The Gunny and Sugar Daddy looked at me when I approached, but neither man stood up. I hadn’t expected them to. I was becoming fully adjusted to life beyond Marine training and stateside barracks behavior. I dumped my supply of C-rations, and other stuff I’d gotten from the re-supply piles, on my poncho liner before turning to squat down and join them.

“Fourth Platoon has a problem with the new guys,” the Gunny began, his coffee steaming up out of his canteen holder held right next to the dying chunk of composition B he’d used to heat it.