the war was in color

[It's been a day. Gene's showered, eaten, slept, and been told he's way behind everyone else, and he honestly has no idea what to do with that. None at all.

(Doesn't know what to do with the fact that he'd collapsed into his bed, in his room, in his house, which he hasn't seen in over a year either.)

But he's here to do a job, and it's not something he can fuck up, so he does his best to shove it all away, to remember the reason why he's here - Sniper got the Skipper - so after clocking out for a solid ten hours, he knows he's got to keep moving, get started, find ways to make this work.

Gene finds the comm on his bedside table after he's up and dressed in clean dungarees. It's more advanced and smaller than any radio he's ever seen, but he's not an idiot and it's not super complicated, so after some fiddling around and a little trial and error, he manages to click on the video feed, and... realizes he doesn't have a hell of a lot of idea what to say.

So the red headed young man in the fatigue green combat uniform looks a little wary, and tired, and maybe a little hollow around the eyes. He's still got scrapes and nicks on his face and neck, but he's clean for the first time in over a month, so really, he looks a hell of a lot better than he did yesterday.]

This is Private Eugene Sledge, United States Marine Corps. [His accent's definitely distinctly from south of the Mason-Dixon Line, even if he looks like he could be Dillon's twin brother.] The Admiral asked me to come on as a warden.

It was October of 1944 before I got here. I was with the 1st Marine Division on Peleliu. K/3/5. [He's not expecting that to mean much of anything to anyone, but he still says it because even after everything, he's still proud of his company and what they were fighting for.] I know I'm pretty far behind a lot of you. [Most of you, even, and it definitely shows in his expression how horrible that feels.

Mostly, it looks like shock.

But then it kind of filters out to be replaced by confusion and genuine interest (even if he still looks pretty dead around the eyes), because this is a problem he absolutely didn't expect encountering when he first agreed to come on board here.]

Is that gonna be a problem? I don't expect anyone to keep it all a secret from me, but- [Sledge draws a breath, like he's bracing himself for the inevitable.] I've gotta go back eventually.

[He's gotta go back to Peleliu sometime. Fuck.]