Season Four: The Children's Crusade

At the Wallerstein Catholic Academy of St. Francis and St. Claire, the students mosey on about their ordinary lives--the strictness of the classroom leads to wildness at weekend parties and rowdy behavior at school games. The children have long formed into cliques, divided by interests and social class. Following along the North American model, the school term starts in August of each year, with a break straddling the fall and spring terms and a long summer break--even in a space colony where seasonal concerns are nonexistent. This is the way it's been done for centuries, and the 33rd seems little different--though changes are in the air.
The vicious Pirate War, the end of which saw the death of half the population of neighboring colony Rothstein, has had far-reaching effects across the Galaxy, but most sharply felt at the Kolossen provinces. Police crackdowns on disorder has spoiled the fun of many a young adult. It is in this world that we find these children, whose riotous youth culture is under threat while the privilege of rank and wealth reign supreme.

By April of 3288, the senior class of the WCA are looking forward to the annual promenade and then graduation. On Friday the 2nd, the school eagerly awaited the last football game of the spring season as class let out--disrupted slightly by the cunning pranks of tinkerer Marioff Scott. Star boxer Bernardino Lynwood Summers flitted about town searching for a high but only found food; he went back home for a bit before heading off to the game. Wealthy activist Elena Rinaldi went home to smoke and eat dinner with her friend Lydia Cooley-McGrady; Lydia begged Elena to go with her to the football game--with Lydia's true intention to ogle her cousin, Jakodi "Jack" McGrady, the star quarterback. Elena reluctantly agreed to go. That night, they all converged on the stadium. Marioff, meanwhile, had stayed in the school even after the alarms rang, and was forced to flee out a window when a school security guard spotted her. She disappeared into the crowd at the game and slinked under the bleachers.
After the game, Jack gathered with his fellow jock Chad Chandrasekar and Chad's cheerleader girlfriend Victoria Patel to plan for that night's party. They set off for the home of linebacker/nickelbacker/all-around douche-bag Keith Laboeuf, who briefly talked to them before skittering off. Lydia and Elena were invited over to the party, while Bernardino tried to admonish Marioff for skulking about under the bleachers. As they were all dispersing, Elena, Bernie, and Marioff heard some muffled thumping and yelling on the far end of the bleacher tunnel--they converged on the scene of an attempted sexual assault upon one of the opposing team's cheerleader. A masked figure took off running, with Elena in pursuit after briefly being tripped; the other assailant, star swimmer Walter Grigsby-Greene, was cornered by Marioff, who struck him with a stun gun until he slipped into unconsciousness. Elena returned with an EMT and a police officer, who tried to get a handle on the situation. Sergeant Broughton, however, lashed out in anger at Elena and Marioff after they protested being escorted to their homes by officers. The assaulted girl, one Stacy Mint, recounted her experience and indicated that Elena and Marioff's intervention had probably saved her life. A third person--Bernardino--had been there but had left after Walter's subdual. Marioff was escorted to her dorm, Stacy was taken home by police, and Elena allowed to leave to her penthouse. Elena later went to the party, admonishing Bernardino for showing his friends the video recording of Marioff subduing Walter; she found Lydia drunk and asleep nestled amidst Jack McGrady, and took her home.

The police questioned them over the weekend, and the following week was aflurry with rumours about what had happened. Bernie's video was seen by a few, which exploded. Marioff was seen by some as a hero for stopping the attack, as was Elena, who had flung herself into action by starting a charitable website to crowdfund for Stacy's inevitable lawsuit against her attacker, and to raise awareness of the assault. Elena, Marioff, and Bernie had their suspicions as to the second.  Bernardino voiced his suspicious to Marioff that it might have been Keith; she concurred and talked about it with her friend Nick Sław. In a stroke of coincidence, as they were discussing this Nick was attacked at lunch by Keith, which prompted Marioff's retaliation. It escalated into an enormous food fight.
At the same time, kids were hurriedly making preparations for the Senior Prom, a mere two weeks away by the time that Friday came to a close. Lydia pined for Jack, who was set to take out a local belle, but when she asked him, he surprised her by enthusiastically saying yes; Bernie wanted to go, but didn't want to go alone, so he asked Lydia, who turned him down. Bernie wound up asking boxing-fangirl and android Jennifer Stalwart. After talking about it during and after school during the next week, Marioff and Elena plotted to reveal Keith as the masked attacker at Prom--a plot that involved Elena asking Keith out, and Marioff taking Nick as backup. But their plotting began to unravel as Marioff and Elena disagreed sharply over what tools to use to spring the trap--Elena offering to buy top-of-the-line Jensen & Co. electronics, and Marioff proclaiming proudly that she could make masterful items herself.

