34

Kipp woke up with a jerk, his hands quickly balling into fists underneath his pillow. He knew sleeping on his stomach wasn't good for his back, but he couldn't sleep otherwise in another position. The months he'd spent sleeping in engineering hadn't done him any favors. In the semi-silence of his room, his ears heard the phantom roaring from the generators. He felt vibrations that weren't there and found himself rubbing his hands on his coveralls that were already clean.

And now it came into question of why he was awake. It was some of the best sleep he'd gotten. His head was spinning from the sudden awakening. He felt sick to his stomach. And then there was the incessant calling of his name. Was it a bad dream? The voice was male yet synthesized, and he could faintly see soft sapphire light against the wall.

Kipp turned over and rubbed his eyes. His vision cleared to see DEV floating just before his face.

A stream of data scrolled down the AI's screen before a white acknowledgment light winked on. "Mr. Brody."

Kipp grumbled and sat up. "What the hell, DEV? I'm trying to get some zen-level sleep here."

"Apologies for terminating your rest, but Captain Anderton has dispatched me to inform you that you're to report to CIC immediately."

"W-what time is it?"

"06:21 hours. Please arrive by 07:00."

Kipp swung his legs out of bed. What did Rey possibly want with him now? They had shifts now to babysit the generators. So unless something went south, there was no need to bother him. Immediately? If it was another update meeting of the camp's resource situation, he wouldn't hesitate to leave on the spot.

"Yeah, fine. Whatever." Kipp slipped into his coveralls and stomped into his boots. "I'm coming."

He hated the walk to CIC. While it only took a few minutes, it gave way to too many opportunities to be social. They rarely spoke to him, outside of a quick greeting. He was busy enough as it was; there was no time for the criminal small talk that grated his nerves. But now it seemed things were different. The corridors were mostly clear and people seemed to avoid each other. He'd heard whispers about some respiratory bug going around, but it didn't bother him in engineering. The irony was humorous. The moment he was able to sleep in a real bed came with the threat of getting sick. A miraculous tradeoff.

His stomach growled, instantly regretting not stopping by the mess hall before going directly to CIC. He hadn't missed breakfast yet, but from the so-called urgency that DEV reported, his appetite would have to wait.

The doors to CIC were ahead of him now, parting open when the sensors detected him. It was the usual suspects inside, from what he initially noticed. Captain Anderton, Astrid, Damon, Aaron, Naomi, Jacen, Briggs for some reason, and…

"What the hell is she doing here?"

Jasmine waved. "Hey, Kipp."

"No, no, and hell no! You should be dead, like really dead."

Rey began walking towards Kipp, hands raised at shoulder height. "Look, I know this is crazy…"

Kipp backed up as he shook his head rapidly. Juggling grenades was crazy; shooting blindfolded was crazy; pouring milk before the cereal was crazy, but what he was seeing catapulted over those and then some. In what alternate reality was this even a possibility. He saw her walk out of the camp at gunpoint with the rest of them. There was no surviving out there, not with what they'd given them. Kipp felt inverted.

"Crazy doesn't even begin to justify this. Am I seeing ghosts or something? Is she a hologram?"

Rey set his hand on Kipp's shoulder, craning his neck low to look up into his downcast face. "She's alive and she's here. It's a long story but we'll tell you everything."

Kipp took the news better than he expected. He was neither excited nor disappointed. Maybe it was the emotional scar tissue he'd accumulated over the years that made the news more palpable than usual. Covenant. Secret ONI site. A Pelican with a super radio. All too good to be true, it seemed. What scared Kipp the most is that Rey was taken in by it. Had the man become so desperate that he was willing to believe an innie that tried to kill him not too long ago?

"I'm all for looking for various methods to get outta here, but listening to anything she has to say is either a trap or a plain lie."

"I agree," Aaron said. "What are we even discussing here? We can't stand here and honestly, think what she said has any validity. There's no evidence, only her word. And there ain't no way in hell I'm believing that."

"Polanski makes plenty of sense and that makes me sick to admit that," Naomi added. She looked at Jasmine as she spoke further. "We can't trust her."

"I'm not lying to you." Jasmine stood up. "Look, you have no reason to trust me. You view me as your enemy, I get it. But it wasn't my idea for things to unravel the way they did. I made a bad call trusting someone like Quinn. I can admit that. Nevertheless, we have a real opportunity to leave this place. If you're gonna kill me, then kill me; but don't waste this chance. This may be your last one."

