On the way back we had some trouble with the conductor on the train - ah, how I love such losers. He did not accept the pass of the military court, and he wanted us to pay the 37 HUF for the ticket, plus the 400 HUF penalty. He kept bugging us till we reached Szekesfehervar, where he wanted to take us to the station chief, but first we didn't go, then the station chief sent him away, so finally he could only share the serious legal problem with the old cashier lady. The lady immediately threatened us with "several consequences" if we don't pay, as she really enjoyed to finally be part of something exciting after years of boring service behind the desk. Finally that bird called conductor phoned the base, wanting to call the military police on us, but Major Brody, the officer on duty, sent him to hell, and while he was on the phone, we left him, along with the paper he didn't want to accept: he might have kept it if he wanted.
The court made the fat mouthed ones shit in their pants. They threatened Krokos with a year of military jail for violence, he became truly depressed. Berkes begged for mercy on the knees, asking us not to confirm the charges against him. Only some of them kept the old voice, mostly those who weren't involved. The loudest of all was a blond, conceited guy called LCorp Balazs Einvachter, our room commander, best brownnoser of Racz's. He hanged in the sergeant-major's office all the day, watched his wishes and praised his wisdom whenever he could. The other was the similarly conceited LCorp Schmidt, and this was besides the entire list of the non-commissioned officers at the company. The November bunch had such a low level of intelligence that from the 12 soldiers sent to the non-commissioned officers' course only two passed, while a minimum number of six was required, so six were always passing, regardless of whether they knew anything or not.
Schmidt was simply a rather unfriendly and selfish oldie, but Einvachter was constantly looking for opportunities to have some revenge for humilating his bros. Of course his primary targets were the leaders of the February bunch: Endez, Attila Pap, Viczko, sometimes Andersen, and mostly me. Somehow he figured that I'd started the fire, so he especially disliked me. In fact he couldn't do much with me, despite of being Racz's homeboy. He could never send me to clean up, since Korcsak, later Koronczai didn't let me go. He couldn't piss me off during guard duty - where he usually was a shift leader - because I never was on guard. He never dared to mess with me openly. But he never gave up, because as he managed to ruin Merenyi's nerves, who had been immediately demobilized for this reason, he had the idea of repeating this with others.
Private Peter Forizs became the "company's bird" these days. He was a bit out of the November bunch because of his role in the Bajai case, so if a February soldier talked back to him, or didn't do what he told, his mates were on his side just for the pretence. Sometimes it happened that he was the only November soldier in the room during a weekend, as others left for home, so we settled on him. In the beginning we annoyed him by saying to him the following, when we met him while he was leading the guard shift as the shift leader:
- The shift leader is a bird! The shift leader is a bird!
Usually he built a menacing face as a response, which made him incredibly ridiculous, and shouted back:
- Shut up before I kick you apart! Hold on ya' yaws before I break it!
Of course he never did so, but his threats were so serious that even his November mates laughed at him. Later we kept saying "Bird!" whenever we saw him, and finally someone mocked bird sound for him:
- Prrrr! Prrrr! Bird Forizs!
This "purring" got spread in the entire base, and after a while it was not only Forizs's greeting. But Forizs took it the hardest. He usually digged up his most dangerous threats when hearing the purring - they were dangerous as someone could easily laugh his asses off on them. All he managed to reach with these threatenings was that, for example, his bedclothes somehow fell out of the window in the middle of the night, his boots got filled up with shoe paste, and so on.
We had funny nights. Once we annoyed him so badly that he jumped out of his bed, and started yelling that he'd kick the ones who didn't keep silent, along with their beds. Of course we just laughed. Finally he found the ultimate menace:
- If you don't let me alone, I go to the service desk and write everyone's name in the service book!
The service book was the serviceman's document, a book, in which the ones recommended for detention were also written every day. Actually only the serviceman had the right of writing in it, and everybody knew this, but seemingly Forizs believed that we didn't know. After throwing this threat to our heads, and seeing that it was useless, he spectacularly marched out of the door. He returned some minutes later and said:
- Nah! Now everybody has his name in the service book. Behave yourself!
