Larry Correia - Monster Hunter International

"About time, Pitt," Grant Jefferson shouted. He glanced at his stopwatch in disgust. "Pathetic. Just pathetic." He had led the run and had made most of the rest of us look bad. Of course, some of us came out looking worse than others. One of the other Newbies stumbled off to the side to puke. Grant just smirked. "All right. We're done for now. Stretch out tonight, because we're doing this twice tomorrow." Everyone groaned.

I sat on one of the empty benches and put my head in my hands. I knew that I was supposed to walk around and gradually let my heart rate subside to avoid muscle soreness, but man, I just needed a break. I excelled at everything physical except for this. Gradually my panting turned to normal breathing, and my heart was no longer pounding away. The other Newbies began to wander off toward the barracks for some much-needed sleep. I stayed on the bench to enjoy the cool twilight.

"Hi." A lovely voice spoke from behind me. "Mind if I have a seat?" It was Julie.

"No. Yes. I mean, of course," I stammered, sliding over so she could fit. She dropped down next to me with a smile. She was wearing shorts and looked like she had been working out. I tried not to stare at her well-muscled legs. I was suddenly very self-conscious about my sweat-soaked T-shirt. I bet I stunk.

"So how's everything going?" she asked.

"Fine, I'm doing okay. Except for that." I jerked my thumb toward the cross-country track. "That sucks."

She laughed, hopefully with me, and not at me. "I know it. I hate it too. Not all of us are like Grant." She pointed across the field. A lone figure stood a hundred yards away, throwing punches at invisible foes under the lights of the obstacle course.

Grant Jefferson had stuck around after the Newbies had left. He had stripped off his shirt and was practicing what appeared to be some extremely difficult martial exercises. I hated to admit it, but the man was a near-perfect physical specimen. If monster hunting didn't work out for him, I was sure he could get a gig as an underwear model.

"So… how long have you guys been dating?" I asked, trying not to sound jealous. I don't know if I succeeded.

"A couple months," she answered as she looked at me suspiciously. "Why?"

"Oh… I don't know. He just seems a little…"

"Arrogant?"

I paused, not quite sure how to answer that. "Uh, yeah, I guess. He just doesn't strike me as your type is all."

"And you know my type how?" she asked, studying me carefully. I swallowed, wanting to shout "Me." Thankfully she continued before I had to answer. "Yes, I know Grant comes off a little arrogant, but he really is a great guy. He's smart and ambitious. He was in Harvard Law School when we recruited him."

Figures, I thought to myself. "The CPA exam is way harder than passing the Bar," I muttered.

"What?"

"Uh… nothing."

"We hit it off when he arrived here. Grant's traveled the world. He's sophisticated, cultured, educated. He's done a lot of really interesting things. So he's kind of… confident. That comes off as cocky sometimes."

Comes off as an ass. I bit my tongue. I knew the truth. I bet he drowned sacks of puppies for fun. In the distance Grant had dropped down and started doing pushups.

"Well, good for you guys… I've got to get some sleep." I stood up to leave.

"Goodnight, Owen."

"Yeah, 'night, Julie." I wandered off. It figured that I had finally met the perfect woman, only to find out she wasn't interested in me. I kicked over the garbage can outside the barracks. Screw it. I was tired.

"What're you doing?" Trip asked me as he entered our tiny barracks room. The windows were open and loud insects chirped and whistled in the darkness outside.

"I don't know," I answered honestly. I was sitting on my bunk, suitcase open on the floor in front of me. My right hand ached from the impact it had taken an hour earlier. "Thinking about packing, I guess."

"You didn't strike me as a quitter," he said simply. "That was an accident with Green. You didn't mean to hurt him. Milo says he'll be out of the hospital in a week. It's just his collar bone and a concussion."

"I only hit him once."

We had been practicing going hands-on. Never a good choice against a monster, but a necessary skill to have nonetheless. They had paired me up with Green, a muscle-bound former narc. It had gotten kind of competitive.

"Stuff happens," Trip shrugged. "Don't be a baby about it."

"Sam said I wasn't being aggressive enough."

"He probably shouldn't have said that to somebody who beat up a werewolf." Trip sat on his bed. "When Green wakes up, he'll be cool. It was an accident."

I shook my head. "No. It wasn't. I got angry. I didn't hold back. Look, man, this is why I should probably go. When I get mad, when I lose control, people get hurt."

"You make it sound like you're the Hulk," he laughed. "You're training to be a Monster Hunter. We're supposed to hurt things. Come on, dude, what's the deal?"

Trip had become a good friend over the last few weeks of training, and I could tell that he did honestly want to help. I stared down at the open suitcase. "You know I used to fight for money, right?" I continued, not looking up. "A few years ago, I had a big one. My last one. Lots of cash on the table. The other guy was supposed to be a real badass. Supposedly he had killed a couple of people in prison. There were no rules, and it wasn't supposed to stop until one of us couldn't fight anymore. Last man standing got paid."

"Why would you do that?" he asked, sincerely perplexed. Trip was a good man, and the idea of inflicting violence on another human being for no good reason was truly foreign to him.

I sighed. "You've got to understand. My whole life, my father tried to prepare me for something. All he did was push. He had some sort of fucked-up vision of the future, and he wanted me to be ready for it. I guess I just needed to prove that I was as tough as he thought I was."

"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 everyday?"

"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.