Four tall-mug ciders later, me, Silver Edge, Ashfall and Anchorage made our way back to base. I felt funny as I walked and my stomach growled—and not in a good way. Ash had passed out just outside the bar and Anchorage was carrying him over his back. It was kind of a funny sight to see, considering Ash was the bigger pony out of all of us.
The cold of night didn't help either and I was shaking like a leaf in the wind. I stumbled a bit as I walked and occasionally let out one or two hiccups. I couldn't have been that drunk, I only had four! Four mugs. Four...really big mugs. I just needed sleep at that point.
We walked into the base and went right to our barracks. My head was throbbing with a pounding headache by the time we walked in the door. Thankfully the lights were off and there was just enough from the moonlight outside to guide me to my bed and hopefully not trip over somepony's bed on the way there.
The moment I reached my bed, I collapsed onto it without bothering to take my uniform off, and went right to sleep.
***
I was startled awake the next morning by the shouting of somepony right beside me. It rung in my head for a while and I groggily opened my eyes to see who was waking me up. I rested a hoof on my head, still feeling the same headache I had before I fell asleep, but this time it was much worse. My eyes moved to the side of my bed, and immediately they met those of Solar Wave. He stared at me with concern and had his hooves on my side.
"Shoot... Don't do that to me, Star. I thought you were dead!"
I murred softly and turned onto my back. As I did, a sharp pain pierced the nerves on my stomach. I yelped softly and stared up at the ceiling with wide eyes. My stomach growled angrily and threatened to shoot some of its content back up where it came from. I held both hooves to it and groaned softly. I wasn't sick, was I?
"Are you alright?" Solar asked, still standing there and watching me with worry all over. His voice was slightly muffled for some reason.
"Noooo..." I groaned tiredly and in distress. "Fuuuudge..." I squinted my eyes and tried to get a bearing on the light on the ceiling right over my head. Of course, staring at it only made my migraine worse and it forced me to shut my eyes.
"It looks like you had some night..." Solar kept staring at me.
"I did..." I strained to get just those two words out.
"Star, you've got to get up. It's past eleven."
"I don't wanna..." I literally didn't. I felt if I moved an inch, I would cover poor Solar in whatever my last meal was. But I felt like that even if I didn't move. It felt like the flu, but worse.
"Star," he nudged me with a hoof. I let out another groan as he did and wanted out of annoyance to slap him, but I didn't. "You're going to miss your first day of Radar Academy. I wouldn't be surprised if you already did."
His words immediately hit me. "Shit, Radar Academy!" I thought to myself, eyes opening wide and worsening my headache. I was meant to be up much earlier than I was, and after the night I had, I was sick.
Solar sighed and shook his head slowly. "And that's why you shouldn't drink before important days, Star. You get hangovers," he turned and walked away, the clops of his hooves ringing in my head along with his words.
So I wasn't sick, but I had a really bad hangover. This was a first. But I couldn't let anyone know that's what it was. At the same time, I couldn't afford to miss a day of my radar training classes. I pushed myself to get up after a few more minutes and managed to do so without losing my dinner from the night before. And as quickly as I could, I showered and re-dressed myself in my uniform, which much to my luck, smelled like alcohol and cider. I'd have to be a lucky son of a gun if no one at the academy caught that.
The academy, much to my surprise, was not on base, and was east of it, in the denser areas of north Manehattan. It was a good fifteen blocks away and I wasn't going to run the whole way. I quickly grabbed my bits and ran out the front gate and hailed a taxi carriage like a psycho pony. I wasn't specific on where to go, but luckily the carriage driver knew and raced down the street towards it. It was nearly a straight shot and before I knew it, we were in front of the small campus. It was three buildings with a large fountain park in the center, each building labeled differently, meaning it wasn't completely a radar academy. The whole place was right up against the rocky shoreline, with a beach about an eighth of a mile north.
I thanked and paid the carriage driver prior to running onto the campus and stopping in the center. The building I needed to be in wasn't hard to find, and the giant glass atrium above the door had a silver radar symbol printed onto the glass. I ran towards it, and immediately slowed my pace going into the building while still rushing to find where I needed to be.
The building was the smaller of the three and didn't have too many rooms in the halls. The room I needed to be in was 14B. I went to one side of the building, then the other. The classroom was upstairs somewhere. Immediately I raced to the spiral staircase leading up to the second floor and went down the southern hallway. Jackpot. 14B was at the very end and the door was still open.
I ran up to the door and stopped without breaking a sweat. I trotted into the room and looked around, panting slightly from the adrenaline rush. "Am I late?!" I shouted.
The room had five others in it, three sailors and one Marine, two of them were standing up and talking. They all looked at me when I walked in, and one replied, "Nope. Teacher's late."
