Texas Nights - Book 13 of the Damned of the 2/19th

...It Ain't Training (Final)

"And where do you feel we stand, Warrant?" 1LT Johnson asked, her voice slightly snide. I noticed she skipped calling me Chief.

"The refit phase, Lieutenant," Captain Jane said.

"Correct," I turned and faced Captain Jane, who still looked coldly ominous in the dark. "Yes, they failed the initial instance. But failure merely gives us a baseline of what you and me have to do," I turned back and faced them. "It's my job, as the Training Officer, to get all of you ready to deploy," I went back to parade rest, "Your performance is a reflection, ultimately, on the leadership of this unit and my training schedule."

"So what do you recommend?" Captain Jane asked me.

"All right. Ten man teams. Four on ropes, four on raising," I said, remembering how we'd done it in 2/19th and how good we got at setting up tents during REFORGER 88. I rubbed my hands together, "Some of you will show skill at this, other will be incompetent or just won't have the knock for it. Those who aren't good at setting up tents, there will be other things to do, so you won't be getting out of work. We'll be putting up radiation shielding, running cables, setting up the positive pressure lining.

"Let's get to work," I smiled. I turned to the rest of the unit. "Actual, over here with me," I pointed at the third tent as they broke ranks and came over to stand next to me. "We've done this before, together. Go lay the tent out."

Captain Jane watched as I handed out instructions. One team from Treatment to set up the surgical tent. One team from Ambulance to set up the triage tent. Actual to set up the supply and command tent. I had Actual set up the tent slowly for the others to watch, had them take it down, then walked around correcting people's stances and putting them in the correct positions.

I stopped in front of the rest of the Company. "Why everyone else is setting up the tents, teams will be laying cable, setting up the generators, setting up the positive pressure system to be installed as soon as the tents go in, putting down radiation shielding if needed as well as putting up shrapnel panels."

There was a lot of confusion at the last part, and I remembered that I'd had the radiation and shrapnel shielding flown in from White Sands, and it was moved here while we were in isolation.

I'd have to train them on it.

"Are you going to be pitching in, Chief?" 1LT Johnson asked me when I pulled the fingerless gloves out of my pocket.

"Lead by example, Lieutenant," I smiled at her. She glared, forgetting I could see perfectly, and my smile grew wider.

"We set them up in the headlights of the vehicles," I told everyone, moving in front of everyone. "All right, I'll call the movements."

It went smoothly, with me throwing in some help here and there with all three. We had the tents up, the canvas floors laid, and the ropes tightened in under ten minutes on the second try.

"All right, let's take them down, everyone change out. If you haven't helped, step up. Actual, you'll do it again. You've had practice, it's time to build muscle and practice through repetition," I bent down and grabbed the rope. "I'll call it, this time, we'll sing."

15th FSB Area
Fort Hood
Texas, United States of America
10 October, 1991
1600

The door to the Conex clanged when I slammed it shut, throwing the locking bar before snapping closed the padlock and pulling out the metal seal to record it once I snapped it closed. I'd excused everyone but Donovan once the equipment was cleaned and reloaded into the Conex, handling the loadout drawings myself.

"What's the serial number on the seal?" Donovan asked me, holding open the folder. I read it off to him quickly and stood up.

The rest of the unit was wandering around, doing half-assed PMCS (Preventative Maintenance Checks & Services) on the vehicles. I knew it was because they were exhausted. I was feeling tired, but nothing I hadn't been through before.