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Who| Agent Carolina & Agent North, Agent Connecticut, Theta, and open to others
What| Arrival/recovery/training
Where| The medbay, and then the training rooms.
When| After “The Reject Pile” and “An Eye for an Eye”
Warnings/Notes| to be added

[ CLOSED TO THETA AND NORTH ]

It had been a hell of an arrival. She’d just wanted a moment to catch her breath, to gather her strength so they could get the hell out of that hell hole of a base, only she didn’t have the chance. She’d arrived with warnings flashing on her HUD, unable to really comprehend what was knocking her out before she was knocked out.

And then, waking up in this medical ward. They’d at least answered her questions as soon as she started demanding answers. Shvaughn is quick to appear, to explain what’s going on. Carolina might be dehydrated and hurting, but she takes advantage of someone willingly answering questions to keep asking them.

And when she’s done, and rests, the next time she wakes up, Brande is there. Even though she’s not done recuperating, she’s quick to agree to become a Legionnaire. Even with everything going back home - but Shvaughn had assured her they wouldn’t be in danger.

Which is what leads to this - her having the ring nearby her hospital bed, turning over the omnicom in her hand. She’s still relegated to bed rest, and she thinks she’ll catch up on any information she can get a hold of, while she’s figuring out what the hell kind of outfit she’s going to have.

Unbeknownst to her, though, agreeing means she’s registered - means she pops up in a scannable database.

[ CLOSED TO CONNIE ]

Carolina’s been in the recovery wing for another day when they bring someone else new in. She’s looking at the omnicom when they bring her in, and so she misses it at first, until she hears the voice of a nurse checking her over. It’s the name that catches her.

That drags her gaze away, locking on the other hospital bed. That’s someone she didn’t quite realize was here, the literal definition of seeing is believing.

“CT?”

[ HOSPITAL (OPEN) ]

Carolina will be in the hospital for a few days, from her arrival to her release. She’ll easily accept visitors… no matter who they are, or why they’re coming by.

[ TRAINING GYM (OPEN) ]

She knows she’s developed powers - discovered the use of some of them in the hospital. Accidentally phasing through her bed had been one of them, and they’d been lucky she hadn’t ended up with a metal wheel through her body before she phased back.

She’s been having training lessons, but even though she was stuck for days on end in her own armor - she’s not going to take it easy. Even though she’s only cleared for light duty and training, here she is in the training gym.

She might be spending some time kicking and boxing a punching bag - but she’s also stopping to test out her new powers. She’ll move forward to move through the punching bag, or give it a hard hit and then brace herself against it coming back, seemingly becoming as hard as rock given that it bounces back without her giving an inch.

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You seem to be just fine.

That was the problem with these traded timelines, the tentative tightrope and never knowing where to step: what was he going to learn about his future? Hell, was she even from the future, even? Maybe she meant because of the robozombies. Maybe she meant when he had been stabbed. Maybe she meant just being brought here.

Fuck. What could he ever say?

"Of course I am; we all had out zombie plans worked out for years before you guys showed up." He walked in the rest of the way, moving to the bedside and nodding at it before he sat down; move it or lose it. "Plus, Wash was in charge."

There it was, that subtle praise without coming out and praising him. It's what they did.

"How are you feeling? What kicked your ass this time?"

"Don't think zombies included the borg on steroids," Carolina says with a little arch of her eyebrow at him, still wincing a little bit as she sits up. Her legs have ached, from being locked in place for days in the armor. She can't say she's going to abandon her armor, but it's nice to be out of it for now. "Not surprised you made it through with him running the show."

Her praise is a little more obvious. When Tucker asks what happened, she gives a little huff.

"You know who did this because he's an asshole," Carolina says. "I still feel sick. But they've almost got me back to normal meals."

“’The Borg’? Simmons has been making you watch his nerd shows again, hasn’t he?” Tucker watched her try to shift and sit up a little; he wanted to help her but he knew how she got so he waited to see if he was asked. Sure, he’d make fun of her for it and maybe she’d hit him, but that was a family dynamic for you.

