Mess Hall Chaos

When he finally walked through the door, Seth was surprised once again. The sheer volume of the people in the room was enough to make him stagger. But it wasn't the volume that made him pause. It was the diversity of people. There were people of all shapes, sizes, and skin tones sitting among each other. The variety of people was impressive. Not all of them were Freelancers though. Some were way too young or too old to even think about picking up a gun. Others simply didn't have that way of sitting and moving around that Seth had begun to associate with Freelancers.

There must have been about three hundred people in the cafeteria. Only one of every four seats was filled. That didn't mean that the place wasn't full. There were people going through the line or leaning against the walls talking to one another.

Seth scanned the crowds, desperately hoping to see a familiar face. It didn't take long for him to spot Gloria. The Freelancer was heading for the somewhat crowded line that was gathering in front of the buffet. He hurried over to her.

The young soldier quickly grabbed a metal tray and stepped into line behind his new superior. She didn't seem to have noticed his absence. Seth kept his head down and his mouth shut as he went through the line and received a dollop of food from each tray in the buffet. The poor boy was nervous in the presence of so many hardened killing machines. He wondered briefly who wouldn't dare to be cowed in the presence of Freelancers, but then answered his question. Other Freelancers, obviously.

The line moved along rather quickly. The men and women behind the counter dished out food and banter with the efficiency of a well oiled machine. Well, a machine that commented on changes in appearance and hit on the people moving along the buffet. Mercifully, they left Seth alone.

He looked at his food as he got it. There were things on his tray that were familiar: mashed potatoes and a roll. Unfortunately, there were more things that he didn't recognize: a pasty orange, red, and brown mixture; some kind of long, thin, yellow thing with knobbly kernels all over it; a squid-like animal that still waved its tentacles feebly whenever his tray was jostled too much. It was still alive...

Trying not to shudder at the thought of eating the wiggling life form on his tray, Seth followed Gloria to a table where the rest of the squad was sitting.

All of them were dressed in the same standard issue clothes that Seth was wearing. The man that insulted Gloria, Balthazar, on the ship was jostling and joking with another big man whose name Seth didn't know. Nicholai and that guy whose name Seth couldn't remember were digging into their food as if it was their last meal. When she saw him, Maria smiled and scooted over to make room for him on the stainless steel bench. He sat and Gloria took the empty spot on the other side of the table.

“What took you two so long to get here?” Maria's accent made the words sound just a bit harsher than they should have. She took the sting from them with a smile. “You're not usually late when there is food involved, Gloria.”

The vicious Freelancer woman smiled a cynical, one-sided smile as she said, “Well skippy over there wanted to play twenty questions. He comes up with some of the most random questions I've ever heard come out of a sober man's mouth.”

They both laughed at this, but Seth felt just a bit insulted. She'd volunteered to answer his questions. If she resented it, why had she let him ask anything at all?

To avoid any facing any more ridicule, Seth turned to his food. The tentacled thing was still waving its limbs feebly. It made him sick just to look at it. How was he supposed to eat this? Seth looked up and saw Gloria eying her squid-thing with apprehension.

Gloria had her fork gripped with the prongs down, prepared to stab if need be. She jabbed the squid that was on her plate. Lightning fast, the thing on her plate grabbed the fork and started to menace her with its wiggly limbs. That was a big mistake.

Faster than thought, Gloria had her pistol from its holster and had pumped three rounds into her would be attacker. It made this pitiful keening sound and its tentacles started to spasm. The Freelancer's gun barked again as she loosed another shot and the squid-thing stopped moving.

The rest of the cafeteria didn't even look up from their food. The other people at the table, excluding Nicholai and that guy whose name Seth forgot, offered their squids to Gloria when she decided they were tasty. Seth decided he wouldn't miss whatever protein that squid would have give him and gave his to Gloria as well. She acted like it was Christmas.

Gloria demolished her food at an alarmingly fast rate, then used her roll to mop up all that was left. Whenever she encountered a bullet in one of the squids (apparently, she hadn't been the first one to have an encounter with some of them) she spat it back out onto her tray.

When she had finally finished all of her food, she turned to Seth, who hadn't even touched his yet.

“You better hurry up and eat. We've got to go get you fitted out and kitted up before today's holomatch.”

“Holomatch?” Seth had a feeling that it was some sort of difficult and probably deadly game the Freelancers played with each other. He hoped he was wrong.

“Training simulations. Less talky, more eaty.” She gestured at his plate with her squid-blood stained fork.

Seth started eating his food, relieved that it would just be a simulation and not some kind of death match. How bad could it be?