He added the latter sentence being sure in his absolute power, as he was the service commander in the absence of Einvachter. There was a few minutes of silence, until Gyorgy Lazar, the only November soldier in the room apart from Forizs, said:
- Erm, Forizs, there's a little problem...
- What?
- There's no service book in the toilet...
Laughter broke out like a volcano, as everybody had heard as Forizs had flushed the toilet outside, but we didn't want to ruin his day. Our favourite pet bird felt better keeping silent from then on.
On another day he deserved being a bird again as he tried to cover his footsmell. He had the rudest stinky legs in the entire company, but the smell was so sharp that when he entered the shower room in rubber sandals, the others immediately left. Once when he left for home on a Friday afternoon, his bare bed matress kept stinking even on Sunday evening. Now, our friend found a better method of getting rid of the smell than simply washing his leg. When everyone was pulling faces around him, he randomly selected someone and yelled at him:
- Haven't you washed your feet again?!
Once he said to me the following:
- Fuck, Polgar, wash your legs because everyone else is kinda higinie... erm... higeni... hiniege...
Forizs was not the single bird on the base. There was a captain named Ferenc Balogh, who was widely called Captain Hogwash, as he had serious demands for the kitchen's waste, just as the stoker already mentioned. In fact he needed that for his pig, not for himself, but anyway, he was a very weird person. I met him on a rather hot Summer day, while I was giving sleeping duty. This means I was sleeping instead of doing anything. Suddenly the door opened and a captain unknown to me entered the room. Of course I jumped up like lightning, as it is rather sharp to lie on the bed without uniform during working time, but that didn't bother Hogwash.
- Eh, just hold on - he smiled awkwardly - just say, are you really in the
computer trade?
- Yes - I replied, and prepared that probably very soon I would be digging the
dust inside some broken XT.
- Good... Erm... Do you know a computer on sale?
- On sale? - I replied like if I were thinking, however I didn't know
any. - Yes, I know some. What kind of?
- Well... I am not a professional... what kinds of are sold?
During the following half an hour we discussed the following configurations: hypermodern Pentium II, not so hypermodern Pentium II, plain Pentium, low-end Pentium, 486, 386, then I finally got bored of the captain, who seemingly didn't have a penny to buy anything, so I asked how much he could spend on it. Ten thousand HUF, he said, which is around 30 USD. I gently kicked him out and lied back.
Next time I've met Captain Hogwash in my office. There was a military magazine, the "Hungarian Home Guard", on my desk. This is the weekly mag of the army, including a lot of guffaw, self-regression and NATO halleluya. There was a Hawker Hunter fighter plane's photo on the back cover, with Swiss marking on the wings, and a large text saying: "Swiss fighter at the airport of Kecskemet". Captain Hogwash took a look at this picture:
- Erm... what kind of plane is this? - he asked, the professional soldier.
- Hawker Hunter light fighter-bomber - replied I, plain conscript.
- But from which country? I don't know these markings... - he said, while
being a military academy graduate.
- Swiss - said I tiredly, the plain, uneducated private.
- Ah, I see - he replied, and now he understood everything.
There will be more about Captain Hogwash later, but let's abandon him for a while.
Something great happened just five weeks before the November got demobilized. Actually it was mostly great for the February only. The new baldies, the May guys arrived! This meant that the February ones became rubbers. Five of them were assigned to our company, immediately quartered in room 8, in which we also "grew up".
It was rather weird to see these five depressed guys. I just realized how familiar we had become with poor living conditions, the desperate environment, the raggy clothes. They exactly looked like we had three months before, and probably the November had looked the same before us. They stood there in their tippy-toppy leave clothes, holding their stuff in civilian bags and plastic shopping bags, shockedly looking at the ruiny corridor, the spilling pipes, the broken lights. And of course, us. Especially me, with my bald head and green mon-x display glasses.
