Boot Camp 3

I was addicted to the TV show "Boot Camp" in 2001. I've taken two incidents from that show and changed them enough to make them my own and write a story around them. I'm not a military scholar so I may have put something in this story that would make a military person scoff. If I did, I apologize. I'm not Tom Clancy *smile* But please do send me an email and tell me what I screwed up if you find something glaringly wrong. And please be wearing a uniform when you write me the scolding email, and tell me in detail what it looks like on you...*big grin*

A couple of the characters are based loosely on people in the show. All characters are entirely fictional. All characters are the property of Moxy Irish. I hope you enjoy the story!

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I.

Recruit Murphy was in a world of hurt. Castille watched with a touch of pity out of the corner of her eye while jumping down into another squat-thrust. Drill Instructor McCafferty was in Murphy's face yelling at the top of his voice.

It was the end of a very long day. Murphy had been cranky since before lunch and an offhand remark she made had cost the squad a half hour of free time. The recruits had just finished the extra PT exercises. The squad broke out of formation and started gathering their things, silently thanking God the afternoon was over. Murphy had moved away from the formation to where she dropped her pack earlier.

McCafferty barked, "Murphy! Did you enjoy the extra 30 minutes of PT you caused the squad with your *little attitude* at chow?"

Murphy mumbled, "No, Sir." Raising her face toward the sky in frustration and tiredness.

McCafferty barked, "So we still have an attitude, eh? Ok, try to roll your eyes as you drop and give me 20!"

Murphy dropped into position automatically with a tired sigh. McCafferty had started striding over to her when he caught her mumbled, "I didn't roll my eyes, Sir."

He stomped over and yelled, "That's 30 now Murphy! Now PUSH!"

And Murphy...poor Murphy...at the end of a very long day...Snapped.

She held her position, arms shaking as they held her body above the ground. "I did NOT roll my eyes, SIR!"

McCafferty bent at the waist and started screaming a foot from her ear. "CLOSE YOUR MOUTH MURPHY! YOU'VE GOT 50 NOW! PUSH!"

Murphy screamed back, "I DID NOT ROLL MY EYES, SIR! I DID NOT ROLL MY EYES, SIR! I DID..." Murphy couldn't stand it anymore. She leapt to her feet, screaming back in the young Drill Instructor's face, "NOT ROLL MY EYES, SIR! I DID NOT ROLL MY EYES, SIR! AGRRRGH!"

McCafferty roared over Murphy's voice, "I *DO NOT* WANT TO HEAR IT MURPHY! YOU CLOSE YOUR MOUTH! I'LL HAVE YOU OUT HERE ALL NIGHT, RECRUIT!" When Murphy leapt up he went ballistic, standing an inch from her face and roaring, "GET ON THE GROUND! CLOSE YOUR MOUTH AND *GET* ON THE GROUND!"

When Instructor McCafferty had started to discipline Murphy, Drill Instructor Taglieri had barked out an order for the rest of the squad to go into squat thrusts. They had all faced him from wherever they had wandered to and dropped down, tiredly forcing their bodies to do the exercise.

Taglieri moved swiftly from where he was standing in front of the spread out squad when Murphy jumped up. Murphy didn't see him coming. She was too busy screaming back at the furious Drill Instructor standing an inch from her face. Taglieri took her flank, backing up McCafferty. His voice was not shouting, but it was loud enough to be heard over the din. "Stand at attention, Recruit Murphy!"

Murphy's body snapped automatically into attention, but she continued to scream. "I DID NOT DO IT! I DID NOT DO IT!"

McCafferty lowered his furious voice a touch. "Shut your *mouth* Murphy!"

Taglieri growled loudly at her right ear, "SHUT UP, Murphy!"

Murphy was tired. Very, very tired. Tears were running down her face and her throat hurt from shouting. The arrival of the other Drill Instructor overwhelmed her. She quit screaming at the man in front of her. She still looked directly into his face though. Her brown eyes were crackling with anger, her chest heaving, loudly breathing through her mouth. She was on the edge of snapping again.

Taglieri read her face. "You had better calm down, Murphy! You had better think about it! Don't you start again Murphy!"

