The Biking Double

Author's Note: This passage is entirely fictional; I've meticulously tweaked every last small detail!

It was past one a.m. at camp. The gates were closed. I was in charge of the gates. My buddy for that night was in charge of the gun. I had not slept before my midnight shift, even though I really should have. Instead, I stayed up all day and read Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five, which was addictive, you have to admit.

And I blame this for the fact that I saw myself on a bike coming towards the gate right now, riding with a passenger. Another bike followed. Four people on two bikes stopped before the gates I am in charge of, all of whom I knew, one of whom was me.

They looked at me sheepishly and eventually begged me to open the gates. It was 0137 hours, and all camp users coming in the wee hours has to report to the guard house. Book in, saith the RSM. Book in, all ye who enter between midnight and 7:30am.

The me who was on a bike was in his civvies. He wore a white t-shirt and a shiny black helmet. The white t-shirt had three chevrons emblazoned across his sleeves. This must be Andy, down the other trouser of fate! He who has a rank of sergeant; He who owns the place; at least, He who thinks so.

You know me, right? He said to me, the Gate IC.
I didn't know this Andy.
And I said to him, would you book in at the guard house?

We're in a hurry, he said, and looking very uneasy. In the morning the book will be flipped, and Lord have mercy on them if their unholy book-in timing was ever found.
But that wasn't very important to me.
I insisted that they talk to the Guard Commander, who was getting pretty damn bored in the guard room.

A car stopped at the barricades. It was outbound.
Andy, the owner of Heandunigna Camp: Let us through, we promise we will make no noise.
One of the other owners: No one will ever know about this!
Andy: Look, you're holding up the traffic now!

I looked at the outbound driver and then I looked at the bikers and then I had a pang of urgency and let the gates fly open...

The four lords of Heandunigna vroomed past us and out of sight. They could not believe their luck. They did not keep the noise down.

The outbound driver stopped right before me. He rolled down a side window and he said to me:
If I were you, I would surely have made them book in.
And he drove off into the night.
I looked towards my sentry buddy, his gaze calm and reproachful under the floodlight and flying ants. He said this:
I wouldn't have let them in if I were you. Those rotters deserve better; they do this all the time!

I thought about my parallel incarnation on the bike. Would I have proved a better person to have earned the chevrons that he even showed on his civvies? Am I not like him the way that I am, now? What have I learnt from my time here? That some rules that are tedious and uncritical can be circumvented! Yet, there are still people around who would do the right thing!

There always will have people around who would do the right thing, in all plainness and unceremony.

For the rest of my shift, I wallowed in shame.
Later on, when I woke up in rest barracks, that good-for-nothing Battalion Cat was meowing in my face again. begging for food, perhaps? Feeling absolutely miffed, I picked up the fella by the scruff and threw him away.
By the scruff, Bretodeau!