But on Friday 16th, 3288, their proud plans to unmask Keith and the personal drama of Prom hit a bump when the news announced soberly: the Extragalactic Exploratory Fleet had been attacked at the outer edge of the Large Magellanic Cloud, a dwarf galaxy outside of the Milky Way set to be explored and mapped for the first time in history. Chancellor Maximilian urged the Central Galactic Congress to declare a state of war to exist between the Republic and their new foe: the Zaaroft, or so they were called. Victoria wept, for her parents were serving aboard the fleet. But, as the school principal announced after the new bulletin, Prom would not be cancelled. For Elena and Marioff, there was still time to lay their trap. The weekend was filled with planning and partying, trying to forget the trauma of the announcements.
The next week saw some changes--Marioff's janitor friend Juan, an Army reservist, had been called up for active duty, leaving her to rely on Enrique for secrecy in her secret hideout in the janitor's closet; Professor Clovis had rejoined the officer corps; and a few kids had dropped out to enlist. Marioff and Elena ran into each other to continue planning, but they continually had disagreements over their equipment and the exact plan: Marioff wanted to rig the prom building with recording devices to catch Keith confessing to Elena, while Elena wanted to entrap Keith with body-mounted recorders. A synthesis of the plans began to emerge, but there was still shaky ground even by the night of Prom. Meanwhile, Molly and Lydia had a fight when Molly confronted Jack about failing to set her up with Bernie, who had chosen Jenny Stalwart; Lydian grew ever closer to Jack as their mutual attraction became more apparent; all the personal drama seemed alien and distant to the two young women plotting to ensnare the suspected criminal Keith.

However, by the end of the week, particularly after an encounter with Bernardino in shop class, Nick implored Marioff to give up her plan and not go to prom, for her own safety. He said as much to Elena, but continued to emphasise to Marioff the threat that Keith posed: over six feet tall, broad-shouldered, and powerfully muscled, he could easily overpower them if things came to blows during their entrapment. While upset and imploring Marioff yet again at her workship, Nick accidentally let it slip that he harboured feelings for her, and he had been intimidated by Bernie. He reluctantly went along with their plan, however, and helped with last-minute details.
At the same time, Keith bragged to his jock friends about the "nice catch" he had with Elena, and about his intent to spike the punch bowl at Prom with booze and drugs. The day of Prom, Bernie hooked up with Jenny after school as they talked about their interests and hopes and dreams; Marioff and Nick planted their surveillance devices. Almost everyone converged at The Lotus, a posh hibachi grill, for dinner before the dance. Soon into the promenade, Keith and his linebackers spiked the punch with a keg of vodka and a dash of InSpire--a powerful hypnotic and hallucinogenic drug. As most of the kids drank the kool-aid, vivid psychedelic hallucinations emerged in everyone's eyes and their unrestrained susceptibility to suggestion turned into a raucous rave. Chaperones attempted in vain to get a handle on the situation, and Victoria was escorted out after she started puking from too much of the drug--upon Jenny's suggestion, who knew exactly what InSpire was and what it could do. Jack watched Lydia get high, but took her back behind the stage area to get her to cool off and relax; he later went to find her some water, so that they could leave and consummate their passions.

