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// 10. Boot Camp: The Last Week 
// Story: Millennia: Beginning 
// by Thunderblast 
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The next morning sent a cold chill up everypony's spine. A strong cold front had blown through overnight, bringing stronger breezes than normal and much cooler temperatures. While still in bed, I shivered, despite being completely covered up to my neck in the sheets. I woke up to the unfortunate news that the heater malfunctioned, leaving our barrack at a brisk forty-seven degrees. Cold enough where I could see my breath.

It was bad enough under the blankets, once I pulled them off, I immediately put them back on and was shivering even more. Most of the others occupying the barrack were already up and either taking longer, hot showers or were out and about. Since there was a short line to wait to shower, I got dressed in the same blue jacket and cadet cap. It wasn't that warm and didn't cover my ears at all.

Instead of waiting for the shower to be vacant, I grabbed some money and went out of the barrack, into the freezing breeze that caused my wing feathers to ruffle and out onto the base. I embraced the briskness of the air and made my way to the small surplus store on-base where I hoped hats for colder weather were sold. Luckily the place had a working heater and was warm, but I wasn't going to stand in there all day soaking up the heat. 

I trotted around the shop, looking carefully around at the different assortments of gear ranging from vests to jackets, to folding knives and gun-cleaning kits. The shop had a small section with gloves and beanies hanging on the wall, and pairs of black boots that were apparently optional with the uniform—which might explain why not many Marines were seen wearing them.

I decided with the money I had brought that I would buy a pair of extremely dark blue and dark grey gloves and a beanie of the exact same shade of blue—combined costing about twelve bits—and put them on before walking back out into the cold. This time with the beanie sitting snug on my head and around my ears comfortably and kept them warm without blocking out my hearing, while my hooves didn't get cold against the wet ground.

That morning, a thick grey layer of clouds shrouded the sky which made for another dark and gloomy day. Even with the strong winds blowing through, the clouds didn't seem to go anywhere. It wasn't as foggy as the day before, yet I could still hear the blare of the fog horn in the distance that sent a different kind of chill up my spine again. It was followed by a loud ship horn which sounded fairly close and startled me. At the same time, I had noticed some ponies were making their way to the shipyard of the naval station.

I made my way back to Barrack #19 and went inside, finding the place was still cold and the heater was now being worked on by a pony working for the technical team in the Lunar Marines. But with my luck, I also discovered the hot water tank had gone out shortly after I initially left for the base shop and forced the remaining conscripts to take cold showers.

I didn't want to be caught smelling like a sweaty stallion in uniform and sneaked over to Barrack #20 where I got a warm shower and very quickly re-dressed myself and went back outside to meet up with the other conscripts. To my surprise, I couldn't find anypony from my barrack around. I became nervous and searched for a higher ranking officer that knew about conscript training classes and their schedules.

Just under an hour later I came across a greyish-green earth pony with an auburn-brown mane dressed in Navy blues, but instead of a dress uniform, it was tactical. The color was the same as my uniform, and the pony held a navy-blue helmet in his hoof to his chest, and for some reason he wore black military sunglasses despite the clouds blocking out the sun. 

The pins on his uniform collar weren't ones I have seen before, but they immediately made me assume he was some sort of high ranking officer in the Lunar Navy. I stood at attention and saluted. "Sir."

"Yes, conscript?" The greenish-grey pony replied, turning to face me.

I dropped my salute a moment after he spoke. I opened my mouth to speak, and it was taking me longer than I wanted to figure out the best way to ask my question without sounding lost. My eyes widened when I realized just how long I was taking to think.

"Sir, what is the schedule of class of late fourteen for today?" It finally came out.

The pony tilted his head a little. "The conscripts of late fourteen you mean?" I nodded. "Nothing as far as I know. But your class is in it's final week before the selection is made for graduation. I won't say what is on your schedule, but if I were you, I would enjoy the day while it lasts," he immediately turned and walked away.

