} / end program
Chorus
Pelican En Route to the Staff of Charon
1729 Hours CMT
The last words he'd said to Tucker echoed through his head, drowning out the whine of the Pelican's straining engines: "You're on your own."
Stupid, Wash chastised himself, butting his helmet once against the cockpit bulkhead. Why the fuck had he said that? He had wanted to prepare them for the fact that he wouldn't be there this time, that he couldn't help them, couldn't…. Fuck! It had sounded so final. He shouldn't have said that.
Then, after narrowly dodging more Mantises than he could count:
"Carolina, we need an extraction!"
"Roger that. We'll fire up a Pelican and be there in a few minutes."
"We… may not have a few minutes."
Then nothing.
"Can't this thing go any faster?" Wash pressed the pilot.
"Sorry, sir, we're already pushing the engines well past redline."
"Goddammit!" He slammed the heel of his gloved palm against the instrument panel and unbuckled. Pushing back from the copilot's console, he turned to find Carolina standing stiffly just aft of the cockpit. She was silent, her stare locked rigidly to him, her neck taught with worry.
Wash shared her unease. It wasn't just that Epsilon had failed to return her hails, or Tucker or Sarge his own. This was a different kind of worry, the kind deep-seated in both their bones, a fearful misgiving honed from years of combat experience and the painful loss of one too many friends.
Something was wrong.
Ducking his chin almost apologetically, Wash pushed past her and into the aft bay.
"Thtill nothing, thir," Jensen reported. She'd been trying, unsuccessfully, to raise Simmons on TEAMCOM.
"It's probably the hull plating," Bitters figured, offering his patented nonchalant shrug. Wash appreciated the attempt. Even he noticed it was half-hearted, the lieutenant's perpetually bored tone forced, a poor disguise for his own concern.
"Matthews?" Wash asked of Kimball, nodding toward the injured soldier and Dr. Grey who attended to him.
"He's — not exactly tough, but he'll survive," the general answered.
"I can help!" Matthews insisted from the back.
Wash pulled his lips into a thin line. He had far bigger issues to solve, namely how to board a Halberd-class destroyer as a decidedly unwelcome guest. He remembered the Staff of Charon from when she had ambushed the Mother of Invention at the UNSC scrap metal station. He also keenly remembered her turrets and was glad none of the crew had spotted their approach.
Which in itself was odd. He didn't like odd.
"Sixty seconds 'til rendezvous!" the pilot called from up front.
'Rendezvous' is an interesting choice of words, Wash mused. 'Rendezvous' implied the other party was expecting you. 'Rendezvous' implied the Staff was a friendly. 'Rendezvous' implied that their Pelican wouldn't splat against the hangar bay doors and kill them all — which was why Wash had hurriedly prepped a plan B. It was less than ideal. He glanced up at the blow pack of C-12 stashed in the overhead. They'd have to find a location on the destroyer's titanium hull that—
"Agent Carolina, Agent Washington," greeted a digital voice from the Pelican's PA system. "It is so very good to see you again!"
Wash's helmet tipped up toward the ceiling's speakers. "F.I.L.S.S.?"
"It has been some time, has it not? When I saw the Director I thought you might be close by."
"Epsilon," Carolina whispered to Wash, speaking for the first time since they'd dusted off.
"Saw him?" Wash queried. "Are you onboard the Staff of Charon?"
"Oh, yes! Forgive my thoughtlessness. I am contacting you via the Staff of Charon's short range radio system. A simple vibroacoustic analysis of your Pelican's hull matched both of your archived voiceprints. I am also detecting eight other unidentified individuals."
"Hi!" Palomo hailed, waving a hand at no one. "It's nice to meet you, disembodied voice lady!"
"Why, hello! I am the Freelancer Integrated Logistics and Security System, but you may call me—"
"F.I.L.S.S., this is important," Wash interrupted. "Can you ID us as friendly and open the hangar bay doors?"
There was a moment's hesitation. "Are you attempting to stop the Chairman?"
