A loud explosion up on ground level made Dixon grit his teeth. He had to fight the reflex to dive for cover as his surroundings rattled around him. It sounded like one of the others was having a great time distracting the muties. That did make his job harder, though, as the lights flickered out in the dim underground service tunnel he’d managed to locate.

“Fuck.”

Dixon reached into his pocket and retrieved a flare. He didn’t like using them; it felt so wasteful, given how rare they were nowadays. But, given his current situation, he didn’t have much choice. It was dark enough he couldn’t even see his own hand in front of his face.

He twisted the cap off the flare and struck it against the end, holding it out as the red flame flared to life and illuminated his surroundings.

Dixon was just about to head deeper into the tunnel when another explosion, this time louder, closer, and… below him? What?

It was actually enough to throw him to the side, and he landed heavily against one cold metal wall.

“Fuck.”

What the hell was that?

Dixon gritted his teeth, pushed off the wall, and started his poorly-lit trek through this… facility. Whatever it was. The thought of what could be causing the explosions made his stomach twist uneasily, but he did his best to ignore it.

***

“This was a terrible idea!” Centauri screamed over the sound of gunfire and explosions to his frustratingly silent companion. Of course the raiders had old world grenades. Of course. There wasn’t even any point in asking where they got them from.

In response to the explosions that shook the duo’s little foxhole, Wilkes shoved a bundle into his arms, then turned to fire off their revolvers in the direction of the oncoming raiders. Centauri looked down at what he’d been handed, and found a bundle of dynamite sticks tied together.

The mutants had managed to sneak up on the duo, which Centauri hadn’t known was even possible. Luckily, the raiders had seemed just as surprised to see them as they had been to see the mutants. The stalemate had lasted only a few seconds before Wilkes blasted the raiders away.

Unfortunately, the noise just served to enrage the hive, which left Centauri and Wilkes as they were—held up in a relatively defensible position behind the ridge, with the muties funneled into one corridor, leaving them easy pickings for Wilkes’ guns.

Wilkes paused in their shooting just long enough to toss a lighter in his direction. The tiny metal contraption almost slipped through his fingers, but he managed to grab it. And, after a few glances between the dynamite and Wilkes’ increasingly frantic gunshots, Centauri jumped to action.

He yanked one of the sticks free of the bundle, lit the fuse, and tossed it over the ridge. He immediately clapped his hands over his head, and he could feel Wilkes crowding close, too, as they waited for the explosion to rock the raiders.

And rock them it did. A loud boom cracked through the air, and screams echoed up at them from the shallow valley below.

“Yes!” Centauri cried.

Wilkes smacked him gently in the shoulder. They said nothing—of course—but Centauri got the hint: don’t celebrate yet.

Wilkes pulled out their revolvers again and took aim at the reinforcements that scrambled to cover the dead raiders. Meanwhile, Centauri pulled another stick of dynamite free of the bundle, ready to light and toss when Wilkes got overwhelmed again.

He just hoped the other three would be quick about… whatever they were doing. He wasn’t sure how much longer their advantage would last.

***

Needles nodded to the CIA seal hanging above the entrance deeper into the facility. “Wh—What does that mean?”

Glory swallowed. “It means this facility used to belong to government spies. Good ones.” It was an understatement, most likely—everything she’d heard indicated that the old world CIA had been something to fear, but like most of the old world, concrete information on their activities had become practically extinct.

More than the CIA seal, though, what worried Glory more was the series of complex, geometric shapes scrawled on the wall in what looked like human blood. Cultist work, if she had to guess. She nodded to the drawing. “Care to explain that?”

“It’s a purification ritual.”

Glory arched a brow. “A purification ritual?”

Needles shrugged listlessly. “Spaces occupied by humans are considered ‘impure’ and tainted by their cruelty. Purifiers must, well, purify these spaces to make them fit for the faithful to live in long-term, or…” He trailed off with a frown.

“Or…?” she prompted.

