[ti]Ep 3[/ti]Building Bridges [Skystone, Avalanche]

[Deleted]

Episode 3, Week 1, Day 6

Evening


Omega Outpost was a constant work in progress. More and more allies appeared each day it seemed, and so their base of operation had to grow with it.

Except saying it just “grows” turned out to be a bit of an oversimplification. The silo they were built out of was (relatively) old, and expansion wasn’t as clever cut as just making the building wider or taller.

They mostly expanded into the underground, trying to expand both storage areas as well as living areas.

Optimus had entrusted both her and a mech named Thundercloud with the construction due to their larger size. However, Skystone’s only experience with building things are the materials required. Even then, she wouldn’t always ask about the things she was transporting.

So that left her in her usual storage compartment/unofficial office, pouring over blueprints, trying to figure out where to put the next set of living areas, and if it was even a worthwhile endeavor with the resources they had.

She had some schematics up, but so far had only accounted for rooms that would suit the smaller Cybtertronians on base. She hadn’t quite figured out how to safely excavate through the untapped walls and Earth surrounding them, taking into account both building supplies and Energon for those who would be building.

She supposed she could ask around, and she probably would later, but right now she was in her “zone”, and determined to power through this issue best she could before she reached out.

[Avalanche]

It was always rough, starting over at a new command. Doubly so this time. It had been a while since she'd been at an outpost where she wasn't the senior officer, where she wasn't ultimately responsible for those beneath her, and she still wasn't sure how exactly she fit into the garrison's command structure. If there even was a command structure. Things at Omega weren't organised the way she was used to.

Sure, she'd usually get to a place where she could be pretty informal with her troops once she'd been with them a while, but that was because they'd been hammered into a unit, one that knew how to get serious when it counted. This place didn't feel like that. Without any formally assigned troops, she wasn't overseeing their training, or dealing with the usual internecine squad squabbles; she felt oddly lost with all the free time on her hands.

Nevertheless. It was still basic command 101 to get to know the troops, and if some of them ended up assigned under her later on, she'd have saved herself a bit of time.

To that end, she was roaming the low level halls of the garrison, her heavy steps thrumming subtly through the ground. Somewhere down here, a femme called Skystone had an impromptu office/lair/hiding spot, which seemed like as good a place as any to get to know her and her duties. Avalanche tried another door, then sighed at the sight of stacked equipment crates from floor to ceiling. If Skystone was in there, she was better at stealth than she'd been given credit for.

Ka-thunk. Ka-thunk. Ka-thunk. A few more steps down the corridor, another pressure plate, another door-

And finally, the mecha she'd been looking for. She was tall, though not quite as tall as Avalanche herself, with an impressively sweeping set of wide white wings and unusual yellow-green optics. Raising a blunt fingered hand in greeting, Avalanche stepped inside, the door sliding shut behind her.

"Hey. You must be Skystone. I'm Commander Avalanche. Got some time? I'd like to get a feel for your duties and capabilities, if you're free to."

[Deleted]

She heard the footsteps first.

The mecha headed her way was large, surely rivalling her own size, by the sound of the pedes hitting the ground. Skytone paused a little unsurely in her task, trying to work out whether the steps were headed her way or not.

As she stood up slightly to get a better view, she saw a very tall femme walk in.

She was mostly dark, with silver peppered through her armor design- she very nearly blended in with the wall behind her.

Skystone caught her wave and nodded, her optics locked with the other femme’s orange ones.

She introduced herself as Avalanche. Interesting name.

Skystone listened quietly to the rest, a little bemused (but not displeased) by Avalanche’s interest.

She straightened a bit, her wings draped behind her.

“It’s good to meet you, Commander. I can certainly make time, if you’d like to talk...honestly, it’d be good to step back from this,” she gestured to the blueprints underneath her. “I’m tryin’ to map out the next set of living quarters...but I’m no construction bot. It isn’t exactly going well.” She winced a bit at that last part, a tiny amount of frustration entering her field. She hated feeling like she couldn’t perform a task set out in front of her.

[Avalanche]

Avalanche had a... complicated relationship with her origin in construction. On the one hand, she wasn't ashamed of it, and she'd shown no reservations about adapting those skills to excavate bunkers and hammer together fortifications. On the other hand, she was grimly accustomed to Autobots that had once populated the higher tiers of society looking down on her for the caste she'd originated from, casually questioning her devotion to the cause given that so many of those she'd been sparked with had taken up the Decepticon banner.

