pushed her away, gently. By gently, she shoved her to the ground.
"Ow!" Kuroi exclaimed, and the rest of the people outside rushed in.
"I…" Lita tried to get up, still dazed and confused.
"That's enough!" Iwasaki said. "You two, prepare to fire!"
There were two orderlies armed with (ironically), tasers. They started to raise them to the firing position but Kobayashi stopped them.
"Hold your fire!" he ordered, much to Iwasaki's dismay. "Lita, listen to me, we're just trying to help."
"And why should I listen to you?!" she yelled back, now standing by the bed and glaring at the people in the room. "It's the same goddamn thing, we're not doing good, we're not performing up to standard, we can't do this, we can't do that, and I'm sick and tired of taking orders from you people in the first place! I didn't even want to be here, I was brought here by some freak accident!"
She shed a few tears, but quickly wiped them away.
"Lita, I can understand how you feel," Kobayashi said. "Please, it's for your own good."
"I don't care!" she shot back.
"I've had enough of this," Iwasaki snarled. "Open fire!"
One of the orderlies fired his taser, but Lita blocked it with her prosthetic arm. The electric current made it all but useless, and it became dead weight on her arm.
"Argg…" she moaned. Seeing that she could either take another taser shot and lay there helpless, or give up, she chose the latter. "Fine. You got me."
"Good to hear," Iwasaki said. "But I'm not taking any chances."
The other orderly fired and paralyzed Lita, leaving her helpless as she was picked up and lifted onto a stretcher. She could hear the doctors arguing with Col. Iwasaki in the background.
"That was completely unnecessary!" she heard Kobayashi argue.
"It was completely necessary!" Iwasaki replied.
Lita saw in passing, Dr. Kawasaki standing by Nurse Kuroi, not really doing anything, just watching. It was completely unnerving.
Several hours later and many pointless medical tests ("Your blood pressure is up again," Dr. Kobayashi pointed out. "But after what's happened, I can't blame you."), Lita was finally released and sent to the cafeteria, where the other members of the SAILOR team were eating dinner.
"You too, huh?" Serena asked her. Typical of her, she had some doughnuts on her plate, next to the tonkatsu sandwich and fries.
"I heard you put up a fight," Raye added, lifting some chopsticks full of udon noodles to her mouth.
"It was nothing," Lita replied, sitting down angrily. "I gave up, but Iwasaki had me tased anyway."
"Don't tase me bro!" Mina joked.
"That was old five years ago," Amy replied.
"Sorry," Mina said, glaring at Amy. "Aren't you going to eat anything, Lita?"
"I don't feel hungry," she lied. Her stomach said otherwise, giving a huge growl in response.
"I think that means, yes," Mina said. "Come on, I'll take you to the line and we can get some food together."
"No, I'll do it," Raye said, getting up from her spot.
"Hey, wait for me!" Serena protested, also standing up.
"Fine, I'll come as well," Amy groaned. Stupid social conventions.
Everyone got more food anyway. Lita grabbed some curry and rice, along with some tonkatsu.
"Itadakimasu," she muttered, clapping her hands together.
"Itadakimasu!" was the vocal response from the rest of the team.
"So, what exactly did they do to you in there?" Serena asked Lita. "They just kept us in there for a couple of minutes, and then let us go."
"They had to look at my prosthetics," Lita said, eating some of her curry.
"Uh, I don't buy that," Serena replied. "Case in point." She pointed to her legs.
"You didn't get tased," Lita said back. "I'm not quite sure what they did, because it was a lot of waiting, then everyone, I mean, everyone took a look at me. Kobayashi, Kawasaki, Nurse Kuroi, hell, Iwasaki was in there for a second just to look at my arm."
"Iwasaki was in the exam room with you?" Mina scrunched up her face at that. "Ew."
"Tell me about it. And if he asked me to give him head or something like that," Lita said, trying not to laugh at her ridiculous statement, "It wouldn't have ended well."
"This isn't ero," Raye replied, waving her fork around. There was a piece of cheesecake on her cafeteria tray now.
"Says the person who watches all that stuff on the internet," Lita retorted.
"Oh knock it off," Raye groaned. "I've amended my ways."
"So you only use the incognito mode now on your browser," Amy said.
"Yeah, I only…hey!" Raye glared at Amy. "Cut that shit out!"
"Sorry, it was only a glance," she smiled softly.
"So you look at that stuff now too, don't you?" Raye said, trying to turn the conversation on her.
"Nah, just me watching you watching that ero stuff," Amy replied, digging into her dessert, a piece of chocolate cake.
"Oh I swear someday…" Raye said, clutching the fork in her hand.
"Sorry to interrupt you dinner girls." Kuroi had suddenly appeared by them.
"How did you that?" Lita asked her.
"Sorry, I came in after you had started talking about ero," she said with a straight face.
"That's great," Serena said, trying not to laugh at Raye's very embarrassed look. "What did you want?"
"Col. Iwasaki wants you in a briefing…"
Everyone at the table groaned.
"Tomorrow at noon."
"Well, that's not too bad," Serena replied. "It could be worse."
"We could be doing more PT drills," Amy said.
"I don't mind PT," Lita noted. "It's kind of fun."
"For you," Amy shot back. "I'm kind of on the weak side here."
"And you still can take a guy down twice your size," Lita said. "That's still respectable."
"Well, some of us can't punch through walls or cars or use alchemy," Raye snarked at her.
"Besides the alchemy part?" Lita said. "Yeah, I can do all those things. Plus, I have the most tal…"
"Thank you Lita," Serena interrupted, stopping her in the middle of her sentence. "We'll be there, Nurse Kuroi."
"Of course." She bowed and left the cafeteria.
"Jesus, this blows," Raye said.
"It could be worse," Serena commented, twirling her hair in boredom.
"Yeah, to you."
"Oh thanks Raye, you always make everything so happy and cheerful around her," Serena said angrily.
"Hold up you two," Lita tried to intervene, but the argument was underway.
"And sometimes, I can't put up with your shit when we're in the field!" Raye retorted.
"Like what?!"
"I don't know, maybe it's the way you're so…"
Mina, Lita, and Amy looked at each other, and quickly excused themselves from the table, leaving the two of them to fight it out.
"What's up with those two?" Mina asked Lita.
"I have no fucking clue," she snipped back. "They did that all throughout our mission, and I had to put up with it."
"Sorry," Mina replied, somewhat hurt by Lita's attitude.
"Yeah, whatever." She stalked off to her room, irritated at everything that had gone on today.
"I'm going to my room too," Mina said.
"Have a good night then, see you at the briefing," Amy replied glumly.
With that, they all dispersed to their own living quarters, no better off today than they had been a couple of hours ago.