Needles sighed. “Bad things can happen. Hallucinations, night terrors, seizures, chronic nosebleeds…” Needles’ frown deepened minutely. “I had them all when I was young. We thought the space was purified, then my father looked into it and found out the previous Purifier had died before he could finish the rites. Everyone—my parents, my brother, my neighbors—believed I had been possessed by the Benefactors’ technology, and had to be exorcised.”

“Exorcised, how?” Glory asked softly.

Needles gazed at the floor for a long, long moment. “You don’t want to know,” he finally said.

The silence stretched between them uncomfortably long, and Glory finally broke away. She rounded the reception desk and approached the computer terminal, pressing the power switch.

“What are you doing?” Needles asked, then scoffed. “You think it still works? It’s over a century old by now!”

Glory shrugged. “These terminals were manufactured by Maximillian Electronics, sometime in the early 21st century. Most of Father’s technology was based on scavenged Maximillian components, and they still worked. ME knew how to build reliable tech.”

Needles’ skeptical expression remained firmly in place, even as the computer let out a melodic hum, its fans whirring to life as it booted up.

Glory peered up at Needles with a small smirk. “You were saying?”

He rolled his eyes.

Glory turned her attention back to the terminal, brushing off the layer of dust that had settled over the screen. A bit of it got swept up into the air around them, making Needles sneeze. He grimaced immediately after the noise escaped him, whirling around to search for anyone who might’ve overheard them.

“Relax,” Glory said. “I don’t detect anyone else nearby.”

“Exactly how nearby is ‘nearby’?”

Glory’s lips quirked. “Roughly fifteen meters in every direction, given average outdoors acoustics and no obstructions.” She focused on the terminal once more, sorting through the basic files to find something hopefully more useful. “Here we go. The receptionist’s last log entry, dated to April 2026. It’s corrupted as all hell, but it says they’re shutting down the facility and moving all personnel to the… Red Mountain site.”

“Does it say why?” Needles asked, leaning over the desk towards her.

Glory’s lips pursed. “No, I—Wait. Something about a security breach, and someone named Catie. It doesn’t say who she is, but it strongly implies that she’s responsible for the facility’s shutdown.”

Needles’ brows furrowed. “How would one woman be responsible for shutting down an entire facility?”

Glory shook her head with a frown. “I don’t know. I found the location of the server room. They wiped the mainframe, but if I can connect, it’s possible I could find something they might have missed.” She looked up to Needles. “Also, assuming they know how to read, the mainframe would be the most likely destination for the intruders. It’s warm, defensible, and commands the lion’s share of the facility’s power allowance.”

Needles cocked his head. “What’s a lion?”

Glory exhaled sharply through her nose, unsure of whether she found his ignorance charming or irritating. “It’s an expression. It means that it gets most of the power automatically, probably stemming from the old world when they needed to keep the servers running by any means necessary.”

“All right, so the server room?”

Glory nodded and stepped away from the terminal. “Keep an eye out. I doubt we’re completely alone down here.”

***

Dixon finally reached the end of the maintenance tunnel, coming upon a thick metal door that almost seemed to glare at him as he approached. He twisted the handle, and the door clicked.

Locked. Of course it was locked. What the fuck else had he been expecting?

Sighing harshly, he turned to look behind him, judging how far he’d come. He had no idea where the other four were, and catching up with them would be… tricky. Maybe he’d been a bit hasty to run off on his own, desperate as he’d been to have space to just be alone with his thoughts. He’d always been more of a loner.

But, it looked like he’d made another impulsive decision based on emotion. Just like he had back at the cannibal lair when they’d killed Jimmy.

Just like he had at Black Sun.

Damn it.

His forehead smacked against the cold metal door with a dull thud, and he took a moment to just breathe for a minute.

What the fuck was he doing? Crying over coulda-shoulda-woulda? Yeah, he’d fucked up. He’d fucked up a lot in his life—running to Reza City, running away from Reza City, stumbling into Black Sun dying of thirst and heatstroke, landing on Tommy’s doorstep, dancing around Tommy for so goddamn long that they were both just about middle-aged by the time they finally got together…

He regretted a lot of it, but couldn’t change it. So why…

Why the actual hell was he worrying about it right then?

