The five of us enter our next class for the day, weapons training. Third Deacon Ravon is waiting for us next to the screen, looking as tired as the first day we had met him. The table underneath the screen - which had been empty for the last three weeks of class - now has two small guns on it, along with two cylindrical objects. My eyes widen as two neurons connect. "Holy shit, are those grenades?" I think, feeling a dash of adrenaline hit my system. My eyes wander over to the gun range, which had been modified last week to no longer have lanes, but instead to have various types of cover at different heights; waist high, full length, and so on. We had been practicing how to move in and out of cover with our weapons, how to move past a squadmate who was sharing the cover, and how to avoid shooting ourselves in the process. "It's all just waist high cover now," I note.

  "Recruits," says Ravon, drawing my attention back towards him. "Sir," we say in response. "Today, you are picking your secondary, as well as your explosive ordinance," he says. I raise my hand, and he locks eyes with me. "Sorry sir, but we aren't being assigned one like with our primary?" I ask. He shakes his head. "The difference between these weapons are minor, and ITO's haven't noticed any decrease in effectiveness regardless of loadout composition," he explains. "Infact, there's actually a marked increase in effectiveness when recruits are allowed to pick their own weapon. Not only that, but I find it's a bit like Stardrop's holopad." I catch movement out of the corner of my eye, and I look over to see everyone in my squad nodding their head in understanding. "Did I miss something?" I think, before a message pops up in my headset. I open it, to find it's from Ko-lee.

  KL: *It's a children's story. Stardust has a holopad that places you on a ship, and everyone on a ship had the same personality.*

  I shoot her an endlessly grateful look, before focusing back on Ravon. "Your combination of ordinance says a lot about who you are, and how you deal with conflict. Now, I'm no Unum. I can't read your mind, and whatever I tell you isn't some hard and fast rule. This is purely based on my own observations from years of experience," explains Ravon. "Recruit Thomoni."

  "Yeah, can we pick two secondaries?" asks Rease. "Or maybe even two explosives?" There's excitement in his expression, his posture, almost hungry at the idea. Ravon shakes his head, chuckling. "No, not as a recruit or operative. After you become an agent? Well, you have a bit more freedom in what you choose to bring on a mission. But that's a few years down the line," he says. "So," he says, stepping to the side of the table, "I'm going to have to come up to the table one at a time to pick. We'll start with.... Recruit Ko-lee." I see the shift from casual observation to intense focus as Ko-lee makes her way to the table of weaponry. She looks down at it, her hand slowly moving to the closest weapon in reach. As she brings it up, she racks the slide, which drops the empty magazine into her hand, then places it back in, and aims down the sight. Eventually, she turns to face Ravon. "Sir. May I ask some questions about the weapons?"

  He nods, his expression serious. "The weapon you're holding is the Lato. It's a semi automatic handgun. Easy to handle, quick to reload, and a manageable recoil has made this a mainstay in our arsenal. 15 rounds to a magazine," explains Ravon. I watch as she examines it for a moment longer, before putting it back down. She reaches over for the next weapon, and Ravon begins to explain, unprompted. "Furis. Fully automatic, high rate of fire. 35 rounds to a magazine. It uses a smaller caliber than the Lato, which translates to slightly less damage per shot, but actually has less recoil, due to an internal damping mechanism," he says. "Like I mentioned before, after factoring in reload times and average accuracy of a recruit, the amount of damage each weapon can do tends to be about the same, so don't worry to much about the numbers. It's all about preference." She nods, and her attention turns to the grenades.

  "TLY-1 Fragmentation Grenade is it's full title," says Ravon, describing the knobby looking cylinder. "Has a cook time of 5 seconds, and the fragments can be effective out to 200 meters, although damage begins to fall off after 30. Touch capacitive sensors means that the grenade won't start cooking until it's left your hand, although the TYL-2 has a mechanism that allows you to circumvent that behavior. For obvious reasons, we don't hand those out to recruits," he says, with a dry expression. She shifts to look at the other grenade, and Ravon continues. "The AVT Disorientation Ordinance, also known as a stun grenade. It uses a combination of multiple stimuli to disorient and incapacitate attackers, including non human ones. Even works on Corpus bots. In the field, it tends to cause disorientation between five to seven seconds, although effects have been known to last up to a minute in severe cases. Has a maximum range of 75 meters, although it's most effective within 50. And, obviously, non-lethal."

