Story Looking for a few good MODs...

A story about Mod trainee class 210

We’d done a physical training test to see how many pull-ups, push-ups, and sit-ups we could do in two-minute blocks. @SpeedBreaker struggled through it, not nearly as crisp as he had been in his self-trial, wondering what the hell was wrong with him. The MODs in training run a mile in heavy boots, and he finished dead last.

Now, back at the gym, @SpeedBreaker is puking his breakfast onto the wood chips by the front door. @Cuddled offers encouragement in soothing tones. But the stridency of his retching brings out a new tone, one of concern. “@Speedbreaker ,” she says, “do you want to continue?”

It would be so easy to say no. I could leave now, before anybody knew my name, saw more of my weaknesses or could appreciate my strength, before I could see what this whole thing was about and learn anything new. Before I got anything out of it. I could go home and tell people I had twisted my ankle or something, and nobody would be the wiser. Including me.

“I got this,” I tell her. “I got this. Mods never quit.”

Hours pass. We run and run and run, carrying packs and heavy bars. Three other participants, named @Striker_Sly , @Nxy , and @Mario who is much younger and far fitter than I am, runs with his hand on my back. “You got this, @Speedbreaker,” he says. If I have it, it’s because of Striker_Sly’s help. We haul around heavy logs, take turns carrying each other on our backs in races, and memorize a poem, “Invictus,” about being the masters of our fate. Sometimes that fate, apparently, involves falling out of trees.

It’s dark by the time they roll up the garage door at the back of the gym and tell us to assemble at the edge of the parking lot, above a rock-strewn gully.

@Cuddled has us stand at attention and explains that we’re all to go down into the gully to find a rock that represents our will to live as Mods and then bring it up to the parking lot.

We stumble down over the rocks, which range in size from pieces of gravel to boulders. I’m looking for the biggest darn rock I can find. Because I know that I’m not going to quit, and I’m not going to be broken, and that if things get bad, I can lean on the other guys.

I find a monster of concretion, but whether it’s the rock’s size or the tally of the day’s activities, I can’t get it up the slope. Weird. Back at CrossFit, I can throw around a 125-pound sack of sand. I stare at the rock, as if my gaze with the force will lift it up.. It doesn’t.

“Come on, @Speedbreaker,” says @way2 from above.

“I’m moving this rock that represents my will to survive Mod Training,” I tell him.

Under his breath, in a conspiratorial hush, he tells me, “Find a smaller one, you [idiot]. You have to carry it for a mile.” Aah. The grand finale.

I find a smaller one, about 75 pounds, I guess. My will to be a Mod remains huge, but more portable. Then the order comes: We will pick up the rock and start walking. If one of us drops his or her rock, we all start over.

No problem. What’s a mile?

But first, we take turns immersing ourselves, head and all, in a barrel of ice-cold water. We help each other climb up and in; we duck under and breathe out until bubbles show. Helping each other keeps our minds off the shivering.

“@SpeedBreaker?” @Cuddled is in front of me. “What’s the most important thing you learned this year?”

I wish I could say it was a carefully, consciously constructed thought. I wish I could say my brain played, in a flash, a two-hour movie of my want to be a Mod, my friends, applying and being accepting into Mod training and anybody who’d ever helped me and whom I’d ever helped. All the people I love and who love me. I wish I could say my fine, educated mind delivered a concise well thought out answer. But I don’t know where it came from. I just blurted it out.

“Love is the answer, sir.”

@Cuddled scares me, staring at me through the cold fog of a January night. She must think I’m putting her on. She looks at instructors @LeTim and @Lord_Roke and they both look at the rock I was carrying. Who talks to a Mod Commando about love? She’s gonna make me take another lap with the rock. And that’s OK. At this point, I know I can do it. I’d rather not, but I can if I have to. Because at this point, I know my answer is right. Love is the answer. If I didn’t love this game, why would I have done this?

She’s still looking at me. “Outstanding, @SpeedBreaker. Outstanding.”

We all graduated and became elite Mods.


Dedicating this to all the past, present, and future Mods.




Evil