Hearts In Winter (RPF_Big_Bang 2009) [2/8]
two
The barracks in which the group of actors find themselves expected to sleep, in which they've been billeted for the duration of the camp, reminds Eion obtusely of old black and white movies depicting either orphanages, or boarding schools. He stands just inside the doorway of the long, narrow room; stares at the double row of metal bedsteads pressed close together, plain ticking mattresses balanced upon their rickety frames with something akin to horror roiling in his gut, even as he observes the others scrambling good-naturedly, almost excitedly around, trying to lay claim to their preferred sleeping space. Eion isn't certain that he can sleep in the room - never mind the prospect of sharing such close quarters with the rest of the makeshift platoon, the thought of living practically on top of one another for such a period of time, the distinct lack of privacy that the barracks provides...
It smells of old socks, and sweat.
As though generations of men have passed through the room, and neglected to prise open a window, even occasionally. As though the room has never been aired, or cleaned, or... a grimace twitches across Eion's face as he contemplates the notion of the room being fumigated, steamed clean of all that currently permeates the stale air that it contains.
“Wow -,” Tim Matthews, a quiet man with an air of self-confidence that Eion cannot help but admire, pauses beside him; chuckles softly. “It's like a fucking refugee camp here...”
Smiling tightly, Eion watches as Tim wanders away to claim a bed for himself; wonders obtusely which bed Ross has decided to sleep on, if only so that he can find one at the opposite end of the room. Since Eion's impromptu nap upon his shoulder, Ross has refused, point blank, to speak to him. Ordinarily, Eion wouldn't mind the mercurial changes and shifts in the other man's attitude towards him - he's only just met Ross, after all, barely knows him... but, to his own surprise, he does mind, and he is taking it as a somewhat personal affront. Even though Webster and Liebgott weren't the buddies whom Eion knows Spielberg and Hanks have decided they should have been, will be in their otherwise exhaustively factual scripts, he'd found himself hoping upon first meeting Ross, that they might be able to get along together, if only to ensure that the entire group will bond together in a way that can only further enhance filming when it starts. To find, therefore, that Ross is apparently taking the instruction to 'get into character' a little too seriously, far too quickly is oddly disturbing to Eion's already bewildered mind.
Stepping down from the bus before, methodically collecting his kit-bag from where it had been unceremoniously thrown by the driver, Eion had absently turned to Ross; asked him whether he wished to be known as 'Joe', 'Liebgott' or simply by his actual name during boot-camp. The fact that Ross had glowered sullenly in his general direction before turning and stalking away, blatantly ignoring Eion completely, still stings enough to make him flush in angry embarrassment. It had been a perfectly reasonable question to ask, he thinks as he continues to watch the others who have been assigned to this particular barracks hut; finds his gaze drawn instinctively towards the source of his own strangely personal humiliation. He knows that its probably nothing more than coincidence, that for all he knows it could simply be his mind projecting sympathy into the facial expressions of the other men where there isn't actually anything but curiosity, but Eion feels as though the few who glance at him as he stands by the doorway, shoulders slumped in vague defeat, are more than aware of his confusion.
That, in itself, only serves to irritate him further.
Rubbing absently at the skin between his eyebrows with one thumbnail, Eion forces himself further into the room, eyes the beds with a desperation that has two sides - one that he's expected to sleep on something that undoubtedly smells horrendously of other men's feet, and the other that he's so tired he suspects the bed's odour won't matter one bit. If he's being honest, all that Eion truly wishes to do is collapse... and sleep away the confusion and the exhaustion which battle together in their efforts to seize control of him. All around him, the other men try to settle in; exchange more small-talk about their real lives, their casting sessions with Spielberg and Hanks, laugh at abysmally bad jokes as teasing banter flows easily between them...
And Eion feels suddenly very alone.
“Hey, Webster!”
He hears the name being called, almost recognises the voice that utters it, but Eion doesn't falter in his progress along the centre of the room, vaguely counting the beds as he passes by them. He knows that the best beds are by the door, that they were the first to be claimed as he stood dithering in abject horror at the scent of the building, and that the mattress upon which he can... he hopes fervently... sleep away some of the lingering haze of vapidity that he knows cocoons his brain, stands right at the end of the room. The worst bed to have, given its distance from the door, has undoubtedly been left for him, and he's simply going to have to grin and bear it, he thinks as he deliberately paces forwards; knows that it's his own damned fault for being so -
“Eion!”
