[Verse 1]
Day one of training
The boots arrived first
Every crew member — one pair
Standard issue, combat weight
Cygnus picked his up
“These are not—”
“They are”
“But they are not—”
“They are, Cygnus”
“I cannot dance in these”
“You are not training to dance”
“I am ALWAYS training to dance”
[Pre-Chorus]
Twenty-nine crew members
Five pairings
One month
To make it work
[Chorus]
Boots and camps — one month to go
Boots and camps — we are making this work
Somehow somehow
Through every wrong read
Every unanswered question
Every fold and every soup
Somehow somehow — we are making this work
[CYGNUS + BROME]
Cygnus demonstrated proper form
Brome clapped to encourage
The floor did not survive the clap
“That was not the wall I needed”
“I was encouraging”
“The floor is gone, Brome”
“I will encourage more quietly”
[one wall falls gently]
“That was quiet”
[THRESH + SOLVREN]
“What are the conditions for success today”
“Excellent or structural damage”
“Those are two conditions”
“How close to excellent”
“Sixty percent”
[long pause]
“I can work with sixty percent”
“I thought you might”
[LORN + CROTUS]
“Something more interesting is happening in Fold 7”
“I asked about the food”
“The chicken in Fold 7 has more context”
“WHAT IS IN FOLD 7”
Cygnus: [from across the camp] “WHAT DID THEY DO ABOUT THE BOOTS”
“I cannot bring you there”
The chicken burned
Lorn was already watching Fold 9
[MIRA + PERSY]
“I saw this coming”
“So did I,” said Persy
“You didn’t”
“I have the feeling I was right”
“That is not data”
“It has failed you fourteen times”
“In how many attempts”
“Fifteen”
“That is a ninety-three percent success rate”
[VAEL + CHAOS]
“Are we starting?”
Chaos: “We are not” [they were]
“Is this the formation?”
“It is” [it was not]
“Is this better?”
“…it is worse”
“Should we call that progress?”
“Yes”
[it was not the right call]
[Bridge]
Twenty-nine days in
Brome stood still for three seconds
Thresh accepted the sixty percent
Lorn gave Fold 7 updates in advance
Mira warned slightly less than three minutes late
Chaos and Vael stopped getting worse
And Cygnus learned to dance
In the boots
[Final Chorus]
Boots and camps — one month done
Boots and camps — we made it work
Somehow somehow…
[Outro]
Cygnus looked at the boots
He would never say they were good boots
But he put them on
The warp gate was ready
Level 280 ahead
He danced
The march step
Boots and all