I just ignored the fact that he left and eased myself. Another day off almost, but I wasn't going to waste it inside. Wasting a day inside doing nothing just wasn't me anymore. That, and I didn't want to deal with Nightpath if he was back at the barracks already. At the same time, I wasn't for going into town to spend the day. I wanted to stay on base.

Bored out of my mind, I instead went to the base gym to get a good workout in. It wasn't busy when I got there, but there were a few other stallions doing their own workouts. One cantered on a treadmill with earbuds in his ears, listening to jams from a music player, another sat up on a bench and lifted a smaller weight with a hoof and curled it inwards. He was a more muscular stallion than me but not the most buff I had seen in my time in training. The other three ponies lifted larger weights. One with his wings, one with magic, one with his bare hooves.

It confused me with the magic part, but then I remembered it takes some physical strength to lift heavy objects with magic—which would technically make magic almost pointless to use.

I went over to the treadmills and started one up, working the speed of it up to a canter, and eventually to a slow gallop. By then I was used to running a lot faster than I was going at the time and it would be a little while before I would begin to have sweat bead up on my face.

I kept a steady pace for a long period of time before I snapped out of my trance when a hoof smacked the off button on the treadmill, a moment later I tripped up and stopped. I snapped my head to the side and saw sergeant Hardstaff standing there.

"Heellooooo? Conscript? Do your ears work?" He waved his hoof in front of me.

My heart raced for a split second after the treadmill stopped and I stepped off of it. "My apologies, I was zoning out sir," I saluted the dark blue pony.

"At ease," he motioned a hoof. "Carry on if you wish," he then turned to walk away.

"Is everything alright?" I watched him begin to walk away.

Hardstaff stopped and looked back at me with a stone expression. "Yes, conscript, everything is alright."

"Then why did you try to get my attention for Luna knows how long?" I furrowed an eyebrow. It felt like he was suddenly reluctant to speak.

The dark blue pony turned back to me and blew a strand of his jet black mane out of the way of his eye. "I simply came to see how you were doing. I didn't catch you at your barrack and asked one of your mates where you might be. So, I came here."

I nodded. "I'm doing fine. A little nervous, but fine," I turned back to the treadmill but didn't turn it on.

"Are you sure?" He walked back to me and stood between my treadmill and the one beside it, staring at me.

"Yup," I pressed a couple of buttons and turned the treadmill on a normal walking pace.

"Hmm..." Hardstaff stared at me still. "You've changed a bit since you first arrived."

"Pardon?" I turned to him curiously.

"You've become a bit more serious about things," he smiled. "I like that in a recr—conscript."

I smiled a bit at his correction. "Who's to say I wasn't before?"

"Well, you're not very interactive with fellow conscripts other than those two unicorns."

He was right, I wasn't one who enjoyed talking to ponies unless they were ponies I liked and knew. "I've always been that way, sir," I pushed the treadmill's speed up by two, just slower than a fast walk.

"How many ponies did you talk to before that?"

I just walked for a bit on the treadmill. "Just a few," I replied after a lengthy pause.

"Hmm," he narrowed his eyes onto me. "You really should interact with the rest of your barrack mates, or others. It's good for you."

I hated hearing that, but I wasn't going to show my bad side to the sergeant. "Yes sir."

Hardstaff smiled and patted my shoulder. "Atta colt. Carry on," he turned and walked away.

After he left, I decided to think about what he said. Maybe it would be good if I opened up to the others. Especially in the military, it would be good to know who's watching your back. But at the same time I was hesitant because I wasn't the social kind of stallion. It brought a bunch of new questions to mind that made me nervous.

Hopefully I could hold them off until after graduation.


***


I spent just about the rest of the day doing light to moderate workouts involving the treadmill and small weights. Nothing special, but something to make my muscles ache after I crawled into bed that night. Lights out came, and soon after, so did another rain shower. It wasn't bad like the last few Manehattan had seen recently and was instead a steady rain that gently patted against rooftops and the already wet ground.

But for some reason that night, I was slipping in and out of sleep and at one point ended up staring at the ceiling for a full hour. Something was off that night that was keeping me wide awake. I hoped and prayed to Luna that something bad wasn't about to knock the door down. Fortunately, nothing and nopony came in guns ablazing.

