#this new place is hellishly noisy for me

[squid--inc]

......

[randomstryprompts]

rejected second chapter of my visual novel

"A new recruit, huh?" the older, grizzled man asked, peering at the boy that stood in front of him. "How old are you, boy?" he leaned closer.

"Old enough, sir," the boy answered. His bronze-coloured hair gleamed in the bright sunlight that filtered into the soldiers' barracks.

"Hmmph," the man sniffed, stamping a sigil of approval onto his papers. "Welcome to the royal army, Jaice Dallas. We expect great things from you."

Jaice bowed, smiling. "Thank you, sir."

"I'll have Reagen show you where you'll be staying." he gestured to a boy around Jaice's age with ginger hair and a dark tan, and he hurried over, grinning. "I'm Reagen." he introduced himself, holding out a calloused hand. "I've been in the army since I was pretty young. I know my way around here. If you're ever in need of help, just ask me!"

Jaice took the offered hand in his own. His skin, though tanned from exposure in the sun, was much lighter than Reagen's. "Nice to meet you, Reagen," he grinned. "I'll take you up on your offer."

"Now, scram, you two," the older man ordered gruffly, giving Jaice a rough shove. Reagen moved towards the door and gestured for Jaice to follow him. Once outside, he turned to the lighter-skinned boy, a smirk on his face. "Don't worry about the lieutenant. That's just how he is. He's actually a pretty nice guy, but he doesn't like to show it. A dark past or something like that," he chuckled.

"I figured," Jaice said sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck, where a sunburn was beginning to form. "Where's the dorms?"

Reagen grimaced. "Yeah, about that. You and me, and the other guys our age, we're not really considered... soldiers... yet. So... we technically don't have rooms."

"Then... where do you sleep?" Jaice asked, growing concerned.

Reagen belched out in raucous laughter, whacking the other guy on the back. "Oh, I'm just messing with you, dude!" he joked. "We have our own place, don't worry. It's nothing special, though, don't get your hopes up."

"I can assure you, they weren't," Jaice chuckled.

"See? You get it," Reagen answered. "The last guy that got accepted wasn't too happy with my little prank. Well, in all fairness, I did bring him to the stables and told him to muck out the stall that was supposedly his room. After that little misunderstanding, he transferred across the kingdom."

"Yikes," Jaice cringed. "Was it- really that bad?"

Reagen nodded, grinning. "Perhaps."

They arrived at their destination, a sandstone hut down the dirt road from the older soldiers' barracks. The roof was covered in sun-bleached wood, and strips of leather hung amongst them, tying them all together. There was no door, and the windows had nothing covering them. Reagan ducked under the low-hanging doorframe and into the shade of the squat building. Jaice followed suit.

"It's not much, but it's our home for the next coupl'a years," Reagen waved his arm about, showing off the messy main room, which contained a worn-out carpet on the dirt floor, a couple beat-up chairs and a scarred desk. A dozen or so doorways led out of the room, but were too dark to see into.

"Whaddya think?" Reagen grinned at him.

"It's- homey," Jaice replied, adjusting the satchel that hung from his shoulder.

"That's high praise," said another boy, emerging from the furthest room on the right. His skin was dark like coal, his hair curly and black, but his eyes gleamed like golden sand.

"Yo, Nair," Reagen called out. "This is Jaice. He's joining us today."

"Nice to meet you, Jaice," Nair offered a hand, which Jaice took. "Nice to meet you too," he echoed with a grin.

A second boy emerged from the room adjacent to Nair's. He was oddly pale, his hair white like the clouds and his eyes matching perfectly. His clothes were a dusty blue colour, and he wore beaded and woven bracelets up and down his skinny arms. "What's all this ruckus about?" he complained, then started when he noticed Jaice. "Oh," he muttered. "Another one."

"I'm not scaring this one away for you," Reagen grunted at him. "Jaice's a cool guy. Unlike that other one. He just gave me weird vibes, y'know?"

The pale-skinned boy sighed heavily. "Whatever." he turned on his heel and marched straight back into his room.

"And that's Rhyne," Reagen introduced. "As you can see, he's not much of a people person. In fact, I don't think he's a person at all. More like a stick. Or a bone," he added.

"I can hear you," came Rhyne's voice from inside his room.

"Nice to meet you too," Jaice called to him. Rhyne grumbled something unintelligible back.

"Lovely," Reagen muttered, then grinned at Jaice. "Well, that's all of us. There were more guys a few months ago, but they got transferred up and promoted. So it's just us four. Pretty cozy." he paused. "There's lots of rooms to choose from. Mine's the one in the middle. Rhyne's and Nair's are on the right. You can pick whichever one you like, though I'd advise you to not go next to Rhyne, he's kinda... noisy at night. Anyway, if you find any books under the bed or hidden somewhere, just like, give em' to me."

"Books?" Jaice repeated.

"Books," Reagen answered.

"Ah," Jaice said.

"Yeah," Nair chortled. "Or you can give em' to me. Just keep them away from Rhyne. Once he gets ahold of one, you never see it again."

"That's not true!" Rhyne shouted.

