Unconsciousness is underrated, York figures. Being out cold is kind of great, because there's basically zero pain and sometimes you have funky dreams and things just really aren't all that complicated: everything's sort of a nice, soothing black, and you can just exist that way for a while and still feel like you've accomplished everything expected of you.

Now, coming back to consciousness? That part sucks.

He's staring up at the sky, waiting for the wavy blur in his vision to resolve into something a little less abstract, when the pain hits. He hisses out a breath, right hand scrabbling ineffectually at his left arm, which feels a bit on fire. Maybe a lot on fire.

Someone grabs his hand, pushing it back to his side, and he twists, trying to kick up at the figure holding him down, because man, he's on fire, someone should probably put him out. But his legs apparently each weigh about a billion pounds, which is very inconsiderate of them, and all he manages to do is sort of twitch one of his feet. His own breathing sounds really loud in his ears.

"York," says Delta. He sounds weird, like, audible but also really distant, like he's whispering into a megaphone. "Do not panic. You were seriously wounded."

Beyond the reactive tears in his eyes, York can just make out the blurred figure of a person, someone in armor. Someone leaning over him. His breath catches in his throat, and he says, "Carolina?"

"Jesus fuck, you have a one-track mind," South says. "Delta, what am I looking at, here?"

"Two bullet wounds to the upper chest: one punctured the left lung and one passed near the spine. The healing unit had time to repair most of the damage; York is no longer in danger of septicemia. There is some residual swelling near the spinal column that may be restricting motion."

"His fucking arm looks like somebody tried to cut it open."

"Compound fracture of the left ulna," Delta says. "His power armor's control modules had already shorted out when he fell; the added weight caused excessive damage. Painful, but the worst was repaired well before Agent Washington confiscated the healing unit. He is no longer losing blood."

York listens to this laundry list of injuries and decides that whoever they're talking about must be pretty fucked up. His arm hurts. "My arm hurts," he says, in case somebody's listening.

"What the fuck am I supposed to do now?" South says.

Now he can actually make out South's armor, the familiar pink and green. He looks behind her, but her brother's conspicuous in his absence. "Wait," he says. It's getting easier to catch his breath, but he's just ridiculously thirsty, and his voice is strange and hoarse. "Aren't you, like. A wanted fugitive or something? I mean, I'm not judging, I know I am too, but, uh. Should we be hanging out? Is that a thing?" An idea occurs to him. "Have you heard anything about Carolina? I mean, I guess Tex is still out there somewhere, but there's gotta be more of us left."

South is staring down at him, her helmet tilted to one side. Now that he can see a bit more clearly, there's something tense in her stance. One hand sways toward the pistol at her side.

"No," Delta says. "Killing him will not improve your situation. He will be a valuable ally, and for you, allies are in short supply just now."

South says nothing.

"Whoa," York says. "I have no idea what you're talking about, but I'm pretty sure I'm with D on that. No killing. No dying. Deal?"

South crouches down beside him, and he would try to shrink away from her, but, y'know. Billion-pound weights on his legs. "You look the same," she says, at last. Accusingly. She brings her hand up, hesitates, then combs back his hair with her fingers. It should feel weirdly intimate. It doesn't. It's exploratory, rough. Her hand is shaking. "You haven't fucking changed."

And, like, he gets it. He really gets it, just then, for the first time. Because her voice isn't the one he was hoping for, but the sound of it is still a tear in some veil of his memory, and beyond that veil is... is everything. It's stupid conversations around the breakfast table, it's ridiculous acrobatics and swapping advice about how to wash blood out of underarmor, it's quiet nights on alien worlds, staring up at the stars, just sort of existing, just sort of being who they had to be. It's unconsciousness, plain and simple, before the rough, rude awakening.

"South," he says. "Where's your brother?"

Her hand stills in his hair, then draws away. "Dead," she says, shortly. "Wash, too, I think. I shot him in the back and left him to die."