“Don’t tell him I said this, but he did a good job.” He rolled his shoulders, shrugging slightly. Tucker could praise Wash, he just made sure not to do it where he could hear it. “If he heard I said something nice, his ego would get too big, and then we’d never hear the end of it.”

Which wasn’t true, but hey, that’s the story he was rolling with.

Her explanation of what/who did this made him blink, confusion in every inch of his body. Really? Because that wasn’t narrowing down shit, was it?

“Dude, I could name off at least ten assholes, and half of them are from our own teams.” Normal…meals? And the concern was on him like a blanket, his brow furrowed while he leaned a little closer. What. The. Fuck. “How fucked up are you?!”

Carolina levels him with a flat, why are you asking kind of look. "Because I've been in armor lock for six days with no food, water, or sleep," she tells Tucker slowly. "So, they didn't exactly wanna give me a burger and fries."

Even though she would literally have killed for one right now. Also, sorry, Tucker - she hasn't figured out you're from behind her in time, even though she knows that there are other Freelancers here by now.

She'll defend Star Trek and Wash's job later.

"When were you in armor lo--"

But he stopped, his eyes widening. Fuck. No. Unless we're talking Project Freel--no, because she wouldn't have recognized him then. Six days. Six fucking days, and he would have at least heard about it in some capacity, especially with how easy she was explaining it now, with that look like he should remember this.

He didn't remember this. He couldn't, because he hadn't fucking lived it yet.

"Carolina, when was the last time you saw me? What was happening?"

He shouldn't ask. He shouldn't, couldn't, but fuck he had to know for sure that she wasn't crazy, that she was from a different point in their messed up timeline.

Carolina is looking at him with confusion in her expression, a little concerned. She finally thinks - hey, if they brought North, York and Connie - maybe they didn't bring Tucker in from the same time as her.

But she takes a deep breath, speaking.

"Six days ago. You were with Temple, before he tricked us into the basement and activated our armor lock. Locus said you were still alive when he came and got us, though."

Temple. The one that Wash left a vague message over, when neither one knew anything about him, even now.

Crap, now he knew shit, though. Now he knew more shit than he probably should have. Now he was probably going to fuck things up in the future because like hell was he letting anyone lock his team down in some crappy basement for six days and nearly kill them. This was what they had been trying to avoid.

But if he was still alive, how the hell did they get locked down there?

"How did Temple trick you if I was with him?" What the fuck was wrong with me? "You're not telling me I turned on you, right?"

Nope. No way. That was impossible.

"What? No," Carolina said, giving him a look that clearly spoke volumes about her thinking he would betray them, and maybe a little bit about how likely she thought that would work.

"You really don't remember this?" She asks him. Then, suspicious, "When was the last time you saw me?"

Hey, hey, Carolina; he could do i—No, Who was he kidding? He couldn’t. He wouldn’t, which was the more important factor, but he couldn’t succeed, either, which was just fact. But family didn’t betray each other, and he was glad, so fucking glad, to know that he still felt that way in the future.

When. The inevitable question.

“You and Wash were splitting up from us on the moon. You were going after Freelancer shit, and we were trying to find some leads on Alpha.” The leads… were the leads real? Fuck, he wanted to ask, felt it itch under his skin, dancing on his tongue. Get the truth. Find out. Was Church - the Church he knew from Blood Gulch, the Church he didn’t get to say goodbye to, the Church who abandoned him in the desert – still alive?

“Wash doesn’t know about the moon; he doesn’t know anything past fighting the Mantises with you, I think.” Doesn’t know about Epsilon. Shit. “I haven’t told him.” With reason. He hoped it was enough of a hint for her to understand that maybe telling Tucker wasn’t the best choice, but it was a choice all the same. She was the gatekeeper of that knowledge; she alone figured who went through.

Carolina lets out a heavy sigh, leaning her head back against the pillow again, closing her eyes.

"We didn't find who we were looking for," Carolina says slowly. "Instead, you showed up with a guy named Temple and his team - another simulation base crew. I didn't recognize him at first and I assumed he was trustworthy since you were with him.