The trumpets sounded a few hours later, I slowly opened my eyes, and they itched in exhaustion. I guessed I only got about three and a half hours of sleep that night and I expected my eyes to be bloodshot. Of all of the mornings I was used to being up early, that one I didn't want to get out of bed. But since the trumpets hadn't been going off the last couple of days, I figured today was the beginning of the end—of our training I hope.

We showered, got dressed, then ran outside into the pouring, freezing rain to get lined up. I couldn't have been happier to have decided to wear my beanie and gloves that morning.

As usual, sergeant Hardstaff trotted out in front of the line—except this time he wore the drill sergeant's hat. I as well as the group gasped a little as the dark blue pegasus walked out, he immediately turned and glared at us.

"What, never seen a pegasus in a drill sarge's hat?" He snapped at us and stood in front of the line. "Today, you pack of bunched up, conceited fillies, begins the second to last day of your training before graduation. You've all come a long way. You've all made mistakes, you've all proven yourselves...so far," he muttered at the end. 

"Today we begin part one of a real life emergency. But, there's a catch. It will be a simulation. Which means, nopony's gonna die, but that does not mean anypony should act stupid. Is that clear?!"

"Sir yes sir!"

"What was that?!"

"SIR YES SIR!"

"You will all NOT be graded on just your performance today, but tomorrow as well! Which means, if you do well today, and you don't do well tomorrow, or vise versa," he stopped and got into one of the conscripts' face but didn't break him. "You can say goodbye to your career in the Marines. Is that clear, conscripts?!"

"Sir yes sir!"

I had to admit, after that, he turned into a really crappy drill sergeant—and I actually missed the old one. After our lecture, we were told he was acting drill sergeant for the last days of our training while the other was out sick. That's right, the drill sergeant was out sick.

"Now, listen up conscripts, and listen good. Very soon will be the first of many tests to come today and tomorrow. All of you will be shuttled to the island here shortly and we will march to the Urban Combat Facility in West town where you will be going through real life situations, such as a prisoner rescue, ambush, you name it. Each will be tested on performance and the passing grade for each test is an eighty five. Don't make that, it affects your day's grade. Now, line up, on me!"

The group moved into a two-rowed line behind the sergeant as he turned to face away from us. We stood at attention but prepared to move. Moments after, we began marching towards the docks. Once at the docks, we split up in three groups and all were seated on three black dinghys and began making our way across the river.

"Whoa, look at that!" One of the conscripts shouted, standing up and pointing to the left side of the boat. We quickly turned in the direction he was pointing and gasped.

Sitting in the middle of the water far to our side was an extremely large ship with the Lunar Army's colored in a splotchy camouflage on the stern of the ship, with the name in a bright white paint that read L.R.S Eclipse. I stared in pure awe as smaller boats tied themselves to the gigantic aircraft carrier and began bringing it to port beside the naval station, whilst behind it, Navy cutters, destroyers and other naval ships waited to enter the harbor and dock. I was particularly excited, because it was my friend's ship.

We made port on the other side of the river and regrouped in a line where sergeant Hardstaff marched us along the street westward into the lower parts of Manehattan where the training facility was supposedly located. That morning, the rain still came down, but was more of a drizzle than the heavy shower it was when we woke up. Nonetheless, it was still cold as ice, and I wouldn't be surprised if it started snowing after that.

Many more minutes after getting off of the dinghys, we marched up to a chain link gate, standing beside it was a slightly taller watch tower with a light blue earth pony in Lunar Marine camouflage standing guard with an AR-15 rifle strapped around his neck.

"Oi, open up!" Sergeant Hardstaff shouted up to the guard.

The guard moved a hoof onto presumably a small panel where he flicked a switch, allowing the gate to slide into the concrete wall beside it and granting us entry. Sergeant Hardstaff nodded to the guard and brought all of us inside. The gate shut behind us, then was locked up by another guard standing by the entrance who moved back to his station against the wall.