"Oh," says York, softly. He brings up his right hand again, presses the heel of it to his good eye, and just breathes. "D," he says. "Something's wrong with, something's wrong with the bad eye. I can't see."

"I am currently implanted in Agent South," Delta says, and the faraway sound of his voice makes sense then. "I convinced her to return for you. My adaptive subroutines are also localized in your armor, which we had to remove due to excessive damage."

The pain in his arm is fading, finally, and York realizes South's just injected him with something. Presumably an analgesic and not something fatal, although apparently she's taken to murdering Freelancers in cold blood so, y'know. Could go either way. "Why am I alive?" he says. "I mean, how?"

"Because Delta's too fucking smart for his own good," South says.

"I lied," Delta says, simply. "I calculated Agent Texas's odds of survival. I suspected that, if she stayed to ensure you made a full recovery, her odds would decrease sharply. Your wounds were survivable with your healing unit. I told her that you would not survive. I remained with you."

York can feel the rushing weightlessness of the drugs beginning to kick in. "Recovery beacon," he slurs. "They'd-"

"Agent Washington was dispatched to recover me. He removed your healing unit and confiscated me. He intended to destroy your body. I created a holographic illusion of an explosion."

"Delta," York says, shooting for 'scandalized' and probably landing somewhere nearer 'heavily drugged and confused'. "Who taught you to lie so well?" He pauses, trying to drag the stuttering movie-reel of his thoughts back into place. "Wait, no. If Wash implanted you, wouldn't he have at least suspected-?"

"Agent Washington would not implant me," Delta says primly. "Not after his experience with the Epsilon unit."

"Oh. Right," York says, and tries very hard to stop thinking about soda cans with swirly straws.

"I could not confide in Agent Washington, as he was still working for the Director. His loyalties are... confused."

"I was working for the recovery force, too," South says.

"You were pretending to work for the recovery force," Delta corrects her, with a pedantic tone of voice that York's always found weirdly grounding, comforting. "I knew your true ambitions as soon as I implanted. I knew that when the opportunity presented itself, you would attempt to escape with me."

South shrugs. "Little green fucker made me a deal. He wouldn't interfere with my plans, I'd help him with his."

York doesn't want to ask, because he really doesn't want to know. He really- "North and Wash? What happened?"

South's hands clench into fists. "There's some fucking monster out there chasing down A.I.s. Killing Freelancers. Caught up to me and North, and North was, I don't know. Getting more and more reckless. Theta didn't let him sleep anymore, and he was-" She sits back, suddenly, hunching in on herself, pressing both hands to the sides of her helmet. "He wasn't who he used to be. He kept talking about how we didn't matter, how we just had to get Theta to safety, and I guess I, I guess I wasn't ready when this thing attacked us. Maybe I wasn't ready on purpose. Either way, he's dead."

Delta seems to pick up on the quaver in her voice, cuts across it smoothly. "Agent Washington's death was necessary to ensure our survival. And yours, York. I knew you would only live for a matter of days without assistance. By leaving Agent Washington as bait for this unknown attacker, we were able to effect our escape. Without his sacrifice, all of us would surely have been lost."

York thinks about that. Breathes slow, floating on the painkillers, watching the world waver and crumble around him. "I didn't want this, D."

"Nobody fucking wanted this," South says.

Delta, a small green glow at her shoulder, says, "But it is all we have."

York sighs and gives himself over again to the dark.

After that, things are... well. They are what they are. He heals. He acknowledges that all the decisions, all the calculations make sense. Delta's been living in his head long enough to make cold analytics a lot more palatable than they would've been a few years back.

But he's still human, and the human things burn. He's furious at Delta for making those calls without him, for taking the decision from him. He's furious at South for not... for not trying harder, for not being better. He dreams in deep purple and cold gray. He dreams in blue-green. He wakes up tense and shaking, his fingernails cutting bloody half-circle grooves into his palms.

