"So what happened?"
"The other fighter really was a bad dude. Meanest I had ever dealt with. I couldn't take him. He just wouldn't quit. Then, something happened… Something snapped, broke loose. No pain, just focus. Like when Huffman tried to eat me. Next thing I knew, I had blood up to my armpits and I was kneeling on this guy while I hit him until my knuckles broke."
Trip looked shocked. "You killed him?"
"Almost, and I would have, but the promoters pulled me off. They managed to stitch his skull back together, but he lost an eye, and I've heard he's still all messed up… I would've killed him. And right then, I wanted to kill him, and for what? How stupid is that?"
"Pretty stupid."
We sat in silence for a while, Trip not really knowing what to say. I knew from our talks that he was a devoutly religious man and was probably trying to think of how to politely tell me that I was surely going to hell. Finally I spoke. "You know why I became an accountant?"
"Pays better than teaching."
"I picked the most straight-laced, stereotypically boring thing that I could think of. My entire life I'd been taught to be a killer, but after that night, I just wanted to get as far away from it as I could."
"But you still carried a gun every day?"
"I didn't go looking for trouble, didn't mean I wasn't ready for trouble to look for me," I answered.
"Beats hitting zombies with a pickax…" he muttered.
"And now here I am. In this place, where all the things I've spent the last few years trying to distance myself from are not only encouraged, they're mandatory. And it seems like I might actually be pretty good at this. But I'm worried…"
"That you'll hurt somebody who don't need hurting?"
"Yeah, something like that." I clenched my scarred-up fists. My hand throbbed from where I had slugged Green. It had only been a brief instant, a flash of anger, but that was all it took.
Trip thought about it for a few long seconds, absently chewing on his lower lip, then stood. "The way I see it, we're here to do good. I don't know about you, but I came here to stop monsters from hurting folks. The Lord's given you a gift, a weird one, but still a gift, and the fact that you're worried about misusing it means that you're not a bad guy. So put that suitcase away, man up, and let's get to class before Harbinger realizes we're late. He kind of scares me." He thumped me on the shoulder, and walked out the door.
I waited a moment, listening to the angry buzz of the insects crashing against the window screen. Then I pushed the suitcase back under my bunk and went back to work.
I thought I understood discomfort and heat. I had lived in Texas for a few years, and I had grown up in the San Joaquin Valley of California. One was miserably hot and windy, and other was muggy from all of the open-air irrigation. But summer in the Heart of Dixie was a whole new type of evil. So hot that you couldn't think, and so wet you could almost drink the air. Summer had come to Alabama.
So of course this was the day when we were issued our body armor. It was heavy, and though well designed to be comfortable and breathable, during summers in Alabama a pair of shorts and a tank top were considered warm clothing. I was sweating profusely, not that that said much, considering that men of my bulk usually started sweating at room temperature, but this was particularly bad. Thankfully the armor came equipped with a CamelBak water bladder and drinking tube. As their ad so eloquently stated: Hydrate or Die.
Milo Anderson paced back and forth in front of the assembled Newbies. Today he was wearing a Violent Femmes T-shirt and his red beard had been braided into two separate forks, both seemingly long enough to rappel from. Occasionally he would stop before a Newbie, examine them critically, and then pause long enough to adjust some strap or buckle. He was the creator of the suit, as well as many of the other devices the Hunting teams used.
Grant Jefferson watched us smugly in our discomfort. He was wearing his armor, which had been tailored to suit him better. Holly had said that he was dashingly handsome, and even she, being so very jaded and cynical about men because of her background, found him very charismatic and charming. She told me that it was easy to see why Grant and Julie had hooked up. He was young, smart, good-looking, knew how to talk to people, and everybody loved him. I still wanted to kick his ass.
On Grant's shoulder was a patch with the green smiley face with horns that was the unofficial company logo, which only Harbinger's personal team wore. We had been told that the other teams made up their own logos. The only other team logo that I had seen here at the compound had been a fire-breathing warthog that Dorcas had engraved onto her plastic leg. Grant wore the smiley face with pride-apparently it was a real honor to end up on Harbinger's team. I had learned that he had only been a Hunter since the business had reopened, but he had shown so much potential in training that he had been picked to fill a void on what was considered the best team.
"You will learn to live in these suits for days at a time. This suit will save your life. This suit will become like a second skin to you." Grant was lecturing us, gesturing at his own gear. Milo stopped in front of me with a scowl and adjusted the webbing around my torso. Apparently Milo had never had to make a suit for somebody as big as I am, and it had been a bit of a challenge to come up with Kevlar sheets for a sixty-two-inch chest.
"Psst… Milo," I whispered. "Since these are supposed to be like second skins, where's yours?"
"Screw that. It's hot," he answered.
And he invented the darn thing. Testify brother, I thought.
"One time this suit saved my life. You can see right here where I was clawed by a golem. See, right there on the abdomen. Surely this would have been a mortal blow, but I was able to shrug it off and stay in the fight. I dispatched the monster and was able to rush to the aid of my team and save them from certain death," Grant told us, lifting up the front of his armor so we could all see his sculpted abs. The man must do crunches in his sleep to look like that. Grant had been talking forever, and unlike the other instructors, did not have a drop of humility in his soul. I was about ten minutes from a heat stroke, and we were stuck suffering in the sun while our teacher blathered.
Milo rolled his eyes and went back to adjusting straps. "Some golem. It was three feet tall," he muttered under his breath so it was barely audible to just me, "ass."
The armor was a modular system that could be configured by the user depending on what kind of threat we were going to face. A thick layer of stab-proof Kevlar covered the vital organs. Though not much heavier than regular thick clothing, the sleeves and pant legs had the same fibers sewn into the fabric. There was a neck guard that could be raised to resemble a turtle neck to protect against bites. Most of the threats we would face would involve teeth or claws, so unlike regular body armor, ours was designed for that rather than for bullet resistance. Milo informed us that the torso was rated the same as a traditional level IIIA bulletproof vest, able to stop most pistol rounds. There were pouches on the front and back designed to hold ceramic plates that could stop rifle rounds if the threat warranted it, and if the user didn't mind the extra weight. The system incorporated load-bearing gear and pouches for magazines, weapons, tools, medical kits, or whatever other useful things the Hunter might need.
There were two different types of gloves that came with the suit. One was a basic shooting glove that offered a small amount of protection, but still allowed good dexterity. And the other was a heavy armored gauntlet for when you needed maximum protection and just had to wade in and crush some heads. The heavy units could be attached to the end of the sleeves. There were also two types of helmets. The first was simply a modified hockey helmet, good basically to keep you from banging yourself in the skull when blundering around in the dark. The second, an armored monstrosity that looked kind of like a motorcycle helmet with a full visor and face shield, could be attached to the neck guard. With the heavy gloves and big helmet, a suited Monster Hunter could become a chew toy for a pile of zombies and come out gnawed on, but unbitten. Unfortunately for me, Milo did not have a helmet that would fit my enormous head so he had special-ordered one. Hopefully nothing would try to eat me before then.