Disciplinary

The Army Witch stood at ease as instructed, hands clasped neatly behind her back and legs stood evenly apart. She was clearly bored, with a bland, uninterested expression and the occasional shift from side to side. She wore her full service dress, which consisted of a sharp, khaki tunic and skirt that fell just below the knee-line, the sensation of which she had not felt in a considerable time, what with all her time spent in her Challenger training strikers recently. Her mud brown hair was cut short and fashioned into a short, serviceable ponytail that was only just in compliance with regulations. It was her little statement of rebellion against what she felt was a wholly unjust punishment.

After all, it was hardly her fault the ammo loaded was hot rather than the dummy rounds the range master had *insisted* was the case. But were the Quartermaster and his flunkies standing here waiting on a disciplinary hearing? No sir, not when said man happens to be a distantly related cousin of the Prince of Wales and the accuser was a woman well known for stirring up trouble.

‘Knew I should’ve joined the Air Force,’ Sandra Murdock muttered bitterly to herself. ‘They seem like they can take a joke at least.’ There was also the uniforms–Sandra looked rocking hot in blue, she’d always been told as much–but she kept that little nugget of info to herself, always wary that anyone might catch word of it. She very much doubted anyone here at Sandhurst would appreciate such talk.

She shut her mouth and straightened up when she heard footsteps approaching. Two sets of them. Maybe it was time. Good. Now she could *finally* get this shit over with.

Two figures rounded the corner, both men. One was in full dress, much like herself, albeit in the military green jacket of a male officer cadet, and wearing the maroon training beret of the Parachute Regiment. He was escorted by a dour looking man in a Guardsman cap, who occasionally shot the Para a look of such sourness that it honestly startled her.

They stood just to the side of the large, oak double doors that led to the chamber in which the disciplinary hearing would be carried out. The Guardsman motioned for the Para to wait there, muttered something discreetly to the man, no doubt something venomous, before he turned smartly, but stiffly, on his heels and left them.

The Paratrooper stood at ease and waited until the Guardsman had rounded the corner and his footsteps began to fade before he relaxed and shook his limbs out.

‘Could feel those eyes of his burning through my skull all the way here,’ he said with a leisurely sigh, rolling his head around to stretch his neck muscles.

She didn’t have to, but Sandra decided she wanted to oblige the Para’s none-too-subtle desire to make small talk while they waited. Besides, she was bored, and Sandra had come to learn that companionship was no bad thing regardless of the situation.

‘You piss him off somehow?’ she asked him.

‘You kiss your ma with that mouth?’ the Para inquired with a quirk of his lips. Sandra frowned.

‘Easy,’ the Para soothed, raising his arms in a calming gesture, ‘just a crack. And yes, I rather did.’

‘Care to tell?’

‘Only if you go first.’

Sandra considered the proposal before she shrugged.

‘I used live ammo on the striker range,’ she told him simply.

‘Kind of the point isn’t it?’

‘Not for those of us still getting acclimatised to our strikers it isn’t.’

‘Ah. So… why exactly are you here then? Shouldn’t I be chatting to–oh, I don’t know–the range master or the quartermaster for such a cock-up right now?’

‘Not when one of those men is distantly related to the Queen’s eldest,’ Sandra muttered bitterly. ‘The fact that I may have… raised some hell in the past probably discoloured their view some.’

‘What kind of hell?’ the Para asked, sounding considerably more interested.

‘Fights, a couple of incidents with firecrackers…’ she swivelled her head around from side to side to check if anyone was listening, ‘maybe… one instance of accidental arson.’

‘Wait a moment… that storage fire in the Witches Quarters two weeks ago? That was *you*?’

Sandra had the grace to look embarrassed.

‘It was an accident,’ she told him. ‘I was preoccupied with something else.’

‘Which was…?’

Sandra weighed her options. On the one hand, it was rather personal, on the other; she hadn’t really had anyone to talk to about this who wouldn’t fry her for it.

‘…my Colour Sergeant’s arse.’

The Para’s brow furrowed in confusion, and then rose sharply as comprehension dawned.

‘Ahhh. I see,’ he said with a slow, understanding nod. ‘You’re one of *those* Sparklies.’

‘Up yours Jumpy,’ she snapped heatedly, her face reddening. ‘You grow up around nothing but girls all your childhood and some… feelings… start to develop.’

‘Hey, I’m not going to judge,’ the Para reassured calmly, ‘I know I’ve felt at least one pair of eyes on my buns the last four weeks.’

Sandra snorted.

‘Anyway,’ she started, ‘I’ve shown you mine, so to speak. Your turn now.’

‘That was the deal,’ the Para nodded. ‘Then I guess I’ll start from the beginning to give you some context. You see… my dad was in 2 PARA, and, growing up, he’d tell me all these stories about his time with them. So when I was old enough…’

---

There was a knock on the door. The Major looked up from his stack of paperwork and blinked, gears in his head shifting as he tried to think who might be knocking at this time of the afternoon. A second later it clicked.