Startled by the loud, fervent chorus of his name, he stops walking; stands still and blinks around at the openly amused grins of the other men. His mouth opening and closing a few times, he tries to decipher the cause of their amusement, is almost certain that it cannot be because of his name, then realises belatedly that it was Ross who was the one yelling it. Realises with another flurry of embarrassment that twists inside of his gut, that it can't have been the first time the other man tried to get his attention...
“You were calling me -,” he says miserably; closing his eyes briefly and breathing deeply before opening them once more. He turns to look at Ross, recognising the distinctive glower of exasperation which dominates the expression upon the other man's face. “Weren't you? I'm Webster...”
“Yeah,” Ross says, shaking his head slightly. “I was, and you are, and I bagged you a bed, mate.”
“Aw -,” The actor whose bed occupies the space beside Ross' grins obscenely wide. “How sweet! Liebgott looking after Webster!”
Ross rolls his eyes, but doesn't turn his head away, his gaze sharp and seemingly observant of the confusion which illuminates Eion's own face. Again, Ross tuts audibly, sucks air over the edges of his teeth impatiently. “Can it Calil!”
“Alley.”
The correction is both immediate and proper, given their instructions to abandon themselves, to lose their own identities in favour of those of their characters, and something in the actor's accent reminds Eion of Ross' own. Wearily flickering his gaze between Ross' stoic, controlled expression and George Calil's amused grin, he wonders if they know each other... if they knew each other before being cast for the series.
Such a thing probably isn't so unheard of, Eion thinks as he shifts his weight, feels awkward beneath the steadiness of Ross' stare. He knows Matthew, vaguely, from other open calls, after all, and Britain's much smaller than America, so the -
“How come it's only us plebs in here?”
Blinking rapidly in an attempt to shake away the confusion of his own thoughts, Eion turns in the direction which the vaguely querulous demand had sounded from; watches as Tim wanders easily across to stand beside him, a dry toothbrush balanced lightly between fingers which twirl it as though it's a baton. A mark of Tim's comfort within the unusual setting into which they have all been thrown.
Glancing back up, meeting Tim's warm-eyed gaze, Eion catches the fleeting movement of the other man's eyebrow; realises that this is an attempt to rescue him from what may well turn into an out-and-out brawl, given Ross' constantly changing moods and the sharp mockery of both Calil's words and grin. Reassured, oddly comforted by the affable presence beside him, Eion allows himself to smile faintly.
Tim dips his head into a nod, then turns to address Ross and Calil once more. “Where's the bloke with the camera?”
“Nixon?” Calil looks thoughtful, as though trying to recall their billeting orders to mind.
“Erm... yeah.” Tim says; shrugs his shoulders, looks blank. “Guess so.”
“He's an officer -,” Ross snaps, meeting Eion's bemused, watchful gaze briefly before gesturing at the bed frame which stands alongside his own. “They've split us up. Officers in one set of rooms, enlisted fuckers in another... Weren't you listening, Penkala?”
“Y'know, I'm not entirely sure I'm going to cope with answering to that...” Tim announces, his voice light, infinitely genial. “I know they mean well, and all, but for fuck's sake! We're not even filming yet!”
“Yeah, look at Webster, there -,” Calil laughs, and there is a malicious undertone to his words that Eion neither likes, nor trusts. “He just walks on by in a daze, whenever anyone tries using his new name!”
For a moment, Eion hesitates; torn between retaliating against Calil's cruelly meant words, and simply taking the higher path by ignoring them. His blood shifts, allows a momentary burst of testosterone to flow through it, before deliberately forcing it to calm. Just because he's going to be playing a soldier, he reminds himself, doesn't mean that he has to start behaving like one... Biting down on the soft inner flesh of his lower lip, squashing the skin painfully between the sharp edges of his teeth until he can taste the faint tang of his own blood settling against the very tip of his tongue, Eion eases himself away from the little cluster of men; strides towards the bed frame which Ross had indicated was to be his, had claimed for him in his temporary, self-enforced absence from the school-boy-esque scurrying to obtain the best space in the room. Deliberately, he tunes Calil's continued taunts, the sharp tone of the other man's voice and words out of his mind.
“Ignore him.”
Raising both eyebrows in surprise, Eion pauses in the stowing of his kit-bag in the foot-locker beside the bed frame; turns his head to glance up and round at Ross. “Hm?”
