Up yours, SIR!

"I'm pretty sure they weren't even sure what rank to give you and threw Captain out because it sounded good and would get people to listen." Because her entire career had ended at 'Captain' and she'd been responsible for a hell of a lot more as a Captain than they ever had. Chorus was a little... Loose with the rules, anyway. Honestly, after the population had degraded as much as it had, the rules didn't really work anymore.

Grif took his lighter out of his pocket, so that he had something to fidget with. "I did go to college before I got drafted. I was majoring in philosophy specifically because it was a useless degree and it would piss off my step-dad. Doubt I would have done anything with it if I actually finished that damn program.

"If it's anything like being an officer, it's a lot of organization and quietly wondering how the people around you can continue to lower your bar for what the average human intelligence is. Yes, the meetings could have been an email, but some people don't know how to read, and a meeting sure beats chasing everybody down individually to make sure they heard what's going on." She was so happy she got to work in the field more than many of her fellow officers; the whole thing was a headache, at best.

He waved finger guns in her direction, "And that's why I never wanted to aspire to actually being an officer. Captain is already too high on the chain of command." At least the Rebels were in dire enough straits that the office side of being an officer wasn't a priority.

There's a long, drawn out, put-upon sigh. God dammit, he's right. After a moment of silence, plopping his head back on the ground, he finally spoke up.

It really didn't matter whether she agreed to that or not, honestly. The fact of the matter is, what's done was done; they can't really go back and change that, now can they? But she would sit with the thought for a moment, gaze now to the floor, hands folded in her lap, almost as if out of some weird kind of respect.

Now they were drifting back into the realm of science fiction. He could work with that. "God, could you imagine that universe's Sarge working a corporate job? Answering emails, and... I actually have no fucking clue what an office job does besides 'email' and 'meetings that could have been emails.'"

"I would argue that they were exceptionally picky. Just with... Nonstandard criteria." But she got what he was saying, at least.

"As fucked as it is to say it, the Sim Trooper program probably had a bigger effect on the War than we realize. It got dumb assholes like me off the battlefield." Lives were certainly saved by removing battle-addled old men like Sarge from the fight, or innocent dumbasses like Donut.

Church didn't respond at first, merely lifting his head so Grif could clearly see the glower being shot his way.

Carolina's no fool; she knows the question's there. What did she do? She knew that the Reds and Blues (rightfully) saw the freelancers with a healthy dose of skepticism, to put it mildly, and she liked to think she'd more or less won them over- though there was definitely still some friction there.

"That's a very flowery way to say that Freelancer wasn't super picky when it came to who they hired," Grif snorted. "That certainly explains some of the stories I'd heard from other bases." He was mostly thinking of Rat's Nest when he and Simmons had briefly been transferred out. The Freelancer who'd actually used the Sim Troopers for training had certainly left an impression.

"Ugh..."

Carolina spent a long moment- almost awkwardly long- quiet, turning what he said, and how he said it, over in her mind, before ultimately opting to, for the most part, not press the matter, except to properly turn her gaze back his way, as if appraising him momentarily, before, for the first time this conversation, taking a somewhat heavy seat. If he wanted to talk about it, he would, but she got the impression that he didn't. She might flag it for later, though- She had a feeling he would need to talk about it, eventually. Just maybe not right now.

If Grif had his druthers, that part of his life would stay a black box in history. There were not many things that he felt shame over, especially not now, but his disastrous first real deployment still corrosively ate at him. It was a demon that he refused to try and excise; he hadn't earned that yet. Perhaps he wouldn't ever.

For once, Grif seemed not to have anything ready to say. He opened his mouth and quickly closed it with a hum. Reluctantly, he said. "I... might have had one deployment before I got shuffled into the Sim Trooper program. It... went badly.

"He's either first one dead or last one alive and I feel like there's no in the middle." She seemed happy enough to change subjects, at least. If there's one thing Grif did well, it's that he knew when to back away from the grizzly combat stories- though, honestly, sometimes she actually liked telling them. It's not like people got to see most of her coolest moments. At least, not people who usually made it to the other side of them. She's a performer at heart, honestly.

"Sarge is one of the few people I've met who's more or less exactly what he says he is on the tin." Grif shrugged. "He's a crazy old redneck who's been in the army too long." Even though he was rolling his eyes, and had his mouth pulled down into a disapproving frown, there was a note of fondness in his voice.

"I can confirm that cooked flesh sure smells like pork." Not that that was a particularly fond memory, thank you, but when your enemy- like, actual alien enemy- fights with weapons that cook flesh, you learn the smell pretty damn fast. Not that she spent a lot of her career fighting actual aliens; a waste, honestly. Though... Realistically, she'd probably be dead if she'd ever actually made it to the front lines.

"You got it," Grif nodded, and made a note to get some stiff apple juice for the occasion. He'd learned from Locus that any gift of Felix's required something to chase it.

"I'm a little hurt. I would have hoped that the strength of my moral conviction would have gotten through by now." Though... It's not like they'd talked a lot about her battlefield principals, and, frankly, he'd met her at her absolute lowest point- though she would have hoped he'd have figured that out by now. At least that was enough buffer for her to reset, though she had to avert her gaze again lest she think about it again.

"What are you- Ew. What the heck?" That came out before she could formulate a more nuanced response, her gaze suddenly sharply on him rather than straying out the door, a revulsion quickly overtaking her usually very mild and neutral expression.

Grif only just managed to cough before it came out as a startled laugh. Carolina was notoriously hard to get a rise out of, and he never would have expected that.

"I think you need to give yourself a little more credit, but... That's just my take." Lina shrugged, crossing her arms over her chest and glancing out of the room- not because she wanted to leave, mind, but because she wants to move- if the difference makes any sense. She gets antsy.

"Not so loud!" Grif's hand flapped as if to shoosh her, but there was a grin on his face. Carolina had put in the work; she'd earned the right to call him out. "If someone hears you, they might start expecting shit.