McCafferty was snarling at her to drop to the ground, Taglieri was growling loudly in her right ear and Murphy was two seconds from punching the young Drill Instructor directly in front of her who had been riding her for weeks.

Taglieri saw her expression harden and growled loudly, "You better THINK about it, Murphy! You better THINK about it! DON'TEVENTHINKABOUTIT!!"

It was then that Castille lost it. She started laughing hysterically, as quietly as possible. She dropped to a knee, her whole body shaking with mirth as she remembered the last lines the handsome, stern Drill Instructor had said and how he had said them. She actually had tears forming she was laughing so hard. That was the funniest thing she had heard in weeks. Somewhere in her peripheral hearing she heard the scene quiet down, a few seconds of total silence followed by the sound of a body dropping to the ground and McCafferty's snarled "PUSH!"

She was glad it was over and felt bad for Murphy, but she just couldn't stop laughing at the unintentional one-liner. She didn't notice the pair of boots in front of her until a stern voice murmured. "Having fun, Castille?"

She looked up startled. Taglieri was in front of her and she could see Drill Instructor Schell heading her way. She leapt from the ground and stood at attention for about three seconds before dissolving into laughter again.

Taglieri's voice was a quiet purr. "Are you laughing at your fellow Recruit, Castille?"

She sobered up at that and bit out, "God No, Sir!" wiping her face swiftly. Christ, he was always waaaaaayyyyyy more dangerous when his voice was quiet.

Schell had showed up and flanked her, staying silent.

Taglieri continued, a dangerous look in his chocolate brown eyes, "Then what are you laughing at, Castille?"

That reminded her of what she had been laughing about and she dissolved into laughter again. By the time she had sobered up, McCafferty was flanking her other side. Ruh Roh, completely surrounded. She begged her brain to not play the line in her head again.

Taglieri murmured pointedly, "I said. What. Are. You. Laughing. At. Castille."

She took a deep breath and managed not to lose it again. "Something you said struck me as funny, Sir."

Taglieri cocked his head slightly in a mocking movement, "Oh really? Something I said? I'm so very curious to find out what I could have said that brought you such overwhelming happiness." He leaned forward, his brown gaze ferocious, and murmured silkily, "Do tell."

Castille was horrified, but she couldn't wipe the grin away that kept coming back to her lips.

She cleared her throat, "You said...you said..." Her voice dropped into a low imitation of his, unfortunately the laughter was creeping back in, breaking up her words, "You better...THINK about it, Murphy!..." Her body shook with laughter but she continued, "...You better THINK...about it!...DON'TEVENTHINKABOUTIT!" She laughed through the last few words and lost it again, dropping back down to one knee as she laughed uncontrollably.

Taglieri, Schell, and McCafferty managed to keep the grins off of their faces due to years of practice. It was rather funny. Tag hadn't even been completely aware of what he was saying at the time. What was even funnier was the completely gone recruit laughing helplessly at their feet. But they were professionals. They did not *laugh* with insubordinate recruits, even insubordinate civilian recruits.

Taglieri purred again, his voice dangerous and slightly triumphant, "I hope the laugh was worth the hour of PT you are going to get tonight after chow, Castille."

She had moved to a hip, an arm between her knees in a casual resting stance. She looked up at him grinning, completely forgetting where she was and letting her natural easy-going personality come full front. Her laughing blue eyes met the shuttered brown ones of the attractive Drill Instructor as she drawled, "Hell, Sir. You could spank me into next Sunday and I *still* wouldn't regret it. That was the best laugh I've had in eight weeks."

After a few seconds she pushed to her feet and stood at attention, having nearly mastered her laughter.

Schell and McCafferty had silently chuckled for about two seconds over her head when she sassed Taglieri. But they sobered themselves, and looked at her sternly when she brought herself to attention.

Taglieri merely stepped up to her, his brown eyes burning. He bit out, "If I did that, Recruit Castille, I *guarantee* you would regret it. Now *Push*."

His expression turned to one of satisfaction when her blue eyes grew round with surprise and fear. She dropped hastily to the ground and started doing push-ups.

He let her up after 20 and allowed her to scurry off to the barracks with a growled, "I'll see you in the sand pit for punishment at 1900 hours, Castille."

II.