“Calil -,” Leaning bodily across Eion's bed frame, elbows barely dinting the hard mattress, Ross' voice is little more than an undertone, lowered so that only Eion might hear him, understand the words which he's saying. “He's just pissy because he went up for your role. Playing Alley? Definitely not his first choice!”
Slowly, struggling to ignore his immediate impulse to glance over Ross' shoulder at Calil, Eion nods his head. He understands that it's going to take a while for them all to get used to the situation, realises that not everyone amongst the group of forty assembled actors has ever attended anything like boot-camp before. It will take time for them to get to know each other, to bond, to feel comfortable living one on top of the other... to actually become the band of brothers which it seems that Spielberg and Hanks are determined that they will be. In all honestly, Eion wasn't expecting the bond to be instantaneous. He remembers only too well the suspicious wariness of newly formed social groups from both high school and fresh casts, the uncertainty that always seems to accompany such things - but he had hoped that he wouldn't find himself seemingly disliked and resented simply because he's the one with a particular role that somebody else apparently wanted. That, he thinks as he rises to his feet once more, straightens his back until he's accomplished his full height, simply isn't fair.
Glancing about at the others who will share his living space for the next few days, Eion instinctively takes notice of the way in which they are all sizing one another up. He knows from the preliminary reading that he's done on the Army, on Easy Company, on Webster himself, that it isn't going to be all easy sailing amongst the main cast. If the rumours which Matthew Settle and Ron Livingston have whispered into his ears about how Spielberg and Hanks deliberately cast actors who resembled the men they're supposed to portray, are even remotely true, then Eion suspects that boot-camp and filming itself are going to be filled with clashes of personality, left, right and friggin' center. Eion can only hope that his new peers aren't likely to indulge in any barracks brawling or random acts of machismo...
“... does have a point though, don't you think?”
Turning his attention back to Ross, still lounging against the mattress, looking for all the world as though he's planning on settling in for a while, Eion realises that he's inadvertently ignored the other man once more. Sighing softly, he contorts his face into an expression of abject apology; smiles tentatively, hopes that Ross isn't going to resort to snarling at him again. “Sorry. I was miles away. What were you saying?”
“That Penkala - or Tim as he apparently wishes to be known away from those who claim they must be obeyed at all costs -,”
“Dye and that Farnsworth bloke!” Tim adds easily as he sidles up to stand beside Ross, the bed frame and its uncovered mattress between him and Eion. His smile is genuinely friendly, warm and wide as he eyes Eion's bemused face; folds his arms across his chest in a gesture that seems habitual more than it could possibly be defensive.
“Yeah,” Ross nods, rolling his eyes in mock exasperation once more, before meeting Eion's gaze again. “Them. Anyway, Penkala, here -,”
“Tim!”
“Okay, Tim, here -,”
Despite himself, the confusion that he feels, the almost palpable petulance that drifts across the bed frames towards him from the furiously glowering Calil, Eion laughs lightly, leans one hip against the window frame that is cut into the wall beside his bed frame, waits for the punchline...
“ - reckons that we ought to rebel a little.”
Tim nods his head enthusiastically, suddenly looking more like a naughty school-boy than the young man he actually is. “Just a little!”
“And use our actual names when we're not out there climbing ropes, or digging holes, or whatever the hell else they're gonna make us do at this fucking camp!” Ross pauses for breath, eyes Eion appreciatively. “What d'you think, mate?”
“You up for rebelling, Eion?” Tim asks, leaning forward eagerly, his eyes practically dancing with defiance and glee.
“I -,” he hesitates; momentarily mulling the idea over in his mind. Eion doesn't like the idea of losing his own identity for the duration of the camp, if only because in part he suspects they will be expected to continue into filming. He finds himself slightly frightened by the thought that if he is expected to be David Kenyon Webster for the duration of filming, by the time the shoot ends, he will have forgotten who he actually is. It is a concept that terrifies the crap out of him, no matter how worthy the cause might actually be.
Eion understands only too well that the series is something unheard of, that the very fact it has Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks at its helm means that it is going to be accurate and something that people might be able to draw some of life's greater lessons from - but is it, he asks himself beneath Ross and Tim's expectant, hopeful gazes, worth losing himself in the process...?