Delta seems determined to stay with South, and York can't really blame him. There's a sort of equilibrium, this way. He's not sure what he'd do if it was just him and Delta again, but on certain dark nights he can take a wild guess.

They find an abandoned house in a shitty little city, just down the street from where York holed up after Freelancer. York indulges in a little breaking and entering to get them money. South monitors comm channels. The arguments, the heavy silences, don't occur nearly as often. They settle into a sort of numb routine, just kind of waiting. Existing.

You know. Being unconscious.

"It's Maine," South says, one night. She doesn't take her helmet off much, but it's sitting on the table in front of her now, among a handful of scattered empties. They both try not to drink anything stronger than beer, these days. She leans forward, and the scars on her face catch and reflect Delta's light.

"Hm?" York's spinning a bottle on the table, testing the limits of his muffled vision. His head hurts.

"The monster following us. Pretty sure it's Maine."

"Oh," says York. He's aware, in a dim sort of way, that he should probably care more, one way or the other.

South is watching him. "What, no reaction? No stoic glare, no 'let's kill the bastard?'"

He yawns, rubbing at his face. He needs a shave. "South-"

Her brow furrows. "Jesus," she says. "You don't know, do you? You didn't see it happen."

"I'm going to bed, South."

"He's the one who killed Carolina, York."

York sets his bottle down, slow, careful. Thinks maybe he's gonna be sick. "She was," he says, and swallows. "She was listed as KIA, after the crash. I hacked the records. That's all I found."

"What did you think happened to her? Maine went fucking crazy, tore out her A.I., threw her off a cliff." South's expression shutters, and York can recognize a silent rebuke from Delta when he sees it. "Sorry," she says, roughly. "I thought you knew."

"I'm going to bed," York says again.

That night, he sinks into confused dreams on his ragged mattress, wakes up to see South sitting with her back to the wall, Delta's light playing across her face. This time of night, even a creepy green glow seems comforting.

She hears him stir, looks over at him, and gives a little shrug. He figures maybe that shrug sums up their current situation better than anything else. He returns the shrug like it's a salute, then rolls onto his side and fades into a dreamless sleep for the first time in months. Years.

He wakes up, says, "Okay," in a soft voice to the dusty apartment, to the morning light creeping through the slats on the busted windows. He gets his legs under him—a little more clumsy than before, but they work, they still work—and springs to his feet with a suddenness that makes South, still slumped against the wall, jolt awake with a yelp.

"What the fuck-?"

"Mornin'," he says, grinning at her.

She stares. "Uh."

"D, you online?"

Delta flickers to life beside South. "Of course, York."

"Great. We're gonna need your help on this one. But first, y'know. Breakfast. Maybe coffee? Do we have coffee?" He drags a hand back through his hair, staring blankly at the dilapidated kitchen. "Nah. We don't have coffee. I think we should go get coffee. I've got some cash." He squints at South. "Do you even own clothes that aren't armor?"

"Yeah," South says, pushing to her feet. "I just figured not wearing armor might be a terrible idea, given that we're, you know. Wanted criminals who also happen to be pursued by a heavily armed tech-stealing asshole."

"You make a good point," York says. "However: coffee. Also stealth. Trust me, nobody's gonna give two shits about a couple of busted-up homeless vets who obviously need a caffeine buzz. We'll fit right in."

"I," she says, and pauses. "What the fuck is happening right now?"

"We're happening," York says. "I'm done with waiting. We're gonna see what we can find out. We're gonna break into a Freelancer facility and find their files on Maine, figure out what the hell is after us. And we're gonna see if there's anyone left out there we can trust."

South keeps staring. Delta speaks up first. "That seems ill-advised, York."

"Yeah," York says, cheerfully. "It does."

The coffee shop's exactly as York remembers it, right down to the cheerful guy behind the counter who winks at him when he jogs up. "Been a while, stranger," he says.

"Eh, you know," says York. "Keeping busy."

"Er," says the barista.

