I stared at the ceiling in my room - easily the nicest room I’d ever stayed in - listlessly wishing for the sweet oblivion of rest to take me from the confines of my own mind. It wasn’t that I was upset about establishing a powerful record in the Guantlet run; I was happy, elated even, that we’d managed to smash the record and prove that we were still one of the top teams.

What dampened my enthusiasm considerably was the constant nattering of the other voice in my head.

‘What are we doing now? Is this sleeping? Oh! We’re trying to sleep!’ It paused, it’s voice somewhere between a man and a woman at the same time. For a few painful seconds it was silent, painful only because I knew how quickly it would end.

‘This is boring, what else can we do?’ The thing spoke, and I screwed my eyes shut with a sharp hiss from my lips.

“Look, can you please just stop talking?” I groaned, “I didn’t expect the terrifying Wolven to never stop talking.”

‘We are not Wolven,’ It stated matter-of-factly, ‘Wolven is dead! You killed it. Obviously.’

“Then what…?” I began exasperatedly, trailing off in my mind ‘What exactly do I call you?’

It still heard me, but I could only sense its consideration of the question vaguely. Finally, it said, ‘Wolven is fine.’

“I fucking hate you.” I glared hard at the ceiling, willing this thing within me to die a painfully fiery death, “You’re Wolvy from now on.”

‘Sure. That’s fine.’ It didn’t care about the demotion as I perceived it. ‘What are we doing now? What things? The not-us-and-not-others are not here anymore, we cannot interact with them?’

I groaned once more in spite of myself. It was difficult explaining certain concepts to this… whatever it was. Anything that wasn’t ‘Us’ or in other words myself and it was ostensibly an ‘Other’ and was therefore a threat or prey. For now, humans were simply not us, and not others. I didn’t have the energy to untangle the rest of that concept right now.

Rolling onto my side, I managed to vaguely sense the sheets that touched my skin, the bed beneath me. It was, again, the nicest bed and sheets I’d probably ever owned. But it was fairly wasted on me as I could barely feel the fabric, and I could probably sleep on rocky mountain earth without caring. My body came with a great deal of perks, being able to feel the comforts of the world was apparently not high on that list.

Except food.

I stood up and went into the kitchen, opening the as of yet untouched pizza box. The cafeteria downstairs in the Legion housing complex was replete with several old world foods.

My hunger growled as I snagged a few slices with everything on it and chucked them on a plate bound for the microwave.

‘This… I like this smell. What is it?’ Wolvy asked, sounding like it was sniffing in the background. I shook my head, having began to accept its presence since I’d already scoured every part of my mind that I could imagine getting into only to never find the thing.

“This is pizza.” I pulled it out of the microwave, listening to the sizzling of cheese, the glistening of delicious fats, “It’s amazing stuff.”

I sat down, biting into it, savoring flavor as it erupted across my tongue. For some reason, my sense of taste was returning. I couldn’t figure why that particular sense was coming back when everything else was firmly in the dumps.

Nor, however, did I care why it was back. Just that it was.

I leaned back, realizing that this was the first meal I’d had since being put back together.

‘Delicious… it is truly a glorious weave. Hurry, put more in us!’ The voice in my head cried.

“Look, don’t say it like that,” I frowned, “Just say you want more of it.”

‘It is what we said? Put more in us, we require more within our parts!’ It repeated, once more creeping me out.

“Say it like ‘I want to eat more of it’ not the other way you’re saying it.” I sighed heavily, knowing the inevitable follow up question.

‘Why?’ It asked, savoring the sensations of food.

“Because… look, I’m not going to get into the topic of sexual and rapey connotations with a voice in my head.” I stuffed my face with more food.

‘That is not-! Mmm… yess… I want to eat more of this!’ The voice it used was sensual and excited.

I stopped dead and breathed in deeply, “You’re just fucking with me now, aren’t you?”

‘After you mentioned it, it became clearer to us,’ Wolvy chuckled, ‘Yes, this will do nicely.’

“What will?” I frowned, suspecting foul play.

‘To fuck you! Oh, no, to fuck with you? Yes, that is the phrase.’ It congratulated itself as I busied myself with eating. Experimentally, I shunted as much ‘white noise’ as I could into my thoughts as I imagined possible. Interestingly enough, my digital arms and their assorted minds helped in the endeavor.

However, there was a dull uptick in a headache that came with it, so not something I could do to sleep.