  I watch as she weighs the pros and cons in her head, her eyes flicking between gun and explosive, gun and explosive. Eventually, and with surety, she reaches for the Lato, and the fragmentation grenade. "Please bring your weapons over to the berm, and hang out there while the rest of your squad make their choices," says Ravon, with uncharacteristic solemnity. "Recruit Caz-V, you're next." Caz-V saunters over to the table, and takes a quick glance at his options. I watch as his gaze drifts over to Ko-lee, and looks at the weapons in her hands, before he looks back down, and also picks the Lato and frag. The quickest expression of frustration crosses Ravon's face, but he says nothing, and Caz-V walks over to the berm, where I see Ko-lee give him a questioning look. He leans over to whisper something in her ear, and after a moment, she just rolls her eyes at him, a smile on her face.

  I do my best to tear my gaze off them to focus on Ravon, and the next squad member. "Recruit Thomoni," says Ravon. Rease grins, and moves towards the table, his hand already outstretched for the fragmentation grenade. His other hand hesitates only for a brief second, before choosing the Furis. He turns to give us a satisfied smile, and joins Caz-V and Ko-lee at the berm. "Recruit Nova," says Ravon, and I feel goosebumps run up and down my arms. I take a deep breath and walk over, feeling the weight of everyone's eyes on me. "Probably should've been thinking about what I wanted, but whatever, we're here now," I think to myself, looking down at my options. "Alrighty, so. Lato was meh in game, if I remember, although I D K if stats really translate in the same way. I mean, realistically I'd rather a Lex, but that's probably a later thing, if ever. Also, I might just be thinking of a mark 1 Lato, maybe possibly."

  My eyes drift to the automatic. "I definitely remember the Furis though. And the Afuris. I was literally always reloading that thing in game. Literal M R fodder. So... process of elimination, it's gotta be the Lato." I pick up the heavy, rounded gun, feeling the weight in my hand. There's a comfort to it, and I catch myself nodding, as though confirming my own decision. "And as far as grenades..." I reach for the stun with barely a second thought. "I've seen too many liveleaks of people absolutely whiffing a grenade toss. I don't want that shit anywhere near me." Feeling confident in my choices, I make my way over the berm, flashing everyone a quick grin, before turning to watch Ella make her choice. "Recruit Tygg," says Ravon, after a few moments of inaction by Ella. She sighs, and with reluctance, makes her way over to the table. She stands there, looking at it, not really moving her eyes or head for 5 seconds, then 10 seconds, then 20, then 40, then a minute. "Recruit Tygg?" asks Ravon, taking a step towards her.

  "I know!" she snaps, before immediately correcting herself. "Sorry, I know, sir. I'll make my choice. I'm... I was just..." She trails off, then slowly reaches her hand out for the stun grenade. It hovers there for a moment, almost but not quite grasping it. "They don't bite, recruit," says Ravon, and Ella gives a defeated chuckle. "I'm aware, sir," she says, before grabbing the stun grenade, and a moment later, the Furis. She joins the rest of us, looking utterly exhausted, and Caz-V gently shuffles closer to her, giving her a small smile. It seems to help, and Ravon gives us all a moment before he speaks. "So, you've all picked your weapons. I'll give you my rundown on what I think each choice means. Again, you can decide whether or not it applies to you." He gives us all a look. "I'm serious. This is meant to be fun, so please don't complain."

  "First, the Lato and the stun," he says. I can feel the cool metal of the weapons in my hand. "This is someone who is economical with their tools. They want to be precise, and leave their options open. Stun a room for a non lethal extraction, or maybe use it as an opener, while picking off those unable to react with the Lato." I feel his words swim around in my head, and I find I don't entirely disagree. "I mean, there can really only be so many choices, so... sure, I see it," I think to myself. "The Lato and the grenade," Ravon continues, "is for those who like to hit hard and fast. The grenade to open the doors, the Lato the broom to close up shop. Fast and efficient, they have a job to do, and they get it done." I look over to see two different responses. Ko-lee, like me, is clearly considering Ravon's words carefully, by the slight furrow of her brows. Caz-V on the other hand, looks somewhat apathetic. "Although to be fair, that's usually his default look anyways. Eh, I don't know. It didn't really look like he gave much of a shit when he picked his stuff, so maybe he just doesn't think it applies to him."

