Work Text:
“Simmons! Get your faxinating fanny over here this instant!”
Simmons’ voice cracked over the crackling of the radio. “Um, can it wait, Sarge? I’m in the middle of organizing the armory.”
Sarge huffed. “You already did that this morning!”
Simmons sighed, his breath loud static over the speakers. “I know, Sarge, but the last scouting party returned an hour ago with weapons I’ve never even seen before, so I’ve been busy devising an entirely new system of classification specifically for them, which means I need to completely reorganize the entire inventory to accommodate the new categories—”
“Just get over here so I can print out my reports.”
“Um, Sarge? There’s at least twenty-three other available printers on the base. Why aren’t you using one of those?”
Sarge snorted, the sound conveying roughly 90% of his derision at the ridiculousness of that proposal. “Yours is the only printer on the premises that puts the right amount of mono in the space!”
“But you can adjust the settings on—”
“And have to readjust things every time I go to use the communal printer because nobody else appreciates a properly-uniformed block of text?!”
There was a brief moment of silence before Simmons sighed. “I’ll be right there, Sir.”
“Take your time, son. I’ve only got a deadline looming ten minutes above me.”
Simmons arrived at Sarge’s office not three minutes later, bent over double and gasping for air.
“Hrm...” Sarge hummed. “That’s an increase of .02 microseconds, Simmons. You’re slipping.”
“Donut... wanted to stop... and talk... about Officer... Hotpants... appearing at... Carolina’s... birthday party,” Simmons wheezed, bracing himself against the wall of Sarge’s office.
“I see. I’ll have to not warn the Blues about that.” Sarge chuckled and turned towards the brown robot standing in one corner. “Now, Lopez, it’s time for you to get to work working your robotic magic and digitalificate these documents. And don’t forget the autocorrect this time.”
Lopez sighed as he scanned the pages Sarge held up for him, one by one. “Esto es estúpido. No tendríamos que hacer nada de esta conversión complicado si usted acaba de escribir sus informes en un cuaderno de datos como una persona sana. Pero no. Nunca has estado cuerdo. Estoy seguro ahora que usted nació senil. Sólo puedo gracias a Dios que no está en cursiva. Su escritura se eleva pollo cero a la caligrafía y la ortografía es tan loco como eres.”
“That’s the spirit, Lopez! Always eager to do your job! You could learn a thing or several from him, Simmons!”
“But I—!”
The fax machine screamed, and Simmons groaned as Sarge positioned a paper tray to catch the stream of sheets about to fall from his posterior.
The print job was swift and smooth, and as Simmons slunk back to the armory to re-reorganize everything (again), Sarge put the final touches upon his report and prepared to deliver it directly to the General himself.
“Lopez!” he said, slipping the papers into their specified folder. “Guard my office. Make sure no one who’s not supposed to be here gets in or out.”
“Mucha gente tiene la autorización para su oficina. Tendras que ser mas especifico.”
“I knew I could count on you, Lopez. Hasta la vista, El Roboto! I’ve got a delivery to make.”
Lopez sighed and settled into his corner as Sarge dashed out the door, determined to track down the General (or his office) before the deadline was up.
It would be close, but Sarge was sure he would make it.
General Doyle poked his head into Sarge’s office, hoping to find the Red Leader sitting at his desk and putting the finishing touches on his latest report.
Alas, the office was deserted but for the stolid brown figure of Lopez in one corner. The robot simply stared at the General with his impassive, visored gaze, his head turning to follow the leader of the Federal Army as the man made his way to Sarge’s desk.
The desk was clear, save for a stapler haphazardly placed on its side and a red file folder carefully aligned in front of Sarge’s chair.
General Doyle took the folder, assuming it to be the due report. He gave Lopez a polite nod, trying not to let show how disconcerting he found the robot’s unwavering gaze to be, and exited the office with a bit more haste than was perhaps appropriate for a man of his rank.
Regardless, he had the report, and with the day growing into the night and Sarge’s propensity for verbosity, the General decided to peruse the document in the relative comfort of his own quarters.
And that was how Doyle found himself relaxing in his salvaged armchair, reading on, transfixed, as two well-respected commanders in his army engaged in a very passionate, and very explicit, sword fight.
At the end of Chapter One, Doyle paused in his reading to fan himself with the document folder, his cooling fans having apparently ceased their workings. It occurred to him then that the Colonel had deliberately left the file atop his desk for the General to find; it was a well-known fact that Sarge was quite fond of elaborate pranks, and the level of work involved in a prank of this magnitude was quite impressively Sarge.
Doyle found himself wondering just how far Sarge had taken the joke, knowing that the man rarely did things by half, so he settled back into his chair and resumed his reading with Chapter Two, pen at the ready to point out areas that could be improved (as the best pranks were the pranks best done).
It was somewhere in the area of Chapter Seven that Doyle realized that the document was not part of a prank, and that realization struck him with a devastatingly sweet and terrible force. The two commanders had just completed a most physically-taxing marathon of carnal deeds and had wakened together the following morning, spending the pre-dawn hours lingering with tentative touches and whispered words, and it was that tenderness that brought Doyle the understanding that he was intruding upon a very intimate exchange between Colonel Sarge and Agent Washington, that the document itself was one such exchange. But Doyle could not bear to halt his reading for he craved to find such sweetness in his own future partner, and reading of the love between these two men whom the General greatly admired allowed him to experience such sweetness, even if it was but temporary and vicarious.
