Sergeant Hani, Reporting!
A situation skit is a little play in which you hand the participants a fixed scenario and then let the thing run on whatever they improvise in the moment.
If anyone asked why I'd cooked up this particular bit of content, the answer was simple.
Lately, close to half the chat on both Wagyu's stream and Lac's had been nothing but the military.
Wagyu was shipping out at the end of the month. Lac was enlisting in November.
KingAnt, an acquaintance of ours, happened to be due out on his regular leave as a private first class, so we'd been messaging back and forth and sketched the outline of the segment ahead of time. And for the final stroke—the eyes painted onto the dragon—they'd brought me in.
From my very first broadcast I'd billed myself as a fourth-year reservist, and I'd made a name as the woman streamer who knew the army to a suspicious degree, so the viewers' response was nothing short of explosive.
"What."
I asked it without sitting up, just turning my head a fraction, the very picture of someone who could not be bothered.
Lac and Wagyu were acting out a pair of privates wound tight with nerves. By the scenario, Wagyu belonged to our barracks room, and Lac to the one next door.
"Permission to run to the PX with Wagyu, Sergeant?"
"Ha? The PX? Two privates, together?"
Unbelievable. They could preach advanced barracks all they liked—since when was it acceptable for privates to stroll off to the PX on their own?
Back in my day, hello? Until I made PFC, the PX didn't even exist in my head!
Saying so myself, though, would dent a sergeant's dignity, so I flicked a look at KingAnt. Handle it.
He nodded like he understood, dropped the locked-up posture, and got to his feet. Then he planted himself in front of Lac and Wagyu and blew up.
"Have you all lost your minds as a unit?! Huh? Privates going to the PX—does that even sound like words to you?"
"I—I'm sorry!"
"Th-the guys from our enlistment group in Room Three said they'd already been..."
"Ha. You two assigned to Room Three? Huh? Want me to transfer you over there for good? Not a scrap of common sense between you. Complete washouts, the both of you."
Lines with the grit of a real, serving PFC. Impressive.
Lac and Wagyu trembled through the act, and I watched the whole thing with a thoroughly unimpressed face.
The manager, who'd been watching the chat, quietly formed an OK with his fingers. Seeing that, KingAnt raised his voice even higher.
"PX is for PFCs. The cyber room is for PFCs. The gym starts at corporal. I say it once, you remember it. Huh? You can't memorize this?"
"N-no, sir!"
"I'm sorry!"
"Sorry ends your service, does it? Huh? And Wagyu, your rifle rack's been a disaster lately. Shovel down lunch and the first thing you think about is resting. Yeah? Not one thought of wringing out a rag and wiping every corner of that rack. Starting today, how about I start inspecting the cleaning?"
KingAnt stepped up to the rifle rack—something we'd thrown together out of plastic in the middle of the room—and the prop rifles, dragged a fingertip through an imaginary film of dust, and his face went hard.
"Hey. Hey. Look at this dust. You privates these days have it easy, don't you? Trash the cleaning, think about the PX, and spend every single day dreaming up new ways to play the seniors. Isn't that right?"
"No, sir!"
"I-I'll wipe it right now!"
"Hey, hey, ease up. Keep that going and you'll actually kill them."
I made a show of holding KingAnt back and beckoned Lac and Wagyu over with a wave. He retreated, looking awkward, and the two of them hurried in like they might break into a run.
"Yeah, yeah. Our little youngest... and the youngest from next door. You wanted the PX that badly?"
"No, sir. I'm sorry!"
I sat up. Then, as if to say there was nothing to worry about, I gave each of them a light pat on the shoulder, and asked.
"Either of you got a pretty little sister in the family? Or an older one?"
"......"
What followed was even more of a spectacle.
PFC KingAnt, instructing them in army songs. Lac showed off the full glory of his tone-deafness, and Wagyu sang the military song like a ballad. All of it, of course, staged to make the viewers laugh.
A baptism of chewing-out poured down over both their heads. Once again I cut it off at a reasonable point and called the two of them in close.
"A cool older guy, then? Or a fresh younger one?"
"......"
From there the skit kept rolling on the same concept. Lac and Wagyu displayed every shade of washout, KingAnt tore into them, and I cut in at just the right moment to spin the whole thing into a gag.