‘Come in,’ he stated, his voice clear.

The door opened, and two men stepped in, both of them Paratroopers. One was a young lad still in training of perhaps twenty; strong and fit, with a serious expression on his clean, strong face. The other was a Sergeant Major, dour, grizzled, and sharply aware of a lot more than his demeanour let on. In his own, admittedly biased, opinion, Major Barker didn’t think NCOs got much better than Declan Perks.

‘Brought him as requested sir,’ Perks stated with a quick salute which the younger man imitated barely a split second later.

‘Thank you Sergeant Major. That will be all for the time being.’

‘Very good sir,’ and with that, the surly NCO left the office to resume his normal duties of ensuring that none of the Paratroopers-in-training murdered each other.

‘Have a seat Mr Atkins,’ Barker said to the Para trainee, motioning towards the chair on the other side of his desk. The man in question, one Shaun Atkins, did as suggested.

‘You wanted to see me sir,’ Atkins said. It was not a question.

‘Indeed I did trooper,’ Major Barker affirmed. ‘A few of us have been watching you rather closely the last few weeks.’

Atkins stiffened in his seat.

‘If this is about anything I’ve done sir, then I–’

Barker cut him off.

‘You’ve not done anything wrong Atkins, let me assure you. Far from it in fact; your marks are unlike anything we’ve ever seen. You take what your instructors tell you and–in most cases–you actually do it *better*. You even explain it to your fellow troopers who aren’t quite as quick on the uptake, and–again–in many instances, you do it better.’

The young man’s chest swelled with pride, though he managed to keep his expression neutral.

‘To be quite frank, Atkins, you’re not fit to be a soldier in the Parachute Regiment.’

Barker reckoned that if Atkins had been standing, he would have collapsed from shock. His face drained entirely of colour and his mouth began to open and close uselessly, much akin to a goldfish. Barker had to fight one of the hardest battles of his life to keep a straight face, though a growing part of him was starting to wish he’d just cut straight to the point instead of doing this to the poor boy.

‘Sir…’ Atkins uttered breathlessly, shaking his head. The boy was starting to sweat. ‘I–’

Once again, Barker interrupted him. This time, however, it was to grant him mercy.

‘You should be *leading* them.’

That stopped Atkins cold; for entirely different reasons this time, though. He blinked; his expression was a mask of confusion. Then he began to understand.

‘So… you’re not kicking me out sir?’ he asked tentatively.

‘Absolutely not lad,’ Barker said, smiling warmly at what he and many others believed to be a very promising young recruit.

‘You’re just…’ he trailed off.

‘We’re sending you to Sandhurst Atkins,’ Barker supplied for him. ‘So you can take your gift and polish it to a mirror sheen. And when your forty-fourth week is done and you’re assigned your Commission, you’ll return to the Parachute Regiment as one of the finest turnouts the Academy has ever seen.’

Atkins shook his head, as if unable to believe the situation he’d found himself in.

‘This is…’ he started, but stopped again.

‘Easy now lad,’ Barker said with a chuckled. ‘I’m sorry for dropping it on you that way; if I’d known it would do this to you I’d have just given it to you straight. Now, pay attention, because time marches on, as the saying goes.’

Atkins straightened up in his seat and nodded.

‘You leave today, so I suggest you go and get all your things together as soon as we’re finished here. The transport departs at fourteen-hundred sharp so that gives you…’ he paused to check the time, ‘a little over forty-five minutes to be ready. Don’t worry about the paperwork, that’ll all be handled on your arrival. Dismissed… and well done lad.’

Atkins took a steadying breath before getting slowly to his feet and saluting.

‘This is… thank you sir. Really.’

‘Don’t thank me yet lad, you’ve got to get there first. Now off you go. I know you won’t let us down.’

The young Paratrooper trainee fixed Barker with a look of steely determination. In that moment, the Major doubted that he had ever felt prouder of one of his trainees.

‘No sir,’ Atkins said, now completely in control of himself, ‘I most certainly will not.’

And with that, he saluted, and quit the office to pack.

---

Four weeks later, Atkins was at Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, in the early stages of some of the most gruelling training of his life. Or so it was supposed to be. Personally, he was of the opinion that his first few weeks of Hell with the Paratroopers was much, much worse.

It was a little after half twelve when Atkins entered the Cadet’s Mess with a few of his fellow Para cadets. They grabbed some trays, got their grub and commandeered a piece of table next to some sallow looking Guards cadets. There were a few dirty looks exchanged but no real confrontations.

Not until Atkins realised his meal needed some seasoning and asked the man next to him–one of the Guards–to pass him the salt.

The Guardsman did not pass the salt. In fact, he didn’t make any movement to suggest that he had even heard the Paratrooper’s request. Atkins shrugged to himself. It was fairly noisy in the mess hall; he must have been drowned out by the din. He asked again, this time raising his voice a few notches.

