Chapter 14: Being an Adult

  Marcus sneaked back into the barracks and had a morning shower. Thanks to his high vitality he felt fully refreshed and ready for the day. The door knocked. Janette barged right in, squinted her eyes and said “sit” pointing at his bed. Unable to resist the command, Marcus sat down unclear what was going on. Janette had her hands on her hips and looked down on him like a drill sergeant.

  “Congratulation Marcus, you are now an adult. It is very important that you learn this lesson right now.” She continued in a serious tone. “You had a one night stand. And it is important that you understand what that means. You meet. You bang. You do NOT cling.” Marcus started to get where this was going. “You do not call. You do not show up to her yoga class and you do not try to make it happen again. It is one and done.” After saying this Janette looked sufficiently happy with herself.

  “I know.” Marcus said after a moment. “Monika told me she just wanted to have some fun. Nothing more.” Janette gave him a smile and sat next to him. “Was it good?” she asked. Marcus nodded “Amazing.”

  They sat in silence for a while. “Did you show up to yoga class?” Marcus asked into the blue. “Sure, did. First girl who turned me from an insecure wallflower into the blazing star I’m today. I wish somebody had told me the rules of one night stands before that.” She laughed and Marcus was impossibly thankful that Janette was his friend. They shared breakfast and the “old man” called the team together shortly after. “Finally we have several teams on base and that means we can have team training.” Moaning came from several of the more experienced team members. “No excuses. We will train with the team from Cullen. It will be good for you to train with other people and classes.”

  With Russo leading, they went to the training hall were the other team was already waiting. Cullen, a smaller man with short red hair and a stern face shook hands with Russo. They started out by introducing their classes and abilities like before. Alternating, one class holder from each team stepped up. Declaring their name, class and level and showed what they could do.

  Lars started out, simple like before. Elise Bakker a woman with thin black hair and an athletic body stepped up. “lvl 22 Shaman”, instead of going for the target she pulled out a pistol and shot at her own hand. She dropped the bullet and showed her undamaged hand. Body reinforcement, Shaman (31) was a buffer type but Marcus did not remember all their abilities right now.

  Next up, Russo moved and showed of some spear work and Cullen nodded in respect. Cullen himself moved forward as an “Alchemist, lvl 31”. He pulled out a small phial and threw it at a target. The glass broke and the red liquid inside covered the front of the target. It melted in seconds into sludge. “Besides that, Mrs. Brown already has gained the benefit of my other ability.” Janette nodded and moved her, now surprisingly healed arm. Without further explanation Cullen stepped back into the neat row of his team. Alchemist was a rank 22 class. They can create powerful medical products like pills and potions. Marcus was surprised to see an Alchemist here and a level 31 to boot.

  Marcus was about to go but Janette nudged him to stay. She introduced herself and put a few bullets of her pistol in a target. Somehow it seemed far less flashy than what he was used to from Janette. Her counterpart was a small man with dark hair and sharp features he introduced himself as “Pierre Martin, lvl 20, Accelerator”. Marcus could see how Pavel’s knuckles went white for a moment.

  Pierre pulled out a knife and in the same motion stood in front of the target. His hand moved so fast that Marcus only saw a blur but the target suffered half a dozen hits in a second or two. What was going on! Accelerator was rank 24, all their classes are high to mid rank and addition to that much higher level than their own team.

  Pavel did not move and Marcus knew why. Instead, Marcus stepped forward and introduced himself. He did not look at the other team, he just moved to the target and punched the head off. “Wait what is your ability?” Elise asked. “That looked like a normal strike for somebody who has some strength crests.” She put more salt in the wound. “Heavy Strike.” Marcus said and moved back without any further explanation. The tallest of the other group was next, a dark skinned man with the name Thomas Fairbank, he was a lvl 18 Firelord. He stepped next the target and it started to burn and eventually melt away. “Give me enough time and I can turn anything into slag.” He shrugged his shoulders and went back. Rank 62, nobody can win a fight of attrition against this class Marcus thought. He was also the only one of the other team who seemed to wear something beyond light armor.

  Stolen story; please report.