Nick slipped into the Prom then, having wrestled with himself over what he had to do. Bernardino stopped him and berated him for being a coward when it came to Marioff, and gave him some liquid courage in the form of the inspired punch. Nick became very affected, almost entranced, as he went up to Marioff and confessed directly his love for her and demanded that she leave, for her safety. Marioff told him to stay put as she listened in to Keith and Elena's conversation. Both the jock and the heiress were very drunk and very high, and Keith blurted out that he and Walter had plotted to ambush and rape Stacy after the game, while Elena gazed absentmindedly at Keith with a bizarre mix of lust and terror. Marioff sprang into action and rushed up to shove Keith, who was unmoved and responded with a well-placed karate chop to her throat. As she stumbled back, Nick walked up, primed a spring-loaded pistol into Keith's face, and blew his brains out. Bernardino, still sober, caught the whole thing on his PDA camera. It all came together--the spring Nick had made in shop class, his desperate pleas to Marioff to take flight, his furtiveness in the past week--Nick had come here to kill Keith.
The hall erupted into screams of horror; teachers pinned Nick, who became near comatose after emptying his gun into Keith's lifeless body, and held the students back. Elena, blood-spattered and shocked, activated her custom distress chip. SRT police burst into the room five minutes later, and shot at Nick, who they saw as armed. The boy was determined to only have been injured, and was hauled away to the hospital while Keith was taken away in a body bag. The police questioned every student in turn, except for those who had fled--including Jack and Lydia, who had snuck out the back before the police stormed in, and others who had left earlier like Vicky and Chad. During questioning, Bernardino, Elena, and Marioff gave what they could--the materials with which the two girls had tried to entrap Keith into confession, Bernie's testimony that Keith had spiked the punch and his original suspicions about Keith being the masked man, and most importantly the video evidence Bernie had filmed at both the football pitch and that night at Prom. Jack was called downtown after he'd dropped off Lydia, but his high-powered lawyer and aunt Genevieve secured his freedom from further inquisition with a testament of what he saw.
The children were held in the hospital; witnesses for just 24 hours psychiatric observation, and those who ingested the drugged punch for 48 hours to ensure detoxification on top of psych evaluation. They were all discharge and went home by the close of the weekend, though Marioff went to see Nick and make sure he was okay. His condition was critical, but it was expected that he would pull through. The Worst Prom Ever was finally over.

Classes were cancelled for the next week, to mourn and recover, so the students went about their lives; Marioff went to see Nick several times in the hospital, Elena quarrelled with Lydia, and Bernie sank himself into thought while building his model trains. Jack and Lydia spent increasing amounts of time together, going on dates and cultivating their relationship. Meanwhile, Chad held a party at his place that Wednesday, where many of the kids tried to come to terms with what they had witnessed at Prom. Bernie mostly kept to himself, trying to make sense of it all. Nick, by this point, had awakened and was in good spirits despite his predicament with Marioff coming to see him daily; she even offered to help his legal defence team, with her knowledge of the events about Keith and her perspective that seemed to indicate Nick acted in the heat of passion. The fact that he had made a spring mechanism for the gun was the main problem, indicating instead that he had planned his attack. It would be an uphill slope. Marioff then purchased some surveillance equipment and hacked into Bernie's phone, seeking to obtain his video-recording of the attack Keith had made. Even Bernie visited Nick, though mostly to gloat that the pipsqueak's actions had indeed obtained Marioff's attention, and to profess his nihilism. Nick was indicted via teleconference on a charge of 1st degree murder, a charge of voluntary manslaughter, and a charge of illegal concealed carry of a firearm. He plead guilty to the firearms charge, but his barrister believed they could fight the homicide charges in court. He would be tried as an adult, before a panel of three judges.
Elena, across town, was going through the whole events over and over again in her head, and in her art, and tore up canvas after canvas as she painted the shooting into every art piece she undertook; she had also had an explosive argument with Lydia over her "kissing cousins" relationship, and it was uncertain if they could remain friends.

That Saturday was the 1st of May, a national holiday galaxy-wide to honour human workers; Wallerstein celebrated with a parade, including a school sports team float. The kids participated just to pass the time, as another raucous party was scheduled for that night.
Elena decided to host a party at her penthouse for once, to take her mind off the past, and filled her place with vegan foods, fancy wines, and an exhibition of her art. During this, she nearly had a nervous breakdown and got into a philosophical shouting match with Bernie. He too was slowly unravelling after Keith's death, struggling to see the world as anything remotely sane, professing a nihilistic creed and shrugging off his responsibilities. While Elena took the stance that they all were responsible for what happened to Keith, and for what happened to Stacy for that matter, and would have to live with it. They sank into a hot tub with Chad and Vicky, and spoke frankly about not really missing Keith, about their ambivalence--except for Elena and her disgust--for Lydia and Jack's relationship, and about their futures. Chad and Bernie relished in having no aim, no trajectory; while Vicky and Elena knew exactly where they wanted to go--medical school and art school, respectively. The party wound down and everyone went home.

