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Post by flippmoke on May 3, 2010 17:07:35 GMT -5
It was becoming more common then ever before that the men of the 42nd Brigade attempted to avoid contact with Nigel. So many new young faces meant that Nigel wasn't viewed as a friend any more, but rather just as an executive officer who barked orders. Yet it, it wasn't just the fact that most of the people in the 42nd who had started the war with Nigel were casualties of the whole mess, but Nigel's whole demeanour had changed as well. Rarely did he smile and his youthful joy seemed as much of a relic as his cowardice actions in battle. Yet on this dawn, it wasn't the men avoiding Nigel's barking orders, it was Nigel avoiding them. With a steaming cup of coffee in his hands, and a rusty lawn chair below him Nigel had found relief in the sun rising over the horizon on this day next to the radio mast on the Lleu Llaw Gyffes.
A blank ghostly stare on an otherwise expressionless face were the scars of war on Nigel's face. A small radio was playing next to Nigel a scratchy recording of Opera music. Its somber tone and mournful singing was barely audible however over the sound of the ocean spraying up around the carrier as it made it way off the coast of Africa. A few moments later the sound of clanking metal was heard by Nigel as someone was climbing up the side of the ship approaching him. A small sigh was all that Nigel could express before he took another sip of his coffee.
Suddenly another lawn chair was thrown onto the deck beside Nigel with a clatter, but Nigel barely showed any reaction to it as he continued to star off towards nothing in particular. The lawn chair was followed by Kyle Webb who soon flung himself onto the deck.
Kyle took a small glance at Nigel, then off into the distance where Nigel was looking, then back at Nigel. However, no explanation was needed for Kyle as he set out the lawn chair next to Nigel's and also began to stare off into the distance. They set for some time neither speaking, as the music continued its mournful procession. However, after taking a sip of coffee Nigel soon broke the silence, "What is it this time?"
It took Kyle a while to respond as he too had turn almost comatose caught up in the lapping of the waves in the distance.
"They found your brother last night, he had shot himself in his hide out," said Kyle as he suddenly remembered why he made his way up to the Nigel.
Nigel didn't respond, nor did he really have any reaction to the news as he continued to sip his coffee looking out in the distance. This was not a shock to Kyle however, as they both had learned there was little joy now in the death of even your adversaries.
A few minutes later though, as if it had just then finally processed in his mind, Nigel muttered "Fuck that son of a bitch."
Kyle couldn't help but let loose a small smile at the comment, he too was glad things back home were beginning to become somewhat more normal once again now that the Federation controlled Europe. Robert, Nigel's brother, had turned the entire nation into a hell hole in the short time he was able to hold power, and everyone knew someone who had died. Yet the war was still raging on and Nigel still had obligations to the Federation, so even as King he had not returned home for anything more then a short ceremony. Melissa and his son were left there to tend to most of the issues of state, as she was now the Queen of the Netherlands officially as well. It was a role that suited her quite well and it kept her mind off the dreadful scars the war had placed on her as well.
The sun was now all the way into the sky, marking the beginning of another day for the 42nd Brigade and Nigel knew it was time to return to work, but hardly felt motivated till he looked again to the deck of the ship and saw a state of disrepair after the actions the day before. Kyle tracked Nigel's eyes and slowly nodded to Nigel in agreement.
"Al-right, lets go chew some ass," said Nigel as he got up folding his lawn chair up.
"God I hate privates," muttered Kyle in agreement as he stood up, both a little more able to face the day now.
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thomas
EFF 
Senior Chief Petty Officer
Posts: 327
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Post by thomas on May 4, 2010 22:27:48 GMT -5
Thorvald Siggurdson was in a bit of a pickle. The fact that the pilots and other service people assigned to his MS team tended to either die quickly or request transfers left him with few actual friends in the Earth Federation forces, although he had scores of drinking chums, casual acquaintances, well-wishers, pub fellows, and mates (in a memorable recent episode, he stole the confirmation code for Nigel Ferdinand's personal account and then bought round after round for all the mechanics in the 42nd Brigade, which had won him their everlasting admiration). Normally, this did not present a problem--Marion, his almost lover--he'd be more ready to admit it if she had a physical body--was all he needed. Or so he told himself.
