Humble Beginings of a long Path

7:30 am

The alarm beeps as expected. In the last three years it was always ringing at this exact time. Not that it was needed anymore. Logan's internal clock was synchronized with that alarm for a long time. Even if it stopped ringing, he'd still wake up at this exact time as he was doing over and over again for those three years. However he was leaving it that way. Just a habit, but he'd really feel uneasy if he woke up without that familiar sound.
He lit up a cigarette while still on bed. He wasn't smoking anymore. Not from way back when he was still in the academy as a student of law. Seemed like a lifetime ago. Now he was only smoking that one cigarette the moment he was waking up. At 7:30 am every day, not missing a single day. Just another habit he thought. His mouth was feeling really tart at that moment. It was probably the results from the wine he drunk last night, right after Jen left his apartment.
He smiled a bit thinking that was a scary change in his almost always ritualistic way of following his personal daily program. He puffed out some smoke and continued his thought. Not only red wine instead of a single glass of whiskey with one ice cube, but a bottle of red wine.


7:45 am

He finished the cigarette and stood up with a sigh. A huge and tiresome day was following. He questioned his decision for a moment. Was it carefully thought out? Could he do it? Hell, could he even come out of it alive?
He then brought the image of Geers on his mind and smiled in a sadistic way. The answer was probably that it was a foolish decision, a decision made with no clear head and that probably he wouldn't manage to even finish the training part, let alone reach his end goal alive and well. But he had to at least try. With small and careful steps he might finish the training. After that he could still change his mind about his plan. If nothing else he had time. In that time he could change it, plan it in a better way increasing the chances of staying alive.

He walked to the kitchen and put a cup at the coffee machine. He then took the time to get the exact amount of coffee he needed into the machine. Another change of my usual program he thought and grinned. Usually he wouldn't care much but this morning he put three times more the amount of coffee than every other morning. He didn't put any sugar either. He hit the button and then walked over to the table and checked his mails. Outside the usual spam he had one mail from Jen about the physical examinations she needed. It was a long list, no, a huge list, but he expected that.
His eyes stopped at a line near the end "Male health check-up"
Eh?
Not that he understood most of the others and he'd be damned if he could even spell half of them but this seemed pretty vague to him. Then at the end he saw "Stress management test" and froze... No way he could pass that.
The mail also included a gridlink to some suggested military exams. He opened that and ended up staring at it with a blank face. Compared to that the previously supposed 'huge' list he read was almost like a two page synopsis of a hundred page book. He closed it and forwarded Jen's mail to Sandra adding an "As soon as possible please" at the end.

He then entered the bathroom for a quick shower.

8:10 am

Logan dressed quickly and sat at the kitchen table to drink his coffee. He laughed hysterically remembering that among all those physicals he also needed an examination from a shrink. He took the time to think this day through. Would he manage it? Or he'd fail from even before starting this long and painful path? It'd be hard for sure, but he was confident. He was looking after his physical condition all those years. He wasn't twenty year old anymore and his endurance would not be at its peak. That was normal...
On the other hand tho' he had stopped smoking, he was cooking and eating healthy foods and not those bronto burgers that everyone hyped about and he also was doing exercises every now and then.
He finished his coffee and with a quick look he looked around the apartment for anything that was out of place, noticing the empty bottle of wine from the last night on table. He threw it to the garbage bin, and left the apartment. It was a sunny day. And soon the second sun would rise as well. Walking in Jobe Platform he made a mental note to buy some nutrition bars and water bottles on the way to Tir. He then thought about it... Tir was basically a square. Each side was around three hundred meters from the information he had stored in his visor memory. That meant a perimeter of one point two kilometers. Fifty times that would make it a sixty kilometer total he had to run. His face turned pale and at that point he decided that Jen was a friggin' sadist.

But his pride would not allow him to look back now. He'd manage it. He had to!