‘We apologize.’ The voice immediately said as soon as the connection came back, ‘We will try to be less creepy.’

I blinked at that, “Well, that’s good then?”

‘Though we must acknowledge that we will also likely fail.’ It shrugged nonchalantly, spiking my blood pressure again, ‘What do we do next?’

“We sleep. And don’t give me that ‘it’s boring’ response, we have to sleep sometime. I sure as hell don’t want to deal with tomorrow with limited sleep.” I cut off its complaints.

It mulled that over for a time before sighing, ‘The Us will agree, then. Sleep.’

I carefully kept myself from broadcasting too much joy, and resolutely settled into the sheets.

‘To sleep is to dream.’ I heard Wolvy voice say as it faded fully into the background. Somehow, that was less comfortable than I’d hoped.

Still, the inevitable march of sleep did eventually take me. But there were no dreams in my head, just silence and sparks. A small part of me couldn’t help but be sad, but then that too was swallowed by the nothing around me.

The next day brought what it promised it would.

Many headaches and political meetings with the city, and then the registration process that took place on ‘neutral ground’ around the Obelisk.

To be specific, I’d spoken with The Bulwark and The Orders in an official fashion, effectively declaring my return to active duty. My first declaration was, in effect, that I was getting as far away from politics as possible.

I was done. No more, for the love of all that was good and stabbable - if I didn’t like it - I was thoroughly finished with dealing with all of these people.

Unfortunately, the registration required my presence, at least to some effect. I’d offloaded a great deal of the decision making to the various officers present, and they would refer to me or Doug in the event that there were questions.

Or in this case, complaints.

“If you don’t want to join the Legion on the expedition, then don’t.” I ground out to the group of six people who insisted that they should get some kind of deal, “Fifty percent of any Mattter Energy you harvest out there goes to the Legion. In return, the Legion will share resources and render aid as needed.”

“But why is it so expensive?” The man complained, heading the - fairly well armored and armed - group while looking very ruffled. “We don’t need much, and we can help with defending if it’s needed.”

I took a moment, taking a deep breath. The man's stance loosened somewhat as I contemplated things. He looked hopeful, and genuinely seemed to want to come and prove themselves.

‘This is the way of things. The threads bound together are strongest,’ Wolvy offered its wisdom, though I was reluctant to take any kind of advisement from a voice in my head.

“This is getting us nowhere. Tell me, what - exactly - do you think the Legion assistance is going to be? It seems you’re expecting to take a loss here, so I want to know why.” I extended the olive branch, hoping that this was a case of misunderstanding rather than someone just being greedy.

He glanced back to the group, “W-well, we heard that the only thing you guys really cover is like tents and stuff. And let you be a part of the group, but we have to defend ourselves.”

My brain stopped ticking for a moment, “Who and the actual fuck said that?” The words left my mouth before I could stop them.

The man took a half step back, posture falling into one more readily defensible on reflex. He realized it, too, as a second later he breathed out tension from his shoulders, “It’s rumors on the wind right now.”

I panned my sight around, seeing the many other stations, this kind of thing happening in several of them. Or, people leaving after having been around a while. This was a large plaza, and there were a few stalls set up for food and drinks, making something of an impromptu festival event. Perhaps there were people out there stirring up trouble.

I stood up straight, “Alright, it seems that someone is making trouble for us. This is how it is-” I stopped long enough to send a mass message, several people all around us suddenly pausing and looking at the new message, ‘This tech existence isn’t all bad,’ I smiled, hidden as it was behind my helmet. “-You have all of the information there in text format to refer too by yours truly. Your ammo, explosives, equipment repair, bunking, and strategic needs are taken care of and insured by the Legion. When biotics do show you will be expected to protect yourself, but the Legion will take on the role primarily. We won’t steal any prey of yours unless you request aid, in which we will render our full support to the extent that is reasonable. That is to say don’t dive into a hive and expect us to come pull your ass from the fire without any plan. Some other inclusions and exclusions apply, but that’ll be there.”

I then exasperatedly shook my head, “The point of the expedition isn’t to get M.E. from you, it’s to give you all a fair chance to prove that you can do what you say you can do. You guys seem like you know better than some what’s out there, but there’s a high probability that we won’t be dealing with Gen 1 biotics. Only Legion has dealt with that so far, so we’re keeping a tight rein on this operation to make sure people don’t go getting offed while we’re checking to see if we can leave local operations in other groups hands. Make sense?”