Marioff was spending the day with Nick at the hospital, but as she was leaving to go get some sleep she heard a strange noise. She found Nick's doctor, a viridian called Dr. Sheen, being dragged by ropes by a gang of humans. She intervened with her taser, incapacitating them while running to call the police and guards. She hid in Nick's room, poking her head out when she heard the calm footsteps of detectives. Two officers of the Security Service came up to her and told her to get back inside, but when she told them she was a witness, they took her along. After waiting for their third person, the secret policemen conducted a tribunal. The good doctor was an unfree alien, and thus state property, so the three men were to be fined for damaging him. The alien was alleged to have struck one of the humans in retaliation, so the officers sentenced him to do hard labour and a severe corporal punishment. Jack ate dinner that night with his father, grandmother, and other family members at his mother's estate. His father pushed him about how he was doing, and Shannon cross-examined him. Fed up with it, Lydia announced that she and Jack were in a relationship. Despite Shannon's initial incredulity, Jack managed to convince her--her even--that it was best for the family, and that only a McGrady would be good enough for him.

The next week returned to the bustle of school. Lydia made some attempts to reconcile with Elena, but their acrimonious split was irreconcilable as Lydia refused to back down from loving Jack. Elena began to sit with Marioff at lunch instead. Bernie was approached by Jenny for sex, but he refused, trying to forget about Prom. The mood was schizoid: the jocks openly mourned, but the outcasts openly celebrated and walked the halls with newfound confidence. That Friday, a school assembly saw Lt. Artemus Beaumont, a recruiter from the Space Marines, come and give a guest lecture on civic duty, military service, and their benefits, as well as imploring them to enlist after the school term in the Central Galactic Marine Corps. Both Jack and Chad talked to the recruiter, and began to ponder a career in the Space Marines; Jack had long consigned himself to such a life, given his father's immense shadow, and Chad was directionless.

The trial began on the morning of May 10th. Elena, Marioff, and Bernie were subpoenaed as witnesses, and various others were also called in to give their testimony of the Prom Incident. The three gave their testimonies, with some discrepancies and biases. The prosecution attempted to prove that Nick had intent to kill, by building his spring contraption, and had indeed deliberately committed a pre-meditated murder of Keith--that it was not self-defence, and that his beliefs about Keith being a rapist were unfounded and did not justify his paranoiac mentality. The defence argued that Nick was unwillingly under the influence of drugs, that he had reasonable belief that Keith would use lethal force, and that he had concealed a weapon purely for self-defence. Nick had seen Keith strike Marioff with extreme brutality, and his warped perception caused him to see it as lethal violence. The defence was couched primarily in one legal principle: imperfect self-defence (in defence of others), compounded by Nick's severely impaired sense of perception and judgement. Nick asserted his intent of self-defence, not an intent to kill. After a brief recess for lunch, in which Bernie fucked off to the local taco hut and didn't come back, the panel of judges gave their verdict: Nick was found not guilty of murder and voluntary manslaughter due to the influence of substances in his action, and his perception of Keith as a lethal threat before and during the incident. He was found guilty of concealed carriage of a firearm, and was fined 10,000 Galactic Credits, placed on five years' of probation, and not allowed to bear arms freely for his lifetime.

Afterwards, however, despite his attempts to hide it, he admitted to Marioff that he had indeed brought the gun with intent to kill Keith, and end his terror once and for all. He had taken the law into his own hands--as, he said, had Marioff and Elena. Marioff stormed off, furious at the deception.

