Rise of a Valkyrie

Part 46

Buy the book now at your preferred store: https://books2read.com/u/bM2Nna

***********************************

The girls awoke the next day to hangovers in Urtiga's apartment. With a couple of days to kill before they had to report to their new units, they took a day off, gorging themselves on food and alcohol while they watched Mixed Martial Arts tournaments.

Kayla signed into the personal tablet she had been issued with her orders. She was pleasantly surprised to see that her old email account was filled with messages from Weslan.

Hi Kayla! I was hoping to catch up with you, but I bet you probably have the same restrictions I do. No outside personal communication until I earned their trust. Hope I'll hear from you at some point! - Weslan

She wrote back.

Hi Weslan, sorry I missed your emails, but you're right, we didn't even have internet access for a long period. Nothing but hard work. How about you?

When Urtiga returned from her unit training in the evening, Kayla took the opportunity to harass her with questions.

"No, Kayla, I don't know how old they are," Urtiga sighed wearily as she grabbed a beer and flopped down on her couch.

For an uncomfortable moment, Kayla was struck with the realization that she had never seen Urtiga relaxing without a drink in her hand. Of course, it wasn't any of her business what a well-respected soldier did in her free time.

"Well... um..." she began.

Urtiga rubbed her temples and sighed again. "I am one hundred and forty-six years old."

"Good lord," Christie covered her mouth in shock. "That's incredible!"

Urtiga shrugged. "It's okay—the universe is a fun place to explore, and I have some awesome friends."

"But you're still only a master sergeant?" Christie asked, then frowned as she took in the scowls around her. "What?"

"Still only a mast—you were actually born to be an officer, weren't you?" Urtiga said in exasperation.

Christie arched her eyebrows. "I'm afraid I don't see why knowledge and experience wouldn't be rewarded with authority."

"My rank," Urtiga explained, "is the highest level of professional soldiering you can reach and stay in the field. Going higher means going behind a desk or becoming an officer and taking over a Ranger platoon—which does not suit me at all. I love my job, and I am not interested in the opinion of people who think that a special badge means they can tell me how to do it."

"Christie is going to be so insufferable as an officer," Thandi said as she shook her head.

"Well," Christie bristled, "I'm sure that individual expertise will always be taken into consideration. Appropriately measured against intellectual ability, of course."

"When you go to officer school," Urtiga explained, "you are going to have your preconceptions about 'authority' aggressively revised."

"Urtiga, will you ever leave the organization?" Kayla asked.

Urtiga took a slow swig of her beer. "I have no idea. It's not something I care to think about, yet."

"Does anyone leave?" Kayla continued as she picked at a piece of lint.

"Of course. The average service time is twenty years. Most women want to get back to reality at some point—start families, and so on. It's only the crazies like me that keep going."