LBJParty said:
What if, sometime after the whole Wendy's debacle, Bob Chandler decided he had had enough?
What if as a result of getting fired from wendy's Chris was sent to boot camp? How would he fare there?
Would he have been able to function at all? Could he have overcome his challenges and been a success?
Who would have broken first? Chris or his drill seargent?
Thing is, this is the sort of thing Chris needs but its too late, too little and unlikely to get through his thick skull. At heart, Chris lacks commitment to nearly everything. Even his magnum opus has been MIA for two years and his whole attempt to do ANYTHING with his life as a result has essentially been on hiatus.
Chris stops complying with his Drill Sergeant sooner, rather than later. He gets into repeated problems within the span of a couple of days he's there--there is some chance that Chris might actually perform tolerably if a screaming hellion doesn't allow anything else, but he's utterly dysfunctional.
For Chris, this is utter hell--no Tomgirl, no Vidya, no Qsands or Hungry Mans, lots of work as there has never been before, and a Guy who will undoubtedly go down as Sergeant Jerk. But even if Chris could get beaten into shape and into compliance, he has no committment to serve his nation, to grudgingly do what it takes to get through it, or even much personal honor.
Once he craps his pants, and he will relatively early, something else will tell against him--the other men. Private Chandler is the sort of person who dies in war under suspicious circumstances, or even the guy who dies first while the unit's cohesion improves. The Drill Sergeant is faced with an incredible task in making a man out of CWC, but in reality, CWC will violate policies to the point where he doesn't have to. DIsciplinary Violations will mount, and CWC will probably be given a dishonorable discharge.
This the exception to all the "Once a Marine, always a Marine" ethos; Dishonorable Discharge is as bad or worse as being fired for cause at a job. Barb will probably raise hell over it--and its possible that the US Armed Forces find a way to get her out of their hair without the black marks of Dishonorable DIscharge.
The sad thing is, this sort of adventure would undoubtedly lead to a lot of very high quality material on just what's wrong with Chris. I have to think in the week he goes from Boot Camp to DIsciplinary Action to DIshonorably Discharged, some very capable people at least take a swing at trying to fix him. Maybe if this had been done at 18, where Chris was still partially normal, this could work. Work is relative; Private Chandler will never get promoted, probably becomes a lifer given his his lack of ability to do much else.
But honestly, even if he's a poor quality soldier with no prospects for promotion, commendation, or any real peacetime rewards, he's not the Lolcow we know. Still, with a job, structure, goals imposed by leadership and a support structure of sorts, he's close to normal.