I let out a deep sigh of relief and eased my muscles, and went to my seat. My heartbeat pumped hard in my ears and made my already bad headache worse, the hangover was still there in full force. The seats had metal bars that extended forward and curved, with polished wood for desks in front of them—typical school room desks. I sat down and eased myself into the hard wooden chair. Not the best seat I've sat on but it was nice to get off my hooves after running around trying to find where I needed to go.
"Teacher's late huh?" I asked again.
The Marine nodded. "Late for this bloody session. Got caught up with another class and forgot us today," he grumbled, resting his head on his hoof, elbow on his desk.
"One of the other teachers is home with a cold so she's busy taking care of 2A," one of the sailors added.
I nodded. "Thank Celestia.. I thought I was late."
"Nnope. We just got back to class a few ago."
I let out another sigh of relief and looked forward to the chalkboard. There was writing in large letters on it, saying 'Welcome to Radar Academy!'
To me, it seemed like an average school classroom, but with decor dedicated to remind those what its purpose was. On one wall hung a detailed map of Equestria, one beside it was a geographical map of the Manehattan region, showing the depths of the ocean and the height of the small hills to the north. Beside them both sat a world map, with all of the known islands and continents on it in green, tan, dark orange, and each color in between. Equestria, of course, sat in the center of the map, with the northern Griffon kingdoms above the Crystal Empire, and Yakyakistan above that. Below Equestria sat a kingdom I've never heard of, followed by a small island nation to the southwest.
East of Equestria, far across the ocean, was the Griffon Empire, the home of all griffons. It was a large country that covered most of the continent, the rest belonging to Prance, Germaney, the Allied Kingdom, and to the south, the unnamed dragon colony, a large, but small on the map, slab of land untouched and left for dragons to live and grow.
There were more countries west of Equestria, across the Western Ocean, with names that I couldn't pronounce even in my head. I could only assume one of them was the country Zebras come from.
I turned back forward the moment I heard hoofsteps fast approaching from down the hallway, the loud clops echoing in the open atrium. Soon after, a tan earth pony mare dressed in a dark blue dress uniform with gold buttons and a white undershirt, complete with a nearly-adjusted black tie. Strange for a mare to wear a tie I thought.
The mare stopped at the door and rested a hoof on the side of the frame, letting out large, audible gasps for air. She turned to us and opened her mouth to speak, only making her breathing louder. When she didn't, she raised her other hoof, signalling to wait a moment. She leaned her head down and very quickly caught hold of her breath before she trotted into the room, shutting the door behind her.
"So very sorry, students, I am not used to handling two classes at once. Thankfully they are done until later. I do hope all of you have been here for only a few minutes?"
The others shook their heads, I nodded.
"Oh dear," she looked disappointed. "My deepest apologies. I should have told you all to come around this time so you wouldn't be waiting all morning! But...now that we're all here. How's about we get started, hmm?"
The two ponies standing up and talking sat at their desks and picked a pencil up in their hooves, as did I. The mare trotted up to her desk and sat down in the chair, taking a pair of squared glasses in her hooves and sliding them onto her muzzle. Afterwards, she reached a hoof up and gently bounced her bun-tied auburn mane to make sure it was holding together, which it was. She quickly went over a couple of papers and looked up at us, silently taking attendance and writing it down. The tan mare stood up, turning to her chalkboard and picking up the eraser and wiping it clean.
"Alrighty. For those of you who don't know," she began writing with a stick of chalk on the board. "My name is Lieutenant Kosec Ping, but if you want, you may call me Mrs. Ping," she then turned to us with a smug grin, her name written on the board behind her. "And don't worry students, I've read your name tags. There's no need to introduce yourself."
The moment after she said that, one of the sailors slammed both of his hooves on his desk and let out a grumbled "Aw!" that drew a laugh from everyone, even the teacher.
Calming her laugh with a smile, Mrs. Ping turned and erased her name, then began drawing a circle with lines in it that easily resembled a radar screen. "So, students, what do we know about radars?" She turned back to us. "Anypony?"
The others looked at each other, I looked around at them, then I stared forward in some annoyance. "Seriously?" I said to myself in my head and raised my hoof.
"Go ahead, private Shooter."
"Radar is used to determine weather conditions in a certain area or to determine distance between aircraft or watercraft," I lowered my hoof.
"Very good, that's exactly what it is! Somepony's done their homework," she winked at me. "As private Shooter said, it is used by aircraft and watercraft, big and small. But, could somepony tell me what SONAR is?"
Aw shoot, what did sergeant Hardstaff call it? I remembered SONAR was abbreviations for a few words.
