Read Online All You Need Is Kill by Hiroshi Sakurazaka - Free Book Online Page A

can be damn sure it included some fucking iso push-ups. I was so busy trying to figure out what to do next that I wasn’t paying attention to the here and now. After half an hour, U.S. Special Forces gave up on watching our tortures and went back to the barracks. I kept from staring at Rita, and she left along with the rest, which meant I was in for the long haul. It was like a software if/then routine:
If checkflag RitajoinsPT =true, then end.
Else continue routine: FuckingIsoPush-Ups
    Maybe this was proof that I could change what happened. If I stared at Rita, she’d join the PT, and they’d end it after an hour. The brass had convened this session of PT for no good reason; they could end it for the same.
    If my guess were right, my cause wasn’t necessarily hopeless. A window of opportunity might present itself in tomorrow’s battle. The odds of that happening might be 0.1 percent, or even 0.01 percent, but if I could improve my combat skills even the slightest bit—if that window were to open even a crack—I’d find a way to force it open wide. If I could train to jump every hurdle this little track-meet of death threw at me, maybe someday I’d wake up in a world with a tomorrow.
    Next time I’d be sure to stare at Rita during PT. I felt a little bad about bringing her into this, she who was basically a bystander in my endless one-man show. But there wasn’t really much choice. I didn’t have hours to waste building muscle that didn’t carry over into the next loop. That was time better spent programming my brain for battle.
    When the training had finally finished, the men on the field fled to the barracks to escape the sun’s heat, grumbling complaints under their collective breath. I walked over to Sergeant Ferrell who was crouched down retying his shoelaces. He’d been around longer than any of us, so I decided he’d be the best place to start for help on my battle-training program. Not only was he the longest surviving member of the platoon, but it occurred to me that the 20 percent drill sergeant he had in him might just come in handy.
    Waves of heat shimmered above his flattop haircut. Even after three hours of PT, he looked as though he could run a triathlon and come in first without breaking a sweat. He had a peculiar scar at the base of his thick neck, a token from the time before they’d worked all the bugs out of the Jackets and had had to implant chips to heighten soldiers’ reaction times. It had been a while since they’d had to resort to anything so crude. That scar was a medal of honor—twenty years of hard service and still kicking.
    “Any blisters today?” Ferrell’s attention never left his shoes. He spoke Burst with a roll of the tongue peculiar to Brazilians.
    “No.”
    “Getting cold feet?”
    “I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t scared, but I’m not planning on running, if that’s what you mean.”
    “For a greenhorn fresh out of basic, you’re shaping up just fine.”
    “You still keep up with your training, don’t you, Sarge?”
    “Try to.”
    “Would you mind if I trained with you?”
    “You attempting some kind of humor, Private?”
    “Nothing funny about killing, sir.”
    “Well, there’s something funny with your head if you want to stuff yourself into one of those damn Jackets the day before we head out to die. You want to work up a sweat, go find a coed’s thighs to do it in.” Ferrell’s eyes stayed on his laces. “Dismissed.”
    “Sarge? With all due respect, I don’t see you running after the ladies.”
    Ferrell finally looked up. His eyes were 20mm rifle barrels firing volleys at me from the bunkers set deep in the lines of his tanned, leathery face. I cooked under the glaring sun.
    “You tellin’ me you think I’m some sort of faggot who’d rather be strapped into a Jacket reeking of sweat than up between a woman’s legs? That what you’re tellin’ me?”
    “Tha-that’s—not what I meant, sir!”
    “Right, then. Take a seat.” He