"I was wrong. It wasn't until after we were at his base, and he'd trapped us in armor lock under it, that I remembered who he was. Texas and I were assigned a game of capture the flag at his base. It ended up getting one of his friends killed, so he was going for revenge."

"And then," she says, her voice saying this is somehow the most incredulous part of the story, "Six days later, Locus shows up, with Grif running distraction."

More Freelancer drama was essentially what she was saying, and he was used to it. They all were; it wasn't even a thing that phased them anymore as if it had been burned out of them by a million previous near-death experiences.. Besides, as important as that was, the actual vital section was glossed over.

We didn't find who we were looking for.

What the hell did that mean? Was someone impersonating Alpha? Was someone just fucking with them? Was he even alive?

"If we didn't find him, then who did we find?"

But wait, as if that wasn't enough, well, there was more, wasn't there? More surprises, more shockers, like this was the cliffhanger ending of a mid-season break. What he had gathered about Locus so far wasn't allowing him to be as shocked as he had been that Mr. Three-Word-Vocabulary would return, but Grif? Grif...who was being decidedly himself?

"Grif? Why the hell did he come back? I thought he hated us." Even if he knew fullstop it wasn't true. For all the bullshit he spewed, Grif hated them in the same way Church hated all of them: loudly but without absolute conviction.

"There wasn't anyone at the shack." And she misses that - that he's asking about Alpha, when she's talking about Illinois. "We didn't find anything until Temple showed up."

As for Epsilon or Alpha's fate... he would have to ask her about that. The comment about Grif, though, makes her shrug a little bit.

"I don't know. Locus said he came to help - I wasn't exactly in a position to doubt him," she says, indicating herself. "I haven't seen any of you for six days. I wasn't even rescuing you - that was Locus, so Wash and I could rest for a bit."

"...Shack?" And their wires were crossed, unless later clues meant Alpha was at the mystery place, but that didn't seem right. What the hell was she talking about? Tucker was too wrapped up in Church to see beyond him, it; angered and desperate at the same time, these rivers of convoluted bullshit that ran way too deep to put into words that he would share with anyone.

Okay, maybe with her.

Grif, though, that was another conversation entirely, that asshole. He frowned a little deeper, their parting words on their last argument here still haunting him like hungry ghosts. That selfish lazyfuck? Rescuing them? Ha.

"Yeah, well, unless Grif was being held at gunpoint and it was to save his own ass, I doubt he would have chosen to do shit for any of us." And let the bitterness permeate for a bit.

"The shack that we were looking for Freelancer Illinois in?"

Her tone is, similarly, confused. She knows what he and the others were looking for, but it doesn't cross her mind to think that's what all of what Tucker is talking about.

At that, though, she frowns deeply.

"I don't think Locus held him at gunpoint. He says he swore off killing, but he could be lying."

"Ooooh, yeah, that." Fuck, he sort of forgot about it. Not completely, of course, but...everything was overshadowed by the other shit, by Alpha, by Grif bailing, by being here with robozombies. Sometimes, it was just a little hard to keep all the Freelancer drama straight, especially after not talking about it for so long, and especially since it had a tendency to impact every fucking thing they did.

She was confused, and he could only shake his head. "Thought you were talking about Church." Not Epsilon. Not Alpha. Just....just Church. Which, the fact that she wasn't made him watch her with scrutinizing eyes a little, as if waiting for an answer on a question he was too afraid to ask. What happened to him? Was he okay?

But he couldn't voice it. He was just messing up the future left and right with this, wasn't he?

"Locus is...different. I think. Hope? Maybe?" Unless it was a long con, one he got from Felix, but that didn't feel right either. He was training with Tucker, he was making pancakes for York, these...these things he wouldn't have done before.

"Why did Grif come back?" Because, dammit, he had to know.

She doesn't know what happened to Church - though given being trapped, she's sure that it wasn't actually him. That Wash's paranoia and hers was actually true, which is depressing.

He wouldn't have been Epsilon, but he would have been someone familiar.

The next question, though, just has her squinting at him a little in return.

"He came to help us. I mean, that's what Locus said so maybe it wasn't that altruistic."

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