"Sound Navigation And Ranging!" called one of the sailors.
"Right!" Mrs. Ping smiled. "And what is it used for?"
"It is used to communicate with or detect objects on or under the water. It is only used by watercraft and submarines."
"Very good! Better write that down everypony, because those two things are what we are here for. Radar and SONAR," she said as she wrote the two words on the board, with SONAR broken down beneath it. She then turned back to us. "And I know for a fact, each and every one of you is hear to learn for a very special reason. We only accept those into the academy looking to man a radar on one of our many ships. Please, tell me, each and every one of you, which ship would you like to be, or will you be stationed on?"
"The Lacus," said the Marine.
"The Zenith."
"The Sinus."
"The Harpy."
"The Eclipse."
Everypony quickly turned and looked at me in surprise. I sat there looking forward, then when I realized everyone was staring at me, I looked around at them. "What?"
"The Eclipse, hmm?" Mrs. Ping walked around her desk and up to me. "You must be one lucky pony to get a position on that carrier."
If she was trying to intimidate me by walking up to my desk, it wasn't working at all. "Yes ma'am," I replied.
"And what got you to convince commanding officer Shadow to allow you to handle a position you know nothing about?" She stared straight at me, hoping to make me flinch.
"I have my ways," I couldn't tell her it was because me and him knew each other.
A quiet snicker came from the pony beside me, while the others just grinned.
"Your ways, huh? Explain," Mrs. Ping didn't seem to like my response.
"I'm afraid I can't."
"Why not?"
"That's...classified information."
"Shouldn't be classified from a lieutenant, but okay, I'll take your word for it," she walked back to the board.
My eyes widened in some surprise. She didn't care that I just denied her, a much higher rank than myself? Surely there must be a catch somewhere. Much to my surprise, she went back to teaching.
***
A good three hours of the history of radar and SONAR and how they work later, we were dismissed for a late lunch. The five of us were given saddlebags with our respective branch insignia to keep our books in. Each of us had two books, and a notebook to write other things down in. But since it was just a break for lunch, we left our things in the room and went to get something to eat. The campus had a small cafeteria, more like a branched cafe that only those in the Marines and Navy, as well as friends and family could go to.
The cafe had a wide variety of coffees, teas, and other drinks, as well as donuts, bagels, sandwiches, and salads. I ended up buying a water and a salad with ranch dressing to avoid the mostly unhealthy food the cafe had there. I wasn't one for eating healthy all the time before I enlisted, but every once and a while I enjoyed a nice, fresh salad. Today was one of those days.
I was the only one to eat something healthy as well, as I noticed the others got a bunch of donuts and were pigging out on them. I shrugged and went along with eating my salad like a civilized pony.
After we finished, there was still time before we were supposed to go back to class. Not enough to do much, so the five of us decided to stay around the campus and explore a bit. Other than the building our classes were in, the other two were much larger and were dedicated for different classes. The second largest one held classes for those who are looking to become ship gunners, and the largest building on campus was the Officer School, and by far the hardest class to go through. At least, that's how the others described it.
About twenty minutes after lunch, the five of us returned to room 14B where thankfully Mrs. Ping was there to greet us and wasn't busy with the other classroom. Once we were all seated, the door was shut and class began again.
With this routine, I knew this would be a long three weeks.
***
Class ended at around six-thirty that evening, shortly before sunset, and all of us with our saddlebags on took the long route home—by walking. It felt good to walk rather than taking a taxi. Of course, I was more tired from walking and would do anything to crash in bed.
The others talked, telling each other short things that happened in their lives previously, or during boot camp. They were interesting to listen to to say the least, but my usual self was preventing me from joining in on the conversation. And to be honest, I didn't feel bad about it either.
We entered the base through the main gate and split off to go to our own barracks. I went straight to Barrack #19 and walked through the door, straight for my bed.
"How'd it go?" Asked a voice that startled me.
I must have been that tired where anything in particular could scare me. I jumped and snapped my head to the side. It was Silver Edge, levitating a book in a magical aura. "Good, actually," I replied, unbuttoning my uniform jacket and setting my patrol cap down on my hooflocker.
"Learn anything new?"
"A lot of stuff. Today was just talking about the origins of radar and SONAR and what not. Mrs. Ping, our teacher, said we'll be getting to the other stuff this week, then next week we'll have a test on what we learned, same for the week after that. And then an exam," I shuddered.
"Good luck with that," Silver said, not taking his eyes away from his book. He must have been zoned out to the point where he wasn't listening to everything I was saying, or he was listening and he just didn't care.
I didn't question it and immediately crawled into bed.
I had a long three weeks ahead of me. And I meant long.