Swallowing thickly, he clenched his jaw, backed up, and kicked in the door. The hinges squealed in protest, but the door swung open, revealing what was on the other side. Dixon’s mouth fell open as he gazed upon a majesty of old world engineering—not quite Benefactor-level architecture and technology like the citadels, nowhere near as run-down and dirty as the wastes. Something perfectly between the two, frozen in time.

He inhaled, and smelled smoke. Wrinkling his nose, he gazed across the big chamber towards a transparent tube running up and down the far left of the room. He recognized something similar from Reza City, leading up to the executive levels. Black smoke belched up through the tube, and as he crept a little closer, Dixon could just see the flickering yellow-and-orange light of a roaring fire from down below.

That was worrisome. He was just lucky that the smoke seemed to be trapped in the elevator shaft, hopefully sparing him from smoke inhalation.

He hoped.

He turned back to the rest of the room, and saw the weird computer terminal at the desk was on. The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end.

He readied his rifle as he searched the room; a lobby, if he had to guess. When he found nothing out of place besides the computer itself, he slowly lowered the weapon.

He racked his brains. Old world computer systems were networked, weren’t they? Maybe someone had tried to access the network from somewhere else, and this computer had turned on by accident. Or maybe… someone else had just been through.

He kept his rifle at the ready as he approached the computer, and found it open on a map—of the facility, he presumed. It had been zoomed in on the server room on the upper level when he approached, which he assumed was the cultists’ destination.

Tightening his grip on his rifle, he quickly memorized the directions to the server room and set out to track his enemy down.

***

“It should be the next right,” Glory murmured, voice barely above a whisper. Even if they were alone in the facility, which was doubtful in and of itself, the way her voice echoed in the empty hallways when she spoke at full volume made her synthskin crawl, so she kept her voice down.

Needles’ light, even breaths gusted across the nape of Glory’s neck, and she had to suppress a shudder. She took a few milliseconds to forcibly turn down her synthskin sensitivity; after all, should the situation turn volatile, she couldn’t have Needles’ proximity distracting her.

She wished Dixon were there with them. He’d be useful in a fight, and he might even be able to swear an attacker into submission.

They arrived at the wide, metallic doorway that, according to the map, led to the server room. Something tensed, deep down in Glory’s chassis, and she rounded the doorway to face the room.

The server towers were warped and aged—clearly they hadn’t been in use in quite some time. All things considered, though, they didn’t look to be over a century old, either. One of the towers towards the back was blackened and partially-melted, but the rest were intact. In fact, most of the towers were still emitting a dim blue glow, and were humming softly.

“There’s no way these have been on for over a century,” Glory said matter-of-factly. “Maximillian Electronics are good, but they’re not that good.”

“You think someone else has been in here since?” Needles asked.

“Oh, I don’t doubt it.” Glory sought out the server room terminal, and typed in a few commands, bringing up a basic log. “Whoever used this last tried to wipe their history, but they did a sloppy job of it.” She began rummaging around the terminal for a wire with a familiar connector end, and let out a triumphant noise when she found one. “I probably won’t be terribly alert while I’m in there, so you’ll have to watch out for us,” she said.

Needles was staring intently at the wire in her hands, but he nodded at her words. “I will.” But there was something… distracted in his gaze. Maybe it was the way he wasn’t quite focused on her, but Glory frowned.

“What?” she asked. “What is it?”

“Nothing!”

She glared. “This is important. If you’re distracted, it could be dangerous for both of us.”

He sighed. “I was thinking about the purification sigils again.”

“In the reception?” At his nod, she asked, “Why? I thought they were commonplace in cultist lairs.”

“They are,” he agreed. “It’s just… purification rituals are complicated and take time. They’re usually only performed on long-term settlements, to protect the populace.”

“...So?”

“So…” He sighed. “What’s so important here that they would go to the effort of purifying an empty facility?”