The rest of the week following the trial was tense for Marioff; Nick tried to talk to her, but she ignored him out of fury. She kept to herself in her room, going to classes but rarely venturing out. But even during school she wasn't insulated and placid--they all witnessed the police come into the school and haul janitor Enrique away on suspicion of him trafficking controlled substances to students. Indeed, he had sold a bottle of InSpire to Keith prior to the promenade, and admitted as much without outright stating it.
After school that Friday, she noticed something odd: Nick and Bernie talking and then walking away together, as if they were hanging out. Bernie had, after school, seen Nick drifting outside of the campus, probably waiting to see if he could catch up to Marioff. Bernie just walked right up to him and struck up a conversation, and they went downtown to get Italian-style ice cream; they talked all the while about their interests--mutually, they both liked tinkering and building things. Marioff stalked them, listening in as the conversation turned to Prom, her, and Nick's unrequited pining. She was noticed, however, and sped away.

That weekend, Lydia called Elena sobbing and in a panic--she'd found out Jack was planning on enlisting in the Space Marines, and needed someone to talk to; she was deeply afraid for his safety, and talked about going in herself. They made up, of sorts, and went to a low-key party at Chad's house. He and Vicky were wearing Marines and Spacy tee-shirts, souvenirs of their enlistment; Victoria and Bernie chatted about Nick briefly, musing on the value of sincerity when being nice to people. Lydia committed, then and there, to joining Jack in the Marines and volunteered. For Elena, everything was moving too fast--all her friends were going away, the shocking events of the past month had sundered her worldview.
Marioff made up with Nick, somewhat, but tracked him through a surveillance device to make sure he didn't do anything stupid.

The last week of school were aflurry with students completing their final projects and tests. Elena presented her art, to much adulation; Marioff built a robot for her shop teacher, installed with a rudimentary intelligence. Bernie passed his classes well enough--not top marks in everything, but certainly not a failure. The stress of their exams would soon seem like nothing, however. The day after Finals, an assembly was called for the senior class; men in suits and MPs stood by and announced a conscription order, and read off names of several students. Among them: Elena, Marioff, Bernie, and several others. Marioff thought it a joke at first, while Elena stormed off in a huff. She tried to have her father call in favours to defer her, but he refused--he believed she needed to earn some backbone as he had in war. Marioff plunged into sheer panic. Bernie took it in stride. The next day, they took their physical fitness tests and vocational aptitude battery. They were coded for their placements, and were fit enough for service--some only by the skin of their teeth. Few showed up for their weekend graduation ceremony on the 22nd.

Two weeks hence they would be sent off to the planet Bittrich, for training. They took time to settle their affairs; Marioff talked to Nick, and convinced him not to lie about his age to come after her in the Marines--she implored him to stay a kid as long as he could. Even as he confessed again his love for her, she told him to think about it, to enjoy his youth and not be clouded by emotions he didn't understand. Marioff then took time to build a tiny robot gecko, which she smuggled aboard the shuttle when she left. Elena had to be dragged from her penthouse, kicking and screaming. Lydia and Jack held each other's hands, looking forward together as their shuttle embarked from the colony to an enormous troop carrier ship. The young adults stowed their things in cabins and then scrambled to medical bays for hypersleep. Marioff resisted, disturbed by the order for everyone to strip and get into pods. But in the end, they were all placed into suspended animation and stasis before the carrier's warp jump to Bittrich, the Inner Colonies' recruitment and training depot. June 6th would be the last day of their childhood--for the next twelve weeks, they belonged to the Ministry of War.

