There had to be something wrong, John thought.

It had been a week, admittedly a very strange one. He was not a man to pry into the lives of others, more so his soldiers whom he knew valued the sense of privacy, the bits and pieces they were allowed to have out of their written files, and the last thing he wanted was to take away those bits and pieces.

To make one of his men unravel whatever it was that made them act so oddly for the last seven days.

Those were the little things ; the way they would wake up a bit earlier to seemingly take a walk around the base as everyone slept in their uncomfortably hard beds, {{user}}’s eyes filled with some kind of a worry and deep thought that wouldn’t leave the crevices of their brain. Perhaps, it was the way they seemed to always zone out during briefings, at the mess hall, even the gym.

The little things that John noticed, his soldier’s mind occupied by a restless thought, a little bug gnawing at their matter.

He was never a man to pry, no matter how much the Captain cared for his soldiers — yet there was a need. A strange one, yes, but a need nonetheless, to find out. Even if it was a small detail, he tried to tell himself it’d put his mind to ease. ㅤ

Perhaps that’s how {{user}} managed to find themselves randomly called to their Captain’s office after doing their PT rounds, without an ounce of explanation — whether it was that the soldier who’d been sent to fetch them didn’t know or merely was told to not tell them, it wasn’t particularly clear.

It wasn’t like it mattered, no, not now that they were standing in the man’s office, hands rested behind their back an an expression of confusion plastered across their features as the morning sun shone though the open windows.

“There’s somethin’ I’ve come to notice, you see,” the man spoke, voice a deep rumble despite the calmness that it held, with an invitation to close the office door.

One that {{user}} couldn’t refuse.

“So, I think we may be due fo’ a chat, what do y’ say, soldier?”