I came to as the others began making their way through the moraine. The rough passage through the rocks and boulders shook Marvin enough to wake me up. I must have made sounds over the comms, since the group stopped and turned to me. I felt as if I had been dropped from a ten story building. My arms felt like noodles as I tried to sit up and retract my helmet; someone had activated it after my fight with the ATCs.

At the thought of the ATCs and Starden, my burning anger returned and adrenaline coursed through my veins. I rolled off Marvin, landing on wobbly legs but refusing to be dead weight for the group. I had been so close I could almost smell the fear on him. I was not sure how I had been able to take down the large ATC considering the strength it showed after I had taken off its leg and when it tackled me. There was definitely something strange was going with my body.

Just as I was getting ready to address the group, I heard my name whispered.

Alpha.

I looked to the others, assuming they were concerned by my sudden activity, especially after a blackout.

“I… I’m okay. Thank you all for lugging me around.” I looked down at the ground, not really able to meet their eyes after realizing how stupid my plan had been.

“It’s okay, Boss. It's not like we all don’t want a piece of that human scum,” Epsilon replied.

I took note of how much more confident the burly man had been since Beta and him met us at the moraine. I needed to know what everyone was capable of; the more time I spent on Dun Lund, the more I realized that working together was paramount. I patted the man’s shoulders and I saw nods of approval from the others.

“We will take it easy on the way back. I think we should have enough time to make it to B1, if you wanted,” asked Zeta, a hint of concern in her voice.

“I can make it. We can stop for a bit at the surface base, if that's okay with everyone.” I had already been a burden on everyone, but I was glad they had taken the initiative to return to base.

There were no objections and we made our way through the moraine’s riff raff. I was really getting tired of the amount of rocks everywhere, but now that I was not weighing down Marvin, we loaded him up with rocks to take back to B1.

It was not long into the trek that I became urgently hungry. I felt myself salivating as we continued forward and barely managed to contain myself until we broke for our meal before heading into the city. As everyone sat around and talked while eating their half rations, I ate my half ration and another whole ration. The burning hunger in my stomach turned into a simmer as the food digested. Without realizing it, I had excluded myself from the others, crouching at the edge of the camp.

My hands were shaking as I put down the extra stolen ration’s foil. A tendril of fear rose in my chest as I activated my helmet to attempt to mute my now panicked breathing.

Alpha…

I snapped around behind me. I checked behind the camp’s semi circle and over the rocks. The only sounds were the mild chatting of the others and the howl of the wind over the moraine. After what felt like tense hours, I felt a hand on my back.

I turned, wrench in hand, to find Beta cowering. I did my best to play off my aggressive stance, but the fear had been evident in the youth’s face.

“Hey, Beta. What’s going on?” I asked when I retracted my helmet.

Seemingly hesitant, he responded, “The others are ready to head down. We refilled Marvin with water too.”

“Good, good. I will be right there.”

I watched him walk away; he glanced back twice before joining the others.

Thankfully, Beta’s presence had shaken me from the tension of the meal. I was not exactly hungry, but I could feel a nagging sensation in the pit of my stomach. I was even more concerned as I remembered what Starden had said about the parasitic mutagen. I was no biological engineer, but I knew about the dangers of mutations thanks to my work with Nuclectric systems. I feared the mutagen had only taken longer to change me and I was hours if not days away from turning into the monsters we had been fighting.

Trying to move past my insecurities, I led the way into the passage. The others followed closely behind and we slowly picked up the pace, the fully lit passage and our weapons a safeguard against whatever we might encounter.

A little over an hour passed before we made it back to B1. The downhill sloping of the passage made it much easier than earlier in the day. The light was beginning to fade as the star crossed beyond the horizon the ice ceiling provided.

By my estimate we had enough time to loot another building near B1, so I had Beta and Gamma run up to B1 with Marvin to drop off our full supply box. We had left the other box at the surface camp, snug between two of the support boulders, to act as a chest in case we wanted to store something there.

I scanned the nearby buildings and their adjacent alleys closely. I was not entirely sure what was going on with my mind or my hunger, but I was not going to be caught off guard.

It only took a few minutes for the young Digits to return, having emptied Marvin of everything but rations and a few rocks so we could collect more. I was trying to stockpile rocks since I did not like our odds if we only engaged mutants at close range. I would have killed for a rail rifle.