Constructicon. A single word so easily used to dismiss her and all she'd done.

But this wasn't that. This was an opportunity to be useful, to contribute to her new garrison.

Stepping forward, Avalanche frowned, taking an upside-down look over the blueprints spread out in front of Skystone. "Hrmm. So you need more space. Not surprised, after the rallying call. Bunks, storage, exercise spaces... but these are all small. Structural integrity issues?"

Straightening up, Avalanche shrugged a shoulder, the thick pauldron rising and falling. "I was built for construction, back before. I'm no architect; wouldn't know where to start designing some of the fancy stuff I laboured on. But If you want to draw up plans for some holes in the ground that won't fall in on you, basic doorframes, air circulation, I can help you out with that."

Holding out her forearm with her palm upwards, she exposed a wide channel fully occupied by a heavy cylindrical weight, mounted atop a piston. The piston retracted, pulling the weight up her forearm towards her elbow, then, as she clenched her fist, the piston slammed out to its full extension, hammering the weight into the baseplate at the end of her arm with a resounding clang. "Pile driver. Don't know what equipment you've got here for excavation, but I'm built to dig out rock with my bare hands. I know the way it feels when it's getting unstable, and I don't mind getting my hands dirty."

Lowering her arm, Avalanche gave Skystone an assessing look. If the garrison had a flier working on plans for expansion, a flier with no experience in the work at that, they had to be pretty short of personnel with relevant skills. Breaking into a grin, the massive femme turned and rested her back against the wall, crossing her arms across her chest.

"So what did you do to end up with a job like this?" she asked, good-natured humour in her field.

[Deleted]

Skystone saw the myriad of emotions cross Avalanche’s face. She knew it wasn’t easy, being sparked lower-class and also being an Autobot. She herself wasn’t of high-caste either, and had even flirted with Megatron’s rhetoric (until his violent tendencies out-weighed his speeches).

She figured that was a huge part of why two fliers were on the construction job, other than the fact it was difficult to find good soldiers in general.


She stood up all the way straight, her wings perking up slightly as the conversation became more work oriented.

“Definitely need more space. The need isn’t incredibly urgent, but at the rate we take in more soldiers, it will be soon. I’d like to stay ahead of that curve.”

As she finished saying that, the other femme showed her impressive set of tools. Skystone took a slight in-vent, mind whirring. Avalanche could be incredibly useful to her and Thundercloud’s efforts.

“Our equipment is...somewhat limited. But like you’ve already hinted at, our biggest obstacle is the fact that we’re diggin’ through straight rock to expand. Unlike you, I’m not meant for going through rock.” This last bit was said with some ruefulness, her mouth quirking up.

She sensed Avalanche’s appraising glance. Her question was neither unexpected or offensive, Skystone knew this wasn’t her area of expertise.

“Honestly? I’m tall, and I can lift heavy things. That qualified me for the job.” She gave Avalanche another once-over. “Definitely wouldn’t mind the help, though.”

[Avalanche]

Avalanche broke into laughter; easy and unfeigned. "You're tall and you can lift heavy things, huh? Well, I'm tall and can lift heavy things too, so I guess it was only a matter of time before I ended up down here. Might as well do something useful with my hands. Like you say, you're more suited for going through the sky, but me? I'm the original ground-pounder."

The big femme relaxed. As unlikely as it was to find a flier working construction, it was actually kind of nice to think of herself as part of an impromptu construction crew. "I'll level with you. Don't know if you're going to end up assigned under me or not." She glanced upwards, as if her gaze could pierce through rock to those moving about the garrison above, but her doubts about whether any form of organisation existed there remained unsaid. "Still, I want to get a feel for the personnel here, and you look like you've got a sensible helm on your shoulders. So."

Propped against the wall, her shield sandwiched between her back and the stone, she let her posture signal the informality of it all. "I'll give you that excuse to step away from the blueprints you were after, and afterwards, I'll go over them with you. Maybe inspect the rock, get some stress readings down so we can plan things out better.

"For now - tell me about yourself. The talents you've got - other than being tall. Preferred role in combat. Recent combat history. How long you've been here, and if there's any mecha you work well with, or don't work well with. Anything you think would help me make the best use of you, if it comes to that." She paused, then unfolded her arms and, grinning, jerked a thumb at her scarred breastplate. "Doesn't have to be a one-way exchange either. Got things you want to know? Ask."