What was so weird about them? I honestly don't know. Perhaps that we found out that the so awaited baldies, the new cleaning robots, turned out to be human beings, just like us, who had been locked up here like us, and they just wanted it as much as we.
This was the first time when the November soldiers acted together against us. They tried to humilate us in front of the baldies. In fact "acting together" ended when they all agreed that they should do so, but they had no idea about what to do exactly, so finally they failed. We were not baldies any more, it was not that easy to piss us off. All they reached was that the baldies never cleaned up if it was possible to put the work on our shoulders. Big deal: we all knew how to cower it already. I sometimes just pulled the broom on the floor for some time, then quickly left for my office.
Soldiers from other companies were surprised that the oldies among us still didn't let the February rubbers "rubber" their trousers - this was to fit the leg of the trousers to the boots with a rubber ribbon, instead of tucking it into the boots as in the regulations - and didn't let them use black shoe paste to clean their boots. Black boots were a privilege of old soldiers. But when we started not to give a fuck about the oldies' yellings, and used black paste for all that, the surprised questions ended. Well, some of our oldies got a paining throat from the shouting, however.
I almost frightened some poor baldies to death during one of my guard duties. They were receiving guard training, and during such trainings they usually lead them around the base, showing each towers and posts to them. I was just sitting in tower 5., which was in the furthest corner of the base, when I saw them coming, some twenty of them. A February rubber was leading them. I was rather bored, so I've decided to take the regulation saying that I must not let anyone get close to my post seriously.
- Halt! - I shouted, friendly and according to the regulations.
- Hey, don't do that, it's just the... - shouted the leader, but I continued
according to the regulations.
- Halt or I open fire! - shouted I while charged my weapon. What they couldn't
see from where they were was that I'd removed the magazine before.
It was rather spectacular to see the poor baldies. Some of them just halted where they were. Some threw themselves away to the grass, because they knew that the next step would be the guard opening fire. Others put their hands on. Well, anything against boredom, anyway at least they learnt how to do it.
Several changes took place at the battalion again. Both company commanders left for some language course, so both companies received new commanders. The 32/B got 1st Lieutenant Janos Reti, a widely hated old officer, our boss became 2nd Lieutenant Attila Mihalyi. Racz was also about to leave, they rumoured some ensign replacing him soon, who was currently in Bosnia with the SFOR forces. Seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, Racz returned to his old entertainment, pissing the February off. He always ordered us to the worst duties, for example he sent me to guard duty while assigning Schmidt or Einvachter as guard commanders, who were rather busy giving me a bad time: they welded me to the phone for the entire night instead of letting me rest, but unfortunately for them I'd learned the regulations by heart, so things usually never went as they wished.
Corporal Einvachter became a self-appointed leader of the November. Thanks to his fat mouth, many believed that he could do something against the "February baldies", and, besides, everyone knew the fact that he was Racz's bro. The latter was a rather small advantage, since Captain Korcsak, now Major Korcsak, as he had been promoted, still visited me sometimes, and besides I was in good relations with both Andrej and Capt. Koronczai. The military court closed the Bajai case, Krokos, Berkes and the rest were acquitted, so they thought they could open their jaws again. War returned to our company.
This war usually meant that the November sometimes tried to forbid this and that, about which we usually never gave a fuck. For example, when a November soldier ordered someone to tuck his trousers into the boots, everyone removed his and left it loose. We used black pastes to clean our boots. Our mate, Attila Pap, was the most impudent of all of us. Sometimes it happened that Schmidt, Krokos, Einvachter and some more stood around him, yelling as a chorus:
- Put that black paste down! Scrape it off NOW!
While he just kept grinning, and sometimes asked:
- Are you pushing it for me? Really? Don't overdo.
We had some really mean and evil idea later. So the November worked together?