  "Next is the Furis, and the grenade," says Ravon. "This is shock and awe. You want to be in the middle of the conflict, or maybe you want to spread a little chaos. Regardless of the specifics, you want all eyes on you." I watch as a dopey grin begins to grow on Rease's face. "However," says Ravon, assassinating Rease's smile, "remember that we are Tenno. Our job is infiltration. Information extraction. Warframe support. We are very, very rarely going to be in the middle of a firefight. There's nothing wrong with the choice of weapon, but if you find that you have that sort of impulse, I want you to make sure you think twice about any decision you want to make when in the field." Rease looks at the weapons in his hand with a touch of what I think is frustration, before his expression softens, and he looks back at the teacher. Ravon makes eye contact with him for moment, before continuing. "Finally, the Furis and stun grenade."

  "I see this choice generally in those who, in some way, want to remove themselves from combat. Whether it's an aversion to killing, or being unable to stomach the reality, the idea is to make distance. The AVT is non-lethal, and you can spray and pray with the Furis." I see Ella shrink a little, but Ravon doesn't make eye contact, or any indication that he noticed. "Anyways! Now that you all have a weapon, we're going to do a little exercise... yes, Recruit Ko-lee," he says, with a slightly exasperated tone. "Why does the primary not count for personality?" she asks. "Because as a recruit you only have the Braton, which doesn't leave a lot of room for interpretation. Seriously, don't think to hard on it. Anyways, the exercise. Like previous training, the targets will pop up from behind their obstructions. However, this time when they retreat behind cover, I want you to take the opportunity to flush them out with a grenade. The goal is to get the grenade behind the obstruction, not to hit the target in the face with it. I want arcing throws here, not fastballs."

  "Now, the grenades are live, with some caveats. The stun grenade has been tuned down to be less debilitating. Note that I said less, not 'none at all'. For the fragmentation grenade, we've removed the fragments. It still has the equivalent of half a block of explosive in there, so in the case of both of these, please, toss, then cover. We aren't sight seeing here, and I promise the grenade will go off without you watching it. Are there any questions?" No one says anything. "Great, then let's get started. Recruits, into cover. Start on the bell." We all assume the various positions in cover that we'd learned from the prior week of training, and after a few tense moments of silence, a tinny bell rings out. We begin popping up from behind the berm on a rotation; two, then two, then one, always keeping a consistent stream of gunfire coming from our position.

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  The sound is echoing off the metal walls, making every shot as loud as three or four, and the cutouts of Grineer and Corpus soldiers are yelling at us in their various languages. The entire situation is a sensory nightmare, but one I've become accustomed to over the course of the last week, and I let it roll over me, focusing only on the weapon in my hand, it's sights, and my target. I watch the Grineer soldier I'm aiming at fold back behind cover, and on muscle memory, I start to shift my attention to a new target, when Ravon shouts at me. "Recruit Nova! Let's see your throwing arm!" he says, reminding me of the explosive attached to my waist. I reach down for the stun grenade, sliding the small covering that's hiding the button to trigger the arming process. I press it, and it vibrates in my hand, a small bit of feedback to let me know that it's armed. Still, I'm caught slightly off guard, and I nearly drop the thing, before a second impulse causes my hand to clamp down in a death grip.

  "Horseshoes and hand grenades," I think, trying to visualize the arc the stun grenade will need to take before I toss it. I'm aware of how awful my non-dominant hand is when it comes to throwing things, but I'm also aware of how large a 30 meter radius is, and so mainly I'm focused on getting it up and over their cover. I swing my hand around in an arc, releasing my grip at the apex, and watch as the grenade sails through the air, before hitting the top of the cover the cardboard enemy is "crouched" behind. It hits the lip, and bounces straight up, rather than continuing over it. "Shit," I think. "Grenade!" I shout, and we all duck down. Only a second or two later, I hear the blast of the stun grenade go off, and it sounds like the entirety of a car crash being compressed into one second. "Hold fire!" says Ravon, and the range falls into a blissful silence.

  I feel Ravon's eyes on me, and I look over to find his expression indecipherable. "Recruit Nova, do you have hearing issues?" he asks. I shake my head, assuming he's referring to the blast of the grenade. "No, sir," I tell him. "So, then did you forget what you were doing?" he continues. "I missed something," I realize, giving Ravon another shake of the head. "I don't believe so, sir. We are practicing with our secondaries and explosive ordinance," I tell him. "Then I'd like to know why you failed to alert your squad until a moment before the blast went off," he asks. My mouth opens, but I hesitate, unsure of how to respond without digging myself further into a hole. "...I'm sorry sir," I finally say. "I got caught up trying to see if the grenade went where I wanted it to." He gives me a look that makes me feel like an absolute moron. "Like I explicitly ordered you not to?" he asks. I just keep my mouth shut, and give him a singular nod, not willing to trust myself with the shovel anymore.

