Blood On The Broken Fourth Wall

[Marburg]

Location: The Temporal Cortex
(Autobiographical memory of the Gaian Guard Trial- Day 2)
Time: Daybreak. Planet Gaia, January 9, 800 A.S.

Damien wants to vomit, but can't.

If he does, he fails his trial and washes out of The Gaian Guard; barred from re-enlistment for three years.

Puking is simply not an option.

Its taken three years with a black mark on his record so far for Damien to get to the point he's at now: Rolling back and forth in the cold mud with the other few recruits for the past couple of hours straight.

He's dizzy, suffering a fair bit of vertigo and excruciatingly numb from pain and exhaustion.

A shadow looms over him, shouting "On your feet you worthless piece of Islay ****!"

"NOW! DO IT NOW!!"

He rose past the pain, getting to his feet on reflex, as if a puppet on strings...He'd congratulate himself for keeping his balance & remaining upright if it wasn't for the sharp and sudden punch in the gut from the ranking Guardsman.

Dimi buckles to his knees as the contents of his stomach lurch up his throat; filling his mouth. Warm acidic bile thick with partially digested chunks of breakfast strain against the back of his mouth like a dam ready to burst.

He can feel the acid beginning to work away at the enamel of his teeth and imagines the sweet relief of his jaw giving out and splintering through his gums at the hinges, forcing his mouth to collapse and go slack, releasing a goulash of blood and sick onto the cold, wet ground.

He Rises to his feet a second time, embarrassed and furious...He swallows, tasting the rancid vomit as it slowly slides back down into his stomach where it started.

With barely enough spare time to take a breath and spit, upon orders, Damien and the other remaining recruits strap on their personal gear & immediately begin a 10K run around the Guard camp perimeter as the dawn breaks.

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