The Flamekeepers of Delta Psi Theta - 4. The First Trial

We stood with thumbs up our asses, staring at those eight stools. My heart rate pounded like a freight train in my ears. Fear. Cold-blooded fear filled my brain. These guys I had spent all day getting to know and learning to work with would now, along with myself, be judged.

“You can take a seat at any time,” I barely heard Teo say over the sound of my own pounding heart.

Kevin moved to sit down, and the rest of us followed. I worked to control my breathing. Surrounded by bothers at the end of our first full day was not the ideal time for a panic attack. I had to remind myself what this was, simple questions.

“The worst thing you can do right now is lie,” Tyler told us as we settled into our stools.

Thanks for that. The menacing tone wasn't making this situation more stressful at all. I know it's the point, Novo, relax, it's ok.

“Answer honestly and to the best of your memory. It's not an interrogation, just a check of what you heard. Nothing to stress over,” Ryan added, seeing us all tense up.

Teo handed Tyler a notebook, and the rest of the brothers stood back as if the proceedings were about to begin. Nick took a step forward in front of us with a face of menacing amusement that had become his staple.

“Tonight begins your first trial. This trial will test not if you can hear your fellow pledges but if you actually listen to what they say, using their context clues to connect dots and grasp their meaning and weight. Your fellow pledges have told you a lot of things while you were cleaning and eating today. How much did you hear, listen, and connect is going to be what you are tested on tonight.”

All of us seemed to relax; we would just be tested on what we heard today. That was possible to do even with my memory.

“Let's start at the end. Novo, who is sitting to your left?” Tyler asked me

I looked to my left and answered quickly, “Jer, Jeremy technically, but he prefers Jer.”

“Correct. Jer, who is to your left” he asked again, rapid fire.

“Logan,” he answered without even looking, feeling the massive muscle man touching his left shoulder.

Tyler went down the line, asking each person who was to their side. When it got to the end of the line and Kevin he answered my name for who was on the other side. Round 1 passed with flying colors with eight correct answers.

“Jer, what is Novo’s first name?” Tyler asked, skipping me over entirely.

“Uhhh shit…. Ian… NO, ISSAC!” He answered with excitement as his brain connected the dots.

“Correct. Declan, what instrument does Jer play?”

“Guitar, it's why his fingertips are all callused,” Declan answered, grabbing his crotch to punctuate the statement causing Bear to laugh in the background.

We did another round of this trivia. Asking facts about each other until at the end of the second round, Tyler asked Kevin the first of the real deep questions, “which parent does Track wish he lived with.”

This was weird. All day Track told us stories of his mom, hell my first time meeting him was because he didn't understand laundry. I assumed his mom took care of him, but the way this question was framed told me I was wrong.

Kevin answered, “he wishes he lived with his mom instead of at the county group home.”

“Correct….”

I could hear my heart rate. I missed it. I missed something fundamental about one of my guys.

“…Novo…”

I was gonna fuck this up, just like in that canyon. I was going to lose it all again. Lt. was going to kill me.

“… what is Kevin afraid of.”

Wait. I could answer that one. It was what I was afraid of when I got to basic after being in the group home: “He's afraid of being out of control because he doesn't trust us, and his experience has been with untrustworthy people but also of making a mistake because he doesn't trust himself.”

“Correct; Track, what is Novo scared of”

Track leaned forward to look at me. He had to see my sadness of not knowing, my inability to see his fear and pain, my kicking myself, and my selfishness of not hearing. My fear of repeating all my mistakes.

He got a half smile and answered, “losing us. It's the first time since he got out of the Corps he's been part of something, and he's going to grip it tight.”

“Correct…”

At least he knew. Partly. We had to talk about group home experiences if we made it through this.

… Travis, what is Logan afraid of?”

“That he will end up like the rock biter, and his big strong hands won't protect us,” Travis answered word for word what he told us when we asked why he worked out so much.

“Incorrect.”

Every butthole on a stool clenched up. It was the first wrong answer; we were at eighteen correct. Unfortunately, it was the first of many. We were good at hearing what people told us, repeating the same stories they told us. We weren’t so good at connecting dots with other people.

Logan missed one about my rank.

Declan missed one about Jer’s parents.

Apollo missed one about Tracks holidays.

Each one of these wrong answers feeling like a punch to the gut.

Another missed answer from Track and me.

Another two punches.

I was exhausted. Kevin was answering correctly, but even he was starting to feel the stress.

“Kevin, what is Jer’s favorite song to play on the guitar.”

“Jersey Giant. He’s been whistling it all day.”

“Correct”

We went again. Apollo missed one about where I was living.

I missed one on Logan’s favorite coach.

Over and over, we missed small details or failed to interpret what wasn't said. Over and over, for a total of eight rounds. Tyler saying the word incorrect became a trigger, each time causing us to flinch.

When it was all over, we failed. 26 out of 64 questions were correct. We sat in depressed silence as the brothers left until only Ryan and Bear remained in the room. The silence marinated for quite some time.

