3

I don't think the kid realized he nearly died.

We were standing there in a giant mob, and we needed to smoke.  Smoking isn't only about chemical addiction, it's about control.  If I were to ask the powers that be for food, they'd tell me wait for meal time, if I ask for sleep, they'll tell me when I bed down, but if I look at them with a crazed and hungry look and ask where the smoking area is, they know they have only moments to acquiesce to my demands or die.  

Back in the States, I had headed out an hour before the flight to smoke... I had to exit security, leave the terminal, and sacrifice a small animal for this to happen.  Pigeon in hand, I walked towards the exit, only to be told by the TSA worker that I wasn't allowed to leave.  Now, I'll fuck with a bunch of people, because there's very little in the way of consequences right now that the military can inflict upon me without involving a lawyer.  But, I did realize this guys was TSA, and they're the new badasses of government sectors: be you an Air Force pilot or Navy Seal or Congressman, they're going to make you take your shoes off and let them take X-ray pictures of your junk.  So when the TSA guy told me I couldn't leave, I nodded meekly and went back to my seat.

End result?  Ten hours smoke free.  And we get herded into a holding room, and the one-striper who is trying to bring order to our chaos tells us to be quiet three times, and he'll "in-brief us when he's ready."  So we wait, and wait, trying to figure out what is more important than getting the sweet sweet nicotine into our veins.  Finally, after 15 minutes, he speaks.

"Hi, this is Airman Snuffy.  Welcome to Germany.  Your plane leaves in two and a half hours.  Please take 15 minutes, and then return to your seats.  There is no smoking in the terminal.  Thank you."

At this point, Airman Snuffy may only have moments to live.  Airman Snuffy is suddenly verbally accosted, surrounded, and told on no uncertain terms that we are going out to smoke, and if it takes to long he will hold the gate or we sacrifice him to Marlboro and smoke his ashes.

Half of us are intimidating Snuffy, the other half are searching frantically for a way out.  There appear to be no exits to this room... we came from the skyway, all the doors are locked.  Panic begins to seep in, followed by a steely determination.  We must escape.  We must.

"Where's the way out!" demands the crowd.  It is at this point Snuffy's poor mind works.  He stammers impotently, the situation has gotten out of control.

"Where's the way out," we demand again.  Snuffy searches frantically through his book.  It has two pages in the binder, both in document protectors, one of which is the speech he just gave in big block letters.  He looks at us with desperation.

"I don't know?"

"You don't know?"  I push my way through to the edge of the crowd.  "You don't know how to get out?"

"I don't know."

"You don't know if you don't know how to get out?  How did you get in here?"

"I don't know!"

"You don't know how you got in here?  Have you lived here all your life?  Have you never left?"

"I don't know..."

At this point the mob has pushed past him and is on the skyway.  We stalk through the terminal, the finest minds of our generation searching for an angry fix.  The exit is found, the information disperse rapidly throughout the crowd.

And Snuffy gets to live another day, to perhaps refine and improve his briefing.