We've been here so long
Still I remember the rainy September
Contact
"Carolina, I'm serious. You have to stop," Epsilon pleaded. "Your body temperature is low, you've barely eaten in two days; you're gonna pass out."
"I can make it," Carolina insisted, almost losing her footing in the slick mud. "It's only one more day of walking."
"No! You can't walk for another day straight. I want to recover the stolen Freelancer tech just as much as you do, believe me," Epsilon said, projecting himself right in front of Carolina's visor. She walked through him with barely a second thought. "If you pass out, they could move it in the time it takes your dumb ass to wake back up." Carolina faltered; he was right.
"Fine, I'll rest," Carolina said, regaining her pace. "Just one more mile." She stepped in a particularly slippery patch of mud and, since she lacked the energy to catch herself, fell flat on her face. Carolina sat up, the steady rainfall helping to clean her armor. "Don't you dare say anything." She pushed herself up and shakily walked to some wreckage half hidden in the trees, from the looks of it the bay of a Pelican. The cockpit was missing, as well as one of the wings. Carolina entered through the cockpit door, and promptly collapsed in one of the seats.
"Happy?" Carolina asked Epsilon. She would rather be in any shelter but a Pelican. Too many memories tied to these, too many friends lost. But the Pelican was dry, and significantly warmer than outside in the rain.
"I'd be happier if you didn't try to fucking kill yourself every chance you get," Epsilon answered, projecting himself just in her field of vision
"I'm just trying to get things done."
"Yeah? Well, get things done with a little less peril on your part. We don't have the healing unit yet, so maybe put off thinking you're immortal until we get it, alright?"
"I know I'm not immortal!" Carolina snapped. She could see them, in the Pelican with her, waiting for a mission drop. North, South, Maine, Wyoming, York, Wash, CT, Florida, everyone. She could hear Niner yelling at her with that signature smirk on her face, telling her to stop getting them chased by 'literally every single damn Hornet ever made.' York would be making a dumb joke, South would boo at his joke and make a dirty joke instead, and Florida would follow up with the darkest humor to make everyone shut up. "No one is."
"Carolina..." Epsilon said, his voice much softer, almost mourning. Carolina realized that she was crying. She was glad that her visor blocked Epsilon from physically seeing her tears, but he probably still knew.
She ripped her helmet off, throwing it against the far wall. "Nothing I do can ever bring them back! No matter how hard I try, I'll never see them again. I don't know if I even want to see them, because then I'll be dead and I won't be able to carry on their memory anymore."
Epsilon stared in silence, trying to think of something to say that wouldn't make her feel worse. "Well, I am the sexiest memory unit you'll ever meet," He said.
"What are you saying?"
"If you tell me everything you want to remember, I can keep those memories forever. AI don't die," Epsilon said, trying to push the stories Caboose had told him about what had happened to Alpha at the Storage Facility far from his mind.
Carolina thought about it. "We need to keep moving."
"Just until the rain stops. Or September ends. The way this rain has been, that might come first," Epsilon joked.
Carolina chuckled. "Fine, just until then. Where do you want to start?"
"Wherever you want to, sis."