“Can we call the underwear thing even,” Kevin said tepidly, breaking the silence.

We all started to laugh. You could almost feel the tension begin to evaporate. The weight of our failure began to lessen as we emerged from the blind panic we had been in.

“Yeah, I think you carried us through that one,” Apollo said.

“How did you know their answers like that?” Travis asked, genuinely curious.

“After I misjudged so badly where we all stood, I sat back and tried to listen as much as possible, trying to find openings to take charge where I could. I just let you tell the stories and tried to fill in the blanks.” Kevin answered.

“Nice work,” I told him, getting off my stool to give him a good job shoulder bump.

“Thanks, man,” he said, looking a bit taken aback that I would praise him.

We then heard clapping coming from around the corner. We turned to Bear and Ryan as they rolled their eyes and sank deeper into the couch.

“Well, the record remains unbroken; no pledge class has passed this trial,” the brother said.

“No shit Alistair. The point is for this to be almost impossible,” Ryan said, defending us a bit.

“Oh, I know; I just had high hopes for this lot.”

“Me too, especially after this afternoon,” Bear said, looking crestfallen.

That stung.

“Brotherhood is more than trivia,” Alistair told him before looking at us, “But try and get at least half if you are going to fail, though.”

“What score is passing for this trial?” Logan asked.

Alistair just grinned “perfect or nothing. Few pledge classes get much beyond the first two rounds. The point is to give you all a taste of failure and what we are looking for. Think of it as a pretest,” he finished with a wink.

You could feel some tension evaporate.

“I still think it's fucked to give an impossible task,” Ryan added.

“Nearly impossible,” Bear corrected.

“We all did it. We all felt the sting of this failure, and we all dealt with the consequences of it. Dealing with success is easy; how you deal with loss is how legacies are made,” Alastair said, causing Bear and Ryan to roll their eyes.

I stood with my arm still around Kevin when Jer yawned. Like a wave, all of us did the same.

“Aww, the kids are sleepy,” Ryan told bear.

“Want me to put them to bed,” Alastair asked.

“Nah, ill get 'em locked up. Go on and get ready for bed. I expect teeth brushed and faces washed, lights out in 10,” Bear told us.

Flashbacks to the group home came in deep as we all filed down to the basement and grabbed our stuff to get ready for bed. The boys brushed their teeth while I grabbed a water bottle to take ibuprofen and melatonin. These boys might be invincible, but my old body was sore, and I knew I’d need extra help getting to sleep after failing the task. I finished brushing my teeth and scrubbing the last of the soap from my face just as Bear walked in to take a piss.

“Bout ready, Novo?” He asked me as his stream flowed into the bowl.

I toweled the last of the water off my face before answering in the affirmative. My eye caught him shaking the last few drops from his foreskin. His eyes turned and met mine, seeing where I was focusing. He skinned it back a few times before chuckling to himself.

“Just like Track. Come on, if you boys are good, I might let you play with it tomorrow,” he said with his laugh filling the room.

I followed Bear out and stood in the doorway next to Track while Bear stood next to Tyler.

“Kevin, as best performing pledge today, the full brothers of Delta Psi Theta ask you: do you vouch for your brothers? Did they properly take care of their pre-sleep activities in preparation for bed?”

“Uhh… yes,” Kevin responded rather tepidly.

“With Kevin's approval, you are all released. Sleep well; tomorrow, we expect better performance.”

We all turned around and made our way to our beds. I stripped off all my clothes except my underwear. I felt like I was back in boot, out of my depth and unsure of what I was doing.

“Hey novo?” Track asked me.

“Sup champ?” I answered him

“Thank you for today. I wouldn’t be here if it weren't for you. Even if we didn’t win, and we did mostly bullshit busy work, it felt more like home than I've felt in a while.”

I just grabbed him into a hug. I didn’t have the words to explain much more. The distrust of myself for missing things, the protectiveness I felt over him, the joy I saw at his success, and the pain at our collective defeat. I couldn’t find any words to explain that, so I hoped a hug would. When he squeezed me back, I felt part of what I wanted him to know was getting through. His eyes were teary when he let me go and took a step back.

“What’s up, champ,” I asked him.

“Mom would have loved this,” was all he could say before starting to cry.

I grabbed him into a hug again and told him, “She is, wherever she is. My mom is loving it too, champ. Maybe they are sharing some wine, watching and gossiping over us. At least that’s what I like to think: she still checks in on me and is proud of the man I've become.”

“Can I ask you another question?” He asked between sniffles as we separated.

“Sure,” I said, crawling into my bed.

“Why do you call me champ?”

“It just feels right. Do you want me to stop?” I answered him as he climbed into bed.

“No… it just reminds me of my dad before…” he stopped without finishing, letting the silence be his punctuation.

I broke the pregnant pause between us, telling him, “sleep good, champ.”

I reached and flipped the switch between our beds. Nothing happened. I was about to get up when Bear came into our doorway.

“You look all set; see you in 8 hours,” he told us before flipping a different switch, turning off our lights, and closing the door.