York glances over his shoulder at South. She's wearing a baseball cap, which would be a passable-yet-dorky disguise if it weren't for the fact that she's currently trying to drag it down so it's covering her entire face. Yeah. Real subtle. He elbows her. "C'mon."

"What the fuck why are you fucking talking to people," she hisses.

"Trust me," he murmurs, and turns back to the barista. "Just a latte for me. And my friend's gonna have, like, something incredibly boring yet still hardcore, right? Triple espresso?"

South glances up at him from beneath the bill of her cap. "Peppermint white chocolate frappuccino," she says, defiantly. "Extra whipped cream."

"Hah," says York, and manages to steer her to a table, garnering only a few weird looks from the other patrons.

"What the fuck, York?" she snarls, then lowers her voice with a visible effort. "We can't just fuckin' leave the armor back at the house while we... go drink fucking coffee."

"Peppermint white chocolate frappuccino," York says, and whistles. "Never would've guessed in a million years."

"Fuck you," South says, reflexively. "I'm serious, York."

"So am I. I was sure I was spot-on with the triple espresso thing." He catches the glint in her eyes and grins, holding up a hand. "Hey, relax. D's watching the armor. We all set up the booby traps, remember? If half the block goes up in flame, we'll know someone's breaking into our shitty house to steal our obviously military-grade equipment. Somehow I think we'll be okay."

"I-"

The barista strolls up to their table, two drinks in hand. "These are on me," he says. "I was starting to get worried about you, guy."

York grins. "I seem to bring that out in people. Thanks, man."

"Anytime," he says, and shoots one more curious look at South before heading back to the counter.

When York turns back to South, she's staring at the drinks. "Uh," she says. "Did he leave his number on your napkin?"

"Nah," York says. "Well, once. But this time it's something else." He takes a sip, smoothing out the napkin, committing the digits scrawled on it to memory. "See, that kid was a gearhead in the army, back during the War. And he maybe sorta got sucked into a weird paramilitary project around the same time we were. You get what I'm saying?"

South, to her credit, doesn't overtly stare at the dude so much as glance up at him from under the brim of her cap. "How do you even fucking know that?"

York shrugs, then has to hide another grin when South distractedly pulls the lid off her drink and starts eating the whipped cream by the spoonful. "Unlike some people, I didn't scare the shit out of the entire crew. I had a poker game going. He joined in a couple times. Good kid. Couldn't hold on to a lead for shit, but he had an incredible poker face." He leans forward, picking at the napkin. "Slipped him a note just now. He's got contacts inside, and he's just given me the latest access codes he had for Freelancer command."

South chokes on her drink, and he pats her on the back reassuringly, right up until she glares at him in a way that kinda suggests that if he likes his balls intact he should probably stop. "Fuck," she says.

"Yeah," says York, and takes a long sip of his coffee. "Like I said, I'm done standing still."

They do have to wait around a little longer while South patches them in to the new comm system. Because, y'know, actually breaking into a Freelancer facility is a terrible plan no matter how you look at it, and if they manage it remotely, that'll greatly reduce their chances of a horrible, painful death. York kills time by repairing his armor, Delta occasionally flickering over to offer helpful suggestions. There's still some tension between them, but York senses that Delta's trying to make amends in his own awkward little way. They talk about it only once, late at night, when South's got her helmet on, listening in on comm chatter.

Delta says, "I think I am beginning to recognize the difference between understanding why something had to be done and... accepting that something had to be done."

"Sure," York says, cursing as he fumbles the screwdriver for the fifteenth time. The screw's gonna be stripped at this rate, and the blind spot in his vision, the fucked-up depth perception, isn't making this any easier. "You can look at something logically, but that doesn't mean you'll be okay with it. Sometimes you just gotta live with it, even if everything inside you's telling you it's wrong."

"Just part of what makes us human?" Delta says.

York holds his breath. The screwdriver slides into place. He grins. "Yeah, D. Something like that."