And so Doyle read on until the end, and the ending was bittersweet, tainted with the taste of guilt, even as he was left longing for more.
The guilt won out in the end, and with a regretful sigh, General Doyle prepared himself for the righteous anger Sarge would no doubt foster upon learning of his General’s transgression.
Sarge had just torn up his office for the umpteenth time that night when the doors whisked open and General Doyle stepped in.
“I am terribly sorry to intrude, Sarge, but there is a matter of utmost importance I really must discuss with you. Immediately.”
“Can’t it wait, General?” Sarge asked, distracted with looking under his desk (again). “Some important files of mine have gone missing, and if they were to fall into the wrong hands… well. The end result would be terribly violent. For them.”
“Oh. Well. About that…” Sarge saw the General shift his stance nervously. “The files you’re speaking of wouldn’t happen to be narrative in nature, would they?”
Sarge froze and levered himself above the desk to face the General. “You wouldn’t happen to have read them, would you?”
The General was hiding something behind his back. “I don’t suppose you’d accept ‘no’ as a truthful answer?”
Sarge stood up, crossed his arms over his chest, and glared at the man. “Well?” he asked gruffly after a long silence choked the room. “What did you think?!”
General Doyle jumped. “Um. I’m sorry?”
Sarge rolled his eyes. “What did you think of the story?”
“It was, ah, surprisingly tender. And very passionate. Certain scenes in particular. I must admit, Colonel, I had never considered that you might be a romantic at heart, but after reading this work of yours, I find myself wondering how I had possibly misjudged you—not to be offensive!”
“Heh heh heh.” The Colonel chuckled to himself. “Of course you misjudged me! I’m a master of the classical art of misdirection! I’d be offended if you’d pegged me for an affectionate and loving sort of fella. Though if you tell anyone, I’ll have to kill you. I’ve got a reputation to maintain, here.”
General Doyle laughed nervously. “That won’t be necessary, I can assure you. Your secret is quite safe with me… though I do have to ask. Are you and Agent Washington currently—”
“No.”
The General reeled. “No?”
“No.”
“Then have you ever—”
“No.”
“No?” the General asked, incredulous.
“No.”
General Doyle stopped to think for a moment, the red file folder in his hand now in plain sight as he tapped the side of his visor with it. “You are attempting to—”
“Yes.”
“For how long, might I ask?”
“Years.” Sarge began grumbling to himself about thick-helmeted Blues being too dense for their own good.
“Oh dear.” The General stepped closer to Sarge’s desk and carefully placed the red folder down. He leaned in towards Sarge and said, voice lowered to avoid being overheard, “If it’s any consolation, know that you have my full support.”
“Full support, eh?” Sarge murmured back.
“Yes.”
“And what constitutes this ‘full support’ of yours?”
“Well, if you are ever in need of another pair of eyes to look over your manuscripts—”
“Hold it right there!” Sarge put a hand on the General’s visor and resumed his regular speaking volume. “Did you happen to leave some comments on this here manuscript?”
“...a few?” General Doyle squeaked, frozen in place.
“Now that’s what I’m talking about!” Sarge walked around the desk to sling an arm over the General’s shoulder. “What did you think of the word choice?”
“Truthfully?”
“Of course!”
General Doyle relaxed a bit. “It was a bit bland,” he began, voice growing more confident with every word not interrupted. “You could do with more variety in your sentence structures and imagery. At the moment, everything is quite literal, which doesn’t leave much to the imagination.”
Sarge hrmed to himself. “I’m not too concerned about my vocabulary, but when it comes to stringing it together in those highfalutin phrases…”
“They do say that learning is best done with examples. I could lend you some of my favorite romances to give you an idea of what can be done.”
Sarge turned to look at the General. “Favorite romances.”
General Doyle coughed but didn’t clam up. “Reading romances is a bit of a guilty pleasure of mine, you see, but if I happen to be helping a friend in need by reading said romance, well, it would hardly make sense to feel guilty about that, now would it.”
“Heh.” Sarge clapped the other man on the shoulder. “I like how you think, General. And while you’re at it, think you could find me a clue-by-four?”
General Doyle looked thoughtful. “I believe I may be able to manage something of that nature.”
“Much obliged if you do.”
Wash was not sure what to make of this latest manuscript. When he had read Sarge’s notes about trying some new techniques, Wash had been expecting some sort of variation with story structure or new scenarios. The usual.
He had not been expecting purple prose.
With a deep breath and growing sense of incredulity, Wash took pen to paper and began to edit the ultraviolet behemoth.
His first comment:
“It was better when the throbbing member was just a dick.”
Translations
- This is stupid. We wouldn’t have to do any of this convoluted conversion if you would just write your reports on a datapad like a sane person. But no. You have never been sane. I am certain now that you were born senile. I can only thank God that it isn’t in cursive. Your handwriting elevates chicken scratch to calligraphy, and your spelling is as insane as you are.
- Many people have the clearance for your office. You’ll have to be more specific.