Exchanging a wary look with Carolina, Wash gambled on honesty. "Y-… yes."
The Pelican's aft hold seemed to brighten as the AI chirped her response. "Then of course! You need have only said so."
As the group breathed a collective sigh of relief, Carolina asked, "What about Epsilon — the Director. Where is he now?"
"Unknown."
"What about the rest of our team, where are they?" Wash asked.
"Unknown."
"Dammit…" Wash muttered, tightening his grip around his battle rifle.
"I directed them to the Chairman's trophy room, but that was roughly 17.634 minutes ago. Would you like me to do the same for you and your new friends?"
"You can do that?" Andersmith asked in his baritone voice.
"Affirmative. I was able to maintain control over interior and exterior doors as well as the primary and secondary weapons systems, and communications of course, but I am afraid the Chairman has locked me out of all other functions. I very much do not like that man."
You and me both, Wash thought. He would make sure that scum was locked away for life for what he'd done to him, to Maine, to the people of Chorus. And if Hargrove had harmed a single hair on the Reds' and Blues' heads, Wash might not leave anything for the UNSC to lock away.
The hangar doors parted their final few inches as the Pelican lined up on its final approach. A cavernous space yawned beyond a shimmering forcefield.
Doors and turrets. "It'll have to do," Wash mumbled, more to himself than anyone. "Okay, listen up. Dr. Grey, Matthews, and Jensen — you hold the fort. Maintain comm. Whatever happens, stay with the Pelican."
Protests from the two News were silenced as Wash held up a hand. "This isn't a discussion. Andersmith, Palomo, and Bitters — get ready to move out. Our objectives are to render support to the Reds and Blues and to detain Chairman Hargrove."
"Priorities, sir?" Andersmith asked.
It was a valid question. He could have provided the tactical justification behind his answer — it was sound — but the tortuous unease surrounding the fate of his team made it easy to forget all that. "The Reds and Blues have priority."
"But, suppose, like, we're getting shot at by Control. Then what?" Palomo asked.
"Shoot to kill," Kimball answered coldly. She cast an unapologetic glance at the Freelancer to see if he dared disagree.
Wash didn't. That call was reserved for the general of the United Army of Chorus; Wash and Carolina's commitment remained to the Reds and Blues. "Expect tight corridors and heavy resistance. Carolina and I have point. General Kimball—"
"If you think I'm staying here—"
"The thought never crossed my mind," Wash assured with a nod. "You have our six." He turned to the rest of the squad. "Questions, ask them now—"
Flak pinged suddenly off the Pelican's outer hull. They were inside the destroyer's hangar now, and they had been discovered. Wash felt the craft's inertia shift under his feet as it transitioned into a vertical descent. He estimated they had about 10 seconds before touchdown.
Ten seconds before all hell broke loose.
Still, Wash waited with more patience than the situation afforded. He'd trained them, each and every one of them, but not for this. His plan had been hastily devised; it lacked the specificity he usually preferred. He should have been arming them with intel. Instead he was asking for their trust.
The LTs all held his gaze. Wash noted Jensen's and Palomo's intertwined hands, the charred and melted armor of Matthews. Christ. They were kids, barely out of high school and thrust into a war they didn't start. They were tired. They were nervous. And they were brave, so brave.
And then there was Carolina. Standing beside him now, her shared apprehension manifested in her continued silence. It was an old habit, one he could trace back to their Freelancing days. She'd always gotten quiet when she had been worried and too proud to admit it — a rare occasion then and certainly not one he had seen since. Apparently F.I.L.S.S.'s report had done little to assuage her, either.
For about the thousandth time during their short flight, Wash suppressed his growing fear for the Reds and Blues.
The Pelican abruptly lurched, dodging small arms fire. The lieutenants flinched with the sudden motion. Dr. Grey yelped and reached for the seat restraints.
"Get ready!" Washington yelled above the cacophony of subsystem alarms. He slammed his elbow into the bulkhead button that lowered the aft cargo door. It was a habit of his own he'd developed as a corporal: he shifted his weight anxiously between his feet one, two, three times, clutched his BR securely to his chest, and braced his legs for touchdown.
