The hot steam from the powered shower water flowed from the ensuite in Solomon's room. After half an hour of standing and sitting under the roaring jet stream of hot water, Solomon emerged from the steaming cubicle, a towel draped around his waist and an electric shaver in his hand. Walking around his room towards his personal desk as he shaved his slightly rough face, checking his datapad for any new messages, nothing. Once dried and groomed, Solomon dressed himself in his usual base olive fatigues with black attachment straps and set off down the almost empty corridors towards the first companies armoury. Most of his Company were sitting on the floors on dirty, oily cushions as they disassembled, cleaned, and reassembled their weapons, talking loudly and laughing as they went. The moment Solomon entered the room, and one of his soldiers caught a glimpse of him, they stood to attention and the rest of the men and women followed in suit without thinking. The air was thick with machine oil and grease, the floor was clean, except for the dirty cushions the bodies where now resting back down on. "Ladies and gentlemen, how are we all, this fine evening?" asked Solomon positively. The group of soldiers nodded and agreed it was a good, easy day, all except, Decius, who sat apart from the group, softly brushing away dried oil from his rifle round chamber. "Private Decius. A word please." said Solomon formally. He had not spoken to him since he was released from the brig, Solomon did feel a lump in his throat whenever he thought about the young private and how he was having a hard time fitting in. trying to impress other people no matter what the cost was quickly becoming his downfall. To impress the company, he had thrown stale bread at the Captain of the Second, and doing that caused himself to be involved in a fight with the monstrous Captain Deeph, causing him to hurt his foot and not been accounted for on the ship at the time of an incident. This had placed him at a prime suspect in the incident in question of someone attempting to tamper with the Last Resort Weapon. "Hard to think, throwing a piece of stale bread would land you in the slammer and accused of treason, ay lad?" asked Solomon softly to Decius when they reached Solomon's personal armoury desk in the far corner of the bland grey room. Decius looked up into the lieutenants' eyes and hung his head low again. After a minute, Solomon placed his hand on Decius' shoulder,
"Cheer up. Soon, you will be considered family to these people too. And then, you will look forward to when we are all together, like this, just cleaning weapons, and having a laugh"
Decius cast his eyes to the lieutenants' desk where small pictures could be seen, stuck to the wall above the flat top of the desk, small writing scribbled above the pictures. Solomon noticed the look on the young private's face. "Fallen and lost family." he answered the unasked question on Decius' lips. "Come."
"Here, we have 'Elran Kay', Killed In Training."
Decius squinted at the small man's face in the worn picture, skinny and blonde with short hair, bearing a happy smile of over enjoyment.
"We took that the day he was told he had a newborn baby boy. That was nine months ago. He was killed about three weeks after that in a training exercise... Next, we have 'Seven', her real name was 'Serene O'blier' Killed In Action. There was a saboteur on The Evergreen about three years ago, during the Luna Wars. Planted a bomb in the starboard engine room, Seven was the person who found it, it went off before she could disarm it... Next we have these two, the O'Riley Brothers. Both died together, twins. There was a rumour that one of the Luna War Lords was hiding out on Mars, The Evergreen was dispatched with two other ships. We thought we was clever by approaching from the opposite direction of Earth... they were waiting for us on the landing. Within half an hour we took seventy percent casualties of what we deployed. My company was left on the ship with the second and third companies, we were boarded. With most of our companies on the ground, we couldn't sufficiently defend The Evergreen. They took a lot of the third company out. The twin's were in the armoury with the thirds primary force giving them their deployment orders, getting their armour on and relaying orders to one and other. They were taken by surprise."
Decius thought deeply in silence as he studied the faces of the fallen and lost family. Their faces frozen with happiness, eyes never closing. Decius began to wonder if his picture would ever become stuck up there, eternally happy. Forever lost. With a sniff, he finally spoke to Solomon. "Sir..." he hesitated. "I know the risk, and I understand the bonds of soldiers in war, but..." his throat began to tighten as he spoke. Solomon flashed a warm grin to Decius, "You're young, lad. Things happen, just, don't try and kick me in the head, and don't get killed." he mused.