Pitch-black shadows stretched blackened fingers across the darkened lime-green walls of the Spartan’s locker room. Oppressive darkness and still air smothered Kennedy in some omnipresent fog, weighing down her shoulders as much as a physical weight pressing upon them. Her back slumped over, her arms rested on her thighs, and her hands hung limp along with her head. Her green eyes traced the contours on the blue speckled linoleum beneath her boot-clad feet, her discarded Spartan bodysuit sitting off to one side. She’d finished donning her coveralls mere minutes before, but still sat, featureless and unmoving, appearing to anyone else like a statue carved from porcelain, the little light that filtered in through the outside doorway casting off her pallid pale skin. She sat in silence, aimlessly thinking, wandering through the events of the prior training session. The rest of the Spartans with her had long since departed, leaving her to her ruminations. Kennedy’s head lifted up from its downcast position, looking around the room. A broken, damaged training helmet sat behind her, in her own open locker, its half-cracked orange visor mocking her with a glint of reflected light. The rest of the locker room held itself in a similar state of quiet, still disarray; discarded canteens, bags, and bottles adorning the benches, next to waste bins and dark water coolers. The Spartan couldn’t help but laugh at that; her comrades had left the trash behind. Before her thoughts could wander further down that self-deprecating road, the light from the doorway darkened, a silhouette appearing, and stepping into the room. The figure turned around, keying the controls to shut the door, and flipping the light switch next to the door controls. The lights flickered on, one by one, with clicks and whirs of electrical components thrumming with power. Now the shadows held little sway in the illuminated space, and Kennedy brought a hand up to her eyes, sighing as her circling fingers and massaging knuckles fought off the first tremblings of a migraine. “Heard you lost a fight,” the figure said. Kennedy’s hands left her face, and she gazed over at the other figure, now leaning up against one of the closed lockers splitting the room in two. “Yeah?” Kennedy huffed mirthlessly, moving her head so her sight was filled with blue floor rather than the other Spartan in the room. “Who says?” “C’mon,” Carrie Lones folded her arms over her chest, and her ankles over one another, allowing more of her weight to rest against the gunmetal grey of the lockers. “Everyone knows.” Kennedy’s eyes snapped up to the other Spartan, doing their best to bore a hole straight through to the featureless-green wall on the other side. “Then everyone better keep their mouths shut!” she hissed through clenched teeth. Carrie rolled her eyes, pushing herself up off of the locker. “Don’t be like that,” she said, stepping up to Kennedy’s perch on the bench, but keeping a respectable distance. “You can’t just sit here and stew because someone finally managed to end your streak.” Kennedy’s hand unfurled, motioning into the darkness. “It’s worked every other time I’ve lost,” she said, blinking once and fixing Carrie with a deadpan stare. “Why shouldn’t it work this time.” “And how many times did you actually learn something from wallowing in self-pity?” Kennedy’s brow furrowed and dipped low over her eyes. “I’m not wallowing in self-pity!” “No?” Carrie smiled a half-smile and motioned at Kennedy with a hand. “Then I take it you’re not dressing your wounds for aesthetics, then?” She hummed, putting a finger to her chin before taking another step closer and sitting down on the same bench. “I know some guys and gals around here like the devil-may-care look, but it’s not for me. At least, not when the wounds and sores are still weeping.” Kennedy flushed and shook away Carrie’s concerns. “They’re minor.” “A black eye and broken skin above the socket is hardly minor, Kennedy,” Carrie said. “What’s it to you?” Kennedy snapped. “Why do you care?” Carrie took a deep breath. “Because I also happen to care about this unit,” she said. “And that means everyone in it.” She made a sweeping gesture with a finger. “Unfortunately, that also includes you,” she finished with a pointed index finger. Kennedy huffed and turned away. “Shove off.” “I get that you’re angry,” Cartrie began, her voice gentle and soothing. “But every failure is just an opportunity to learn a lesson.” “Who are you, the shrink?” Kennedy’s body twisted to look back at Carrie, her eyes suspicious. “Did Monroe put you up to this?” Carrie waved a hand. “I haven’t spoken to Monroe since my last eval.” “When was that?” Kennedy tilted her head. Closing her eyes, Carrie sighed. “When we got back from the Sprawl,” she