One Weekend a Month, Two Weeks a Year

One weekend a month. Two weeks a year. Give us that, said the Army recruiter, and we'll pay for your education. Once I got my Bachelor's, they'd even make me an officer in the reserves. Guaranteed.

The social worker lady told me I was making a deal with the devil. But I told her straight up: when your ass is about to age out of the foster system, the devil's deal was a lot better than no deal at all.

The only hitch was that I had to get a degree in one of their "critical subjects." You know, stuff like nuclear physics and biochemistry and shit like that. I thought I was a goner until I saw that there were some foreign languages I could study.

Saved. I suck at math and science and all that stuff. But talking and writing? That I could do.

College was fun. I mean, it wasn't laugh-out-loud, but it was a lot better than I thought it would be. If you could have seen me in high school, my skinny ass in spiky hair and baggy pants, counting the seconds until detention was over and I could jump on my skateboard and jet, you'd know what a big turnaround that was. I guess it was because it was the first time I was going because I wanted to, not because Mister Fosterdad-du-Jour was going to whop me if I didn't.

Don't even ask about the girl situation. To be honest, this place truly was the promised land, overflowing with milk and honeys, but I never got a single taste of it. One look at my ratty hair and second-hand clothes, and the ladies would just turn their heads and walk away. One even told me straight up, "Look, the reason I'm going to college is so that I won't ever have to date losers like you."

And then it happened. Midway through my last semester, a guy in an Army uniform came down to the campus, rounded up all us cadets, loaded us onto a bus, and took us to the Processing Station. "Until we get your security clearances squared away," he said, "I can't give you any details." He grinned at us. "But I can assure you, gentlemen, that your country does indeed have a great need for your skills."

They told me I was going west, to the Land of Fire, a place I wouldn't have known about if I hadn't been studying their language. I was going to be part of the first wave, not so much to fight but to act as a translator, telling people why we were getting rid of their daimyo (their word for "lord" or "ruler") and helping them to set up a democracy.

I didn't know if I was more scared or more excited. I mean, I knew it was going to be dangerous, but imagine a guy like me, making history. Being in the middle of it all. Wow.

And then my urinalysis came back. It was hot.

I tried to explain that I didn't actually smoke anything. I mean, there were lots of people at the party who were doing that shit, but I just had a few beers and that was it. Honestly, that was the truth.

Didn't matter. The guy tore my security paperwork in half. And then he tore up my orders. I was still going, of course, but not with the first wave. They needed translators, but without a clearance, I was only of limited use to them. Once the war was over and I returned home, I would be out of the program. If I wanted to finish my degree, I would have to pay for it myself. In fact, they told me, I would have to repay the Army for my whole fucking education, even the room and board.

Shit.

They took the other guys to the airbase. They took me down to the docks. Next thing I know, I'm stuck on a rusty container ship with a bunch of stupid logistics assholes for a long, slow ride into the sunset.

Next: The Land of Waves