The mood shifted when we covered the screen for a short break and then revealed everyone again.
A blazing red drill-instructor cap and jacket, the kind that trips every instinct a man who has served still carries in his bones. The fact that I was still wearing a mask in the middle of it only infuriated the viewers further, but anyway—transformed into a drill instructor, I stood in front of all of them.
The three of them sat there with faces as bleak as if the world had ended. This time KingAnt was on the receiving end too.
I smiled behind the mask and spoke.
This was the highlight of everything we'd prepared.
We'd worked hard on the skit, but its limits were obvious. Most of it was military material, so anyone who hadn't served struggled to follow, and customs and petty abuses differ by unit—and by whether you served up front or in the rear—so there were stretches where empathy simply would not land.
Which was why I'd put this part in.
I, the instructor, would throw nasty little questions, and the three of them would answer. Then we'd check the viewers.
An answer they liked would sail through on goodwill. A sloppy one that killed the mood would be punished on the spot. The three of them had already tasted PT exercise eight during rehearsal, so the gloom on their faces was not for nothing.
The first question was aimed at Wagyu.
"This instructor is not a bad person. So perform well, and do not turn this instructor into a bad person."
"This instructor made one promise back during the Blame Game. If you carried, I would come visit. So I ask. Trainee Wagyu—do you believe you carried even a single game?"
"...Y-yes, sir!"
"Oh-ho."
He wrestled with himself for a second, then squeezed his eyes shut and shouted it. The manager shook his head and relayed what the chat was doing.
"Noooooo!"
No further comment was necessary. I shook my head, firm.
"PT eight, full-body twist—ready!"
"R-ready..."
"That voice is too small! Keep that up and this instructor can no longer remain a kind person. Is that acceptable?"
"Ready!"
"Head up. Head up, eyes on the belt. Do not let those legs come down! We start with five. How many to start?"
"F-five..."
"Voice is small. Seven."
"Seven!!!"
"Seven, begin!"
"One, two, three, one!"
I left Wagyu grinding his teeth and twisting, and stepped in front of KingAnt. Watching Wagyu suffer, he seemed to remember something from a few days ago; the color drained out of his face.
I asked, wearing a wicked smile.
"Trainee. You will answer honestly."
"Yes, understood!"
Locked in. Full of spirit. At this kind of tension, the odds were high he'd spit the truth without dodging, hot and clean.
"Trainee, you have met this instructor several times recently. And every so often you get those flounder eyes. Speak honestly. Did you look at this instructor's chest, or did you not!"
"...!"
KingAnt's gaze flicked between the camera and Wagyu, who was panting and kicking his legs, and in the end he squeezed his eyes shut and yelled.
"I—I looked!"
The chat's verdict was favorable. I confirmed the manager's OK and clicked my tongue, disappointed.
"This instructor rates an honest answer highly. One light lap of the living room, duck walk. Execute!"
"E-execute!"
KingAnt dropped into a crouch with the face of a man who had just survived and started duck-walking. The viewers cackled at the sight.
"......"
"Trainee. Front and center, before this instructor."
Lac, wound tight with nerves.
Easy, easy. This isn't even a real army—what's there to be so tense about?
Seeing him gone a little stiff, I suddenly remembered the hidden-camera bit we'd run on him. He'd mistaken me for Mia, gotten thoroughly flustered by the confession-adjacent atmosphere that followed... and then, at the end, taken the conversation seriously anyway.
So I asked, in a mischievous voice.
"This instructor has a question. Trainee—do you, as a man, have feelings for Mia?"
I was close with both Lac and Mia, so I was rather looking forward to the answer. What would Lac say? The truth? Or something that showed off that variety-show instinct of his?
"No. I think of Mia as a close younger sibling."
"Eh?"
The answer was so much sharper, so much more clean-cut than I'd expected, that I was the one who got flustered and let a weird sound slip out. The chat, likewise, went up in flames. Most of them refused to believe it.
So, to salvage the mood, I had no choice but to throw in a follow-up.
"Th-then is there a woman you do have feelings for? This instructor hates lies. Very much."
"......"
Lac didn't answer. He just looked at me. For longer than I'd expected.
And in that deep gaze, I saw the truth.