Not every mecha could be trusted with a free and open exchange, but - as she'd said - Skystone struck her as a femme that wouldn't give her the run around when offered the chance.

[Deleted]

Skystone gave an easy smile in response to Avalanche’s laugh.

She dipped her head in acknowledgment about her also being tall and able to lift heavy things. Fair point, she was even taller than Skystone, in fact.

She was a little bemused at Avalanche’s comment at not being sure if Skystone was going to end up “under her”. As far as she knew, the hierarchy at base wasn’t that sophisticated. There was Optimus, and Red alert. Otherwise, they all seemed to be almost peers here.

She couldn’t help but droop her shoulders in relief at the mention of an excuse to step away from the blueprints. She loved work, and was a true workaholic, but even Skystone needed outside communication. She was used to hard work, but not in an office, and not constantly alone.

She in-vented in thought at Avalanche’s questions.

“Talents? Long distance flight, space flight…” she considered a moment more. “...but I suppose those were just the abilities I was sparked with. What’s kept me alive all these years is my ability to survive just about anywhere.” Truly, her own adaptability had kept her both alive as a Neutral in the ruins of Cybertron, and in the coldness of space when she had been all by herself, flitting from planet to planet in search for scraps of energon. “As for combat, I generally prefer melee combat. Using blades, specifically.

I’ve been here a few months now, and I haven’t strictly met anyone I don’t work well with-in the life I’ve lived, I’ve learned to handle just about any type of personality. I do get on well with Rain,” she mused, thinking of her little joy flight from earlier that day. “What about you? I’m assumin’ you must be a pretty good soldier...but what else? Were you always a soldier?” The question was bold, but Skystone had never been the type to not be honest-at least, not in conversations with people she genuinely respected.

[Avalanche]

Space flight?

Avalanche looked at Skystone with an edge of surprise, rather impressed by the claim. Of course, as a grounder, she was used to the occasional flier having an edge in terrain navigation that she simply couldn't match, but independent space travel was a whole other level of capability. The number of times that that would have been useful for her unit...

Well. Circumstances were different now. All the nearby forces were consolidated on a single planet, from both sides, and there was the functioning space bridge which itself was a huge shift in the tactical calculus. Nevertheless, an ability to remember, and to keep in mind carefully for the future.

Avalanche's orange gaze held steady on Skystone's faceplate as the other femme talked, listening and making notes without interrupting her train of thought. Survivalist traits, if not any mention of formal training in it... that combined with her long-range capability to give the option of some really impressive feats of off-the-grid travel. Still, despite her intention not to interfere, Avalanche's brows did raise at the mention of blade-based melee combat.

Most fliers, in her experience, were strong ranged combatants. It made sense; stay out of reach of ground forces like her, and bombard them from out of effective retaliation range. Skystone didn't fit the mould. Perhaps some combat training would be in order, to see the other femme actually move and fight. She didn't have any trouble with anyone at the base, either... implied she had a level helm and a steady temper, with clowns like Carbine wandering around looking for a nerve to stand on.

All useful. All filed away. Avalanche didn't have a natural gift for leadership, nor tactics: she had to work at it, and she did so, hard.

"Yeah, I'm a damn good soldier," Avalanche replied, a grin tugging at her lips. "Hard to stop me once I get going, and I keep a close optic on me and mine. I'll want to see how you fight, later, so I can anticipate your moves when it gets rough. I wasn't forged a soldier, though. This chassis-" she slapped a hand against her scarred armour, with a clang, "-was built for hard labour, way back when."

The big femme paused, looking upwards briefly as she thought. How much of her past to go into, here? On the one hand, talking about her neutral past had previously handed her enemies within the ranks ammunition, but even if she said nothing of it now, it'd come out eventually. And it was always Avalanche's way to tackle an issue head-on.

"Built for construction. All about raw strength, load capacity, being able to hammer things together with my fists. Subtlety was not high on the design specs." Nor was fuel efficiency, but there was no need to rub that in Skystone's face. She'd lived through the local energon shortage. "When it all went sour, I stayed out. Protected those I could, they helped me find fuel. It worked for a while. Wasn't going to last. Wasn't hard to see that the 'cons were bad news for everybody, neutral or not. So I enlisted. Got fragged a few times. Learned better. Got better. Led a brigade for a while. Good mecha."

