Training Day: A recruit's journal
Date: 30 December 2001, 7:33 pm
Journal of Recruit Barnard, Blake.
Marathon Training Academy
UESC Marathon,August 5, 2882
Orbiting Titan
This is Recruit Blake Barnard. I'm making this journal to send
back to my parents to tell them how I'm doing. I just arrived here on
the UESC Marathon, and we began training immediately. We did push-ups
till our arms broke, sit ups till our spines curved, crunches till
our abs were rocks, and jumping jacks till our Achilles tendons
nearly tore. O.k., so it wasn't that bad, but it was tough. We also
did a trek around the ship's 24 decks that took three hours because
this thing is over a mile long and an eightht of a mile wide. After
that, we got to class, and learned about ancient battles of the
Greeks and Romans. We also learned about the Battle of Marathon,
which is where the ship got its name. After our lessons, we ate. We
studied after eating, and it's almost lights out now. I remember this
ship from one of my text books, but I don't remember where. Granddad
might remember. It's lights out now, and I need to get to bed. I'll
record more tomorrow.
>End Transmission<
August 6, 2882
Journal, today we learned what endurance is. We ran the same
exercises again and again because some stupid idiot was goofing off.
I was ready to punch him. His name was Tom Crenshaw, and he seemed
like one of the guys who would get 50 demerits in one day, rather
than in a semester. If you didn't already know, if you get 50
demerits, you are out of boot camp. The extra exercises made us late
for class, and our teacher, Lt. Grimm, wasn't very happy. He gave us
a lot of homework, and grilled us over history, math, and tactics.
The tactics lesson was very interesting, learning how ancient
warriors used phlanxes and made one of the most effective fighting
units ever. That tactic would be well used if we could somehow
develop some kind of shield against enemy fire. We also played a very
tough game today. We were expected to climb to the top of a nearly
sheer wall,rappel down, and ring a bell before the other people. The
winners got to eat. The others got nothing. I lost tonight. I won't
lose again tomorrow. I'm starving. I've heard stories about hostile
aliens taking out our colonies, and I've heard about it on the news.
I believe the anchor called these aliens the Covenant, a race of
aliens on a "crusade" to destroy the human race in front of their
gods to appease them. I hope we will be able to stop them.
I looked up the history of this ship. It turns out that there was
once a great battle here, between the humans, specifically a security
officer known only today as Mjolnir Recon 54, and a race of aliens,
called the Pfhor. The Pfhor's homeworld was destroyed, but there are
probably still more out there. I hope that if we face any type of
alien, it would be the Pfhor instead of the Covenant. The Covenant
sound more ferocious. It's now lights out, I've studied, so I'm going
to bed.
>End Transmission<
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