The Pelican's struts crashed onto the hangar deck, the now open cargo door in concert with it.
Wash's boots beat them both. He was firing before he even felt steel underneath them. Carolina advanced next to him, confident and unyielding in her attack.
The Freelancers focused on the larger threats: a pirate armed with a rocket launcher, a deckhand manning a machine gun. Kimball and her lieutenants took out the rest. Despite their inexperience, they wielded their new alien weaponry like pros. Retribution was powerful motivation, and powerful motivation, Wash knew, tended to demystify the new real quick.
"F.I.L.S.S.?" he asked when the last shell casing clinked off the deck. His motion tracker showed clear. "Where to?"
When the AI spoke next, her voice sounded from their helmets' internal speakers. "I have opened bulkhead hatch H13S located in the aft starboard corner of the hangar. Would you like me to transmit a waypoint to your HUDs?"
What Wash really would have liked was for the AI to stay lightyears away from his HUD, his helmet speakers, or anything else near his neural port, but he buried away his irrational fear and the spike of adrenaline that came with it. "Do it."
"Waypoint transmitted. I will keep it up to date as you progress."
"Whoa," Wash vaguely heard one of the lieutenants marvel while another said, "Holy cow, look at these graphics!"
But Wash's attention was on Carolina, who stood apart, hand to her ear.
"All right, focus," he directed the LTs. "Just like we trained: buddy check, ammo check. Are we good?"
Taking only a few seconds to inventory themselves, Kimball replied on their behalf. "We're set."
"Then let's go."
The hangar bay sat roughly one third of the way down the destroyer's length and low along its draft. It looked like F.I.L.S.S. was directing them all the way aft to the far back of the Staff. They got to it, pushing down the ship's main artery, colored utility pipes placarded for one hazardous material or another paralleling their path.
As Carolina fell into point beside him, Wash risked tearing his eyes from his rifle's reticle to glance at her. He switched to a private channel. "Epsilon?"
She shook her head.
He bit his lip. Switching back to TEAMCOM, Wash tried his luck. "Tucker? Tucker, it's Wash, come in." Silence. "Tucker, Wash, do you read? Caboose?" Nothing. "Sarge? Come on, guys, somebody answer me.…"
"Opening blast door B29S," F.I.L.S.S. replied instead.
The solid titanium door was wide enough for a tank to pass through with ease, but F.I.L.S.S. raised it with a speed that belied its mass.
It meant the idling Charon soldiers on the other side were caught off guard.
Good.
Kimball fired first, just as the first pirate began a "hey, what are you guys—?" Her shot landed, preventing him from completing his bewildered query. His three comrades were downed by the LTs seconds after.
The walls immediately behind the fallen pirates were scarred with bullet holes and plasma scorching. Palomo fingered one of the pockmarks, turning and sending a silent question to Wash. He didn't have any answers.
The group pressed forward, rounding blind corners more swiftly than caution suggested. Each long, empty corridor stretched onward, mirroring the continuing silence on TEAMCOM. Wash felt his speed accelerate with every empty minute that passed. His feet barely hit the deck plating by the time they reached their next waypoint.
"Opening bulkhead hatch H42S."
Nothing happened.
"Opening bulkhead hatch H42S," repeated F.I.L.S.S.
Six pairs of boots skidded to a stop in front of the still closed hatch.
"Isn't the door… supposed to open… when she says that?" Palomo wondered, panting.
"I am sorry, but I cannot seem to open this one. It appears the my command signal lines have been physically severed from the other side."
Kimball looked to Wash as her lieutenants caught their breath. "Someone on the other side knows we're here."
"Options?" Wash prompted.
"There must be an alternate route," offered Andersmith.
"I am afraid not. This hatch is one of only several throughout the entire ship that is a single point of passage. It is the only means of transiting this deck."
"Well that's inconvenient," Bitters deadpanned.