Castille dragged her ass back to the barracks after Taglieri finished with her that night. The dark-haired Drill Instructor had been ruthless, running her ragged for the full punishment hour before allowing her to head off to bed. He stumbled past the male barracks and headed into her home for the past eight weeks. Three pairs of eyes followed her as she staggered into the female barracks. The other women all murmured sympathetic words to her.

She smiled at them, "No worries. I *still* don't regret what happened."

Murphy moved over to her, "What exactly happened? I wasn't in any state to pay attention to anything."

At her words Castille started chuckling again, "Ok, let me preface this with I was *not* laughing at you..."

The rest of the women gathered around, they had only heard bits and pieces of why Castille was being punished. When she imitated Taglieri's voice and said what he said, all of the women burst into laughter. Castille started laughing so hard she fell onto her rack. The barracks laughed and repeated the episode to each other for a good ten minutes before they finally wound down and started preparing for sleep.

Drill Instructor Taglieri chuckled and moved out of the shadows outside of the barracks open window. It really was a funny story. He was more interested in what happened afterwards though. He made his way back to the Drill Instructors' quarters musing about Recruit Emma Castille.

Working on a reality TV show was a far stranger experience than the Drill Instructors expected. They were all US Marines and had been real Drill Instructors for the Marine Corps. All of them were out of the Corps and in the world now. They had responded along with countless others to the advertisement sent out by the TV producers.

Their job was to take 14 civilians, male and female, and teach them about the experience of Boot Camp. However, these recruits weren't soldiers. They were regular people of varying age range, most in their 20's and early 30's, that were there to win a game.

The Drill Instructors were a shock to most of the squad. Many of them hadn't ever had to deal with being dominated in any way. Now it was their life from the minute they woke up to the second they closed their eyes at night. As for the Instructors, they sometimes found themselves dealing with situations that would never happen with real recruits, like the incident with Murphy. They often talked candidly among themselves, without the cameras around, about their interesting group of civilian recruits.

Drill Instructor Schell was the oldest of the three at 45 years of age. He was a husband and father of two. One of his daughters was in college near his South Carolina home. He had retired after 25 years in the Corps. He was the quietest and most reasonable of all the Drill Instructors. He would ride the squad's collective ass when he needed to, but most of them saw him as a Father-figure type, and strove to make him proud. He was a bit gentler than the other two men and would talk to the recruits and become approachable when there was down time.

Drill Instructor McCafferty was seen as a sadistic older brother type. He was the youngest Instructor at age 29. The South Bostonian had been in the Corps since the age of eighteen and had spent several years as an Instructor. He was loud, maddening, and demanded immediate obedience. Most of the recruits resented the hell out of him, but when he praised them, or allowed a joke or a smile to pass his lips, they hung on it. They grumbled about him, but it was obvious to most of them that he rode them so they would become better rather than out of meanness.

Drill Instructor Taglieri was a strange mix of Schell and McCafferty. The San Diego native was 31 and had spent 10 years in the Corps, spending time in Bosnia and the Gulf. He could easily get as loud as McCafferty, but tended to keep his voice down and speak through action and expression. The recruits feared him, but as with the others, they worked hard to make him proud of them. Periodically he would let them see a lighter side. He had a wicked sense of humor and occasionally said something that had them fighting to keep straight faces.

The squad was originally made up of young and old, female and male, married and single, with most of the married people being parents. They completed missions, cultivated team comraderie, participated in forced exercise, were continually yelled at by the Drill Instructors, and lived much like real recruits. However, they had to vote people off every 10 days or so. The back-stabbing and alliances were not something real recruits had to deal with. It was a game, and the two recruits left standing at the end of 14 weeks were going to have to compete against each other, the winner eventually winning a large cash prize.

It was week nine and the squad had been cut down to eight people. By chance it was divided equally males to females. At this point in the game the older people, the weak, and the annoying people had been weeded out. The squad was fairly strong and the recruits were responding more like a well-trained unit. The Drill Instructors had been impressed with their "kids" for the last few weeks.

Taglieri arrived at the Instructors' quarters. The quarters were strictly off limits to any cameramen. They all had private rooms with common spaces like a rec-room and a kitchen. The other two Instructors were kicked back in the rec-room, and greeted him when he walked in. He dropped into a chair, tired and still musing.