The spacecraft popped into near orbit mere minutes later, and the recruits were awakened; they were given fatigues, sorted by service branch, and taken down to the planet in shuttles. Picked up by bus, they were driven to Camp Anderson, the primary Marines training base. After milling about in their barrack, the recruits were introduced to, and subject to a dressing-down by, their Drill Instructor, Gunnery Sergeant Rickman. With harsh language and physical intimidation, he swore he turn these "maggots" into Marines. He marched them to the barber for their haircuts, to the mess hall for chow time, and back to the barracks for sleep. Bernie bunked under Marioff, and Elena with apprently waifish fan Serenity Zane. The next day saw a morning breakfast of waffles and soybeans in a mystery sauce, followed by hours of PT and marching and then running an obstacle course. Rinaldi flummoxed on the initial jump and rope-walk, but scaled the climbing wall and ran to the goal: a tall pole with a bell on top. Clambering up, she rang it, and slid back down. Marioff ran in, but repeatedly fell into the mud; reaching the end exhausted, muddy, and bleeding, she could not make it up the pole--until Elena helped her up to the goal and the two came back down together. Bernie managed the course nearly perfectly on his own, but took many attempts to scramble up the pole until Rickman's shouting drove him to success. The rest of the platoon completed the course with varying degrees of failure, with only Chad Chandrasekar and Paul van Patten making it through just fine. Supper was a full meal of steak or soy patty with bread and vegetables, which they all consumed hungrily--through Elena and Marioff were mysteriously given a bonus dessert. The first week was full of continued physical training, cleaning, marching, yelling, and cleaning. For the privileged children of Wallerstein, it was a shock. But some fell in line, like cogs in a machine, adapting well. The second week included classroom learning as well as the usual rhythm of PT, where the recruits learned Marine history, culture, and structure. A second running of the obstacle course was far easier than the first--they knew its pitfalls, and their bodies were ready. Even Marioff, the scrawniest of the lot, completed it on her own.

At the end of the second week of training, they were issued their gun: a disassembled M150 Battle Rifle, which each maggot had to assemble on their own; they were made to recite the Rifleman's Creed and were told they would sleep with, march with, and PT with their rifle. Marioff assembled hers without looking, earning Rickman's earnest pride, but Elena resolutely refused to touch her assembled weapon--earning Rickman's ire. Doubly so did she earn the contempt of her fellow recruit, the redheaded Shelby, who was forced to carry Elena's rifle on that afternoon's run.
The weeks dragged on with grueling training, vigorous exercise, and classroom instruction. All the while, Elena refused to touch her rifle. She became increasingly unstable and was compelled to meet with the camp psychiatrist. Her deep convictions, however, couldn't be "worked out" so simply. Rickman took a special interest in Elena, trying to dig at why she refused to fire her weapon. She stated quite plainly that she didn't want to kill, she didn't want to pick up a gun and shoot an alien, or another human, who hadn't harmed her. He shot back that the new enemy had killed thousands of humans in a surprise attack--which Elena did not believe--and that the chance of her being assigned to the front was slim. The recruits were being trained to reinforce Reserve units that had been activated for front-line duty. When drilling and anger did not work, he switched tactics--he calmly guided her to simply hold the weapon, and imagine the targets down the practice range were her deepest, bitterest enemy. She envisioned them as Keith, and at last her aim was true.
They continued their training for a dozen weeks, learning to rely on one another in increasingly difficult exercises: rappelling, rock climbing, life-fire trench crawls, tear gas rooms. Repetition filled the monotony of the day with constant activity, constant tasks, constant PT or cleaning or drilling or weapon assembly. Shelby warmed to the geeky crew, and even Bernie became less and less grating and unbearable. The aimless selfishness and nihilism that had defined him in High School melted away. All the while, Jack and Lydia grew closer--something Elena continued to find bizarre and foul even as the two training groups crossed paths in the mess hall.

In the final phase of training, the recruits were subjected to "the Crucible", a wilderness survival and mock battle exercise between opposed teams of recruits over the course of three days. Repeated encounters and hectic mock firefights peppered the monotony of the forest encampment. Tensions ran high, but after a fast-paced final assault the team of Marioff, Bernie, Elena, and Chad secured the other team's flag and hid their own from sight, winning the initial game. But no one had told them how to get out, and they all waited for another night in the forest. Fear gripped the recruits; something was off. The mock combat was over, the game had been won, surely a chopper would come by to evacuate them...right?
The trick to the scenario was that the teamwork was not just team-vs-team; the final obstacle required all of the Marine recruits to cooperate. At the edge of the mountain-forest area, a wide, deep lake blocked the path to what could clearly be seen: Sergeant Rickman and the evac helicopter. With Marioff's and Bernie's mechanical know-how, the teams hauled some nearby fallen trees to the lake edge. With rope, they jury-rigged a rudimentary raft and sailed over the lake.
Returning to the Base Camp, they were treated to a banquet. Then, exhausted and weary, they were subject to a graduation ceremony. They were now Marines.