"And a choke point," Wash added, thinking of whomever lied in wait beyond the door.
"So we backtrack," Kimball suggested. "Descend one deck, push on, and climb back up once we get closer to whatever this trophy room is."
"Hmm, that plan would work, but you would need to descend five decks in order to clear the barracks that lie just aft and below your current position."
"No, no, that would take too long," Washington dismissed, unable to keep a tinge of frustration from coloring his words. "Come on, there's got to be another way."
"We could ask Dr. Grey to come up here," suggested Palomo. "She's pretty smart with all sorts of stuff."
No. Wash wasn't about to deny their resident genius from treating Matthews, and pulling the next best thing, Jensen, would leave the Pelican largely undefended.
"Perhaps the Charon soldier in the adjacent radio room can help."
The group collectively paused.
"Oh, I am sorry, I should explain. My remote control lines have been severed, but this hatch's locking mechanism will still operate through conventional means."
Wash looked to the keypad embedded in the wall adjacent to the hatch. His visor locked with Carolina's.
"Passcode," they said in unison.
Wasting no time, the teal Freelancer marched down the corridor and kicked in the door to the radio room. Wash could hear the yelp of surprise sound from the pirate inside who had just born witness to what was undoubtedly the most terrifying sight he'd ever seen.
Unable to suppress his growing unease, Wash took the opportunity to again switch comm channels to a backup frequency. "Caboose, it's Wash, come in." Static this time. It only meant that they were closer. He hoped. "Caboose, if you're there, it'd be really nice if you answered, bud." He waited. "Tucker? Grif, Simmons?" Nothing. Wash clenched his fist tight with worry. "Come on guys, this isn't fucking funny—"
F.I.L.S.S. clipped his broadcast with her own. "Charon radio transmissions indicate Chairman Hargrove is on his way to an escape pod."
"Location?"
"Eight decks directly above the trophy room, still well aft of your present position."
"Can't you stop him?" petitioned Kimball.
"Escape pods are categorized as an emergency system. I currently do not have control of emergency systems."
"Great," Bitters complained.
"I can, however, slow his progress. Would you like me to direct you to his current location?"
Wash looked to Kimball. It wasn't his place to stop her.
"No," she addressed the AI, though she maintained eye lock with the Freelancer. "We stick with the priority. We go after the Reds and Blues first."
"Very well. I will seal all bulkheads in his path."
Wash was about to thank the general, but the sound of boots stomping on decking disrupted that thought. Carolina dragged the thrashing pirate out of the radio room by his chest plate and slammed him face-first against the wall near the awaiting keypad. The man winced in pain.
"Open it," Wash ordered.
"Fuck off."
Leveling her needler at the pirate's head, Carolina said coolly, "He won't ask again."
The Charon soldier glared at her sidelong, switched his focus to her partner, then returned it to her with a snort. Reluctantly he began to type in his access code. "You're wasting your time. They're all dead by now anyway."
Wash felt his face harden and his nostrils flare as he fought every muscle in his body that strained to put a bullet in the man's skull himself. He felt it, the second half of what the Counselor had written on his indoc eval: "reserved with hostile tendencies." It had been a curse since adolescence. Now it drew him in like an old sweater, familiar and worn in, faded and stretched too large and all too easy to slip back into.
The seconds stretched by interminably as the last few digits were accepted, and before Wash could suggest bringing the hostage along for similar scenarios, Carolina's boot planted squarely on the pirate's back and she shoved him bodily through the parting door halves.
A hail of bullets from his awaiting compatriots tore him to ribbons.
Wash saw his opening. Bringing his rifle to bear, he squeezed the trigger without delay, sending a three-round burst into the first pirate's chest and an identical grouping into his accomplice's.
He was moving again before the bodies had hit the floor.
Wash swept around the next corner, and the next. He wanted to run, he itched to sprint forward full tilt. Careful not to outpace the lieutenants, he kept them in a tactical spread behind him. His BR led the way, dropping every single Charon son of a bitch that stood between him and his team.