said. “Oh.” The word dropped between them and stayed there, the dark shadows lengthening around them, and the blanket now smothering both of them under its ever-present weight. “Yeah,” Carrie answered. Kennedy raised a hand, going to place it on Carrie’s shoulder, but thought better of it halfway through. “That was a rough one.” “Some would even call it a loss,” Carrie said with a smile. “But you didn’t sit around moping afterwards, and you took worse wounds than these.” “The Sprawl wasn’t a loss,” Kennedy said. “We completed our mission objectives, and saved a lot of lives.” Carrie nodded, then turned it into a sideways shake of her head. “But the habitats were all destroyed. One by one.” Kennedy hummed. “I’ll sacrifice infrastructure for life, any day.” “Maybe I just see things differently,” Carrie looked towards the lockers in front of her, then her gaze went through them. Her eyes seeing, but not perceiving, in a thousand-yard stare. “It’s hard to watch planets and habitats go up in flames, even if we save so many lives. Even when we win we still lose.” “That’s…” Kennedy shook her head. “Just war.” Carrie snapped back to the locker room with a jolt of her head and a smile. “And this was just a training fight. Makes you feel kinda silly, doesn’t it?” She leaned in close and bumped her shoulder into Kennedy’s. For the first time since their exchange began, a smile spread Kennedy’s lips. “Alright, I get it. Perspective.” Carrie tilted her head, her own smile widening. “Ain’t it a bitch?” Kennedy laughed. “It’s a mean one, for sure.” Carrie stood up, reaching into one of the lockers for a box of medical gel. She turned around, standing in front of Kennedy, holding the box up at eye-level. “Patch you up?” Kennedy sighed, sitting back and nodding. “Go for it.” Carrie knelt down, popping the lid off of the box of gel, and squirting an amount onto her fingers. Her right hand reached up to cup Kennedy’s face, her left hand placing the gel onto her open wounds with a gentleness that surprised her. With a sweep of her fingers, Carrie moved a lock of blonde hair out of the way of Kennedy’s wounded eye. Carrie winced, seeing the extent of the damage done to the other Spartan’s face. “They really did a number on you, huh?” “You should see them,” Kennedy said. “We made them work for it.” Carrie’s eyes diverted from the open wound, now glistening with a blue-tinted sheen. “Who was it?” she asked. “Wolfpack,” Kennedy said. Carrie’s eyebrows shot up. “Torres? Her team did this?” Shrugging, Kennedy smiled. “Barton has a mean swing.” “Well,” Carrie worked the gel in a bit deeper, before spreading it wound with massaging fingers. “Learned something for next time, then.” Kennedy winced, the pain turning to a broiling fire. “Next time they won’t be so lucky,” she hissed. Smiling, Carrie stroked a thumb over Kennedy’s cheeks. “Atta girl. That’s the Kennedy we all know.” The two sat there for a time, Carries hands still cradling Kennedy’s pale skin. The gel was on the wound, and the surrounding bruise, but Carrie didn’t move to pull her hands away. For a second they just let the silence overtake them, but this one was not oppressive nor smothering. Merely a comfortable exchange of something wordless, as green eyes stared into matching green. “Well,” Carrie began, reluctantly pulling her hands away from Kennedy’s warm skin. “You’re all patched up.” She wiped her hand on the thigh of her coveralls. “Keep the gauze on until the medigel works its wonders.” Rolling her eyes, Kennedy waved a dismissive hand. “Yes mom.” “That’s yes ma’am to you, missy!” Carrie barked, eyes twinkling with mirth. Kennedy laughed and made a flippant motion. “Get out of here, you freak.” Laughing, Carrie turned around and walked back towards the entrance of the locker room, shooting a look over her shoulder. “Sass me again and you’re grounded, young lady!” Kennedy tossed the now-empty medigel container off towards Carrie’s retreating form, watching it clatter harmlessly off of the door jamb. Carrie’s ringing laughter echoed back to her from beyond the door. The walls and shadows of the darkened locker room were much brighter now. Kennedy stared around at the discarded duffel bags and water bottles, the closed lockers and the waste bins. Standing up, the Spartan turned to face her own locker, hanging open with a towel draped down the door. She stepped up to it, picking up the damaged training helmet, and tossed it towards the processing station, not caring where it landed. It didn’t matter anymore, and she wouldn’t spare it another thought. She grabbed her tags from the side of the locker door, winding them around her neck, over her coveralls, then shut the locker door with a clang. |
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