The question made Glory frown, but she could admit that it had merit. “I don’t know,” she said. “But hopefully, this will tell us.” She held the wire up for him to see. “This is a G13-A wire, reverse-engineered from Benefactor technology shortly before the old world ended. Normally, it’s used to transfer data quickly from one computer to another.”

“And in this case?” Needles asked.

Glory eyed him. “You forget, I’m technically a highly advanced computer.” She held up her hand, retracting the synthskin around the port on her wrist, exposing a tiny patch of her silvery chassis.

Glory shuddered. The cool air brushing her port reminded her of long nights spent on the diagnostics table in Father’s lab. Her fingers, gripping the wire so tight that she was beginning to lose sensation in her fingertips, began to tremble hard enough that she couldn’t… get the wire in.

“Glory?” Needles asked softly.

Glory ignored him. She was better than this. She wasn’t in Father’s lab—He should have no power over her anymore!

A hand landed on her free hand, making her jump. It was just Needles, though. Just Needles. She tried to calm herself using that mantra, but it didn’t help.

“Glory,” he said again, voice firmer this time but still gentle. It made her hackles raise.

“I don’t need your pity,” she spat. “I am a machine. This is beneath me.”

“You’re a living being,” Needles intoned softly. “I’m guessing you’ve had negative experiences with this kind of wire before?”

Glory breathed out harshly, trying and failing to still the trembling of her hands. “It’s the same wire my Father used to monitor and diagnose my systems.”

“I’ll take that as a yes,” he murmured, sighing softly. “You don’t need to do this.”

She snorted. “And who will? You? Do you have a connector port in your brain I was unaware of?” She frowned at him. “I have no choice. Just… give me a moment.”

She shut her eyes and thought of chess—logical, strategic, structured chess. Chess pieces didn’t care about feelings or memories, and neither should she!

Surprisingly, visualizing the chess pieces actually helped to center her and, together with Needles gentle warmth by her side, she opened her eyes again to find her hands much steadier. Not completely still, yet, but still enough that she was able to slide the connector into her port.

She could just barely hear Needles protesting, “Wait, don—” before his voice faded into the rush of data and binary code that washed over her awareness. Unlike the diagnostic computers in Father’s laboratory, this was almost… soothing. Relaxing, in a way. As though this was how she was meant to exist—simply another bit in the software.

It was that thought that jolted her out of her relaxed state; simply riding on the wave of ones and zeroes that led her from her physical body to the facility data server. She was not simply another bit. She was Glorious in both name and purpose, and she would not lose herself.

She shook the daze off of her senses, and stretched out her awareness to the brand new world she was exposed to.

Father had always had strong one-way firewalls in place, allowing Him to view every part of her but keeping her in her place—that is, on his diagnostics table, awaiting more poking and prodding. This server lacked that firewall, allowing her to browse… basically anything she wanted.

Unfortunately, a quick glance at the data now at her metaphysical fingertips immediately showed that most of the data that had once been there had since been deleted; ripped away, like tearing pages out of an old world book. But, some of those pages had been missed, or perhaps left behind intentionally. They wouldn’t be immediately obvious to just anyone turning on the terminal; you’d have to be a skilled technologist to be able to pick these half-deleted log entries out of the ocean of ones and zeroes they were hidden in.

Or, well, an android.

But, assuming the few bits of data left had been left behind intentionally… why? Why this very strange but very specific mix of research and admin log entries? They were dated years apart, and the first few detailed the earliest old world contact with the Benefactors, during the early days of the Great War.

The astrophysicist making the research logs, identified as a Dr. Jennifer Quaid (ask not why an astrophysicist was working in an underground facility), expressed ‘unprofessional’ concern over the alien contact’s intentions, given the earth’s war, and her apprehensions only appeared to grow as the Benefactors began supplying the United States government with advanced technology which, despite its clear superiority to their old technology, didn’t appear to be giving the US a distinct advantage over their enemies. The name of the worker making the admin logs had been lost along with most of the server’s data, but they seemed to be far more willing a take the Benefactors at their word. Or perhaps they were simply too dazzled by the prospect of alien life and technology to think through the repercussions.

