PROTOCOL

"Get thru this course the first time and you won't have to repeat it... and by the way, it's my course... I amFLOTT... the only trainer on base that can pass or fail you so follow protocol and get through it today... first trial!" The unit started out behind the leader dressed in pickle suited splendor and so well versed in expected flinch or gasp responses of those following him that he could trip the lever releasing images of civilian or threat to civilian and mark their score before hand. Forty two trainees to put through paces on any training run is a big load but he was over twelve years ready for them and so well versed due to his twelve year experience on this base with this course. Over and over the thought echoes through the mind of those being trained to endure the mind games wrought upon them for the surety of a community that could be besieged and put in need of a responder so well trained. They were to follow his order noting sudden movement shouldering weapons intent at harm sent to none but those who would do harm to the innocent. Faces popped up, popped out from doorways. A mother coddling a child standing at her side. An elderly couple dart out and back inside, then a dark shadow in a window... above a wall... a roof and from a bush of flowers. Making their way behind the leader, they can assort and sling danger out of marked "harm's way" sent as a simple flash in the light from the darkness. Midway through the community of puppets the leader steps out of light and back in over and over... again and yet again. The trainees make their pace as instructed by protocol. THE CHALLENGE of not harming the innocent who would be harmed by the other than compassionate nailing through their mock community tearing away at their mock society and the reality they represent. Terrorists lunging out from the darkness to spill evil across mock terrace or picket fence need to be eliminated from the mock threat pushed through to trainees needing to hold the proper mentality of the mock scene so that a real event and true rationale of innocence and evil... terror and passivity could properly progress to a trainee intellect and allow for the ticket out moving them on their way to the next post. They would win the ticket out on his agenda. One by one pulled aside for a personal challenge. Response to assault on their person. Not hand in hand but instruction and expectation of performance. They could proced with a passing mark if met without rejection and to his personal approval at his in and out assertion of physical insertion. A greenhouse amid the wooded end, along the side and filthered glass and dusted bench with pots and plants from long past rents and lifeless petals and forced male stench. The end of the line. The innocents shorn and passing marks to all for "jobs well done" performance buying his applause beneath wincing brow and a jowled smirk. "PASS!" and "You won't need to see me again... most of you." Training after training to certification's date and out past innocents to protects that which is left.

AND NOW, FINALLY all the so many years later the license shows up. The CDL issued in the military for driving the rig that was never extended to a woman's hand except in writing. The license trained for... via protocol, and ignored by regulators outside. The license, the skill, the brotherhood earned therein doing what could be done for the "little boy" back home or "that little girl we left alone" at someone else's doorstep where care and concern and the love of a mother's heart should be an important note to make note of in the life of an enlisted personnel. Protocol... the ticket out.