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As soon as the danger passes, Astamon collapses to one knee. You whirl around in concern, watching as his body is overcome by light. He shrinks all the way down to his Rookie form and flops onto his back with a gasp.
<span class="mu-s">"That's all the gas I have left in me... Gonna need... A long nap."</span>
"You did good, bud. I'm proud of you."
He raises a red claw and flashes a thumbs up, while you look around at the wrecked room. Now that the danger has fully passed, the noncombatants are exiting their sealed partitions and slowly returning to the main chamber, staring in disbelief at the carnage. The biggest reminder comes in the form of the pods, with their occupants frozen in various poses. You look at Wind.
"What now?"
"Debrief, meeting room."
==
Every Dog of War is cramped into the chamber, including Liza. Once she looks around and sees the empty seats, she starts squirming about uncomfortably, feeling the weight of what she's allowed to happen. Wind keeps going with the debrief, not bothering with any projector or slides. For once, Squid is there physically, though she's stalwartly facing a wall.
"-operation Augur a success. But in the wake of it, one of our members, Lenny, was compromised. I tasked Liza here with seeing to him. A simple job: make sure he doesn't follow us back, deal with him however she sees fit. Instead, she brought him right back."
She shrinks in her seat. She keeps staring towards the pods, which are sitting in the corner of the meeting room. Wind has insisted that they be brought in to make a point. You wonder what they're experiencing inside their prisons. Some kind of simulated reality, meant to keep their thoughts placid, where they survived getting jabbed by syringes in the first place? New nightmares from their minds going wild? You wish there was some way to pull them out, but the material seems to be indestructible.
"And as you'll notice, Lenny is no longer with us. He was one of the first gunned down when 87O security sent their goons into our base. We haven't even had time to check on Mr. Lash, but since they trailed Lenny and Liza directly, it's safe to say he's no longer with us."
All eyes gradually turn towards her, and she tries to mumble a defense.
"He was going to get-"
"Podded when they caught him? Yes, because he got sloppy. Now look what you've done. You turned one loss into... I don't even know. I can't count how many friends are now dead. Or as good as."