“Okay -,” he says, twitching one shoulder into a loose shrug and laughing easily as Tim all but bounces in place. “Sure. Why the hell not?”
“Excellent!” Tim enthuses, spinning in place so that his back is towards Eion and he's looking in Calil's direction. “You, my friend, and I - we need to have a little chat!”
“Oh, Christ -,” Ross' own grin is wry as he shakes his head, quirks one bemused eyebrow up at Eion. “You've unleashed Hell, there, I'm afraid, mate!”
“They stole my mobile phone!” Tim announces loudly, his voice echoing with a peevishness that Eion already recognises as being at odds with his general persona. “There's no fucking way they're going to steal my bloody name, too!”
“Yeah, yeah...” Ross looks almost fond as he glances sideways; eyes Tim's irate profile for a moment or two as he and Calil mutter darkly at one another, then turns back to meet Eion's observant gaze. “They want us in the canteen fairly soon - some chat about what they expect from us all, or... something. Fancy wandering over there now, before Tim starts beating someone's brains out with his shoe?”
Behind Ross, Calil snorts derisively. “He wouldn't fucking dare!”
“Really?” Tim's voice lifts slightly, reminds Eion of how his mother's used to just before she smacked his backside for various childhood misdemeanour's. “You want to place money on that, Calil? 'Cause I'm thinking that you'd lose!”
A flash of irritation ricochets across Ross' face even as he pushes up from the mattress, rudely moves past Tim's abruptly defensive stance, gesturing with both a flick of one hand and a tilt of his head that the slightly bewildered Eion should follow in his wake... yet he doesn't turn to make sure that the other man is doing as he has been bidden.
A vague sense of uneasy deflation consumes Eion as he silently, wearily wanders along in Ross' wake. He hopes that Tim and Calil don't actually come to blows in the barracks hut, not only because the latter is distinctly heavier than the former and would undoubtedly relish the opportunity to hurt him, but also because Eion cannot help but suspect that it will be Sergeant Farnsworth who ends up dealing with anything the actors do wrong during boot-camp.
And Freddie Joe Farnsworth already terrifies the living crap out of Eion.
He isn't sure why. Perhaps, he thinks as he treads in Ross' footsteps, it is the determined look in Farnsworth's eye, the malevolent gleam that appeared there when he removed Ron's camera from his possession in the uniform warehouse, the disdain of the older man's smirk as he'd read through the list of rules that the actors were expected to follow, to obey to the letter...
The fact that there is something about Farnsworth which reminds Eion of his own father.
“He doesn't think we're going to be able to do this -,” he says with a sudden clarity, pausing upon the scuffed dirt path which winds between the rows of mostly empty barrack huts towards the large building in which they'll eat their meals - but only, Eion remembers Farnsworth telling them with quiet glee, if they've managed to earn them first.
He sighs, heavily even as Ross eyes him with interest, hands fumbling through the pockets of his shirt and jacket for a moment or two until he withdraws a crumpled pack of cigarettes. Absently, head canted slightly to one side, he regards Eion as he taps a cigarette out; lights it expertly and inhales deeply.
“Who?”
Eion feels his mouth tilt despondently. “Farnsworth.”
“So what?”
There is a challenge behind the question, a defiance that Eion almost finds intriguing enough to comment upon, but instead he settles for breathing in the faint aroma of nicotine laced smoke that lingers in the cold air between them. Ross' smile is quick as he turns away again; continues along the path, leaving it up to Eion whether he follows, or stays where he had stopped.
“Don't you care?” Eion asks, frowning as he hurries to catch up to the other man. “Doesn't it bother you that they've dragged us all out here, and the guy they've put in charge of making sure we're up to doing the damned film doesn't think that we can do it!”
“He's not in charge,” Ross' voice is low, bemused. He exhales another lungful of smoke into Eion's face - a gesture that may, or equally may not have been deliberate. “Didn't you listen to anything they said back there?”
“Yes!” Eion's eyes narrow against the sudden, sharp sting of the drifting smoke, and he curls one hand into a loose fist of irritation. “I was listening. There was a lot of talking about how we can't do this, and we can't do that, and -,”
“And Captain Dye's in charge...?”
Again, Eion pauses mid-stride; gapes at Ross' smirk. “No!”
“You've heard the rumours too, huh?”
