He shivered from the cold. It felt as though the heat was escaping from his body into whatever surface he was lying on, perhaps a stone floor.
The temperature was low, and Kuklo breathed what looked like white steam out at a regular rhythm. While much of his body’s heat had been robbed from him, his clothes seemed to keep him from being frozen stiff. After all, Kuklo had once spent his days being drenched by cold water while completely naked. This was no life-threatening crisis, and he felt relaxed enough to change his posture and go back to sleep. If he held his knees to his body and curled up into a ball, he’d be able to minimize the loss of heat.
But there was something he had to find out before succumbing to his drowsiness.
Where am I? He was surrounded by complete silence and couldn’t detect anyone else. He concentrated on his sense of hearing but only sensed the wind, the chirping of insects, and other sounds of nature. Fortunately, there seemed to be nothing malicious nearby.
Kuklo squinted his eye open to look carefully around him, but he could see nothing through the pitch darkness. Nevertheless, he cautiously surveyed the area, and in time his eye adjusted and gradually conveyed his surroundings to him.
He was lying in a cramped room just barely large enough to sprawl in. There was nothing resembling furniture, only a toilet and a small window for lighting with bars over it. With only stars and pale moonlight on the other side, no clue offered up his current location. The telltale silence could only belong to the dead of night, however. The sturdy metal door in the entryway featured a slit that could be used to observe the room’s interior.
“This is a─” Kuklo frowned at his sense of déjà vu. Although he didn’t know where he was, the room’s setup was familiar to him.
Why am I in jail?! Kuklo trembled at the accursed sight and his absurd plight, but soon gathered himself, rose off the floor, and stood on guard to be ready for anything. Just as he did, a dull pain shot across his skull.
“Ow!” He grimaced and put a hand to his forehead and felt a bump on it. He must have taken a blow to the head. He wanted to know why but didn’t have the time to sit back and think─his sensitive ears had registered a faint noise.
Something is here. Kuklo strained to hear what it was, focusing his attention on the noise coming from the other side of the door. It wasn’t the sound of a small animal’s steps, nor the flutter of a bug’s wings.
The sound of clothes… In other words, the rustling of cloth against cloth. A person’s here. Friend or foe, he was sure of that.
A jailer? Considering his surroundings, it was a reasonable guess. His life didn’t seem to be threatened for the moment, but he couldn’t let down his guard.
What now?! Just as Kuklo was thinking about his next move, a familiar male voice broke the silence.
“So, are you finally up?”
“Cardina?”
“Yes. Doesn’t it suck to be us?”
“Are you in a cage, too?”
“Why would I be in a cage? I’m not an animal.” There was a hint of a chuckle in Cardina’s voice, and he was surely smiling as wryly as ever.
“We’ve been put into nice little disciplinary cells.”
“Dis-ci-pli-nary? What does that mean?”
“Let’s just say it’s where people who break the rules are deposited to urge them to reflect on what they’ve done,” Cardina explained in what he thought was a straightforward fashion, failing to enlighten Kuklo. “Don’t you remember the fight with Xavi during logistics training?”
“Oh. Yes. I was kicked by Xavi…” Kuklo finally recalled, arriving at the cause of the bump on his head at the same time.
“You probably don’t remember, but training was aborted after that. We all came back to the academy.”
“So this place is inside the academy?”
“Yes. It’s rarely used, though. Actually, I’m not sure I’ve ever heard of it being used before.” Cardina sighed and added, “For that matter, I’ve never heard of training being aborted before, either. By a brawl, at that, so I suppose we deserve this.”
“Was it such a bad thing to do?”
“Of course. Acting on your own is a big problem once you’re a member of the corps.”
“Why?”
“Troops act as one. That’s why it’s called a corps. One might even say that there is zero room for independent behavior. Basically, whatever you’re concerned about is secondary. Operations can’t be carried out if soldiers decide to act on their own.”
Cardina’s point reminded Kuklo of a certain event, a scene from the time he’d snuck along on the Survey Corps’ expedition. If the corps had abandoned the wagon, it would have been easier for them to return safely. What Cardina described sounded similar.
“By the way, the smallest unit of soldiers employed in carrying out missions is the eight-person team. Your father was a team leader, which means he had seven soldiers under him.”
“So the reason the recruits were running in such an orderly way…”
“Is because that’s part of training, too. Logistics training isn’t meant to be a competition. I told you, didn’t I? Those knapsacks were full of essences that soldiering requires.” Cardina explained that logistics training not only bolstered knowledge, technique, and physical abilities but also fostered a spirit of cooperation. In other words, clockwork order was a must. Kuklo didn’t have to search his mind to recall that only he and Cardina had passed other recruits.
Thinking back, the Survey Corps were advancing in an orderly line, too. While nowhere near as spectacular, the recruits’ logistics training did resemble the Survey Corps’ march.
“Is he here too, then?”
“Xavi? No, he’s probably curled up in his bed right about now.”
“Wha?!” Shocked, Kuklo actually bent forward. “But─”
“Whoa, don’t ask me why. I don’t know,” Cardina interrupted. “The one thing I can tell you is that Xavi handled himself well out there. He could say he was teaching a lesson to a chap who was flaunting military discipline. His violence would take on some legitimacy.”
While the explanation did make sense, something kept Kuklo from being fully satisfied. Why didn’t he tell me?
If Jorge had explained how the corps worked, Kuklo probably wouldn’t have acted so rashly. It wouldn’t have done away with his desire to know what Xavi was now like, but he could have avoided causing an incident that merited his landing in a disciplinary cell.
“He didn’t tell you on purpose.”
“Why?”
“It’s just a few months until graduation. He doesn’t have time to guide you through the alphabet. Rather than teach you using words, he probably intends to have you learn first-hand. And honestly, I think you have, no?”
True, Kuklo’s body might absorb the lessons, but that didn’t make Jorge’s method of instruction any less rough.
That’s why he didn’t stop me. Jorge had stood by and watched Kuklo and Xavi’s scuffle on purpose then, to teach Kuklo the rules in an efficient manner. There had to be better ways, but the instructor must have decided that the method suited Kuklo best.
I definitely won’t be forgetting while this pain lasts, Kuklo admitted with a wry smile, rubbing the bump on his forehead.