All right, so did we. We went out to town, and purchased some stuff. Itching powder. Stink bombs. Stinky cheese, the well-known "Palpusztai" brand, which was rather a chemical weapon, and so on. First we used the itching powder. The primary targets were Einvachter, Krokos and Forizs. One evening we poured an entire pouch of powder in Einvachter's bed, another portion made it to Krokos's shirt which he had left on the bed, while the third dose was poured in Forizs's neck while he was asleep. The effect was incredible!
Forizs tumbled himself into the powder while asleep, and soon he woke up. He took three showers during that night, but he kept scratching even the next day, like a flea dog. Krokos didn't take a shower, but when he realized that something was wrong in the morning, he turned insane. Its first sign was that when we were doing the morning cleanup, the room's door got kicked out to the corridor, and we heard Krokos yelling like a rabid:
- POOOOOOLGAAAAAAAAAR! PAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAP!! OOONNDRAAAAASIIIIII !!!!
The blood froze in everyone as they turned in the direction. The three of us calmly walked there. Einvachter closed the door behind us, and Krokos started to interrogate us:
- Nah! He what e' dat he? Who paure' Faorizs wih pau'daa?
(Nah, what's that, who poured Forizs with powder?)
- What? Forizs got poured?
- With powder?
- Wooow... Who was that?
It seemed our mortar operator would immediately explode, although he hadn't get as many of the powder as Forizs. I don't know how Einvachter had managed not to feel the stuff on his bedsheet, but he was not scratching. Anyway, he was rather itchy the next day! It happened that some moron gave a pouchful of powder to Robert Beres, our little favourite, who lied that he wanted to pour it into Schmidt's bed. In fact he immediately rushed to Racz with the pouch. The November first wanted to take it to Major Hermann as a proof, to denounce us for this (they somehow thought that using itching powder on someone would lead to a court case), but Einvachter had a better idea. He took it to Captain Koronczai. The problem was that I'd already told the story to the captain, who had really enjoyed it. Finally the corporal got angry and poured the powder into my bed, while I was away. His surprise happened in the evening, because Endez had spotted him while preparing my bed, and he had swapped my bedclothes with his. Bad...
Stink bombs also proved to be effective. We observed that Racz often left his office, when he went to the storeroom for something, while leaving the door open. It just took some seconds for me to fit a glass stink phial to the leg of the sergeant-major's chair.
Just some minutes later they sent me to the guard room to replace someone who had turned sick. We were sitting in there, chatting, telling jokes, when the phone rang, and the shift leader said that Endez has a call. It was Krokos, with the following:
- Ondrasi, ha! Wha' ya put in Racz's aoffice?
Endez didn't know anything, which he told. The response was:
- Ondrasi! Ya gonna suck in!
Later, as news slowly arrived from the quarters, it all seemed shaping. My bomb had a great effect. Krokos sat on the "boobytrapped" chair, which of course immediately started smelling. Some minutes later Racz moved out of the office with all his work, and the November soldiers were looking for the source of the horrible stink. They dismantled and cleaned the fridge. They threw all the food out. They washed up. Then they washed up again. They searched the entire floor for the source, Krokos also climbed up to the roof, where he unfortunately found our cheese, getting ready to be used as the next weapon. Finally they agreed that freon was spilling from the fridge, and this caused the smell. Congratulations!
Time passed slowly. Einvachter sometimes phoned the guard room and threatened me with breaking my face when I was alone in the guard tower, I said to him he was welcome. He didn't come. Bajai at least had his balls for this. We finished our duty in the morning and left to have a rest, but Einvachter was already waiting for us.
- Sergeant-major! Sergeant-major! - he shouted out immediately as he saw me in the room. - Polgar is here, sergeant-major! - And to me: - Don't you go anywhere, you fuckin' little prick!
I wanted to ask who he was pushing it for, but he rushed out for the sergeant-major. He returned shortly, while I was unpacking my backsack.
- Polgar - he huffled on me - unpack your locker!