  "The grenade doesn't need an audience!" he says, turning to look at the rest of the squad. "I know it feels odd, but once it's left your hand, there's nothing you can do about it. Once it's no longer touching your hand, that's five seconds on the clock. I promise, that is not very much time when it comes to battle, so you can not waste it watching your handiwork. Call out the grenade, then toss, then get in cover yourself. Have I made myself clear?" There's an intensity in his voice, but he doesn't feel particularly angry. Just... forceful, as though he's trying to directly implant his words in our head. "Well I only need to fuck something up once. Call, toss, cover. Call, toss, cover," I tell myself, as we all return to our positions. "Alright recruits, once more with feeling!" The tinny bell rings out, and we return to firing.

  Around 10 to 20 seconds in, I hear Ko-lee's voice over the pops of gunfire. "Grenade!" she yells. I have a momentary impulse to get visual on it, but I crush it, and fall back down behind cover, counting off the seconds. "5... 4... 3... 2... 1... ..wha-?" My counting must've been a touch fast, because I was just about to ask Ko-lee what happened when the explosive goes off. The bang is short and sweet, followed by what sounds like somebody running into our berm with something heavy and soft. "Fight's not over recruits!" yells Ravon, over the mechanical voices of our targets. There's a momentary awkward shuffle as we try to reestablish our rotation, since we'd lost track once we'd all gone behind cover. It only takes a moment though, before the sound of gunfire fills the space one again.

  "Recruit Tygg, now's your chance!" says Ravon, and I see Ella jolt next to me, as though hit by electricity. I watch out of the corner of my eye as she jerkily reaches for the grenade at her side, pressing the button on her stun. "Grenade out," she says, her volume somewhere between regular speaking and a yell. I watch as her arm moves in an arc, and her hand holds the grenade... then continues to hold it, for just a touch too long. It hits the berm we're crouched behind, flying back up and towards us. Everything about the moment plays out at the same speed as always, and yet, it's like my brain is suddenly able to process more information. I see it's new arc; up into the air, around face height, then on to the floor next to me, Ella, and Caz-V. "Face down!" yells Ravon, and I see Caz-V rotating from his crouched position and into a dive.

  "Is this like a real stun grenade? Does it explode? Or are we just going to get hit by it point blank?" I wonder, watching it spin through the air. It's floating there, at the apex of it's momentum, as though suspended; just a hair higher than eye level for Ella, who's too busy flinching to obey Ravon's command. She's less diving for cover and more falling on her ass, and one of her hand's is stretched out behind her to catch her fall. "That's how I fractured my wrist," I think, although I'm unable to do anything about it. "I hope she's okay. I wonder if we're going to learn how to fall correctly in physical at some point." There's a hand reaching out for the grenade, coming in at an angle that doesn't immediately make sense to me. It takes me an embarrassingly long time to realize it's mine.

  My left hand grabs the grenade, and I feel the warmth of the device in my hand; I feel an odd texture to it that I hadn't noticed when throwing mine. I don't wind up for a huge toss, because I know I don't have the time. Even though I've made no conscious decision, I know exactly what my body is trying to do; it's trying to get the grenade down on the floor on the opposite side of the berm, to shield us from it's disorientation effects. I was already moving forward when I grabbed the grenade, and so instead of planting myself for a throw, I just keep moving forward, giving it a sort of gentle shoving motion rather than a toss. It flies out, past the berm, into the open air, aimed at nothing in particular. And then, roughly at my chest height, about 15 feet from me, the AVT Disorientation Ordinance does exactly what it was designed to do.

  It doesn't sound like the frag grenade. In fact, at this close, it doesn't really sound like anything. It's more like when you're recording a concert with a phone, and the decibels blow out the microphone. Just a single, max volume pop, and then silence. Or, in my case, the high pitched whine of my tinnitus. It's pretty much the same experience for the visuals. I see the geometric shapes extend nearly a full inch out of the cylindrical body, a glow of possibly white inside it, and then nothing. Not black, but a brief absence of visual sensory information, as though somebody had reached into my brain and flicked the switch telling my mind to process anything coming in from the jello organs in my face. It's only for a moment, but even as my eyes decide to come back from vacation, I'm still unable to see anything but a mishmash of colors, mostly white. Unfortunately, unlike the first two senses, I do very much feel the grenade.