‘Sorry mate, guess you couldn’t hear me over the racket. Could you pass me the salt?’

Still the Guardsmen continued to eat, and once again, did not pass the salt shaker. Atkins narrowed his eyes, starting to become considerably irritated at whatever game the man was playing. He leaned in towards him so that his mouth was barely a hands width from the Guardsman’s ear.

‘Look mate,’ he growled; his voice low and dangerous, ‘I know you can hear me; they don’t let deaf people join the forces, let alone the Guards. Now, with that in mind, can you *please* pass the salt?’

The Guardsman paused for a moment. After a brief deliberation, he removed his black cap and set it gently down on the table next to his food. He then turned to face the surly Paratrooper and said, ‘When a Guardsman wears his cap in the mess hall, *mate*, it signifies that he is not to be spoken to.’

With that, he picked his cap up, placed it back on his head, and resumed his meal.

Atkins blinked, momentarily dumbfounded by what had just happened.

Then he started to get angry.

He clenched his hands into fists and unclenched them, repeating the motion every few seconds, willing himself to calm down. When that didn’t work he tried counting to ten. He made it to four before deciding that was pointless and wasn’t doing anything for him. He tried imagining all the nasty ways he could get back at the Guardsman when no one was looking and while that certainly offered some brief entertainment it wasn’t solving the issue at hand.

The issue being that the snobby little prick had just mouthed off to a Para when said Para had made a perfectly easy, reasonable request.

‘Right then,’ Atkins murmured under his breath, an idea forming in his head. He nodded to himself a few times and then reached for his own maroon training beret marking him out as one of her Maj’s finest officers-in-training. He then got up from the bench, hopped atop it, and–checking quickly to make sure he was balanced–slammed a heel down right on top of the Guardsman’s dinner plate. There was a sweet, satisfying *splat* and the Guardsman suddenly found himself spattered with gobbets of squashed toad-in-the-hole, mashed potato, and baked beans.

‘When a Paratrooper plants his boot in your food,’ Atkins seethed through clenched teeth at the flabbergasted Guardsman, ‘*it signifies that he wants you pass the bloody salt!*’

The Guardsman had stared at him for a full ten seconds, utterly and completely agape. For a moment, Atkins thought he might actually have a fight on his hands.

He was proven correct on the eleventh second, when the Guardsman lunged at him.

That in turn kicked off a full blown brawl when Atkins’ Parachute Regiment buddies joined in to back up their comrade, which prompted a response from the other Guards cadets, which drew all the other Paras and consequently all the other Guards in the mess. In true Parachute Regiment form, many of them would later admit to mucking in simply because there was a punch-up going on and names to be taken.

Naturally, once the dust settled, Atkins was hauled off, where he currently awaited his disciplinary hearing.

---

A moment passed between the pair. The air was still, as solemn as the court behind the large set of heavy, oak double doors which concealed the men who would decide on their punishment.

Then Sandra tittered.

And began to laugh.

‘Oh,’ she said, gasping for air, hitched over and clutching her sides, ‘oh I have to hand it to you lot; you know how to make a girl’s day.’

‘We aim to please,’ Atkins said simply.

‘I doubt the Guardsmen felt very pleased at the end of all that,’ Sandra snickered.

‘Not one of them was conscious when we wound down so I doubt it,’ Atkins agreed. ‘Come to think of it, they were a bit of a let-down. We ended up dragging a few of the other regulars into it just so we could have something to do before the MPs arrived.’

Sandra shook her head.

‘You Paras are something else,’ she said with an exasperated tone. She was grinning as she said it though.

‘Damn straight we are,’ Atkins told her, completely serious. ‘Our standards are like nothing else you’ll find in Her Maj’s armed forces. We push, and when you think you’ve reached the absolute limit, we push you harder beyond that. There’s a popular saying among the regiment: “Three More Steps”. When you think you’re absolutely done, you take three more steps, or lifts, or hits, whatever. And when you finish those, you take another three, and another three, and so on.’

‘I see…’

‘We’re trained to be absolute bastards to put down from the get go. Quitters don’t make the cut, period. The barest hint of weakness and you’re out. It sounds like machismo bullshit, but it’s the truth, and it’s worked bloody well for us so far.’

Sandra didn’t have a lot to say to that, so she said nothing.

The doors suddenly opened and a slim, pale individual stepped out.

‘You may both enter,’ he said in a reedy, thin voice. It hardly seemed like such a gawky looking man could have ever managed to enter, much less remain in the armed forces. Then again, Sandra supposed that appearances could be deceiving, and the pencil-pusher could be much more athletic than he seemed.

‘Time to go then,’ she said aloud.

‘Mhm,’ Atkins hummed, taking a step towards the open portal, but not going through.

‘Ladies first,’ he said to her.

‘Thanks,’ she muttered sourly, and stepped on through to meet whatever fate awaited the pair of them.