- What for? - I asked.
- Not the banging back, fuckin' little prick! - This was his cool talk, it
was the coolest which he could have. - You received an order from your room
commander, didn't you? Unpack the locker!
- I don't give a shit about the order - I gave a simple reply, hoping that he would
understand. He did. As a good commander, he wanted to give me bodily
punishment: he pushed me. I was just about to punch his face apart, when
Racz entered.
- What's going on here? Einvachter, Racz, what are you doing?
- He doesn't want to unpack his locker, sir!
- Open the locker, Polgar - said Racz rigorously.
- I can't, sir - I pointed to my locker door - someone kicked my locker's
door, so now it's stuck.
Einvachter was about to say something, but Racz was quicker.
- Einvachter! Bring a screwdriver and open it!
- B... but... but sir...
- Haven't you hear my order, corporal?!
- But sir... - he quickly thinked the regulations over - I am a corporal, I
must not do physical work in the presence of a private!
- All right. Polgar, leave the room!
I left, laughing inside. Einvachter suffered some ten minutes with my locker, but at least he surely lost the habit of kicking it. There was a nice audience already in the room, Lieutenant Kocsis and also half of the company.
- Polgar! Come in! - I did so.
- What are we looking for, sergeant-major, sir? - asked I while opening the
locker. - Weapons? Ammunition? Drugs? - I pulled out a rather used pair of
socks. - Will this fit? - Racz built a grin.
- Get out, everyone - he said to the others. - Everybody! - Everybody left,
except for Einvachter. - You too, Einvachter!
- But... but I am the room commander...
- I said get out! Are you deaf, soldier?! - the sergeant-major shouted, and
Einvachter left like a rocket, rather thinking about what had happened to his
beloved sergeant-major outside. Only Lieutenant Kocsis stood inside, but
he was already red of silent laughter.
- Nah, Polgar - the sergeant-major asked - what do you know about the cheese?
He of course meant the cheese found on the roof.
- Cheese - I answered with an innocent face - that's a dairy product, very
healthy...
- Say Polgar, are you taking me stupid? - asked Racz, but he seemed to hardly
suppress laughter. Kocsis felt better leaving.
- Meeee?
The case led nowhere of course. Einvachter had a smaller mouth from then on, and he was always looking for some pieces of his equipment which had got lost somehow. Caps, jackets, half of his boots and so. He never found any. How could it happen, I didn't know.
Next day we received a nice little fella. A live hamster. Major Hermann called for me because he had some problem with his computer. While I was digging in the old XT, the major's secretary came in, with some little furry ball in a glass jar.
- He bited the dog too - he said to the major sadly.
- What dog? - asked I.
Then they told me the story of the furry ball, which was a cute little hamster, but so fat that he was equal with a rat in size, and didn't even resemble the cute little hamsters you usually see in pet shops. So, this hamster had been living there for a while, as the official pet of the crime investigation section. Someone then had the idea of bringing a female hamster for him. But the hamster didn't like his new bride, and bited her leg off, and let her bleed to death. This was a clear case of assaulting the roommate, so Major Hermann tried to remove him from the terrarium to be taken to court. But the hamster didn't respected rank, and he bited the officer's hand badly, who dropped him. The hamster rushed under a locker and never wanted to come out again.
Now some moron had the idea of spraying fluorescent paint under the locker, so they would at least see the hamster in the darkness. It was done, but that bastard licked the paint from his fur off, and kept staying there. Of course everything else got covered with paint, and some mysterious light flowed from under the cabinet now.
When they finally caught the hamster, they put him back into the terrarium, and fed rat poison to him, to kill him finally. He didn't die, but he ate all the poison with good appetite. Finally the secretary women had the idea of throwing the little monster among the guard dogs, which would surely rip him apart. As a result they had to bring poor Lord to the doctor, as the mean tiny devil had ripped his nose.