  As the last of the team Pavel just moved behind the target with Wind Walk and put a rifle burst in its back. The last in line was a young woman who had not shown much interest in the event. She had snow white skin and platinum blond, long hair. She moved one step forward, pointed her hand at one of the targets and snapped her finger. Something appeared above her hand and moved with extreme speed into the target, punching clean through it. “Elena Volkova, Elemental Mage, level 16.” she said and stepped back. Rank 8, Marcus thought. They have a top ten class in their team and he felt a knot in his chest.

  After this “friendly” event they went outside for one on one sparring. Melee classes performed unarmed combat while the ranged ones had a shooting competition. Marcus got paired up with Pierre. To make matters worse for the first time temperatures had risen enough for the snow to melt and the ground to be soaking wet.

  Marcus went into his basic stance like he had learned. He wanted to let Pierre go first to get a feeling for the fight. Before he even got ready Pierre moved up kicked him into the stomach. The impact made him bent over only to receive another kick against his left leg. He went on his knees and Pierre followed up with a barrage of strikes. Marcus desperately tried to keep his guard up but a heavy blow pushed his arms away. Strike after strike hammered into his face until everything went dark.

  Shouting brought him back to reality, that and pain. Marcus blinked and saw the face of his team leader while he heard Janette shouting and cursing. “How are you? Can you stand?” Russo asked and Marcus came up on his feet. His head was still hurting but the rest of his body seemed to move well. “You see, he is already up again. No reason to be upset.” Cullen tried to get things calmed down. “Because he is built like a tank. Anybody else would be in the medical ward.” Janette had fire in her eyes and the rest of the team looked much the same. “Was it fun to beat up a level 7 Fighter?” Pavel asked. “It was nothing.” Pierre replied and shrugged his shoulders.

  “Very well, everybody back to their tasks. Marcus can you go again?” Russo asked and Janette’s jaw dropped. “Luca!” Some blood dropped out of Marcus’ nose but he nodded. “Back to sparring” Russo said and then bent to Marcus’ ear “Don’t hold back.” Russo gave him a pat on the back and made space for the “sparring”. Marcus could see Pierre and Elena talk for a moment and a thin smile appeared on the man’s face.

  Marcus went into his stance and brought his guard up. Then he put Anchor to max.

  Pierre also got into position and charged with blinding speed. Marcus couldn’t see the kick, only feel the pain of the impact on his right knee. But the level seven Fighter did not budge, instead Pierre staggered with surprise. Marcus did not think or hesitate and delivered a plain palm strike to the chest of the surprised man. Impulse Hammer.

  Since the time with Mr. Tree Marcus had not put this much power into Impulse Hammer. The man was blown over and rolled over the soggy ground. Marcus flinched as he remembered that he had gotten six more vitality since then, something he had not taken into account.

  “THAT was reckless.” Elise Bakker shouted. “If I had not reinforced him in the last second this could have killed him!” Pierre’s breath was rattling and he held his chest unable to stand up. “Na, na. Look, he is fine. No reason to be upset.” Russo sounded rather relaxed.

  Marcus felt he had to say something, “I’m sorry, I have not yet adjusted to my increased power.” The Cullen team looked even more pissed but Janette could not stop laughing for minutes.

  Even later in the common room she replayed the scene in her own style for the whole room to hear. “Ohh. I’m sorry! I didn’t know how awesome I was!” Janette laughed tears and hit Marcus on the back so many times he worried his vitality could not keep up.

  “But seriously. Thank you for being a weird, super tanky Beefcake.” Janette said removing tears from her eyes. “It feels so good to see those elites speechless for once.” Pavel gave him the thumbs up. “Elites?” Marcus felt he was missing something.

  “I told you, we are the trash caravan. We are the trash that gets stationed at the end of the world. Or why else do you think they send us a level 1 Fighter?” Janette said with a bitter voice. “The LCPS has more elite teams where they put the high rankers and hopefuls. Those guys get the good gigs were they can earn a lot of EXP and can level up until they get scouted by big money.”

  Marcus looked around his teammates and saw a lot of pain behind smiles. Being second or third rate and still pushing on. Being stepped on and not say something because you need the money. Things like that hurt. “I think you are all awesome.” He said. “I drink to that.” It was Russo, who raised his wine glass.

  “That we all survive the next mission. CHEERS”. Janette’s words caused laughter but Marcus felt a heavy mass in his stomach. ‘They might not all survive’ until now this fact had not been real to him. Maybe something like this is also part of being an adult, he thought.