goddamngrenades | RP Open Post

Wash nods. "Yeah, I know. Sleep well York. Come get me if you need anything."

He doesn't go straight to bed. There's a perimeter check to do, rounds to make to make sure everything is secure.

Reports to send to Carolina. Yes, he can keep York busy here until they figure out what to do. No, he's really not going to be amenable to joining up with them. Kind of the opposite Wash expects. He's already adopted half the kids on the base and if he figures out what they're doing, he'll probably adopt the Feds as well. He could be a dangerous uniting force.

The answer is obvious. Set him up to get killed. It should be easy; they're in a warzone. He'd be a martyr to the cause.

Neither of them actually suggests that line of action, but he knows they're both thinking it. He's glad they don't suggest it. Maybe there's still a little humanity left in them somewhere. Maybe.

He eventually heads back to the base, walks past York's door and pauses outside for just a moment before heading to his own bed.

Sleep, when it comes, comes in fits and snatches. Even in a secure room. Even on a bed. Even with a sidearm on the table. There's a voice that should be there and isn't, a warmth that he used to press back against and can't. Nothing but him in his head and him in his bed and he's never felt like less of a person than when he's trying to count sheep and all he can count is lives he couldn't save.

Half an hour here, an hour there and- well- after remembering the firefight that cost him the suit and Delta he never gets any more sleep anyway. Rolls out. Suits up. Swings around for a perimeter walk after locking up behind him. does a personal inventory of supplies. Of men. of intel as they have it.

Not much. No aerial support, no ground support other than the rough infantry- a few jeeps with turrets but no tanks. No Phyliss.

He's worked with less and come out on top.

Hours left till the morning drill and he Drops by Kimball (getting a handgun to the face for picking the lock which he kind of earned) to let her know he's going scouting for a bit.

Wash- he considers bringing along. Remembers the room, the eyes, the everything before he just slips on by on his own. He could use the eyes- but he needs a to give the time to sleep and process. It's been a lot for both of them.

Wash sleeps. It isn't restful. It hasn't been for a long time. Maybe eventually his brain will have finished using every scrap of it to process another set of memories, Epsilon, Alpha, the Director, but he isn't holding out much hope. Tonight those merge with York, with Carolina and Connie and Maine. There's this horrible black thing trying to swallow him; it has Sigma's voice, glows green like Delta. Screams like Epsilon.

He watches as his own hands cut York down, watch him die. And he feels nothing.

Morning is a relief. He shouldn't have bothered trying.

York isn't around when he wakes. Out scouting apparently. Kimball tells him the rough direction and he heads out too, following trails that he knows by heart. Even if he doesn't find York, it serves a purpose.

He's found his way to an abandoned Fed base by the time Wash catches up. Everything's cleared out for the most part. No supplies, no transport, no weapons. Doesn't matter, it's not what he's looking at. Computers you can wipe but nothing short of an EMP can really purge the system. it's worth checking. When his motion tracker pings he flicks the surveillance system back on to check and- hey. Wash.

Using the intercom's a piece of cake. Has to be for civvies turned soldiers to use it. "Head for the central building. I'm inside."

He's pretty sure that the base he ends up at has been thoroughly cleaned out by their backup from Charon. He hopes it has. Maybe they should have destroyed it completely although that would probably be even more suspicious considering the rebels' lack of firepower.

"Alright. I'm coming."

He heads inside, feigning wariness as he approaches until he reaches York's location. "What're you looking for? This place is cleared out."

"Clear's never clear, kid. D taught me a few tricks." He might not be able to grab much, but there's fragments of something left in the drives here. Might be surveillance footage, might be the menu for the mess, might be nothing. Who knows? "Take a loaf, there are still crumbs. So we're looking for the crumbs."

"You were always the locksmith," Wash replies, edging up closer to him to see what he's doing. There's a twist of apprehension in his gut. "Unless the crumbs involve access codes to the Fed bases, it's probably useless.Surprised they didn't blast everything."

"Why waste explosives on a building you could fill in and retake when it's tactically relevant again when you can use them blowing up the opposition?" He coaxes a few more lines of code into some kind of coherency and- ha.

Roster. Duty roster? For motorpool security. "Lesse what we got here."

More than two and they probably have a fair chunk of vehicles. less and it's likely about five.

There are six names on the list so, damn. "Guess they got a lot of transport that needs watching. Three are mechanics so either they're being prudent or some of them are banged up."

"This is true, I suppose," Wash replies.