Slowly, reluctantly, Eion nods his head, his thoughts skittering chaotically from one industry whisper to another concerning the all but infamous Dale Dye, Spielberg and Hanks' apparent weapon of choice when it comes to turning actors into soldiers. Although nobody has ever categorically stated that Dye was the reason behind the brief actors strike on the last World War II movie that he acted as an advisor on, Eion knows people who either participated in it themselves, or know someone who was there.
Dye is legendary.
And not necessarily, Eion thinks with a soft groan, for the right reasons.
“Hey guys!”
Instinctively turning at the interruption, Eion watches as Donnie jogs easily along the path towards them, slowing his pace only incrementally as he draws closer. He looks entirely at ease with the situation, content to be there, to have been chosen and, for a moment, Eion thinks he might just hate the former boy-bander.
“Ten minutes and we get to eat!”
“Yay...”
Ross' mutter is low, laden with sarcasm, and within its depths, Eion thinks that he catches another glimpse of him in character. Brow furrowed in consternation, he turns his head; watches Donnie move past them, continue along the path towards the barrack huts, apparently having been sent to fetch the rest of the men.
“Hey!” Ross calls after him, coughing harshly in surprise as Donnie turns immediately, manages to jog backwards a few paces. “Dye gonna be in there?”
“Hell, yes!”
“Great - cheers, mate!”
Disapproval flows smoothly across Donnie's face, marking his features with concern and irritation. “That's Sergeant Lipton, to you there, Corporal Liebgott!”
He doesn't give Ross a chance to respond, simply jerks his head into another nod even as he turns and continues to jog towards his intended target. Eyebrows raised, Eion and Ross regard one another for a few moments in startled silence, before the latter slowly shakes his head; sighs wearily as he drops his cigarette to the ground, automatically stubs it out beneath the heel of his uniform boots.
“We're fucked,” he says, and his voice is cheerful enough that Eion finds himself obtusely worried.
Even though he barely knows Ross, has met him only twelve hours earlier, he suspects that the bonhomie is not a good sign...
“And not, I think, in a good way!”
“Great...” Eion mumbles, forcing his gaze to shift away from Ross'; wondering at the shifting sparkle that seemed to ripple throughout his system at the words which the other man had spoken. His mind is suddenly laden with images that he isn't certain he wants his thoughts to be consumed by; flashing mental pictures of skin bared to the elements, tongues dragging against its surface, the steady writhe of one body below another...
His, below Ross'.
Swallowing thickly, perhaps even audibly he abruptly wonders, Eion shakes his head; silently curses jet-lag and its various stages of assault against his body. He's used to flying, is not a novice at time-changes and the fact that his body finds it difficult to comprehend his mental willingness to play around with its own biological clock, has almost been waiting for the latent twist of desire to shift and coil through his veins, simmer insidiously inside of his blood. It was, he decides, simply unfortunate that Ross had to be the one to mention sex, albeit vaguely, within his immediate vicinity - although, another part of Eion's brain accepts the inevitable. Recognises the shiver of attraction that has silently lingered within the depths of him since first he glanced up from his paperwork and caught sight of the other man standing beside him, for what it was.
What it is.
“Hey - you okay, there?”
The concern in Ross' voice, the tentatively placed hand against his left bicep, disturbs Eion's equilibrium and he almost wrenches himself away; startling his companion in the process. Affronted, Ross glares tightly at him for a moment, seems almost to be weighing Eion up inside of his mind; perhaps even debating whether one punch might fell the slightly taller man...
“Yeah -,” he says quickly, suddenly eager to reassure Ross, to have him lose the irritated look that illuminates his eyes, to bring his mood back towards affability once more. He smiles shakily, drags a trembling hand through his hair; feathers the strands that rise from his forehead habitually, nervously, fearfully, even as he chuckles. “Yeah. Just... Jet-lag, y'know? It's killing me!”
It isn't a lie, but Eion knows that it's not the whole truth, either, and he realises with a sudden jolt to his system, a little shudder of his heart-beat, that anyone who actually knows him would be able to not only recognise the falsehood of his words, but also call him on it.
But Ross doesn't know him.
And for that, Eion thinks with relief, he can only be grateful...
oooo
Captain Dye has a way of looking at the men as though he can see right through them; cut through their self-defensive ticks and tells, see past the bravado and the almost habitual way they each have of protecting themselves by pretending to be someone else entirely, until it seems as though he's peering directly at whatever is left of them.
Their souls.