17.634 minutes. Christ. An eternity in any firefight.
A cold sweat started to bead under his helmet's seals as images of York's and North's bodies threatened his focus. He'd been too late, for them both. In his mind's eye the Freelancers' armors shifted hues, gold becoming blue, violet becoming red—
No, he prayed silently. Not again. Please not again.
"Opening bulkhead hatch H57S."
Expecting more resistance, Wash leaned firmly into the butt of his BR. He quickly saw why he needn't have bothered. He swallowed.
A wide passageway extended beyond their newly opened hatch. The resistance he had been expecting had already been cut down. Dozens of bodies lined the length of corridor ahead, spent shell casings littered among them. There was blood on the floor, on the charred walls. The carnage even extended down an intersecting corridor.
Chaos. There had been absolute chaos.
Now it was a sinister quiet.
"Arriving at final waypoint." Even F.I.L.S.S.'s artificial voice seemed hushed in their helmets.
Silently, Wash motioned forward with two fingers. Their destination laid at the corridor's dead end. He kept his vision centered down the sight of his rifle as his boots picked a careful path between the corpses. He risked a glance down at their armor. Black. All black.
F.I.L.S.S.'s waypoint disappeared from his HUD once he reached the threshold of the presumed trophy room. The bifold door had been breached with a cutting torch, its two halves sitting warped and scorched just outside the compartment.
Leery, Wash set his left foot onto the mangled metal. His right crunched on broken glass. Puzzled, he lifted his boot. The shards were gold. Frowning down at the deck, he spied a composite hexagonal reinforcing pattern embedded underneath the aurous sheen and knew instantly what it was.
Shards from a Mark VI visor.
As he fought against the tightening within his chest, Wash pushed cautiously into the trophy room, muzzle first. He'd prepared himself for an ongoing firefight. He hadn't prepared himself for this.
This was far worse.
Wash slowly lowered his weapon, eyes growing wide in horror.
As with the preceding passageway, scorch marks and bullet holes riddled every wall, the weapons that had made them — human and alien alike — strewn across the floor. A portion of the ceiling had caved in from an explosion. Small spot fires still licked at the debris below while the ship's fire suppression system had coated everything in a fine mist from above. Half the lights flickered intermittently while those that remained steady illuminated the grisly scene in an ominous glow.
The smooth obsidian floor was covered with bodies. Some were burnt and unrecognizable. Limbs were bent at unnatural angles or missing entirely; pink and gray tissue spilled out of gaping wounds. Blood pooled everywhere, obscuring the polished mirror surface.
Wash was no stranger to bloodshed. It was the stillness of the room, though, that crippled him like a blow to the back of the knees.
Oh, god….
It was over. He was too late.
No — there. Motion. Wash snapped his rifle up and sidestepped to the left; Carolina mirrored right. Kimball and the lieutenants fanned out behind them once they'd funneled through the open entrance.
With a grunt, Sarge pushed himself up from the deck to a seated position. His helmet laid discarded on the floor beside him, its visor shattered. He pressed a hand fast to one eye, a rivulet of blood trickling between his fingers and down his jaw.
"Jesus, Sarge," Wash breathed, just relieved the man was alive.
Before he could assist the Red, the distinctive noise of titanium alloy scraping across steel decking drew his attention to the back of the room. An armored orange leg kicked out at nothing, the rest of the body hidden behind an overturned metal table. If it had once served as cover, it wouldn't have lasted much longer. Wash crept around its battered surface.
Grif laid on his back, groaning. His legs thrashed in anguish. Wash could see why. Blood flowed freely from an ugly wound to the gut, an unlucky shot that had improbably snuck between the barest gap in armor plating. It looked bad. Wash was unable to assess the full extent of the injury, though, because Simmons's hands were pressed tightly down on his friend's stomach in a vain attempt to stem the bleeding.