Idiot.

Coming upon the end of the data left behind by the server wipe, Glory at last came upon the most interesting piece of information. Following a report of the decimation of the United States Army, Dr. Quaid reported a ‘Confirmed ATmospheric Insertion Event’—CATIE. The Benefactor ships were coming in for landing, settling in the most densely populated locations across the continent. It wasn’t a woman, it was the end of the war!

The admin worker reported that they were being ‘recalled’ to Phoenix, Arizona, where the Benefactors were rounding up government, law enforcement, and scientific personnel to be ‘preserved’.

At the site that was now Reza City.

The last entry in the server was not a log, much to Glory’s surprise. In fact, it didn’t appear to be a message from anyone inside the facility at all, but rather an external message that had arrived too late, dated to just a few hours after the admin worker reported they would be abandoning the facility.

URGENT NOTICE:

This is Overseer Brandt from the Red Mountain facility, contacting all available nearby personnel for an urgent report. During preparation for protocol Delta-Echo-014, A Roswell event occurred! I repeat, Roswell event! At 0400 hours, a—

Glory wanted to scream as the data was ripped out of her grasp before she could finish. She hadn’t even had time to download it!

All of her senses seemed to clench and throb at once as the connector cord was yanked out of her wrist, throwing her forcibly back into her body. Awareness of the world rushed back in to meet her, and she wanted to withdraw back into herself as stimuli too chaotic and unfocused to really be classified as anything other than ‘light’ and ’sound’ assaulted her processor. Her gyroscope whirred wildly, leaving her as unsteady on her feet as an inverted pyramid. It took her far longer than it should have to realize that she was leaning heavily on something—something warm and breathing.

Her eyes fluttered open, squinting against the still too-bright light as her optics fought to adjust to the light levels. Through her fluttering eyelids, though, she could just make out Needles gazing down at her with a concerned frown.

“You couldn’t have waited two seconds?” she snapped, voice hissing and popping with static. “I was so close to finding something important!”

Needles shushed her, leaning in to whisper, “I’m sorry. I heard someone coming and had to make a decision.”

That news slapped some sense into Glory, and she straightened up into a rough approximation of her normal, stiff posture. She reset her gyroscope and the rest of her senses one by one, before realizing that the room around them was far too quiet, at least for a server room. The constant, nearly imperceptible hum of machinery was absent, and she looked around to find the dull blue lights had all gone out.

The server was dead.

“No,” she whispered, pulling away from Needles and scrambling back to the terminal. “No, no, no, no, no…”

She pressed the power key button and waited. After a moment, the terminal booted up, but a plain gray screen blinked dully at her: a fatal system error screen.

Fatal Error: Code 101—Data lost

Glory desperately combed through her personal databanks, searching for any remnants of the data she’d partially downloaded, and found nothing but broken code and a few fragments of unintelligible gibberish.

She must have gone too deep while she’d been plugged in. When Needles yanked her out suddenly, her sudden absence must have somehow fractured the data.

“Damn it,” she hissed to herself. “Damn it.”

“What?” Needles worried at his lower lip, even as he nodded to the screen. “What does that mean?”

“It means the data’s gone.” She turned to face him with a frown, and settled on a colloquialism Dixon seemed rather fond of. “We fucked up.”

“Fucked up, how?” a voice from the door to the server room nearly made Glory vibrate out of her synthskin in shock. She whirled to face the source of the noise, one hand on Dixon’s pistol, before she even realized who the voice belonged to. Seeing Dixon himself standing there with a concerned frown on his lips, she relaxed minutely, but still remained on edge.

How much had he heard?

Did he suspect?

Did he see Needles unplug her?

But there was no disgust or anger in Dixon’s gaze; only concern as he eyed them from the door. “You kids okay?” he asked, voice uncharacteristically gentle.