Then came I and took him away. This is how the hamster got to the third battalion, as a final punishment. He also received a name: B.A.D., and an assignment: "b. hamst.", as battalion hamster. He immediately bited Schmidt's finger, who wanted to caress him at all costs. Har-har.
Around this time it happened that Major Korcsak phoned us from the Alba, and asked me to go there with Szuhai, because he needed some help. We did so. His new place was a nicely furnished office, with new computers and photocopiers. He was working with some other majors, it was some NATO committee. He gave us a pile of papers, and led us to a separate room. Our task was to copy these papers on the photocopier. I didn't understand why he needed two men from the other base for this.
- It is because that moron in the other room - the major explained, meaning the other major next door - can't get how the copier works.
I was not surprised at all, I'd already got used to the cultural level of some officers. In fact the guy suspected that he was in shame now, when two conscripts were called from the neighbouring base to do his job, while he was an officer with a diploma. When Korcsak left for a while, he decided it'd be time to restore his responsibility. He came to us, kept standing in the door for a while, then fussly he said:
- Erm, soldiers, khm, be careful, because that lamp inside that machine is rather strong, and, ehm, so don't stare in it, that's dangerous...
Well, this was sharp. Fortunately the major found it enough and left.
The November didn't have ten or fifteen days left, and every soldier gets freaky in the last days. They ignore unnecessary regulations, rules, they don't work. They also don't wear their clothes as in the regulations. There are several poetric descriptions about this state, for example:
"He is so old that not a doctor comes to him but an archeologist."
"He is so old that he must not lie on his back, because his eyeballs would
fall inside."
"He is so old that he goes for a test lie to a cemetary."
"He is so old that even shit comes out of him with crutches."
Our oldies had two ways for spending their last days. The smaller pack decided to be normal during them, some of them even apologized for former behavior, like Dosztaly, Berkes and some others. But the majority became even more agressive, thinking that they couldn't do anything with them any more. The leaders of this pack were Einvachter, Schmidt and Krokos, but they had several followers.
The itchy powder action welded the February community even tighter together. Most of those who had been separated from us, like the Borsodians, finally stood on our side, seeing our bravery. There were some nice, huge guys among them, who even Krokos didn't dare to catch up with. For this reason our mortar man started resembling a toothless bear. He threatened us, flashed his eyes like in the old times, but he didn't even dare to step close to us anymore. We simply laughed at his face. However, when all the defendants in the Bajai case got acquitted, including him, he got somewhat stronger. He started claiming that he'd return some days after demobilization and knife everybody he had trouble with, including Endez, Pap and me.
(By Hungarian laws, the demobilized soldier can still be arrested and taken to military court 48 hours after leaving the army, mostly to prevent too happy ex-soldiers throwing trouble. This is why Krokos said "some days later".)
Meanwhile February and May started to build friendship. As I've already written, we had five baldies. One of them, a bearded dude called Zsolt Vincze, gathered a bunch of role-players, including me. We played Shadowrun, sometimes also Codex, a Hungarian developed fantasy game. The members of the group were constantly changing, while finally we formed a somewhat permanent player club: Endez, Vincze - who received the name D'Artagnan later, because of his characteristic beard, and was also called Furry - and me. Another May soldier often played with us, called Gabor Tauser, shortly Tau or Uncle Tau, after the old Czechoslovakian toy story about the mage with the same name. The third bald was called Istvan Puskas, a silent, huge guy, who soon became my subsidiary. The other two men were not with us, one of them was transferred to the vehicle repair company, the another left for a longer medical leave.