The maroon sim trooper knelt over Grif. Like Sarge, his visor had been completely fractured. Unlike Sarge, he had merely ripped out the spiderwebbed glass, allowing for a clear view of Simmons's features. A deep gash skewering his helmet's right side gave way to a similar one on Simmons's face, the nasty wound spanning the transition from organic skin to metal implant. Both halves looked equally excruciating. Simmons didn't seem to notice. Wash suspected the tears on his cheeks were ones of panic, not pain.
With a quick scan of the remainder of the room, Wash found no hostiles, none alive, at any rate. He spied Doc seated against the far wall. The medic clutched his legs to his chest as he stared in a catatonic stupor. He could see him shaking from across the compartment, making Washington wonder just what O'Malley had done.
Lopez — most of him — sat squarely atop a fallen combatant seemingly in defiance of his missing arms.
Donut lay facedown, partially obscured by the corpse of a pirate, unconscious. At least Wash hoped he was just unconscious. The room's circular chandelier lay broken in two pieces atop him.
"Holy god…" Andersmith muttered on behalf of them all.
It was gruesome.
Blinking out of his daze, Wash instructed, "Bitters, see to Grif. Andersmith, Donut."
"They did all this?" Kimball wondered aloud, spinning to take in the entirety of the destruction.
Frowning in reply, Wash knew what the general meant. The Reds and Blues could hold their own, but not against what had to be easily a three-to-one — no, a five-to-one disadvantage. Wash's boot nudged a plasma rifle in thought. On the floor alongside it was a rocket launcher, an alien incineration cannon, a hard light rifle…. Those certainly would have helped their odds in such close quarters, but still. The math didn't add up.
"Kimball, post up outside the door in case our Charon friends get any ideas. Palomo, I want a full roster check. Find Tucker and Caboose."
Carolina called him over. What she'd found was something neither of them had expected to see ever again. At first he didn't recognize what she was bent over, but its spherical form was unmistakable. Carolina placed a hand on the artifact's glass lens. It was warm to the touch, evidence its laser had been recently fired.
"Epsilon?" she whispered to it.
There was no reply.
Another token of the past sat at the base of one of the room's several display pedestals Wash only now took note of. The AI storage-turned-capture unit might have looked like just one more piece of wreckage, even with its menacing probe extended, but Wash remembered it all too well. They'd left it at the UNSC Archives after extracting Epsilon. Somehow it had ended up here.
Nearby, beside Donut's empty holster, laid a third curious item. Wash picked up the pistol, the serial number and pattern of gashes scratched into its barrel burned into his memory like so many other useless details his brain wouldn't purge. He recalled vividly the day it was issued to him in the Project; the condescending manner in which Hargrove had returned it, one of his 'personal effects', before sending him out with the walking corpse of his friend; its report echoing across the canyon after he'd shot the very same pink soldier with it; the gratitude Carolina had expressed accepting it as they stood before the 100 Tex drones; the detached tone her voice had adopted when she had told him she'd left it locked in with the Director. And here it was, some sick celebration of Hargrove's victory over his former rival. Wash took it, clipping it to his magnetic—
"Hey!" shouted Palomo suddenly, causing Wash to spring to his feet in alarm. He spun to find another Mark VI helmet in his face.
Before Wash could unsheathe his knife for a close-quarter block, Palomo lowered the helmet. "I didn't think any of the Reds and Blues wore black," the LT pondered, examining it.
Carolina closed the distance in two quick strides and snatched the helmet from the lieutenant's hands. "Where did you get this?" she demanded of him.
"It… it was just sitting there, on the floor."
Wash recognized the star-shaped hole in the middle of its visor, as though the patented matte black wasn't telltale enough. He remembered in graphic detail the moment the Meta had mercilessly stabbed Tex with the same AI capture unit. Memories that were not his own he fought to keep at bay; the ones that were were bad enough.
He shared a troubled look with his fellow Freelancer.
Just what the hell was this place?
A pained groan snapped both their weapons to. From out under a heap of rubble rolled another helmet, white and bulbous in form. It turned his blood to ice.
Meta.
