Nikolai opened his eyes slowly, still drowsy from his sleep.
Sitting up, he looked down briefly at the magazine he had been reading, before looking around. Damnit, I must have fallen asleep, theirs an entire new line out here now.
Sighing to himself, Nikolai willed himself to stay awake until he was called, as to not miss his chance next time.
Master Chief Petty Officer Pavel Byk had been around.
He'd seen Admirals start out as rookies in a waiting room, just like that one.
He'd cleaned up after commissars, and executed a few of the unworthy.
A grizzled NCO, he'd been through wars, crashes, boarding actions, he'd served with Trotenkopft on his insane suicide missions, and lived to tell the tale.
That meant one thing.
Byk was one tough old goat.
The barrel of his breeching shotgun tapped the armed recruit that had entered the room on the back of the neck, twice.
"If you don't give me Gun, Comrade, I will redecorate wall with your brains. No one comes in here armed... and sometimes they leave without arms as well, da Durak?"
He felt the gun on the back of his neck, it's cold steel sending a shiver down his spine. He knew his mind was about 5 seconds from just giving up and running off.
He couldn't let that happen.
He drew in a deep, quiet breath, and began to speak to his unseen assailant.
"The gun's on the table, sir...or, rather, the shell is. It's, quite honestly, useless." He chanced a quick glance, to show the socket in the gun where the discharge piling had once been attached. After flipping his eyes around in a quick hope that he could glance the one behind him, but, to no avail.
He continued.
"The discharge piling is in my left pocket. I believe I felt it snap as I placed it there..." He slightly shook his head, again feeling the barrel of the weapon behind him, whatever it was.
Slowly reaching down, he slipped out the rusted and cold discharge piling. As he had expected, it was in two pieces, and he held up them both to his side, dangling between his thumb and forefinger. He then slid the gun in his other hand, and dangled it the same way.
He sighed. It was a junk gun, but, all the same, it had meaning. But, his head ALSO had meaning, a great deal more than a piece of scrap metal.
So, he focused more on keeping that, instead of the gun.
Comrade Byk wasn't born yesterday, he grunted to one of the other marines, who stepped forward and relieved the man of his weapon.
Nodding to himself he prodded the man forward and towards a chair.
"Sit down," he ordered. sitting down, himself across from the recruit. His shotgun braced in such a way that it never wavered from the recruit.
"Commissar will see you soon, I suggest Commissar Gonzales when she is free." Pasha Byk reached into his pocket for a cigarette, then lit it one handed. Puffing an expert ring.
"Thy must not remember me, but I remember thy. We met where Gas meets rock and metal. We conversed, alas a Metal Behemoth swept forth and through its devilish glow, it striped metal from metal, skin from bone. Rescued from peril we were and we return from certain death into life anew."
"I'm Daemon Steele. Captain of the Ironic Gentleman" He bowed slightly to Commander Angie Broch. Perhaps she would remember him now.
' Wrote:A silent cry of Huzzah! flew through Paddy's mind as he heard Vicenta shout 'next'. He shot his arms out in front of him to provide momentum for standing up. Shaking his legs briefly, he glanced shifty eyed around the waiting room before beginning to walk; pausing only briefly to look at the secretary who simply nodded prior to returning to her previous tasks.
He moseyed up to the vacant office and walked in, tipping a tattered hat at the officer present.
"The name's Paddy. At your service," he said with a gentle bow.
Vicenta eyed the man and sighed. "Always the weird ones... Alright, where are you from and why join the Coalition?"
Paddy sat down and with melancholy syllables began to utter a response.
"My home was Planet Leeds in the Mullingar district; before the Kusari Blitz," he paused, "But you don't want to hear a tale sorrow-laden of my passage from a distant Aidenn."
"Nothing is noble. Nothing which I have seen, in any case. Kusari destroys my home, Liberty destroys my ship, Bretonia is crumbling, and Rheinland instigates war. The Revolution, I am made to understand, is different; opposed to all the factors which cause such..."
He hesitated at the use of such a cliched word, but decided on its fitting use, "Corruption."
"They've taken everything. The Revolution is my last hope," he sighed in conclusion before quickly adding, "But... Trust me that I'm not simply some rogue, gypsy orphan with a grudge."
He blinked, unsure as to whether or not he answered the question. He fell into the black shawl of his mind and incoherently mumbled a verse from a poem, images of his home quietly haunting his mind;
"There open fanes and gaping graves
Yawn level with the luminous waves;
But not the riches there that lie
In each idol's diamond eye-
Not the gaily-jewelled dead
Tempt the waters from their bed;
For no ripples curl, alas!
Along that wilderness of glass-
No swellings tell that winds may be
Upon some far-off happier sea-
No heavings hint that winds have been
On seas less hideously serene."
Again, the gun was on him. At least that damn gun was away from him, That thing had caused him a good amount of trouble as is. A slight twinge of pain from beneath a hidden bandage reminded him of such a fact.
He could now see the man clearly. He had the shotgun placed firmly at his chest, expertly gripping the handle in a way which seemed to send a clear air of authority. He found himself being quite intrigued by how the grip was done, but pulled his eyes away. He didn't exactly think an altercation was a good thing to cause, under such circumstances.
God, that smoke was stifling.
Yet, still, his eyes locked forward, his back stood straight, and he laid perfectly still. He had sacrificied alot to get here - and shotgun to the heart was NOT what he considered "worth the effort"
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