I participated a non-commissioned officer course. This is nothing but a quick course in which they explain the basics of tactics to make someone a lance corporal. It doesn't matter if he can't learn a word of it, he will receive his star even if the sky falls down, since he's appointed as a non-commissioned officer. I was one of our appointed ones, along with Endez, Padre, Torzsok, Pinky, Speedee, just to name some. I would just like to add that someone really had a good sense for misselection, since the most unsuitable ones became lance corporals. I've already said that Torzsok was an insidious, less than zero man, Pinky was a silent sitting duck, who couldn't order "shoo!" for a fly, not "attention!" to a squadron. Speedee had a severe lack of self-confidence, his complex was that he felt worthless, and I don't even dare to tell that Roland Kiss and Merenyi would have also almost become lance corporals, if they had not demobilized them meanwhile. Such natural born leaders like Pap or Andersen could only see stars on our collars. Not like that a star would have meant anything, it was in fact no power at all, it only meant five hundred forints more payment, and one hour extra leave.
The course was rather interesting, just as we had expected. They explained very simple things, in a silly manner even imbecile people should understand. There were some who didn't understand, however. There was a day when they explained one single rule from the regulations for three hours, still with no result for some people.
When the course started, I was also sitting in a classroom with my mates, and listened to Sgt. Margitai's exciting presentation about the regulations, then Captain Toth, a balding man in his fifties, followed with some stuff about commanding the guards. The entire guard commander stuff fits one printed sheet of paper, but he explained it for two weeks, which was not simply boring, but also exhausting. Besides, the asshole kept telling his jokes, intended to be funny, like:
- Do you know the one when the boy asks the girl if he can escort her home, and the girl answers that yes, even from behind, har har, I bet you didn't know this...
Or:
- So, the base should be guarded. Do you know why we have to guard the vehicle depots? It should be because it's not a good business for the army if Aunty Gizi would go there with the tractor and take some petrol, har har, that's not a business, hahaha...
Needless to say, I soon had important scribble work, so from now on I was only in the classroom for once, when Lt.Col. Andrekovics really wanted to give me some work, so this time I referred to the course to get rid of it. The others were sleeping in the classroom's desks, and the trainer - yes, it was Sgt. Voros - went to the pub. I didn't return any more, till the final exams. That was another funny experience! For example, there was a counter chemical warfare exam, where one had to tell about what one had learnt about mass destruction weapons (MDWs). To let it go fast, everyone received one single question. The first which the officer asked was:
- Tell me about the ingredients of sarin gas, and the effects of this gas. After receiving rather silent answers to this and some similar questions, he figured that we were not chemists, so he switched to easier ones. For example: What are the effects of a nuclear blast? What parts does a gasmask have? But soldiers couldn't even answer these. Finally he went down to the level of sissy kids, he asked questions like why one must not breathe poisonous gas, but some even couldn't answer these! One nice answer:
- Tell me a mass destruction weapon. Any of them!
- Erm... Machinegun!
Purple spots appeared on the lieutenant's tired face, but the guy got dragged away because he would have shot him. Later he almost got shocked to death during the gas alert practice. During such alert the soldier has to put his gasmask on within three seconds. But it took me more than half a minute until I finally managed to stuff my size 4 head into the size 1 mask. We discussed it with the lieutenant like this:
- Soldier, you're over time! You're dead by now!
- Mmmphfffggghhh... mmmpf!
- What are you saying?
- Mmmmpfff... CRACK! - this was the mask. - Sir, I report that this mask was
too small, and now it's also unusable.
- Moron!!
Finally all of us passed the course. Racz and the November would soon disappear, the base would be ours! (Yes, all your base... I know.) Racz presented us with some gifts for his last week, I received two days in the kitchen during the weekend, but I didn't spare this little fun from him. We'd passed the exams, including the guard commanding revision, but Captain Koronczai told them to give me only a shift leader's level, to prevent me from always going to duty, while leaving him without a scribble. Whatever, I thought, it's still fine, even the shift leader never rots in a goddamn tower, which I hated the most, even more than the kitchen.
There was a minor incident among the February soldiers. We ordered a pizza with Pap, and went to the gate of the base to receive it. The pizza was not coming yet, so we sat there, talking with the gate guards. Suddenly Torzsok appeared, bound to the city for a short leave. But how? Imagine this outfit: a thick soled "moon landing" shoe, a thin and tight pair of velvet slacks, a little white shirt, a tiny backpack, with the belts accurately folded on the chest by hand, and all over it a fop's face. He seemed like someone willing to be liked by Sgt. Latyak. We even said:
- My god, what do you look like?