No one said a word after she spoke, quietly deliberating within themselves on the legitimacy of her words. For Naomi and Aaron, it went in one ear and out the other without a moment to process it. Her words were as hollow as the heart she claimed to have.

Rey remained steady, refusing to buy into his immediate distrust. Emotions tended to fog the judgment of even the most logical circumstances. Then again, there was nothing about this situation that wasn't touched by some type of emotion. To ignore it completely was impossible.

"Thanks for your testimonial," Rey said. He nodded to Briggs. "Nathan, please escort Ms. Lang to the holding room with the boy. I'll check in later."

"Sure thing." Briggs marched over to Jasmine, the 6'3" behemoth taking her by her arms and securing them behind her back with zip ties. He leaned forward to her ear with a low tone. "Best behavior now. Give me a reason and I'll smash the teeth outta your skull. Now move!"

Briggs gave Jasmine a small shove in the back and guided her out the room, giving a glare to Jacen before he exited. The door was barely shut before Aaron voiced his additional opinions.

"Captain, I hope you're not serious about this. This is nothing but a ploy to get us off-balance, to pull the attention off of her and have us looking in another direction while she plans another strike."

"Well, that's why we're all here, Aaron," Rey replied, "to judge whether or not that's the case."

Aaron sucked his teeth. "It is the case and we can close it."

"If it's untrue, it's incredibly elaborate, almost unnecessarily so," Astrid said. "While I'm not a fan of believing a single word from her, it's telling that she was willing to risk everything to return here. It seems she had a comfortable life in the Selk camp before it was attacked. Allegedly. Why not settle for a simpler lie? That's all I'm saying."

"She is dishonest, " Jacen spoke. "It's the nature of where she came from. It's how you survived. There's no benefit for her lying about something like this."

Aaron folded his arms, staring straight ahead without making eye contact with anyone. "Is that you talking or your dick? Sorry, Pearce, but I don't think you can be objective here."

"Eat sh*t, Aaron," Jacen said in an even tone.

"She was your girl. If you know her so well, then tell us why she turned and tried to kill us?"

Jacen prepared to take a step, but Naomi placed her hand on his chest and slowly shook her head.

"Take your beef and eat it," Rey intervened. "This ain't the time."

Kipp sheepishly waved his hand just above his shoulders, garnering the attention of the Captain and Astrid. "Yeah, hello. Um, if there's another element of the Covenant on this moon, why are they just now making a move against us? They've had plenty of time."

"Desperation maybe," Astrid said. "Even before we lost communication with the other camps, we knew there had to be more Covenant here. The Unggoy stragglers were just pieces left behind from where the rest possibly settled. We know for a fact one of their ships crash-landed here shortly after we arrived here. The location of where it crashed is still unknown."

Naomi blinked a few times to get her thoughts straight. "Shouldn't we have known about this from the start? All of us have lived under the belief that the Grunts were just abandoned here like the rest of us. Now you're saying there's more Covenant out there?"

Rey cleared his throat. "It wasn't your business to know at the time. If these Covenant stragglers are as desperate as we are to survive, then it's no surprise that they'd start attacking us."

"It wasn't our business?" Naomi muttered an expletive under her breath. "We're basically your army. We had a right to know."

"As of now you are," Rey said. "Beforehand, you were all just displaced civilians under our protection. There was no need to concern you with news of more Covenant being here. People are scared enough as it is."

Aaron ran his hands down his face with an elongated grumble. "I'm more pissed that Jasmine may be right than the Covenant attacking other camps."

"You should be more concerned about the latter," Astrid said. "We could very well be the next target."

Aaron gave a dismissive wave and eyed the Captain. "Or this could very well be a tactic to lure us away for a second chance to put a bullet in you. And still no whereabouts for Quinn. Did he survive the attack or not? She never said and we didn't ask. He could be hiding under our noses like she was."

Damon let out a guttural sigh. "Are we going to keep talking in circles or are we going to do something about this? All I keep hearing are opinions, not solutions. We don't trust Jasmine. That's been clearly established. We either check to see if she's right or just bury it and move on to something else. That said, I say we should take a look."

Rey looked over at Damon with a blank expression, but there was relief behind his eyes. "I agree with Corporal Vasher. If there is even a 10% chance Lang was telling the truth, it could mean the end of this nightmare."

"Or the start of a new one," Jacen commented. "If this is true, this small Covenant group steamrolled an entire UNSC camp. They didn't experience an uprising like us, so I imagine they were at full strength. That doesn't exactly bode well for us."