We looked around the place curiously, only seeing rusty debris lying around on the edges of the place. Towards the center was a large grass patch where few trees were planted and had grown large, beyond that was an abandoned building with mostly boarded up windows that was being used for the facility. It was something I hadn't seen before, and it was smack-dab right in the middle of the city just west of Center Park.

After a quick briefing, we were each given paintball guns of different color, while three other soldiers who worked at the facility had the same colored red paintball guns. I assumed it was to tell who hit who, and that would go towards our grade for the test. We were also given black military masks to wear over our faces to shield them in case one of the 'enemies' decided to be a prick and shoot one of us in the face, as well as black vests. That would have left a mark, but with the mask, that wouldn't happen.

The first test started with one pony at a time going lone into the forest, as the facility workers called it, and each were forced to make it out of an ambush coming from the building with four hits or less. I watched Solar Wave go, the poor unicorn took five hits and only managed to hit one when his mask was covered in paint. He didn't pass for that reason.

After that came Silver Edge. He fared more well than Solar did, but still took a good four hits to his chest and shoulder. Luckily he managed to 'kill' the ambushers and passed. Following the two of them came many more conscripts who half and half did and didn't do well, one of them actually got angry and ran up to one of the enemies after he was finished and kept shooting the poor pony at point blank before he was restrained by the facility guards.

Then I was next. I gripped my weapon tightly and entered the forest with the others watching me closely. I went a slightly slower pace than the others and anticipated the ambush—probably something I wasn't supposed to do, since ambushes were meant to be unexpected.

First came a red paint ball that whisked my ear and exploded against a tree beside me. The noise of the air rushing out of the way was enough to catch my attention and I whipped to my right to find one of the ambushers had changed positions—and anticipated my anticipation, if that makes any sense.

I dove against a tree and waited for him to reload before I whipped around the tree and took a quick and careful aim and unloaded three paint balls onto the enemy pony without remorse. The pony dropped onto the ground and pretended to be dead. I breathed a sigh of relief and kept moving towards the building. Unlike the previous conscripts' tests, nopony came out of the building which led to questions as to where they were. I expected that if I stepped into the building carefully, I would either be grabbed and put in a choke hold or I would be gunned down by the two remaining enemies.

I approached the building and stopped many yards from the door, leaning against a tree to take a deep breath. I peeked around the corner and looked over the building, spotting a smaller entrance to the side. I moved quickly to the door and tried to open it. Locked. I briefly glanced towards the others as they watched me, as if I was waiting for them to say it was okay to smash the door down.

But when no one answered my mental question, I turned around and drove my hinds into the door and bucked it open anyways. I whipped back around and moved into the building, aiming my gun around for trouble. Nothing to be seen. Of course I figured since I was the last one to go in, that I would get the brunt of it.

The building was poorly lit and the only light that came in was through broken and dirty windows that even then still didn't change the lighting much and didn't help my situation one bit. Then came the scuffle of hooves moving into hiding. I raised my gun and looked around quickly for any signs of my ambushers. Still, nothing could be seen.

"Come out, come out wherever you are," I muttered under my own breath and went further into the building.

As I walked past some crates, one of the ambushers jumped out from behind one and opened fire on me. Paint balls flew past me, one managing to explode in bright red onto my vest and marked one hit. I dove behind another crate and waited for the pony to reload. Much to my surprise, that calm never came and I had to take a chance at that point.

I stood up on my hinds, just above the second stacked crate and began shooting from there. Another paint ball grazed my ear, this time actually touching it, but didn't explode and couldn't be considered a hit. My ambusher wasn't as lucky and took four sloppy hits to his vest and fell 'dead'. Two down, one to go.

I was doing good at that point, up until I took another hit right in the wing that seemingly came out of thin air. There was almost nowhere I could take cover while at the same time being able to shoot back. Instead of doing so, I went right for the source and soon found the final ambusher and surprised him from behind.