Last night, sleep came easy for me. I wasn't so sure the same thing would happen tonight. Track and I lay in our beds in the darkness, the only sound being each other's breathing. I tossed and turned, trying to get comfortable. Just trying to get my brain to turn off, but my anxiety kept waking me. As I was about to fall asleep, something told me I needed to check for security, see if the orderly was coming, or check my weapon. No matter what, I couldn’t just turn my brain off.

After what felt like two hours of this, I started to hear Track whimpering. I rolled over to look and him and saw him balled up, almost in the fetal position. His arms were flailing as if he was protecting himself from something trying to hit him. I immediately jumped out of my bed and went over to him.

“Hey champ, it's ok. I got you, buddy. I got you.” I told him softly as I dodged his flailing arms and tried to rub his back.

“Novo?” He asked as he slowly woke up from his terror.

“I got you, champ. It's ok. Yer safe,” I told him in a hushed tone so as not to wake up the other pledges, especially after my poor wake-up the night before.

He held onto my arm while I stayed crouched in front of him. When my legs started to burn, I needed to move.

“Hey buddy, I got an idea; I'm not going anywhere,” I told him as I pried his hands off my arm.

I climbed onto his bed and sat with my back against the wall, legs across the bed. He grabbed my leg and used it as a pillow as I rubbed his back to soothe his fears. I kept repeating that he was ok until he eventually started to snore lightly, using my leg as a pillow.

I sat there in the darkness, back against the wall, acting as a life preserver for my lil bro. Was it comfortable? No, no it wasn't; but I didn’t want to be anywhere else at that moment. I closed my eyes and held onto Track, feeling relaxed and useful in protecting him from whatever was happening in his head. Finally, sleep came for me.

“How many times did we sleep exactly like this,” Becker said to me, arms on the back of his head, resting on my leg, his elbow in my chest.

His fingers gripped my silkies, playing with the material and my cock beneath. The wall behind me was still cold from the desert night, but my t-shirt protected me from some of the chill.

“More times than I could count. As I recall, your legs were my second favorite pillow,” I told him, playing with the chest hair poking out from the neck of his shirt.

“Oh yeah? What was your favorite?” he said, sitting up and crossing his legs on the stiff wool blanket.

“As I recall, your chest was especially good at lulling me to sleep. Your heartbeat sounded strong enough for the both of us,” I answered, matching his position crossed-legged in the bed.

Purple and orange light started to chase away the darkness outside the window between our two beds. Sunrise. The start of our last day.

“What happens next,” I asked him, trying to change the past.

“I don't know. Does LT know about us?” He asked me, taking my hand into his.

LT. I don't know what he knew. I don't know if LT knew most of my leadership abilities were in this bed right now. My confidence, drive, and reason for pushing past when I wanted to give up sat across from me, fear and sadness in his eyes. Even if LT knew, he couldn’t fully know.

“Do you want him to know? Do you think it would change anything?” I asked him back, squeezing his hand tighter.

“Probably not. Your promotion had to come at the perfect time, didn’t it,” he said, trying to hide the pain in his eyes.

I didn’t want this to end the way it did last time. The way it actually had. With us getting into a shouting match. With us saying words we couldn’t take back. With me walking away from the only time I had been truly happy in my adult life.

“We don't have to deal with that just yet; we have at least two hours before formation,” I told him.

“Then I would rather spend it using you as a pillow,” he told me, wrestling me into sitting across the bed with my legs, back once again against the wall.

We sat like that as the light in the room slowly increased to a bright yellow as the sun crossed the horizon. My heart rate and anxiety increased, never wanting to let this moment go. I held onto Becker’s hand as he looked up at my face. I could see my reflection in those bright blue eyes, with tears starting to stream down my face.

“I wish I told you that I loved you when I had the chance,” I finally said.

“You just did,” he said, poking me in the sides with his free hand.

“I mean before you died on patrol,” I said, poking him right back, tears dripping off my chin.

“Sometimes I wish you knew how alive I still was.” He said, getting up.

Suddenly the window was gone, and the blanket I was sitting on wasn't the scratchy green monster. My silkies and t-shirt were gone, and I was left with only my briefs. I could see him standing in front of me, but I still felt the weight on my leg. I looked down to see my muscled bear of a lover replaced with a scared kid in a young adult's body holding onto me, the room now illuminated in a bluish-white light.

“He needs you, doesn’t he?” Becker said, looking at Track curled up using my leg as a pillow.

I looked back at Becker to see him bathed in light. His body hair took on an almost angelic glow off his arms. He was so close, and yet it was clear he was so far. What I wouldn’t give to go back to that base in the desert, to go back to that moment in LT’s office, to undo everything that led to this moment being so full of pain.

“Yeah, as much as I needed you. How are you doing this? Please come lay back down.” I asked Becker, tears freely streaming from my eyes.

“I'm never as far away as you think. Whenever you need me, I'm right here for you. Always,” he said before disappearing, leaving the room again in darkness; the only sounds were my labored crying and Track's slow rhythmic snoring.