"And that surprises you?" Rey walked to the middle of the room, resting his fists on the oval table made of peeling synthetic wood. "A small Covenant force can decimate an entire platoon of marines. I've seen it more times than I'd like. And the type of species that she allegedly encountered, well, complicates things."

"Then what's the verdict?" Damon came up beside Rey, hands on his hips and staring at the profile of his superior. "It's your call."

Rey didn't answer immediately, not yet. To accept or decline could damn them either way. To accept would mean putting the lives of his people in jeopardy to confirm or deny the claims of an idealistic rebel with venom and contempt in her heart for him and those who wore the uniform. And to reject risked closing the door on a prime opportunity, while possibly opening another to a new and more dangerous threat. He didn't know how many more lives his conscience could bear endangering or losing completely. Damned if he did, damned if he didn't.

"We investigate Jasmine's claims," he decided. "But I'm not throwing all of our manpower into this. We'll send scouts. Two volunteers. We can't waste valuable resources on what could be a fool's errand."

The gravity of silence was weighty. It was no surprise to the Captain. In the minutes of dead air, Damon spoke first.

"I'll do it. I'll go."

The Captain nodded approvingly at his subordinate before sweeping his eyes across the others. "Anyone else?"

Kipp waved both of his hands. "You might as well not even look in my direction."

"Yeah, I think we already knew that, to begin with," Naomi laughed. Her tone switched, flat and serious. "Sorry, Rey. I'm not game for this."

"I understand," Rey said. "Aaron?"

Aaron paused from lighting his second to the last cigarette. He pulled it from his lips, delicately holding it between his fingers. A terse laugh vented from his throat as he shook his head. "With respect, Captain, f*k no. I'm not risking my neck for something like this. More power to you, Damon, but it's an unnecessary risk."

"I'll go with you," Jacen said.

Aaron laughed through sealed lips as he lit his cigarette. He exhaled after a drag with a smirk. "That's right, Pearce, stand by your woman. Trust and loyalty. The foundation of every innie relationship."

"Dios mío, shut the hell up, pendejo!" Naomi snapped. "Joder!"

She gave Jacen an I'll-talk-to-you-later type of glare and looked away.

"Lock it down, all of you!" Rey exhaled and refocused. "Vasher, Pearce, thanks for stepping up. Understand that this is strictly recon only. If you encounter enemy contacts, do not engage. Fall back, retreat, and hustle back here. But herein lies the obstacle: the AI. According to Jasmine, Captain Ross shut the AI down to protect it, but it means you'll need to find it and bring it here for DEV to access. The camp's CIC would be a good place to start. DEV will send you the schematics."

Damon shrugged. "And what exactly should I be looking for once we're inside?"

"A memory matrix," Rey said. "It's a housing unit to transport AIs. You'll need credentials that only Captain Ross knows to access it, but being that she's most likely dead, DEV has something for that."

A flexing arm image of crude pixels flashed across DEV's screen. "Brute force! A coding algorithm that will remove the security protocols in place."

"And it's guaranteed to work?" Jacen asked.

DEV's screen went blank. "It's guaranteed to try. Best of luck."

"That… is extremely disconcerting," Damon sighed.

"This will be a daring journey," Astrid said. She walked to the middle of the room, accessing the podium that projected an ever-present hologram of Titan. A few pecks on the screen to her datapad that never seemed to leave her hands brought up the projection of a map the surface with red markers over specific locations. She pointed to the red marker just outside the Soi crater and then another southwest.

"We are here. West Camp is there in Selk. By vehicle, it's roughly 10 to 12 hours, and with our only vehicle being the M18 at this point, maybe 13. Even with a full fuel tank, it won't be enough for there and back. Like Jasmine, you'll need to stop at the supply depot to refuel."

"It might be a good idea to see what you can find there to bring back," Rey added. "Every little bit helps."

"Right." Astrid continued. "DEV will program the waypoint to the depot and West Camp in the M18's GPS. I do wish you two the best."

Jacen preferred if she'd kept that last bit to herself. They'd either find something or nothing, the former bearing the most weight of danger. It was the only way to know for sure, at this point. He didn't know what Damon was thinking. His willingness to volunteer was either bravado or desperation. Maybe it was a little bit of both.

"Prep your gear," Rey said. He looked across the faces of Aaron, Naomi, and Kipp. "Since the three of you declined, you are responsible for getting the M18 ready and stocked. Kipp, make sure she can make the trip. Aaron, get the fuel. Naomi, stock the supplies. Hustle up. You'll head out in 24 hours."