The most recent battle had been uncomfortable and awkward. Not once did Thorvald really fear for his life: he had survived so many battles by now, had his body cut up in so many different ways, that death seemed almost impossible. Even daily communion with the fact of his own mortality through the knowledge of his comrades' death did little to convince Thorvald's core of his own impending termination. It always seemed, simply put, that he would weather whatever storm the battlefield could devise.
After the battle, Marion claimed that it was her time of the month. She'd be fine in a week, she assured him. Thorvald, who had always considered women mysterious as it was, accepted this explanation initially. On a whim, however, he happened to look up menstruation in the Encyclopedia Britannica--he had pilfered an ancient copy from Odessa library after the battle--and realized that, rather than being a magical alignment of the humours, menstruation required a physical, human body to occur! We must remember that Thorvald had only a sixth grade education and that his knowledge of the female body is accordingly limited to that of a twelve year old's. For this reason, Thorvald, unknown to him, had also sired nearly twenty children out of wedlock across Europe and Africa.
Digressions aside, Thorvald realized that Marion was intentionally misleading him and he couldn't fathom why. He hoped to talk to someone about it--anyone--and instinctively thought he should go ahead and ask Marion what he ought to do about Marion. Faced with proof of his codependency, Thorvald had taken to sulking around the carrier, even rejecting invitations to drink from his mechanic pals.
It was on one of these sulk trips that Thorvald spied Nigel Ferdinand coming off the deck. He quickly looked around for a place to hide--noticing an empty crate, he all but leapt into it and hunkered down, as if in a foxhole.
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Post by flippmoke on May 5, 2010 8:51:48 GMT -5
"Sometimes I wonder if he was raised in a zoo," said Kyle Webb as he saw Thorvald jump into a crate obviously attempting to avoid them.
"Who?" questioned Nigel as he turned to look in the general direction of where Kyle was looking.
"Our Scottish Tarzan just jumped into that crate over there, trying to hide from us," said Kyle as he pointed out the crate.
"Oh, him," responded Nigel as he shook his head in some disgust.
Nigel had no clue how to ever deal with Thorvald, though he had been in command of him for some time. Every time he would think he was close to having some sort of working relationship with him, he would do something to endlessly anger Nigel, such as stealing his money recently.
"That man is the bane of my existence," said Nigel as he sighed walking slowly towards the crate.
"But one hell of a pilot," comment Kyle trying to put a positive spin on the situation.
"That is exactly why he is," responded Nigel thinking about how wonderful it would be to just leave Thorvald in the brig till the end of the war.
"Private Siggurdson, why the hell are you in a crate and why the hell were you not at the operational debriefing at 1700 hours yesterday?" said Nigel as he moved look down into the crate where Thorvald was hiding.
"I would love to hear some sort of damn good answer, because you are wearing on my last nerve and are this close to being in the brig," continued Nigel as he put his hands very close together.
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thomas
EFF
Senior Chief Petty Officer
Posts: 327
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Post by thomas on May 5, 2010 13:11:13 GMT -5
Thorvald hunkered down even further in the crate until he heard Ferdinand address him by name. Very slowly, he raised his head just enough to see the two officers bearing down on him. He darted his head back down.
Suddenly, a poor imitation of a Cockney accent emanated from the crate:
"Siggurdson innit 'ere, guvnah'! N'one 'ere but... Tommy Patchkins... Outta... Reading..."
This was too humiliating, even for Siggurdson. With a resigned sigh, he stood up out of the crate and saluted.
"Sir, was tryin' to see if this crate contained my newest shipment of herring, sir. It does na'. As fer the debriefing, sir, I was consulting with the fairy girl in me mobile suit as to her condition durin' the battle. I reckoned that more impor'ant, sir, to my personal performance than any bloody debriefing. Sir."
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Post by flippmoke on May 5, 2010 15:03:49 GMT -5
It was one thing to have forgotten about meeting in Nigel's mind, and was much more able to understand Thorvald not making it to the meeting for that reason, but the fact that a fairy was having precedence over him just about sent Nigel to the brink of losing it.
"Private, I don't care what fucking fairy you were talking to, talking to a god damn fairy isn't as important as your obligations to this unit!" screamed Nigel as he stared down Thorvald. The veins in Nigel's head were now showing and his left eye was twitching ever so slightly.