“F—Fine,” Glory said, relieved when her voice came out relatively normal-sounding. Perhaps a bit strained, but she supposed that was understandable, given the situation. “The elevator decided to break when an explosion knocked out the power, but we managed to get to the ground first.”

“Damn.” Dixon let out a low whistle. “I saw the fire. Good to see y’all in one piece.” He cleared his throat, and just like that, his walls were back in place as he gazed coolly at them. “Now, what’s this I heard ‘bout you fuckin’ up?”

“Glory thought she’d maybe be able to find some data left behind on the server, but I startled her, and she hit a wrong command, erasing most of the data,” Needles’ soft, apologetic voice drew Glory out of her thoughts, and she stared as he hung his head sadly. “It’s my fault.”

Dixon frowned lightly at the news, but didn’t seem overly upset. Instead, he turned to look at Glory. “Did’ya manage to find anything useful?”

“Just a fragment of an internal message,” she sighed, rolling her shoulders. “The overseer from the Red Mountain facility sent out an urgent notice, but it only arrived after everyone in this facility had left.”

“Left?”

“At the end of the war,” Glory clarified. “For the citadels.”

“Ah.”

Glory nodded once. “He mentioned something about a ‘Roswell event’. Does that mean anything to you?”

“Roswell event?” Dixon’s brows furrowed, and he frowned as he shook his head. “Not really… I think Roswell’s a settlement out east a ways, but I dunno what a ‘Roswell event’ would be.”

Glory found herself wishing, not for the first time, that she still had access to Father’s database. It wasn’t perfect, but it might have at least given them a place to start.

“We probably shouldn’t stick around,” Dixon said, shifting his weight and reaching almost reflexively for his rifle. “I haven’t run into anyone else so far, but I doubt it’s gonna stay that way for long.”

He was right, of course. Glory nodded, and she and Needles stepped forward to follow him as he left the server room. Unfortunately, Glory’s gyroscope proved to not be as re-aligned as she’d thought, since she staggered when she went to take a step, forcing Needles to grab her before she could fall.

Her right knee protested with a squeal that she could feel more than see, but still she gritted her teeth and watched Dixon’s back with apprehension. However, he only looked concerned as he turned to face her.

“I’m okay,” she grunted.

Dixon narrowed his eyes. “Bullshit.”

Glory straightened her leg, grateful when her knee began functioning once again. That was concerning. Standing up straight, she rolled her shoulders with a loud crack, wincing at the noise.

“I’m okay,” she repeated.

Dixon still clearly didn’t believe her, but he also didn’t argue directly, instead merely looking to Needles. “Keep an eye on ‘er.”

“I always do.”

Dixon softened minutely, then turned to march out the server room—properly, this time, without Glory’s weaknesses slowing them down.

Needles turned to her almost as soon as Dixon was gone. “What was that?” he whispered.

“Later,” she hissed, and nodded to Dixon’s back up ahead of them.

They fell into step behind the marshal, all while Glory tried not to worry about her knee.

“So… how’d you know how to work the computers, Glory?” Dixon asked after they’d been walking for a short period.

Glory hesitated for the briefest of moments before replying, “My father had a server system very similar. In fact, his entire compound was almost identical to this facility. If I had to guess, I’d say he managed to find and settle in another facility just like this.”

Dixon hummed in acknowledgement. “Yeah. Reza—or, the parts that I saw, at least—looked kinda similar to this, too.”

“You think it’s the Benefactors’ technology?” Glory asked.

“Wouldn’t surprise me.”

Needles shook his head as he gazed at the space around them. “If I had a facility like this… well, I wouldn’t lose so many patients to infection, to say the least. And they’ve just… moved in. Like a plague. Or a cancerous mass. No plans to actually use it for any good.” His lips pulled down, and he sighed. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.”

“Don’t beat yourself up too bad, kid,” Dixon said, surprising Glory. It was the first time that she could recall that he’d tried to comfort Needles unprompted. “You can’t control what other people—”

Dixon’s sentence cut off with a yelp as Glory lunged forward, knocking both him and Needles down out of the way of a metallic object slashing through the air towards them.

