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Mitch riley taptap send3/10/2024 ![]() The guard detail consisted of a cadet officer in charge, a sergeant, and four low ranking cadets which included the likes of himself, other freshmen, and troublemaking upperclassmen like his brother. What a joke, right? God forbid somebody needed to leave a message at 3 AM instead of getting a live human being. The Sergeant of the Guard was even expected to sleep overnight on a cot in a tiny enclosed space just off the guard room in case the phone rang in the middle of the night. There were a few meaningless tasks to perform, but the main “guard” duty was monitoring the desk phone at all times, 24/7. ![]() “Guard Duty” was a bit of a farce to Tommy Carter. “Yes, sir,” Tommy said, finally forcing himself to meet the older boy’s eyes. It brought Tommy back to the present, and away from the ire he felt towards his family for abandoning him in this wannabe fascist hellhole. “Right after Taps, Carter, we’ll head over,” Scott said to him, referring to the bugle call that signified lights out across the grounds. Nope, Cal Carter, a junior private who’d failed to get any sort of rank in three years at Woodland, was just too cool for his little brother. And to make things worse, his lousy brother hadn’t even helped Tommy adjust to the new school, despite being in the same company barracks. Just thinking about this grave injustice caused the anger Tommy felt to flow up his neck towards his head. Tommy’s older brother had been allowed to break all the rules before he was finally sent here a few years prior, and yet Tommy missed one lousy biology class and was sent packing. He didn’t belong here with the troublemakers and the weird military wannabes. ![]() He’d skipped class at his old school in December just one time and so his parents sent him here, telling him he needed discipline despite the forgotten fact that he’d hardly gotten in trouble before. He hated the marching, he hated the rigid down-to-the minute schedule, and he hated the old drab buildings that served only to make the atmosphere all that more dreary and depressing. He hated the itchy wool pants and polyester collared shirts that made up their uniforms. He had been here three weeks, and yet it had felt like an eternity. The two leaders of the on-duty guard detail turned their conversation to classes, and Tommy tuned them out. “Probably too late for that, but it’s worth a shot.” As often happened to Tommy, the other people in the room spoke as if he weren’t there. “We have to take the kid under our wing before Cal Carter gets a chance to corrupt him.” “See?” Scott turned back to Baker and shrugged. “Yes sir,” Tommy said timidly, unable to meet the older boy’s eye. “How long you been here, Carter, three weeks?” “Why not? It gives me a chance to see if he’s gonna be as much trouble as his older brother.” He turned towards Tommy, who was still fiddling with his zipper and looking at the ground. ![]() Scott leaned against the desk and shrugged. “New kid getting thrown to the ghosts right away, huh?” “You taking little Carter to Thacker Hall?” Baker asked with a grin and a glance at Tommy. “It’s 2145 and study hall is over, so I’ve sent the rest of the guard detail back to their barracks,” Scott said to Baker, who was sitting behind the old oak guard desk with his school books still open. Those people are wrong.įourteen-year-old freshman Tommy Carter sat on the wooden bench that lined the wall of the guard room, fiddling with the zipper on his plain black Woodland Military Academy jacket while cadet Captain Leonard Scott, a senior and the on-duty Officer of the Guard, spoke with cadet Sergeant Brandon Baker, a junior. They say that ghosts don’t haunt places, they haunt people.
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