It is, Eion thinks as he watches Ross shift uncomfortably in the chair beside his own, hunch forward across the simply made wooden table in front of them, Dye's pale blue eyes focused squarely upon the other man's, almost eerie. Certainly unnerving. The last person who seethed with sheer authority in the way that Dye does, the only other man to make Eion's stomach churn with anxiety lest he's found wanting, made to believe that he might have done something wrong, even when he knows perfectly well that he hasn't, was his late grandfather. The man who tried to convince Eion's pilot father that a twelve year boy had no business getting behind the controls of a light aircraft - and even less, being taught how to fly the 'plane between contracts...
“Welcome, gentlemen, to 1942 -,”
Dye's voice is a beguiling mix of confidence and restrained power. It sends a shiver along the length of Eion's spine and he reflexively glances sideways; wonders if the others... if Ross is equally affected by its sound.
“For the following ten days, you will discover a little of what the men of Easy Company had to endure in order to earn their jump-wings -,” Dye continues, “and by the end of this boot-camp, you will also - hopefully - have earned your own wings!”
There is a low, collective murmuring around Eion as every one of the actors immediately wonders whether they are going to be expected to actually jump out of an aeroplane at some point in the next week. Breathing deeply, Eion listens to the undertone of noise, the thread of confusion and downright horror that he is able to discern within some of the individual voices - finds himself wondering at the other men's somewhat blasé attitudes in not having double- and even triple-checked the finer details, the small print of the contracts which their agents must surely have brandished at them at some point...
“There will be no more namby-pamby actor shit.” Dye announces quietly, the sheer power of his voice, the natural authority that he holds over them all cutting smoothly, effortlessly through the panicked mutterings of the assembled men. “I will not tolerate it. Is that understood, gentlemen?”
“Sir; yes, Sir!”
Blinking rapidly, his heart rate accelerating in shock at having the variously employed former soldiers turned advisers bellow the appropriate response to Dye's question, Eion looks to Ross; returns the other man's wide eyed stare of dawning comprehension with one of his own.
“Fuck...” Ross mouths silently across the short distance between them at the table, and Eion cannot help but inwardly echo the obviously heartfelt sentiment; nod his head in speechless agreement.
Disbelief grows within the depths of Eion's mind as he listens to Dye continue to outline the purpose of the boot-camp. He had known, had understood, had realised how tough they were going to be worked - but at the same time, his actual ignorance of the early morning starts, the repetitively mind-numbing, back-breaking details that they would all be expected to perform, the very fact that their basic comfort levels would be challenged, was staggering.
“... showers will be every three days -,” Dye informed them, watching them all closely, pacing in measured steps across the length of floor that he occupied before them. “When the men whom you are going to become were fighting for their country upon the Front, gentlemen, they did not have the luxury of constant hot water! They did not have the ability to step out of their dugout and into a pristine, hygienic bathroom!”
“Oh God...” Eion mumbles, feels faintly sick as he is struck by the realisation that the stench of the barracks hut is only going to grow worse; suddenly comprehends why the room actually smells so dire.
“No, these soldiers endured the grime upon their skin, the dirt beneath their fingernails - and they did so without complaint!” Dye pauses, folds his hands behind his back in a gesture that seems, somehow, paternalistic. His eyes are sharp as they skim across the horrified, stunned faces of the assembled men before him, and his smile is bemused. “You'll stink like fucking goats, gentlemen. But later, when Mr Spielberg and Mr Hanks call upon you to act as though you are actually fighting for the freedom of the country that you love - you will be able to remember precisely what it feels like to have your skin crawl because of the sweat which has dried upon you. You'll understand how it feels to lose the strength of your sense of smell, because you are surrounded day in and day out by the foul odours of your fellow soldiers - of yourselves! And your performances will do honour to these men whose memories of the war, of the battlefields upon which they fought so that men of your generation might have the freedom to choose not to, are those which have inspired this forthcoming project...”
In theory, Eion agrees wholeheartedly with Dye's statement, understanding - as he does - that it has been further sanctioned by Spielberg and Hanks. In practice, however, he's less certain that depriving the group of actors of basic personal hygiene is necessarily the way to go, to make them understand how it felt to be a soldier during the Second World War.
His own personal phobias and neurosis to one side, Eion doesn't think that any of them have gone much longer than a day or two without bathing since they were teenagers. At least, he thinks as he glances discretely around at the vaguely disturbed, slightly horrified expressions upon the faces of those men closest to him - he hopes that's the case. And if it isn't?