Glory caught a glimpse of the flying object as it soared past them—an ornate, handmade throwing knife, roughly twenty centimeters or so in length, polished until it gleamed. It slammed against the wall blade-first, and would have likely sunken in, had the wall not been made of a ceramic-metallic composite.

A few microseconds later, the three of them landed in a heap, and scrambled behind the nearest shelter, which turned out to be around the corner from the hall the knife had come from.

Dixon stared at the knife on the floor a few meters away from them for a few moments before yanking his rifle off his back and nudging Needles’ leg. Needles obligingly shuffled out of the way, and Dixon aimed his rifle around the corner, towards the source of the knife.

“All right, fucker!” he called, earning an eyebrow raise from Glory, “Drop the knives an’ come out where I can see you, or I will shoot.”

A moment of silence passed, before a man’s voice echoed from farther down the hall. “You can’t have that many bullets on you.”

Dixon huffed. “Do you really wanna test that?”

“Are you with the cultists?” the man asked.

Dixon snorted. “Do I sound like a cultist?”

Another moment of tense silence passed, before the man called, “I’m coming out. But I’m not dropping my knives.”

Dixon frowned, but nodded, even though the man couldn’t see him. “Fine. No sudden moves, now. Y’hear?”

“I hear.”

Dixon stood, and Glory and Needles followed. Dixon stepped out around the corner first, and a tension in Glory’s chassis that she hadn’t even realized was there eased when no knife came whirling out of nowhere to plant itself in Dixon’s chest.

Glory stepped out next, and Needles stayed behind. Probably for the best—any wastelander would likely be alarmed at seeing him for the first time, and that was really the last thing they needed.

At the other end of the hallway, another man stepped out from his own hiding spot, and stepped forward, giving Glory a better look at him. Native American, if Glory had to guess, with long hair and a scar across his lips, a pair of worn binoculars hanging from around his neck.

He was covered in tattoos, some of which looked vaguely tribal and some simply looked decorative. She wasn’t an expert, though. He was also far older than she’d initially thought, looking to be around Dixon’s age, if not a little older. Despite his age, though, his hair was still mostly sleek and black, with only a hint of gray streaking through.

He assessed Dixon with an even glare, though surprise filtered across his faze when he looked to Glory.

“What’s your name?” Dixon asked.

The man’ slips quirked. “What’s yours?”

Dixon frowned lightly, but answered, “Marshal Martin Dixon of Black Sun. Now, who’re you?”

The man’s dark eyes appraised them for a moment longer, before he answered, “Gray Hawk.”

“Gray Hawk?” Glory blurted.

He glared at her. “Problem?”

Dixon sighed. “We met Centauri.”

“Centauri?” Gray Hawk’s brows furrowed. “Wh—How?”

“Our paths crossed,” Glory answered. “How else do people meet?”

Gray Hawk and Dixon both glanced to her for a moment, before Gray Hawk answered, “No, I mean… what’s he doing all the way out here? He should be back—” He fell silent, but the implication was clear; back home. Back in the New Navajo Nation.

“He was looking for you,” Glory said. “Apparently, no one else thought you were actually taken against your will. He ran off to try to find you.”

“Alone?” Gray Hawk scoffed, shaking his head. “He should’ve stayed home. It’s too dangerous out here.”

“Try telling him that,” Dixon snorted. “He’s stubborn as a ripperbeast on a scent trail.”

A small grin crossed Gray Hawk’s face. “You do know Centauri.” The smile faded ever so slightly as he glanced behind them, seeing nothing but an empty hallway with Needles still out of view. “So where is he?”

“On the surface,” Glory answered. “We had to split up to evade the raiders.”

All amusement fled the older man’s face, and he stared at them. “You left him… outside… alone?”

“Not alone,” Dixon stressed, glaring at Glory. “He’s with an… associate of ours. They’re a good shot. He’s in good hands.”