He manages not to let out a breath when he sees what York has pulled up. A motorpool security roster is not high security information. Useful, but not compromising.

"That's a lot of trucks and tanks if they're using everyone. Might be worth taking a look."

"Mhmm. Just getting started. Eeenie, meenie, miney, ha, got you cocksucker." Three strands of code to the left and another little nodule of fragments. He'll get back to the transport but this? An incomplete inventory of munitions. Now THAT is what he was looking for. "Up to date till they moved on but this is promising. It'd go faster if I had d but you got eyes on our six, right?"

Too fucking competent by half. This might mean they have to move things around. They need to keep the fighting going, not end it.

"Now that is useful. Kimball will love you for this. And yeah, I got our six. It's all clear so far as I can tell. I'll keep an eye on it."

"Shotgun rounds, 9mm, plasma coils, sticky grenades- fuck'n grenades, man." he mutters, transferring the file over to his suit. Doubles back and picks at the node with the motorpool list again till he gets a vehicle registry. It's bits and pieces- nothing complete, nothing classified, but it's a good start for them having not been here.

And then he finds a file that's more a personal memo than anything else.

"...this guy was a fucking idiot. Wash- someone listed their comms frequencies and encryption key." Now THERE is a break. Not a big one but every crack can get widened till you wiggle on through.

"I would love some grenades," Wash replies. "They're great."

Good way to get rid of incriminating evidence if you don't mind causing massive damage.

Oh- He leans over York's shoulder, staring at the message. "Oh damn, seriously? What a moron I mean, they might have changed it since but... you are a goddam genius. We might actually win this thing."

They need to get York out of here, off this planet, soon.

"Backwater colonies have old tech. I was playing with this shit in highschool, man." Not for weapons or encryption keys but, damn. Good to know that his juvenile delinquency is going to be of use for once.

Well not for once it's been pretty damn useful his whole career.

"The rest of it is just inventory. Armor, transport, fuel, mess. But with these numbers we can get an idea of how many people were at this base and maybe where they were going." He copies over the last of it and shuts the system down.

"Of course it was cutting edge top of the line tech back then," Wash teases. "This stuff was ancient history when I was in high school."

If he keeps it light, friendly, they might get out of here without too many mishaps. "It at least gives us a better idea of their power than we had before. They always seem to have a new base set up somewhere."

"Now that is a little curious. These buildings aren't prefab and they aren't new. They've been around for awhile so obviously this place used to have a standing military. Honestly? This looks like a training base." He unplugs from the console and turns, resting his hip on the counter. "That and all the alien tech lying around- I wanna say they're probably hopping through bases established leading up to and during the war. Not a lot of use after till this conflict popped up. Which means there should be a public record of them somewhere."

And where there are public records, there are maps.

"Where's the nearest city?"

"I guess," Wash replies, looking around at what he can see of the base. "This place saw some action during the war I think, although I didn't really read up on the history before I came here."

He shrugs. "The capital, Armonia. It's a fair distance though. Couple of days drive if you don't hit bad patches on the road. There are a lot of those. It's Fed territory. We don't tend to go that close to it."

"No other towns? Suburbs? Public libraries?" Somewhere with a network that's not the base. Last thing he wants to do is try this from there and get noticed.

Wash thinks for a few moments. "There's a couple of villages closer by. Been abandoned for a while. I think everyone moved into Armonia when the civil war got going but... we could check it out. They seemed to be pretty well stocked with services." That should be safe, right?

"We can do recon on one in a few days. They aren't going anywhere and the kids need consistency." Speaking of, he checks his hud. "Gonna have to rush on the way back or I'll be late for my own drills."

"They are adults. Most of them," Wash replies, amused despite everything. "I'm sure they'll be super keen to do more laps of the compound."

"They're adults but I'm teaching them how to be soldiers. They're kids, wash. none of them signed up for this- to fight? Sure. What that actually means? No. No one ever does." He pushes away from the counter and starts back the way they came. It's gonna be a long week, he can already feel it. "you mind helping me demo the hand to hand stuff later today?"

"Yeah, the military would be pretty understaffed if they were honest about the nightmares and PTSD and watching your friends die." That it would turn you into someone who couldn't function in normal society.

"I can do that. It'll be like old times."

"Dunno what the recruiter told you, but I actually got that memo. Didn't believe him. I really, really should have." He doesn't regret all of it. Just. Most of it.

"It was all... serve your planet! Honour humanity! Be a hero stuff. And I was a stupid enough kid to believe them." Starry eyed and desperate to be someone important. To do something worthwhile with his life.

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