The group looked to each other for a few seconds, seemingly surprised at the terms. The leader scratched the back of his head and had an apologetic expression, “Ah, yeah. That’s a lot better than what we expected. I mean, we were gonna have to do this either way, but it’s nice to know that we’re not getting screwed in the deal.”

“Appreciate your understanding,” I sighed, “If you hear of someone spreading that crap about us, well, I can’t say you have to do anything about it. But I’d appreciate knowing who I have to watch out for.”

The man nodded, “For sure, so, sign here?”

The woman manning the counter stepped forward then, giving me a grateful nod, “Yes, just right here. Fill out the information regarding your group, and we’ll take a snapshot of each of you in the event that identification is required. Also, if you’ll report to the fabrication yard’s eastern entrance, we’ll get you updated with some general equipment, if you want. It’s a one time thing,” She leaned in conspiratorially and whispered, “We’re selling equipment for a huge mark-down right now, I’d really recommend stocking up. Don’t go telling random people though, it’s only for those who sign up.”

“Thanks. And thanks to you too!” He called over to me as I walked away. I waved over my shoulder, and then heard a friend of his say, “He’s not that scary. Seemed pretty nice to me.”

I shook my head at that, wondering what other rumors were circulating around us now.

‘Whatever, moving on.’ I kept walking, scanning the crowd.

Then I froze on one person in particular as they came to a stall. ‘Well, that’s surprising.’

‘Is this an other? Or a not-us-no--’ Wolvy began, confused by my own conflicted feelings toward the individual in question.

‘Please, Wolvy, there’s not any distinction like that. There’s humans and biotics, most biotics are enemies. Except Yaga.’ I explained as I walked to the stall.

There was an electric zap in my head, ‘Oh, that is Yaga. He is… biotic, but is not an enemy. These are… humans? They are not us, but not-’ it paused a heartbeat at the mental glare I gave it, ‘-it is just human. Yes. Definitely not not-other. Human.’ It repeated the topic to itself as though to make it easier to remember.

“Cassandra,” I greeted, the officer in attendant nodding at me as he filled out some other paperwork. “You’ve decided to join the expedition?”

She glared at me, “Yes. Is that a problem?”

I shook my head, “None, so long as you abide by our rules like anyone else. Is the rest of your Order joining you?”

She opened her mouth before literally seeming to bite back a scathing remark. Instead, she managed what passed for a friendly smile - with altogether too many teeth bared - “This is what’s left of my order. The rest went their separate ways, or with Alex.”

I tilted my head at that, “Mmm, so your group schismed? I suppose that wasn’t unexpected.”

Her eyebrows rose dangerously, and I quickly backpedaled.

“Rather, what I mean to say is that your better off without his type. At least now you can rebuild, and do it right.”

“And you would know what ‘right’ is, hmm?” She put a hand on her hip, provokingly.

I sighed, “I won’t claim such, and I’m not playing politics anymore today. I’m sorry your Order has disintegrated at the seams, but I do sincerely wish you the best. That’s all I mean to say.”

She stiffened a brief moment, “I’d say thank you, but somehow you always seem to have a barb for every good thing you say.”

‘I wouldn’t if you didn’t make it so easy,’ I felt the acidic comment sit on my tongue. Instead, I said, “Well, what of the rest of them? Will they register today.”

She shrugged, “Probably not. They don’t recognize the Legion’s authority, regardless of how many people obviously do.” As though to highlight that, she glanced around at the thickly packed plaza.

I nodded, and found myself immediately considering the possibility that Alex was the reason why people were wary of the Legion. However, I decided it would be best to not broach that topic with her at this time. The leader of the Hunter’s Order, now vastly reduced, probably had more than enough to consider without me stirring the pot any further.

“Well, take care. Don’t skip out the equipment portion.” I nodded to her and thanked the attendant for putting up with me being in his area. At least this time it was for something that wasn’t complaining people.

Tomorrow was the day. The expedition would be setting out in the morning along with the top twenty teams of the Legion and any groups that wanted to prove themselves.

“We’re finally pushing out.” I smiled, recalling the hazy and indistinct memories of the family that I would likely never be able to fully remember.

It was bittersweet to be on the road to recovering Damond, what had been my childhood home, only to be incapable of remembering it.

Perhaps, though, that would be for the best. Who knew what kind of hellscape awaited us there?