Chapter 9: Rise and Shine

The sun arose casting a shadow halfway across the canyon. The alarms ringed in the bases and the soldiers one by one woke up. They all went about their morning routines and gathered by their respective base storage to fish out their breakfast. Since yesterday, not a word was spoken again about training, or about Church. Carolina had once again isolated herself, and this did not sit well with Washington as he was greatly concerned for her mental well being just like the rest of the crew.

The blues finished their breakfast. As always Caboose found out that feeding Freckles through the gun barrel still won't work, at least he hasn't lost his sense of…wonder, thought Wash. Tucker cleaned his tray and disposed of it in the nearby trash can. "How do we even manage to get rid of the trash here?"

Caboose and Washington looked towards the aqua soldier equally curious. No one had bothered bringing it up before. Normally they would just press the trash disposal button and it would go somewhere, but where? Wash rubbed his head against the question with no answer in sight. "Does the trash go into a dump somewhere for the UNSC to pick up later?"

"Beats me," Tucker replied with the shrug of his shoulders. He began to walk away only to be quickly stopped by the person walking into his view. "Carolina?"

Wash turned to look at the female soldier looking around the room. She sighted the breakfast trays and with slight embarrassment, as her stomach grumbled she asked. "Got anymore of those?"

"I will go get one," Wash answered finding this to be somewhat of an improvement. Carolina had yet to eat with them ever since landing back in Blood Gulch, at least that's one thing improving today. He came back with a warmed up tray and found her also chatting with the other two blue members. He walked by her gently setting the tray in front of her. "Eat up while it's still warm."

"Thanks," she opened up the case surrounding the tray. She removed her helmet and let the aroma of the breakfast sink in. It was military food, but it was as good as gourmet food out here. She dug her spoon into the oatmeal and let it slide down her mouth. It has been a while since I have had oatmeal. I never realized it tasted this good, she pondered noticing the other soldiers staring at her. "What?"

"Nothing," Wash replied quickly turning away. Tucker smirked under his helmet. "Yeah, it's just we never thought you could smile like that while eating food."

She was suddenly conscious and the smile quickly faded. Caboose jumped in his seat. "Aww man, that smile looked good on you Carolina. You should smile more often."

Caboose must have balls of steel to want to smooth talk Carolina like that, thought Tucker. Or a brain made completely of peanuts. Wash cleared his throat looking at the other two. "Gentlemen, I believe it's time to go to your posts."

"Actually," everyone looked at Carolina who rested her hand on her helmet. "I was wondering if you still have that training routine Wash?"

"Sure, but why?"

"I thought it would be nice for all of us to train together."

Everyone nearly choked on their own saliva. Tucker caught his breath from the coughs. "Carolina, you want to train now? What happened to 'no amount of training would help us'?"

"I thought about it," she began turning to look at Wash. "But I also finally understood that if I did nothing to try and accept Church's death, and move on in the process. Then I will never really move on. Maybe running away from training was just me running away from accepting Church's death."

Wash's mouth was agape in surprise, but it quickly turned to grinning. Now that's the head strong Carolina I know. Carolina turned to Caboose. "How about it Caboose? It could be fun."

"Okay!"

She looked towards Tucker and asked him to gather the rest of the crew together. She finished her breakfast in one go and stood up putting on her helmet. "I think it's time we finally all try our best to move on."

Within a matter of minutes, the whole crew was together. As soon as Carolina walked outside of the blue base, she was bombarded by Grif's question. "What's going on? I was having such a nice dream and then aqua boy here comes to ruin it."

"I thought we should give that training Wash worked hard on creating a try all together."

The reds and Doc looked at her both confused and suspicious. Sarge stepped forward asking. "What are you up to Carolina?"

"What am I up to indeed," she pondered out loud as Tucker shook his head. "Don't tell me that Wash's cryptic-ness has rubbed off on you."

She stood up in front of everyone and cleared her throat. "Before we do anything, I think I should set the record straight for all of our sakes. Yesterday we all went through some surprises and shocks, and we all agreed that training won't help us because it felt like we were trying to suppress the memory of Church's death instead of facing it. But maybe we were just looking at this the wrong way."

"What do you mean?" asked Doc.

"I mean that maybe we all disagreed to the training and instead went our separate ways because we were afraid to face what has been happening with us recently. Maybe we all decided to go our separate ways to hide in our holes and hope to never talk about our grief again. Maybe we were all just running away all this time, when we should have all banded together to help one another up from these times of sadness."

That does make sense, Doc conceded and acknowledged that he himself may have perhaps been running away as well. He didn't know Church as well, but he could feel the void in the crew. He could feel the grief of others which had a major impact on him.

Carolina looked all around her and decided to be open with her feelings. "Church was a close friend to all of us, I know that well. I don't know if he was at peace with his decision to sacrifice himself, but we know that his death has left a hole in our hearts that feels like it can never be filled again. But I also know that if Church saw us like this right now, then he would come back to just tell us to quit our bitching and do what we do best. And that is to make wise ass cracks and blow shit up."

She stopped a moment to imagine that scene in her head much to her amusement. With a small chuckle she continued. "So for his sake, we have to learn to move on. I know that if he were here right now, he would no doubt be very disappointed. He would want us all to get back to our usual selves, to stand around talking like usual and occasionally kicking ass."

Washington stepped forward and agreed to that sentiment. "She is right, you guys are strong. From experience I can tell you that as a fact. You have all been through hell and back again many times. Everytime the odds seemed to be against you, you all always managed to prove everyone wrong and strike back hard. Now that we are at our weakest, we should be standing together as one instead of disbanding. We should help one another up to once again become strong. We should show the respect Church's sacrifice deserves. We should show that his faith in his sacrifice was not misplaced, and that the warriors still stand strong and united."

The whole crew remained silent in awe struck at the speech. Donut then spoke up after looking at the rest. "You know what, that doesn't sound so bad."

"Yeah, I agree," said Simmons feeling a new sense of growing purpose to help fill that void. They all felt this purpose, it was the purpose to stand together and help one another out of these tough times. Sarge chuckled audibly. "I guess being sad and miserable was just getting old anyways."

"Oh man I love this. I love how you guys are banding together as a team!" exclaimed Doc with Caboose cheering in the background. "Now we can all sit down for milk and cookies together!"

Wash looked all around to see their spirits rising back up again and nodded his head. He nudged at Carolina's shoulder saying. "Great job, I think we will all be just fine now."

"Thanks, but don't thank just me. They are all strong after all; they just needed a little push, just like me."

Wash grinned under his helmet now looking forward to the day with a much more positive outlook than he had before.