Cometh The Hour.
I just finished this new chapter I hope you enjoy it still don't quite know what I'm gonna do with this story yet but o well we'll see where it goes, I don't own jak and daxter but I do own my characters.
Ortz walked over towards the cooking stove which had to be shared between the entire Company so it wasn't exactly sanitary the stove had engrained food within it made from the last three weeks rations, Ortz tried to scrape off as much as he could, which wasn't a lot. The entire Platoon had arrived to eat, the platoon was made up of four Hellcat crews who were formed to fight back against the Underground. Not every soldier was as experienced as Sergeant Tork, he was an old dog in the ways of fighting but he was also a useful dab hand around the camp, he was brilliant for bringing up the morale of the men. Ortz had begun to fill the pot with clean water by the time Tork and Dugan made their way over, Hutch had already made his ass comfortable on the makeshift seats that were around the stove, they were nothing more than a large Hellcat cannon ammo boxes which had been wrapped in linen to stop the aluminium box from freezing your ass off at night.
"So what are you guy's thinking will happen tomorrow?" Ortz asked while he placed the boil in the bag rations into the boiling water over the stove.
"Not a lot," Tork told him bluntly, "It's just like every other day we've spent in the slums where we go in don't shoot take some phantom rounds and we all get in tired and angry that we couldn't take out more of the Underground."
"Yeah but we have to be careful of civies in the slums," Ortz said politely.
"True but when the Underground can be any of the civies we pass in the Hellcat and they could just be dicking us that is what annoys me," Hutch voiced his opinion.
"Amen to that, brother," Dugun agreed, "so Serge you ever been on a deployment like this?"
"Not like this, never had such a large scale op inside the city walls," Tork began, "But around ten years ago a large force of bandits who'd been banished to the wastelands tried to mount an attack on Baron Praxis, at that time the old Commander of the guard, before the time of Erol, a brilliant soldier called Torn, mounted an attack straight into the bandit camp annihilating every bandit we found, but for Praxis that was not enough so he ordered Torn to kill off every bandit family aswell even if they were within the city, Torn being the honourable soldier he was refused this task and left the guard no one has heard of him since."
"And that's your largest operation?" Orts question.
"Yep, that's about it," Tork replied.
"So we are technically making guard history tomorrow?" Hutch asked.
"Yeah, that's about right let's just hope it's for the right reasons though," Tork told him ominously.
The group sat in silence for a few minutes while everyone was left alone with their thoughts, they had all been into enemy country before but never this far in. Although they had received light contact fairly shallow into enemy and going as deep as they would be the following day everyone had the thought on their mind that someone was going to be lost but who and how?
But as they all sat in silence Ortz took it upon himself to break the silence, "Dinner's ready children," he said jokingly as everyone was snapped out of their trance.
"Good I'm starving," Hutch said as he reached over to the pot to grab a boil bag to eat.
"Oh no you don't, Corporal!" Tork told him as he punched his way to the front to grab a bag.
"Oh you didn't just pull rank on me old man," Hutch replied with a smirk.
"Respect your elders bitch," Tork said as he moved back to his seat.
"Yeah but you're gonna die soon so therefore you feed the young and strong," Hutch said as he grabbed a bag from the pot and went back followed quickly by Dugun who had still not spoken since the silence had started.
"I may be old but I could still have your ass on the ground before you know what happened, Hutch," Tork said as he paused between taking gargantuan forkfuls of his stew.
"So Dugun what are your thoughts on my expert cooking?" Ortz asked Dugun as he sat in silence taking small spoonfuls of the Yakow Stew.
"Well if it improves the food either that cook or our food provider needs to change cause I'm sick of this shit food," He said with a grin.
"Nice to have you back with us Corporal," Tork said as he tossed him a ration packed chocolate bar.
"Good to be back!" He said as he unwrapped it and took a bite, "sorry I was out of it, over thinking."
"We all do it but then we move on together," Tork said assuming his experience role as Platoon Sergeant, Tork looked down at his watch and saw the time, "It's late we better hit the sack got a busy day tomorrow."
Ortz quickly gobbled down his stew, the hot liquid burnt as it slid down his throat he felt like he was eating his last meal but he savoured every mouthful, like a dog that didn't get fed, every gulp was like salvation from the dry dust of the slums. When he finished the foil package he folded it gently and placed it in a gash bag, the bag almost flew away as a gust of wind ripped across the camp.
The others were over by the Hellcats by the time Ortz had finally managed to get the bag in place, "Come on Ortz, no wonder you're the gunner you're too slow for anything else," Hutch told him from across the yard.
"Pipe down!" One of the Officers barked from his bunk.
"Yes Sir!" Tork responded whilst slapping Hutch across the head.
Ortz walked leisurely over to his Hellcat taking in the sights of the camp as he walked, aside from the Officers mess there was very little in the way of buildings on the site a few guard towers spaced at perfect intervals and fencing covering the perimeter of the camp, the armoury on the western flank was the only 'building' that the NCO's were allowed into and that was only to collect a pistol or an assault rifle. As he made it too his Hellcat Ortz sat down on the gravelly floor and looked up there were no clouds only stars overhead, Ortz remembered back to when his grandmother used to tell him about the precursors and their war against the dark makers, just stories but they brought joy to him as boy. He laid back against the ground which felt warm against his back, the sharper rocks were slightly uncomfortable but after so many days in the slums they didn't seem as important as they did at first, he closed his eyes and waited for the morning in wonder of what would happen.
I hope you enjoyed the chapter I have a few ideas of what I'm going to do with it but we'll have to see how those pan out please review and tell me what you think so far.