"Yes it is!" Nair shouted back.

"Come in here and fight me!"

Nair laughed. "I'll be back, bros. I got business to attend to."

"See ya," Reagen smirked. Nair dashed into Rhyne's room, and crashing and yelling sounds could be heard. Jaice raised an eyebrow.

"It happens," Reagen shrugged. "Can't do anything about it."

Jaice walked over to the room the furthest to the left, and peered in. It was dark, the only light coming from the main room, his shadow illuminated against the carpeted floor. A small cot lay in one corner, a woolen blanket and down pillow piled haphazardly on top of it, and opposite the bed was an old desk and a chair. "No windows?" he asked Reagen.

The darker-skinned boy approached him. "Nah," he answered. "The wall's too thick. And the sun is too strong in the morning on that side anyway. You want a lamp?"

"Sure," Jaice responded, setting his meager belongings onto the bed while Reagen raided the empty rooms for an oil lamp, which he produced with a flourish to his new companion. "Dunno how much fuel's in it," he said. "But if you ever need any there's plenty around the back. It's kept in a barrel."

"Nice," Jaice said, taking the lamp from Reagen. "What's this made of? It's really light."

Reagen shrugged. "Some sort of clay? I don't know. There's a trillion of those everywhere. Guess it's some cheap material or whatever."

"It's pretty, though," Jaice traced a finger down the painted surface of the oil lamp, admiring the detail that was put into decorating it. He placed it onto the desk and turned to Reagen, who was leaning an arm against his doorframe.

"Training's in the morning at dawn. Just so you're prepared," he told him. "You'll get used to waking up so early eventually. The key is to go to sleep early too."

"What kind of training?" Jaice wondered.

"Physical stuff in the morning. Then breakfast. Afterwards we do formation practice and after lunch it's weapons. Sometimes they change up the schedule, but it's almost always in that order."

"Doesn't sound so bad," Jaice grinned.

Reagen sighed. "That's what they all say at first. It's really not so fun."

"You don't like it?" Jaice asked.

Reagen shook his head, his long hair tickling the back of his tanned neck. "Nah. I only enlisted for the money. My family's pretty poor."

Jaice nodded in understanding. "Why'd you join, man?" Reagen asked him. Jaice paused, as an anxious feeling began to boil up inside his chest.

"Why'd I join? Um- same as you," he answered. "It's only me and my mom. She's sick... so I thought this would be the best way to help support her."

Reagen rubbed the back of his head. "Ah, that sucks, man. Can I ask- what happened to your dad?"

Jaice flinched. He didn't want to reveal the truth just yet. Reagen was nice, but they'd only just met, and he was scared these new friends would treat him differently if they knew who he really was. He swallowed. "He- he left my mom when I was pretty young. I never knew him."

That was a blatant lie. His father never left. He knew exactly who he was. His mom was the one who was thrown out, when he was just a baby- left to fend for herself on the streets of Favoris. Then when he was ten his father's soldiers had killed her, and forced him to leave his home and live with the father he barely knew and hated with every inch of his body. It was fortunate he took after his mother, and not his father. The golden eyes that his half-siblings had were too recognizable and would instantly mark him as a son of the sultan. His eyes, however, were a dark, soft brown. The kind eyes that his mother had. The same eyes that had looked at him so fondly and told him he was worth more than a mountain of gold.

It was night when Reagen reappeared in his doorway, framed by the lamplight of the main room, golden fire lighting up the fiery orange of his hair. "If the noise of the other soldiers doesn't wake you up in the morning, I will," he grinned. "Someone's coming in a bit earlier with your uniform. You're supposed to wear it to the orientation. But I'll warn you about one thing- make sure it doesn't have any maggots on it. It's not fun doing sit ups with maggot juice running down your back and face."

"You sound like you have experience with this," Jaice joked. Reagen laughed aloud. "Aha, who knows? I'll see ya in the morning, Jaice Dallas. Don't let the bed bugs bite." his shadow flitted from across Jaice's face and he disappeared into his own room.

Jaice lay down in his bed and tucked the scratchy blanket up and around his body. Goosebumps covered his arms as the air grew cooler. For how hellishly hot the temperature could be in the day, it was just as cold at night. But it was better than keeping the same dastardly temperature all the time, he mused. Gotta have some variety or else they'd all go crazy.

He tugged on the loose, billowing pants, which were the unfortunate colour of donkey urine. The shirt he pulled over his head smelled like it'd been worn by a pig bathing in its own feces. They hadn't given him any boots, so he pulled on his own and laced them up. He tied his bangs off his face with a long strand of cloth and pushed his arms through the arm-holes of the leather vest.

"They don't wash these before giving them to new recruits, do they?" he asked.

Nair shook his head, dressing in his uniform. "At least yours doesn't have moth holes."

"Or maggots," Reagen sighed.

"Or idiots in it," Rhyne finished, glaring at the other guys.

"What's your problem?" Reagen grumbled.

"It's right in front of me," the pale boy replied.

"I'd slap you if my arms weren't stuck in this shirt," Nair hissed, pulling his clothes over his head.

"Shut up," Reagen yelled at them.