Then he doesn't want to know.
oooo
Five-thirty AM, and the ground is frozen solid beneath their feet, jolting each step that they take as they stumble blearily through the start of what will be their first full day at camp, bruising Eion's already tired system even further. Incredulously, he stares directly ahead as he runs; looks at the dizzying up-and-down motion of the back of Tim's head before him, wonders if someone... if he is violently sick, they'll be allowed to stop in order to catch their breath for a moment or two.
Somehow, he doesn't think so.
Dye runs smoothly alongside the formation of coughing, panting men, breathing normally, as though he's taking a morning stroll, a walk in some proverbial park, as opposed to a five mile run. Briefly, Eion pushes aside the burning loathing that he senses he is beginning to feel towards Dye and his Sergeants; feels awe for the man instead, contemplates the fact that the Captain isn't exactly a young man, is probably somewhere in the vicinity of the same age as Eion's own father... and he's supremely fit. Fitter, Eion thinks with a bitter cough, than the vast majority of the campers he's determined and honour bound to train into something resembling a shadow of an actual soldier.
Dawn hasn't even broken, the world is still dark, and the temperature is close to freezing despite the sweat that coalesces upon the curve of Eion's brow, the length of his spine, the backs of his knees. In front of him, between his thumping vision and the back of Tim's head, he can see each exhalation that he makes as his breath fogs immediately, steams in a way that he remembers having found astonishing and beautiful as a boy...
He barely slept the night before.
Being in a room with eleven other men, all shifting upon the uncomfortable, unfamiliar surfaces of their beds, coughing and muttering to themselves as they attempted to get warm beneath the thin blanket and sheet that they've been given, hadn't helped. Eion had found himself listening uncomfortably to the noises which the others made; forcing himself to lie as still as he possibly could lest they find his attempts to get comfortable enough to sleep as annoying as he found theirs, to ignore the treacherously intriguing thought that if he were to stretch out his arm to the left, he would perhaps be able to touch Ross' arm as it hung laxly in the air between their beds, its owner snoring contentedly as he, alone, slept...
“Mama, Mama, can't you see -,”
Dye's voice intermingling easily with that of Farnsworth and the group of watchful Sergeants who keep pace with them easily, bored expressions upon their faces, interrupts the tangle of Eion's thoughts and he stumbles slightly, a knee jarring just on the painless side of injury, his brain slamming back into the brutal reality of the early morning run.
“ - what the Airborne's done to me?”
“Killed me -,” Calil chokes out from his place beside Eion, panting desperately between each word that he manages to spit into the atmosphere. “Killed me, buried me, and then stamped on my fucking grave, that's what!”
Eion smiles grimly, struggles to inhale, feels his lungs burn with indignation as he attempts to force oxygen into their ever-tightening depths. He wonders almost absently if he's having a heart-attack, whether twenty-four is too young to die of cardiac arrest caused by over-exertion... then decides that he's being pathetic. Realises that not only did the real soldiers of Easy Company endure far, far worse than anything which will be thrown at Eion, but that Dye's irritated comments the previous night of how they're currently nothing more than 'namby-pamby actors', is absolutely correct.
Defiance immediately kicks in, reminds Eion that he's there for a reason - not only for the fact that he wants the kudos of having been involved in something which Spielberg and Hanks are putting together, the mere thought of being a part of something that has the potential to over-take their previous effort in Saving Private Ryan... but also because his grandfathers fought in the war, because he's grown up feeling insignificant and small beneath the weight of their tales of how men would risk their own lives - sometimes even sacrifice them, to help a brother-in-arms and to protect the wider world from the oppression and tyranny that Hitler and his warped ideals thought should become the norm... If Eion has to run five, ten, fifteen fucking miles before breakfast each day until the shoot is over, then he suddenly knows that is what he's going to do.
Without complaining.
Narrowing his eyes against the stinging sweat that drips continually into them, huffing slightly as he tries to drag in a deeper breath, Eion lifts his voice until it matches those of the others around him, keeping pace and time with the rest of the men, vaguely certain that their own senses of defiance, their own reasons for having taken the parts which Spielberg and Hanks have offered them on plates have kicked into force.
“Mama, Mama, wait and see - just what boot-camp's done for me!”