"Peek-a-boo!" I shouted. He quickly turned around and fell onto his back in surprise, shooting blankly—and still managing to hit me. When he did, his ammunition fell out of the tube on the paintball gun and rolled away. He scrambled to grab at least two more paint balls, which would have ended my test with a big fail all over it.

Without hesitation, I unloaded all but two paint balls onto him and 'killed' him. I walked out of the building full of pride. I had taken three hits and had managed to get all of them. That was, until I took a hit to the back of the head and was knocked down. 

I turned onto my back and stared in the direction the shot came from and saw the final ambusher approaching with a big grin crossing his muzzle.

"Four shots kill, you only got me three times. Say goodnight," he raised his paint ball gun to shoot me again.

Out of reflexes, I raised mine quicker than he could and shot blankly. Since he was so close, it exploded all over his mask and he fell back screaming. I grew a small grin and stood back up.

"That's four," I removed my mask and held it in a hoof.

And just like that, the simulation was over and I passed with an eighty five percent—minimum passing grade. I felt good, but we weren't close to done yet.

Next came a group ambush, this time the enemies had higher powered paintball guns and paint grenades—and so did we. Except now there were more enemies than before and we were outnumbered by four. Eight against four weren't good odds, and especially since they were more likely to win the test with their toys.

It took longer than expected, but we managed to just barely pass the test and moved on so the next group could go. By then we were all slowly turning red from all of the paint ball hits from the enemy. I was happy to hear that it could all be washed out in the next shower too, because I didn't want to have a sudden coat color change.

Then the final test of the day came. All of us against a whole platoon of ambushers—still very much outnumbered. But luckily, we were given a leeway. If two of our stallions were taken out by the enemies, we could still pass—that is, if we made it past the others. However, it meant those ponies wouldn't pass this test, and everypony was required to pass at least two of today's tests to officially move on. If not, they would be going home. 

For a moment, I thought all was going well. But, something was bound to go wrong. And it did.

I took four hits all of a sudden out of nowhere and was immediately out of the game. I wasn't happy but I simply went to the sidelines to watch. Solar Wave took three hits, Silver Edge took two, the rest took one or two. But, the rest of them passed the test.

I couldn't stay unhappy forever, and I was happy for the two of them for passing and gave them hoofbumps when they returned to sidelines. We lined up shortly after and were given our scores on paper. Since the final test was a failure for me, I had just barely made passing grade and to my relief, I was going to make it to tomorrow.

Solar Wave and Silver Edge got the same score as did many others, except for one, who actually broke down sobbing on the ground in front of sergeant Hardstaff. Then something surprised us all; sergeant Hardstaff picked the pony up and actually gave him a hug to calm him down.

To see a pony who is supposed to be training others into soldiers, especially an acting drill sergeant hug somepony else was a once in a lifetime occasion. Man, I wish I had my camera with me, because it made me smile seeing he wasn't mad. 

Following the hug, sergeant Hardstaff nudged the pony's shoulder. "Get back in line," he said to him.

"Sir...?" The pony sniffled and wiped at his eye.

"Get back in line," he repeated.

"I don't...understand?"

"Just like the other conscripts I've helped train before, I always say you must pass two of the tests to make it to the final day for a reason. An objective is by far the only way to get ponies to work hard and use what they've been taught to save them. You all passed. But, there is always tomorrow. I expect you all to perform your best tomorrow and to not let anything get in the way. I expect each and every one of you to graduate. Is that clear?"

"Sir yes sir!"

"Very good. Fall in, boys. Let's head home."

We fell into a two-rowed group again and marched behind sergeant Hardstaff back to the docks where we were shuttled back across the river. The entire time, none of us had noticed it stopped raining and the thick layer of clouds were lightening up slightly. When we arrived at the naval station, the Eclipse was tied to the dock and whatever cargo was on the ship was being unloaded, the sailors and few Marines on board were reunited with their families—a sight that always brought a smile to my face. 

All of us took showers and washed our clothes, grabbed late lunch, then relaxed for the remainder of the day. Before we knew it, it was time to go to sleep. Tomorrow was a big day for us, and I couldn't have been more ready to face it.