The Meta had survived. He had somehow survived the plunge off that cliff and gotten aboard the ship, had ambushed the Reds and Blues and—
No, Wash realized once the rational part of his brain had taken over. He reminded himself to breathe again. It was just the Meta's armor, another triumphant trophy to add to the rest of the Chairman's freakish collection. It wasn't even the Meta's, Wash concluded. It had a stripe of….
Aqua.
Wash sidestepped quickly around the debris to find the hilt of a deactivated energy sword, just out of reach of an outstretched hand. The glove, aqua.
"Jesus…" Wash uttered, rushing to remove the chunks of ceiling that buried Tucker. Carolina and Palomo followed suit until the semi-conscious captain was free. Wash knelt next to his teammate. "Tucker?" he promptly beseeched, turning his friend's head in his hands, looking for wounds. "Tucker. Tucker, are you okay? Can you hear me? Tucker. Tucker, fucking answer me."
Slowly, Tucker's eyes fluttered open.
Wash exhaled in relief. "Jesus Christ — Tucker, you scared the living shit out of me."
Keeping his head still, Tucker's gaze drifted once across the room. "Where is he, Wash?" he croaked weakly.
"Who, Hargrove? I don't — radio chatter suggests he made for the escape pods but—"
"I can't feel him anymore."
Wash frowned. Probable concussion. Suddenly, Grif cried out in agony, briefly stealing Wash's attention away.
"What's he talking about?" Palomo asked quietly.
Wash didn't know, but that old, familiar feeling of unease was starting to mount again. He saw Sarge belly-crawling over to his two Red teammates. "Go help Sarge," he mumbled vaguely to Palomo, trying to put his finger on the source of his distress.
Tucker's eyes started to dart wildly. He thrashed against Wash who held him down.
"Whoa, hey," the Freelancer urged. "Hey, slow down."
"He — no, I can't…."
"Tucker, I need you to look at me. Follow my finger."
"No. No, he's not…."
"It's okay. You have a concussion—"
"I don't have a fucking concussion; I can't fucking feel Church!"
Wash titled his head, puzzled, when he caught sight of the Meta's helmet once more. The single stripe of Tucker's signature color had seemingly vanished.
Wash pulled back. He watched as, before his eyes, the rest of Tucker's armor slowly faded from aqua to white, as if the very life was being drained from it.
Hurriedly, Wash activated the AI scanning tool embedded within his suit, a leftover vestige of his Recovery One days. "AI NOT DETECTED" blinked prominently in his HUD.
"Oh, no…" he breathed. Immediately he recalled the reports of how Maine had brutally ripped Eta's and Iota's chips from Carolina's neural port, how Gamma had forcibly extracted himself from Wyoming. A concussion would be the least of Tucker's concerns.
Washington accessed Team BIOCOM, but the data barely registered with him as he frantically hauled Tucker up to a seated position. The sim trooper hardly noticed, dead weight that lacked the strength or will to stay upright. Wash examined the back of his neck. His neural port was still intact.
Still intact.
Oh, Christ….
Wash choked back the bile rising in his throat. Horrific images of his own torture and terror assaulted his memory, his primal screaming as Epsilon attempted the unthinkable while still inside his head, the beginning of his descent into madness and paranoia and years upon years of padded cells and and restraints and needles and nightmares, oh, god, the nightmares—
"Tucker. Tucker, do you remember where you are?" Wash demanded, paying far more attention to the Blue's BIOCOM readouts now. They showed nominal. He looked into his friend's eyes, searching for any sign of mental instability. "Can you tell me your full name, your age, where you grew up?"
"What's going on?" Palomo quietly inquired, still hovering at Wash's shoulder.
"Tucker, I need you to focus. What team are you on?"
"Is he gonna be okay?"
"You have a son. Tell me his name."
"What's wrong with him?"
"Dammit, Palomo, will you go help Sarge?"
The outburst drew the gazes of the other lieutenants.
"Y-Yeah. Sure," the LT relented, casting one last fretful look at his captain before making for the Reds.
