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It’s not the same anymore.
There is no one left—no Kat, no Emile, no Carter, no Jorge, no Jun—and the loneliness eats away at Brooke’s heart. Spartans are meant to be machines, not emotional freaks. She is used to not caring. Caring is dangerous; yet she contradicted herself and unknowingly got attached to Noble. No one left.
Brooke’s wish was to die on Reach. Become one with the soil and fallen soldiers. No more thinking. Die. After all, death was the better option. Wasn’t it?
The medbay is where Brooke wakes, glaring headlights beaming into her gray eyes. A female nurse walks in; Brooke sits up in the bed, demanding to leave.
The nurse responds, “Your condition must be monitored the next couple of weeks. I’m afraid your right leg might not operate—”
Brooke sighs. “Don’t tell me that. I already know.”
A hot blush decorates the nurse’s pale cheeks. She leaves as soon as she arrives.
About an hour later, the same nurse arrives with a breakfast of chia seed oatmeal. Brooke slowly eats; somehow, the meal tastes mediocre to her. She imagines Jorge sitting on a chair eating the banana, Carter and Kat huddled in the near corner discussing the next mission, and Emile leaning against the wall with his kukri knife telling perverted jokes.
Brooke doesn’t feel hungry anymore.
On the fourth night, that is when the nightmares come.
Glassing, glassing. Running, running, running—a shot, Kat falling. Guns firing. Kat tapping at her datapad.
Brooke wakes up. A cold sweat runs down her dark skin.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers to the void. “I’m sorry.”
I’m sorry.