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thomas
EFF
Senior Chief Petty Officer
Posts: 327
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Post by thomas on May 5, 2010 16:07:59 GMT -5
Thorvald scowled. "Now ye listen, sir..." He almost spat out the polite form of address. "If Marion's nae happy, then I promise ye, no one in the whole bloody 42nd's going to be happy. Now, sir, I don't think ye've been married, so let me explain it this way--"
Thorvald had, in fact, been married to the daughter of a Madinka tribe leader, whom he'd been selling high grade Turkish hashish to, in the Southern Sudan several years prior but had managed to divorce her through a series of traditional rites of strength and manliness.
"--when ye're married, keepin' yer' wife happy is the number one thing, y'see. Because if she ain't happy then you ain't happy, because she'll make ye miserable. Maybe she won't mean to, but she will. So 'tis in the best interest o' yerself and all those around ye' for to make sure nothing's wrong with wifey. That's the sort o' situation I'm in now. Marion, the fairy girl in me mobile suit, what makes it do all the batshit insane stuff it does--I think something's wrong wit' her. She wouldn't talk to me in the last battle. Sir, we always talk in battle. Something's wrong, I tell ye'. I'm rightly concerned and if she starts up with her own batshit stuff against our own lads and lasses, then ye'll be rightly concerned to, now won't ye? So, I reason it behooves all 'o us that I make sure she's happy, les' we get some sort o' situation on our hands."
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Post by flippmoke on May 6, 2010 9:15:45 GMT -5
It was exactly Thorvald's fault, but it definitely was the last straw that pushed Nigel over the edge. Nigel's eye was now violently twitching and his face red with anger. Even Kyle had never seen him like this before and tensed up as if a grenade was about to go off.
"Jesus mother Mary of Christ, what the fuck do I look like to you? A fucking mind reader, perhaps that would have been something important for you to tell me in a fucking god damn debriefing!" screamed Nigel, as he began to stomp around in place as he continued to scream, "You think that maybe just maybe your god damn fairy in your fucking mobile suit going crazy and killing us all would be a wonderful thing to tell us in a debriefing so maybe just maybe we would be able to determine what the fuck to do about it."
Nigel was on a rant now, it was quite obvious that he didn't expect any answers from any of his questions as he didn't even take a breath between sentences.
"So don't start bringing up all this, when you are married crap, because I am married and god damn I can relate to it on my god damn own. I however, seem to be able to deal with my own god damn relationships with out impacting the rest of the god damn unit. First I had to play Dr. Ferdinand the love doctor for fucking Aurem and Arieta because of their crazy ass relationship and now I have to deal with a god damn fairy in a god damn mobile suit that I can't see, touch, feel or even know about besides what you say about her and how she deals with you. The only way I know for certain that she does exist is that she goes bat shit crazy in Africa always and tells us all about how she wants to have everyone else kill her! What the fuck planet are we living on, they don't teach this fucking shit in the academy! Maybe, just maybe she is going bat shit crazy because she is a woman and is starting to love you and can't fucking touch you! God damn it Thorvald maybe your problem is that you are getting to fucking close to her, ever thought of that? Maybe then she will really want to kill us if you break up with her god damn it!"
A crowd was starting to grow in the distance standing in horror at Nigel's break down as he continued to scream louder and louder, still not taking a breath between sentences.
"I swear on my mother fucking mother's back stabbing grave that I am going to kill the next son of a bitch that causes their own god damn personal problems to interfere with the safety of everyone else in this fucking unit! I am so fucking tired of this shit, I don't make enough money as an officer to deal with this crap and I have to deal with a god damn fucking asshole who steals my money to buy drinks for everyone else in the unit! Where is Slater, he is the only fucking normal one in the whole fucking group of mobile suit pilots I have! God damn I swear you and Aurem better not ruin him or I am going to fucking go postal on this fucking ship! I am counciling fucking faeries in mobile suits! I am a god damn King of a country counselling fucking faeries! Hello audience, this fucking fantasy universe sucks, why the fuck am I dealing with a god damn faerie! That is fucking it, I am calling you Private Tinker Bell from now fucking on!"
Nigel's face was now bright red and he tried to reach for words but he had run totally out of breath and suddenly the twitching in his eye suddenly stopped as both his eyes rolled to the back of his head. He then collapsed suddenly falling with full force to the deck of the ship. Kyle Webb then hurried quickly next to Nigel but rather then making sure Nigel was fine, he quickly pulled Nigel's pistol out of his holster and put it into his belt.
"I think it is safer this way," said Kyle as he stood back up and took a few steps back again from Nigel.
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