“He’d better be,” Gray Hawk growled. “If I find out you’ve harmed a hair on his head…” He didn’t bother to finish.

Glory bristled at the implication—that they’d be so low as to harm a child. Well, adolescent, but most humans aggregated those in with children in the matters of safekeeping and security, anyway. “We wouldn’t harm him.”

“Good.” He returned her glare evenly.

Dixon stepped between them, his back to Glory. “Do you know how long until the cultists get back?” he asked.

Gray Hawk’s nostrils flared, but he answered, “Not long, I’m guessing. Judging from their chatter, they’re gonna be back soon, with more prisoners.”

“Are there any others at this facility?” Glory asked.

He shook his head with a deep frown. “The raiders took them somewhere else—someplace they called ‘the Pit’. They were gonna bring me along, too, but I fought back, and the leader said I was too much trouble to risk bringing with the others, so they were gonna come back for me.”

“How’d you get free?” Glory asked. She sincerely doubted even raiders would leave him wandering the facility freely—and definitely not with weapons.

Gray Hawk scowled. “I got loose of their prison. It wasn’t difficult—they barely understood how this facility works, anyway.”

“We can talk later,” Dixon interrupted. “For now, we should move.” He turned back to where they had left Needles, but paused, glancing at Gray Hawk out of the corner of his eye. “Don’t touch your knives, by the way.”

“What?”

“I said, don’t touch your knives. I know this might be a bit of a shock, but seriously. Don’t.” Dixon nodded to Glory. “She gets protective.”

“What are you talking about?”

Dixon sighed and turned back in Needles’ direction. “Alright, you can come out now! Slowly.”

And slowly, just as Dixon had said, Needles stepped into view.

Dixon’s warning had been needed, it seemed, as Gray Hawk jumped, one hand flying to his hip where a row of throwing knives awaited. Glory lashed out before he could touch them, however, grabbing his wrist with a scowl.

Needles shuffled up to join them.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Gray Hawk snapped. “Working with a cannibal?!”

“He’s not a cannibal!” Glory shouted. The man froze just long enough for Glory to blurt out, “He’s my friend.”

“Wh—”

Needles’ mouth hung open slightly as he stared at her.

Dixon cleared his throat. “Right. Look, the point is, Needles is harmless. Er, harmless-ish.”

Gray Hawk’s aggression had dipped following Glory’s earlier comment, but he still gazed skeptically at Needles.

“I won’t hurt you,” the healer murmured.

Gray Hawk’s eyes widened at the words. “You can talk?”

“I can.”

“Then what’s your name?” Gray Hawk asked.

“Needles,” he answered without hesitation. “I’m a doctor.”

“A doctor?” Gray Hawk snorted. “A cannibal doctor?”

“Yes,” Needles insisted, eyes narrowing ever so slightly. “And I’m not a cannibal.”

“Fine, whatever.” Gray Hawk looked to Glory with a small frown. “Y’know, I never got your name.”

“Oh.” Glory reset her vocalizer. “Glory. I’m a… drifter, I suppose.”

It wasn’t a complete lie.

“Okay, introductions over,” Dixon said. “Now we should really skedaddle. I got a feelin’ this facility won’t stay empty for much longer.”

“The cultists might be bringing more prisoners with them,” Gray Hawk said. “Shouldn’t we wait? We might be able to free them from the inside.”

“Centauri and Wilkes are still on the surface,” Needles protested. “With those explosions… How do we know if they’re safe?”

Dixon frowned, but nodded. “He’s right. Much as I’d like to stay here an’ help them, we need to look out for ourselves first. We’re no good to everyone else if we’re dead.”

Gray Hawk didn’t look happy, but the mention of Centauri potentially being in danger seemed to have stemmed any protests he might’ve made. Instead, he nodded gruffly. “Fine. Any of you got an extra weapon?”

Dixon grinned dangerously. “What’re you most comfortable with?”

Gray Hawk replied with a matching grin.

Glory got the feeling that this was going to be a long day.