- What? - he turned back.
- You look like a faggot!
- What? What? Hm... All right... all right... - he nodded with insulted face,
and left.
This happened at around four o'clock, and the short leave ended at ten in the evening. Preparing for the bed somewhat later than ten, I was just putting the toothbrush back into the glass, when Torzsok flitted into the M3 and attacked me:
- Who is the faggot? Say, who?!
- What? - I asked, because I'd already forgot the case.
- Say, who is the faggot?! - he screamed and pushed me. Thanks to the skippery
military rubber sandals I wore, I fell quite a long way. - Who is a faggot?! - he
yelled again, and pushed me on the floor again.
Now I got enough, I jumped on foot and smashed him right in the face. The internal serviceman, Szuhai, rushed in and dragged him away, because I could break some bones in him.
How did you think the case ended? He claimed that he had badly bet me for days. As a matter of fact he could hardly eat for some days without a straw. And sometimes he said that moral victory belonged to him, because he could dress up, not like me! This stupid...
The last three days of the November passed in mutual hatred. Krokos kept threatening to kill everybody. Einvachter suddenly became rather patent, they checked everything hourly, especially if someone had his boots rubbered or pasted to black. However, they never got far, no one was interested. Krokos posed the only real problem. He was insane, we all knew this, and he was thinking seriously about killing some of us, so we took some steps. First we copied all his personal data from the roster, copied his photo, and took them to the police station on the next short leave. Then we told Major Hermann that Krokos couldn't keep silent again, so he also called the police to keep an eye on this man in the forthcoming days, especially after the 6th of August, the day of demobilization. Tau also heard what Krokos said, so he offered the name and the number of one of his local friends, who was a local street fighter for hire.
Krokos received the rumours about us visiting the police and the major, but when he saw Tau giving me that phone number with his very eyes - anyway it was in fact another number who he asked me to call - he started thinking if it's really worth to mess with us again. Finally even Andrej learned about his plans, so he immediately ordered the mortarist to his office. I could hear every word, as the door was open. Shortly, he explained Krokos not to feel strong. Krokos indignatedly cried out:
- But laeutenant colonael, sir! Tha' can do anything, ha! Tha' paur sum pawdaer on us? And we can not do any becaaause Major Hermann caomes? Tha' ain't no justice!
This is all about the guy's level again. He thought if we were free to use itching powder, it'd also be all right for him to knife us, these were the same category. Andrej quickly made him understand the difference. Those few minutes broke the Borsodian's nerves: during the night he had talked while asleep, mostly about himself being ratted on, also saying Major Hermann's name several times.
We had a final surprise for the November. We spreaded some fake rumour that we would climb the building of the 1st battalion during the day of demobilization, and throw balloons filled with water on them as they were leaving in civilian clothes. The underground news service worked great, the news even reached other units, of course with the usual coloring, so some heard we'd throw stones, others knew about dog mud. Finally most of the November guys stared at the rooftop very suspiciously that day, and kept distance, regardless of the fact that no one was there. Anyway the November behaved like a cattle herd, they didn't say goodbye like the August guys, but they shouted swears and broke everything in the way, street lamps, some windows and so. But finally they'd left, and February became old!
These are the people from Room 3, piled up. From the bottom to the top: Endez (the one with the gray head, it's gray because he has 700 kilograms of soldiers lying on him), I am lying on him (I am less gray, I've got only 630 kilograms), and to the top, you can see them grinning wider and wider as you go upwards, because of the decrease of the weight on them: Tau, Pap, the one without a cap and grinning, Padre, in that loose lance corporal cap, and the others are mostly unrecognizable.
This is the grating at the end of the corridor. Neat. And the May baldies.
tomcat^grm