Avalanche exhaled a soft vent. If she'd have had the option, she'd have still been out there with them. But as it was... "Ended up here," she concluded.

[Deleted]

Skystone knew when she was being assessed, and Avalanche seemed to be trying to take in every detail she spoke. It made Skystone feel both vulnerable and seen.

Just as avalanche kept her optics on Skystone, the favor was returned. Even as Avalanche started answering her questions.

It was no surprise to hear that the other femme had been built for hard labor. It was written all over her. It was a little amusing to hear how proud Avalanche was of her current occupation. So many (honestly, sometimes including herself) were so bitter about where the war had taken them. It was good to hear someone at least was proud of what they did anymore.

Skystone saw the moment of hesitation on avalanche’s face during her pause in speech.

Then the other femme spoke again.

When she mentioned how she stayed out, protecting innocents, Skystone’s optics went wide and her wings went down, somewhat slack in shock. Her field gave a pulse before she managed to rein it back in.

She took a deep breath. “We have similar stories, then. I got caught up with a...friend,” she still to this day couldn’t help the slight choke of her words there, “and we both joined the cause. But when I saw what the war did to Cybertronians…” here her field slowly went bitter, “I couldn’t stay. So I tried to protect all those being slaughtered as collateral. To be quite honest, I only rejoined once I realized that Autobots were as hunted as the rest of us. The only real enemy still left were the Decepticons.” She looked again to Avalanche, wondering what her response would be. Wondering if she’d ask about the Exodus. Because that’s where the two femme’s stories differed- Skystone had no inclination to join a brigade in the face of so many displaced and lost. Of course, that path ended with her being alone once again, as it usually did. She still sometimes wasn’t sure what exactly made her join the Omega Outpost, except for her sense that this was the Autobots final stand, and she intended to be present for it.

[Avalanche]

Neutrals were nobody's favourite mecha. No one in the primary factions, at least. The Decepticons were worse about it, as they were with everything, but that wasn't to say that Autobots didn't view them with resentment and distrust. Those who'd fought with the Prime from the start never quite forgave those who hadn't.

Avalanche knew that well.

It seemed Skystone hadn't had an easy time of it either. The flier's shock at finding another who shared at least a portion of her story was tangible. In a strange way, it was... reassuring. Somewhere within Avalanche, a shield dropped, and she took in Skystone's manifest distress with a quiet sympathy.

"Sounds like you had a rough ride," the big femme said softly. "I don't blame you. Known a lot of neutrals that saw things the same way; both sides to blame for the carnage. We all lost everything." Her gaze lowered, the orange light of her optics glinting from the edges of her dark helm armour. "More than we could have imagined we had to lose."

Her hand came to rest against the angular front of her breastplate, feeling the steady thrum of her fuel pump beneath. "Can't have been easy to strike out on your own." No judgement there; Avalanche might have been a die-hard warrior for the cause, but she understood the reservations of those who stood aside as well as anyone did. "Still have friends out there somewhere - I hope - that would never fight the way I do. A lot wouldn't approve of what I've become. All I can do is tell myself that each 'con I scrap is one less to head out there and hunt them down."

She looked up, taking a step closer to Skystone. There was a real emotional rawness there, linked to this mecha the flier had signed up besides, and Avalanche couldn't yet read what kind it was. Her heavy hand settled onto Skystone's shoulder.

"This friend of yours. They not around anymore? What happened?"

[Deleted]

Skystone didn’t open up often. It just wasn’t who she was as a person, in general. She’d seen too much and lived too long to ever truly be comfortable reliving some of her memories. Sometimes it felt like her own mind was a graveyard filled with her worst failures. It wasn’t a place she often chose to go.

But there was something suddenly shifting in the room between her and Avalanche. As if the air itself knew that sparks were beginning to be bared here. Skystone debated shutting it down, she really did. Debated shutting it down, to going back to professionalism, her desperate need for everything around her to be about the job so it couldn’t ever be about anything else.

Maybe her time at the Outpost had changed her. Maybe having a group to belong to had worn her down. Because where she would have once simply turned away she found herself softening. Softening to the understanding she heard in the other femme’s voice.

Because Avalanche did get it. She’d lost everything too. They all had.

Skystone listened openly as the other femme mused about her friend’s perception of her.

“Who you are today is who you had to become. I’m sure they wouldn’t begrudge you that.”

