Young, Stupid, One of Us. Part 2.

"Run! I said run, you useless piece of shit!"

"Twenty push-ups! And don't you fucking tell me you're tired! I'll give you a fucking martial arts anal warm-up!"

"Too slow! You're already dead! The fucking Voodoo Boy burned your brains and is going to take advantage of your still warm and soft asshole!"

"Whj the fuck are you calling chumba?! I am not choomba or dude! I'm your fucking instructor!" - a thud sound erupts through the room, followed by a recruit falling to the ground, throwing up his breakfast.

"Come on, come on, call me 'chumba' again! I'm begging, bitch! Come on, come on, call me dude, man or chumba!"

But the recruit, displaying clearly remarkable intelligence, chose to remain silent. Although in fact he just passed out. And who knows why: because of excessive physical exertion or beatings by the hands of his favorite instructors.

Approaching him and making sure that the recruit was alive, I asked his sadistic instructors.

"So guys, what do you think of him?" - smoking a cigarette, got ready to listen to the report.

"His physical proficiency sucks. No melee skills. He can manage some tactics, but honestly, he's not much better than a civilian. To put it crudely..." Rico spoke first.

"Complete shit." - I finished it for him.

"Yeah... But there's an upside. He's practically a blank sheet. No need to retrain him or change bad habits and reflexes. He's got potential, only it's going to take some time. Although, with good motivation, even that won't be a problem." - Private spoke next, handing over a clipboard on which the results of the first few weeks were recorded.

Comparing the scores before and after, there was some progress. Even if not as much as I would have liked to see, but the important thing is that we have at least something.

"Good, good. What about the others?" - Turned to the medic brothers.

"I second everything that's been said before me. But not only do we need to toughen up his combat skills, teach him field hacking and netrunning, but we should also work on his brains." - Manfredi said, and his brother nodded, letting me know he agrees with brother's opinion.

"Yeah, his mom seems like a smart lady and raised him right, but the street messed him up. Still can't make him talk without excessive slang, and get rid of all the crap he learned on the street?" - I smirked and asked the instructors, which made their faces crease as if they had eaten a pile of lemons.

"Chumba, what's up? Dude, give me a gun and I'll prove to you that I'm a man! Chumba, this is the 21st century, I don't need that kind of athletics: I can get where I need to go by car or motorcycle. You guys only ride airdanes." - parodying our young underling, Johnson commented.

"That's okay,at least now, you'll know how to raise your on kids so they don't get their heads full of street bullshit. All right, I need to talk to him, so get him up."

"Get up, or I'll have to use Pikachu," - Manfredi took out his electric baton and approached the lying recruit.

To give him extra motivation, he waved the baton, which had electric sparks on the end of it. This was enough to get the guy almost immediately to his feet and into a pose, showing his willingness to receive new orders.

"Listen up, Recruit Martinez. They want to talk to you. So that's it for today with the physical training. But I'll see you tonight in the tactical training room, off you go. And don't you dare to fall asleep in the shower or in the cafeteria again. If I don't see your face at five o'clock sitting in the classroom, I'll use Pikachu to show you all the pain you've inflicted on my heart with your laziness." - Manfredi clarified his further schedule, and threatened him with an electric baton just in case.

"What do you think of our place?" - I asked, to the guy who was covered in sweat and dirt.

"Chum...I mean, Skipper. Why are you torturing me like this? And why am I being taught how to hack?" - How quickly he corrected himself made me chuckle.

After all, the brothers had managed to cure him of that Night City slang. He might still be a long way off, but with such teachers of manners he wouldn't have to blush with embarrassment in front of people in high places.

"David, first of all, this isn't torture, it's very basic training. You're just too weak. And your stamina's no good, either. We have to get you up to the minimum acceptable level. Second, our team doesn't have a specialist to counter enemy netrunners and hackers. It would be counterproductive to teach other team members about it: everyone already has a role." - began answering his questions while simultaneously pulling out a new cigarette from the pack.

"You probably think you can achieve all this just by stuffing a bunch of implants in? I can see it in your eyes, yes. But a problem there is a problem; if you rely on them too much, at some point it becomes your vulnerability. A few viruses targeting critical implants can make you a useless piece of chrome-stuffed meat. Oh, and in your case, you need to develop stamina on a compulsory basis. Do you know why?" - I asked him as I explained the pitfalls of the implants.

"Because I'll need a powerful cyberdeck?" - He amused me with his cleverness.

(CyberDeck example.)

"Yes, a really good cyberdeck is very demanding not only in terms of skill, but also in terms of the physical prowess of the user. It loads not only your brain, but your whole body, so unless you want to become a vegetable because of problems such as overloaded nervous system, for example, or lack of breathing, arrhythmia and all that stuff, you have to have a strong body." - I mimicked the ovation, praising him and revealing some of the specifics of working with cyberdecks.

"But there's another reason: you'll be working with us in the field in the near future, not from a soft chair in some bunker. What does that mean? It means you'll be engaged in heated firefights, while attacking our enemies and protecting us, not only through the net, but also using firearms. You don't have to be as good a marksman as Rico or me, but you should still be able to kill the enemy using regular bullets. Mistakes in strategy can be corrected with good tactics. Mistakes in tactics can be corrected by good shooting. But mistakes in shooting are not so easy to fix. I hope you understand what I expect from you, what Trauma Team expects from you?" - Asked the question, I began to stare at him, trying to see if my words were imprinted in his mind.

"Yeah... Thanks for explaining everything." - David thanked, and understanding began to dawn in his eyes.

"You're welcome, and now, David, you can get back to training. We have less than a year to get you up to the bare minimum." - After saying goodbye to David, I headed back to my office.

"God, I hope this works out for us. I still can't believe I got him not only into the TT recruits, but the Archangel candidates as well. At least the IQ tests showed that his brains are working, and he has a certain hidden talent for hacking." - sinking into a soft armchair, I expressed my thoughts into space.

As I thought about it, I remembered how I'd had to fight with Human Resources, and then with Jeremiah and Ron. It wasn't until I got the kid to pass the tests that they agreed to take him. And then all hell broke loose for all of us: I had to make a schedule with a training plan. We had to beat the crap and garbage out of his head, while holding back from wanting to strangle a guy who wanted to show he was badass and knew the real truth of the streets.

Now the important thing is that we all endure this hellish pace, especially David. And there we'll have a full complement: Skipper, Private, Rico, Manfredi, Johnson and finally Kowalski. With a team full of specialists it will be much easier to work with, as will the example of my team it will be easier to push the initiative to train field hackers and netrunners, and then who knows...

It remains only to do what we can and hope that luck does not turn back on us, that's all we need.