Their first break comes while he's out getting groceries. Because, y'know. Food that doesn't come out of a can is generally a big part of planning ambitious operations, and their latest hideout is only four blocks away from the nearest supermarket. When he shoves through the door, a truly ridiculous number of bags hanging from his wrists, he doesn't notice the ashen look on South's face.

He's halfway through unpacking when she comes up behind him and says, "Wash is alive."

He freezes partway through stacking boxes in the cupboards, then turns toward her. She's looking at him with a defiant, go-fuck-yourself glare. Her hands are bunched into fists. "Hell," York says, softly, because he can't think of anything else.

"He was hurt bad," she says. "He's been half-dead all this time, recovering at a hospital, apparently. Just got discharged. I caught a transmission-" She swallows. "He was talking to the Counselor. He sounded... fuck." She turns, slamming a fist into the wall, which wouldn't have been a big deal if she'd still been in armor. But she's not wearing armor, and for a moment they both just stare at the blood as it runs between her fingers onto the floor.

They patch up her hand as best they can, but they're kinda trying to hang onto the drugs they've got, so she dulls the pain with the shitty bottle of gin York's managed to keep on hand for emergencies. She's always been an unexpectedly quiet drunk, and as the night drags on she retreats back into a chair in one corner of the room with the bottle, sitting with her knees drawn up to her chest. York, crosslegged on the floor, keeps tinkering with his armor, Delta floating near him—not quite at his side, not anymore, but close enough to cast his light on York's work.

South speaks up eventually, says, "It would've been easier if," and just sort of trails off. She brings up her bandaged hand, swipes it once across her eyes, takes a long swig from the bottle. "Me and North almost went back for him, you know? Back at the crash site. He was in Medical after they pulled Epsilon, and he'd just woken up when you and Tex attacked. He seemed... he seemed okay. Better. But we thought maybe he'd have a better chance on the ship, maybe we'd have another chance to get him out later. We sort of expected to get shot in the back any second, at that point. And North was... North was worried about Theta. We had to move."

"I know," York says.

"He barely knew me when we met up again," she says, bringing the bottle up to press it to her forehead. "He was different. Y'know? He was always being that dumb kid, back on the ship, like it was easier than being serious. Fucking silly straws and skateboards. And then when I saw him again it was like he just, he just stopped. I think I really fucked him over, York."

York cocks his head to one side, picks critically at a rough soldering job on his armor's chestplate. "I think maybe we all did."

"We all didn't shoot him in the back and leave him to bleed out in the fuckin' dirt."

York looks at her. "No," he says, "we didn't. That one's on you."

"Suck my cock, York," she snarls, then sighs and drops the bottle. It's completely empty, which is a little alarming, and it rolls across the uneven floor until it hits the opposite wall. "Jesus fuck," she says, and rubs her eyes. "Fuck."

York waits for the little hitch in her breathing to smooth out, because she probably won't react well to him talking to her while she's crying, and even drunk off her ass with a busted hand he's pretty sure she can beat him to a pulp in approximately no time flat. "Hey," he says, "what say we bust him out of there?"

"He is still an agent of Project Freelancer," Delta says, softly. "He may not want to leave."

"Nah, see, it's just that nobody's given him the option."

South snorts. "He's not gonna be happy to see me. Might take the chance to shoot me in the head."

York smirks. "Yeah, well, then I get D back and we skip off into the sunset together. Fine by me." When she doesn't snap at him, just staring morosely at the wall, he raises his voice. "Seriously, South, I think we gotta go for this."

She squints at him. "You realize," she says, "that just because Wash is alive doesn't mean Carolina isn't still dead at the bottom of that cliff."

"Yeah, I realize that," York says, which is a fucking lie and they both know it. "It's still the right thing to do. There's... there's not a lot of us left. We have to try."

She sighs, resting her head back against her chair. "Yeah," she says. She looks weird in the green half-light, pale and cold, but her jaw is set. "Yeah, we kinda do, don't we?"