  The best way to describe it is as though a gallop of horses had spawned in my veins, and beelined straight to my heart, before donkey kicking it, and scattering out every pore on my body. The incredible pressure doesn't exactly hurt... until it moves past my skin, where suddenly it feels like I've just stuck a fork into an outlet. The sensation is brief, but my skin feels uncomfortably cripsy, as I stand there. Something smacks into my face, and my inner ear spins wildly, and it dawns on me that I actually wasn't just standing there, but had been falling forward the entire time, and it's not until my face made contact with the berm do I realize this. I make an adjustment to what I think is rolling onto my back, and then lay there on the ground for somewhere between 7 seconds and 43 years. I feel sound come back almost at the same time visuals do, but it still takes me a second to process the repeated sound I'm hearing as my name being called.

  "Recruit Nova, are you with us? Recruit?" says Ravon, hovering above me. "Yes sir," I mumble in English, before correcting myself. "Thank the Seven," I hear someone say off to my left, but I'm unable to see who. My vision is still spotty, but I watch as his expression flicks through five different feelings, before landing on a cold fury. "What the fuck were you thinking, recruit?" he growls, spitting out the final syllable of my title as though toxic. "At what point in training have I ever told you to REACH OUT FOR A LIVE GRENADE?" My head is still spinning, a fact I'm immediately reminded of when I shake my head, and so I instead opt for the vocal response. "Never, sir," I tell him. He stands there for a moment, taking deep breaths, before getting down on a knee next to me. "Recruit," he says softly. "When I give an order, what are you supposed to do?" My throat feels dry, but I give him the answer. "I follow it."

  "So when I tell you to dive face down, you don't play hero!" he yells at me, each word escalating in volume. "When I give you a command, you don't make a CHOICE. YOU DO WHAT I FUCKING ORDERED YOU TO DO!" His face is red, and the adrenaline from the shouting and the explosion are wracking hell on my ability to ground myself. A part of me wants to lay out exactly what happened; how the instinct to reach out for the grenade wasn't one I was aware of, how I made the best decision I could with the information I had, how it's something that I could now train out since I knew about it, that yelling in my face isn't going to make me more likely to follow his instructions. Another part of me wants to yell right back; to tell him that diving face down wouldn't have helped for me and Ella and Caz-V, that we still would've gotten the physical and auditory effects. And another part of me is trying to analyze and categorize his behavior.

  "He's lashing out cause he got scared. He cares for his recruits, and he's not handling his emotions well. He's probably seen a lot of bright students die," my mind casually lists off. "Yes, sir," I say, unable to come up with any other response that won't land me in hot water. He breathes heavily over me for a moment. "Recruit Tygg," he snaps, his eyes looking to someone standing near my head. "That was your throw." There's a moment of silence, and if it weren't for my sense of balance doing the samba, I'd look at her to see what she was doing. "Yes, sir," she responds, her voice almost clear. I watch as he glares for a second, but instead of yelling, he just sighs. "Work on your throwing arm. That's an order. Also, you can take Recruit Nova to the med bay," he says. I see two suited hands appear in my vision, and my eyes trace them to Ko-lee and Rease. I grab them both, and they pull me to my feet, where I very unsteadily manage to stay.

  Rease lets go once he notices I'm moderately stable, but Ko-lee keeps holding onto my hand. There's a look I feel like I should probably be able to classify, but all my focus is on staying upright, and so I just file it away for later. I give her my best cocky grin, and eventually she releases my hand. At the same time, I feel an arm wrap around my waist, and I look over to see a misty eyed Ella doing her best to support me. She leads me to the door, and I'm immediately grateful as the first few steps likely would've put me back on the ground had I not been able to lean on my squadmate. As we leave, I hear Ravon speaking to the rest of the squad. "Alright, shows over! Class isn't finished, so let's go again!" As Ella and I walk towards the med bay, I listen to the sound of gunfire slowly fade into the background.

  Discord to pick a weapon about a week before this chapter came out, so now they all get to know what I was rambling about :p You should totes come hang out with us! You've already read it, so you know what each choice means, but which two weapons would you have picked?