"I can't feel him," Tucker reiterated softly. His eyes met those of his team lead, wide and pleading for hope. "What does that mean, Wash?"
Wash knew exactly what that meant. He just couldn't bring himself to say it. "We'll figure that out later. Are you okay? Are you sure you're not injured?" While he waited for an answer, he turned his head to locate Andersmith. "Andersmith, get ready to move Donut; carry him if you have to. Bitters, you and Grif, too. Lopez, can you walk?" More of an edict than a true question, Wash let Lopez's untranslated reply go unacknowledged as he opened a channel to their awaiting Pelican. "Jensen, tell the pilot to prep for an immediate departure. We're bringing you wounded."
"No," Tucker groaned from the floor. He pushed himself to his feet, wobbling on unstable legs atop the slick floor. If it hadn't been for a steady hand from Wash he'd have toppled.
"We'll be ready, thir," Jensen radioed in return.
"No! I'm not going anywhere until we find Church!"
"Yeah, what about Epsilon?" Bitters pitched in.
"Shouldn't we find him first?" Andersmith added.
Wash met the gaze of each one of them. They were all looking at him, locked to him for an answer he couldn't give. Feeling the weight of the collective gaze of the room, never before had he felt more like a failure than in that very moment. He swallowed. "Kimball, you have point. Andersmith, Palomo, Bitters — you're in the middle with the Reds and Blues—"
"I'm… not sure I understand, sir."
Wash was determined to press on. "We go back the way we came. Eyes up and out; ears on each other."
"No! We're not leaving Church!" protested Tucker, pushing away from Wash. He began to shout, "Church! Church!"
Wash winced. "Tucker—"
"Church!"
"Tucker, keep your goddamn voice down—"
"Church! Where the fuck are you!"
"Tucker!" Wash warned, grabbing the sim trooper's collar firmly. "Tucker. Listen to me. Four of your teammates are badly wounded. We have to get them evac'd now or at least one of them won't make it, and if we stay here shouting, drawing Charon's forces directly to us, we all won't make it. Do you understand?"
The tears of confusion and fear welling in the young captain's eyes brimmed but did not fall. He latched onto Wash's calm. Nodding meekly, he allowed the Blue Team lead to release him.
"Good," Wash accepted, as close to satisfied as he was going to get. He looked beyond the room's entrance where the UAC general still stood watch. "Kimball has point."
"I'm going after Hargrove." The resolve in Kimball's voice, even through the radio, left no doubt that she would not be dissuaded.
Wash exhaled, assessed. The Reds and Blues had been located. They could evac them without her. She had upheld her end of the bargain and supported their primary mission objective. He couldn't deny her her own. "Take Palomo and Bitters with you," he acceded. "After we evac the Reds and Blues, we'll rendezvous at your location."
With a simple "understood," Kimball and two of her lieutenants ran off.
Turning to the remaining LT, Wash said, "Andersmith, I'm going to still need you to carry Donut. Sarge and Simmons, carry Grif. I've got point and Caro-…." He trailed off, remembering his fellow Freelancer for the first time since the shock of the Meta's helmet. His eyes found her rooted exactly where he'd last seen her, staring down at the rounded visor, frozen as if no time had passed at all. Shit. "Get ready to move," he directed the rest of the team, the normal zeal of such an order softened by a newfound concern.
As Andersmith prepped the injured for extraction, Wash joined Carolina's side. She was silent again, unmoving.
She didn't have any of Wash's Recovery tools. Still, she knew. Somehow she still knew.
Wash looked down at the white helmet, the once aqua surfaces now covered in water droplets from the overhead sprinkler. "We don't have all the facts yet," he tried weakly. "He might not have…. He could still be…."
Seeing her fists tighten, Wash knew the empty platitudes he couldn't even bring himself to say would have been wasted. She felt it, deep within her just as he did, that one thing that hadn't sat right since they'd gone wheels up.
Church was—
"Incoming!" Andersmith yelled, shattering the silence.