McCafferty murmured, "How did it go with Castille?"

"Oh fine, she's incredibly willing. She didn't give me any trouble." He chuckled, "She told the story to the rest of the girls though, they laughed for like ten minutes."

Schell's smile was teasing, "It really was funny the way she told it, Tag."

Tag nodded, "I agree, it was funny, and it was hell not to laugh when she was rolling around nearly under our boots."

McCafferty picked up his mug and took a swig of tea. "Castille really is something else. I know we aren't supposed to get attached. but I hope they don't vote her off. She has been good-natured and dedicated from the second she got here. And the woman has a wicked sense of humor, I almost lost it today when she threw out that spanking remark."

Schell grinned, "Yeah, that was really funny, God knows I like the girl too. I think the look on her face when Tag threatened her was funnier though."

Tag pointed at Schell with a grin, "Hey now, I didn't threaten anyone."

McCafferty nearly spit his tea out. "You did so!"

Tag shook his head smiling wickedly, "No I didn't, I said *if*. *If* makes all the difference."

The other two men laughed and then started talking about what they were going to do to the squad the next day.

Tag went to the kitchen and grabbed a beer. He sat down at the kitchen table wanting a few minutes of privacy. Recruit Emma Castille was still on his mind.

The dark-haired, blue-eyed recruit was a single, 32 year old woman from Northern California. From her file he knew that she trained horses for a living and gave riding lessons. That came out in her interactions with the squad. She was a natural leader and trainer, but practiced a good-natured, 'soft' leadership. She often had a recruit thinking something was their idea as she guided them towards an action that she wanted. She helped others, even if it meant increasing her time on a timed course. She was also incredibly honest. She didn't take part in the rampant back-stabbing, and spoke very plainly about hating having to vote. She was often very funny and made the other recruits laugh all the time. She was a strong candidate to win the game. He hoped she wouldn't get voted off because of her strengths. He liked her. Perhaps more than he was supposed to.

He had to admit he was attracted to her looks from the beginning. She was pretty, rather athletic, and stronger than she looked. She was fairly tall at 5'9, only a few inches shorter than his 6-foot frame. In the beginning he had put all thought of attraction aside. That was not something that was allowed. However, as the weeks went by he was charmed. So charmed, in fact, that he rode her harder than any other recruit. He often caught her glancing at him with frustration and disappointment after he railed on her about something he would have let slide with someone else. She never ragged on him behind his back though.

The barracks windows were kept open due to the heat of the summer months and the Instructors often heard complaints and jeers coming from both barracks. They didn't take it personally. They expected the recruits to blow off steam with each other.

Tag remembered a day when all three Instructors were grouped together discussing something near the female barracks and heard a rant going on. That day all of them had ridden the recruits mercilessly. The whole squad was ready to explode. All of the other girls in the barracks were egging each other on about how nasty the Instructors were and how much they hated them. When Castille walked in, they eagerly turned to include another in their rant.

She had chuckled, the men could almost hear the casual shrug in her voice, "Oh I don't know, maybe it's the Roman slave girl in me. I just respond well to growly, bossy men."

There had been about two seconds of silence then laughter. The mood lightened up considerably after that.

The Instructors had moved off and had a laugh about it. They were also all impressed with how Castille handled the negative group and turned the mood positive. If anything, Tag was even more intrigued with the girl.

He pondered his beer bottle. He had heard her joke a few other times about things like that. It always made people laugh, but now he wondered. Her voice had been amused but completely frank today when she drawled the spanking remark at him. He found himself pondering what that might be like, and how she might respond to that, then he shook off the thought. He had no right to think such things. He wasn't even allowed to be interested in the girl until after the game was over. It made him wonder though. She *did* respond well to orders. From day one she had never whined about how she was treated, when all of the others were having fits.

The only thing she had ever objected to was volume. The Instructors had been trained to yell everything, usually directly in the ear or the face of a recruit. Early in the game during a moment of downtime she had admitted to Schell that she was worried about damage to her hearing when McCafferty would scream an inch from her ear. Her hearing was sensitive and trained acutely for her job. She wasn't used to loud noises and had spent the first ten days having severe ear-aches. Schell scolded her for not reporting the ear pain and mentioned what Castille had told him to the other Instructors.