She straightened slightly as Avalanche stepped towards her. She didn’t tense, exactly, as the other femme laid a hand on her shoulder, simply tilted her head towards it, bemused. But her next words had her world stilling.

“I don’t know where Rebar is. Quite frankly, I don’t care, so long as I never have to see her again.” It’d been a long time since she’d heard her own voice go so cold, but Rebar was a sensitive subject. Arguably the most sensitive subject.

Even as cold as she felt, however, a part of her was warmed that Avalanche had even bothered asking. It’d been a long time since someone had. The rawness in the room was charged, electrified. She looked the femme across from her directly in the eyes.

“And what about your friends? Where did they go?” The why they were going was implied in the question.

Throughout all of it, she hadn’t shaken off Avalanche’s hand. She nearly leaned into it, in fact.

[Avalanche]

A sad, wry smile tugged at Avalanche's lips. She appreciated Skystone's supportive words, she truly did. But the other femme was wrong. Sometimes, you did things for what seemed like the right reasons, and it still did more damage than you could ever repair.

It wouldn't have surprised her if Skystone had shaken her hand loose, or even just drawn back slightly, and Avalanche wouldn't have been the slightest bit offended. Every mecha dealt with their pain differently, and it was damn rare for that method to be opening up and baring it to others. All the same, sometimes, just sometimes, you just met someone's gaze, and saw the same loss in their optics that was reflected in your own.

And then you talked.

The coldness in Skystone's voice, when she spoke of Rebar? That was old, old pain, grown deep and hard, penetrating right down to the struts. Something to be handled gently, if at all. It was enough to have touched it, and let the other femme know it was okay to talk of it. And truth always deserved to be answered with truth.

Avalanche drew a half-step closer, meeting Skystone's gaze, not yet removing her hand as she answered quietly, "Not sure. We separated a long time ago. Back then, we were all still on Cybertron, still eking out a life for ourselves. Eight of us at the time; number went up and down as mecha headed off on their own, or fell in with the group. Energon was getting real scarce, and neither army liked the competition from a bunch like us. We got pushed, further and further into the barren lands. Chicane and Sideslip - energon scouts, together since before the war - they did their best, but there just wasn't much of anything left out there. So we couldn't keep retreating."

She shrugged slightly, a weariness in the gesture that was as good as a portrait of the inevitability of fate. "I was the protector. Kept the group together. Warned off troop scouts. Usually they'd back off, if it seemed like I was willing to give them a rough time. Not worth the effort, see. Had to bang a few helms together, now and then. Got shot up a couple of times. Then this group of 'cons took a special dislike to us, started coming after us proper. Leaving energon bait out. Shot Chicane's left arm clean off. Seemed like warnings were off the table. We were running, hustling for shelter north. Then..."

Avalanche trailed off, then resumed, "Hit an Autobot patrol. They didn't like us much, but we needed the help, and there were too many of the 'cons for me to even slow them down by myself. So I offered the 'bots a deal. Get my guys to safety, and I'd enlist. Thought I was being so damn noble. Patrol leader told me I didn't need to make bargains, they'd do it for us anyway. Felt like a fool.

"So we went north. They did like I asked, escorted us, kept the trackers off our tailpipes. I ended up enlisting anyway. Seemed like we'd run out of room to exist by ourselves, so it was pick a side time." She sighed. "Rest of the group didn't see it that way. Sideslip thought both sides were as bad as each other. Chicane wasn't having any of it either. None of them were. Said I was abandoning them when they needed me. Guess I did. Had to go off for basic training. Never caught up with them again."

[Deleted]

Avalanche’s story hit a chord with Skystone. It seemed they both had experience with trying to keep other’s protected.

The fact that Avalanche held her gaze while telling such a story meant something to her. It took courage to not try and hide while baring your spark.

She noticed that Avalanche hadn’t moved her hand. Skystone moved the arm being held and lightly held on, trying to help ground the other femme.

She listened to the entire story, and felt comfortable enough to wait a few moments before responding, wanting to gather her own thoughts before speaking.

“The Decepticons take everything they can, always. There’s no endin’ their incessant need for more...more resources, or weapons, or whatever else it is they’ve decided they’re entitled to.” Her voice had gone bitter. Her years of neutrality weren’t forgiveness towards the faction that had gladly ripped her planet apart to take power.

“But it was fortunate for you that the Autobots came in the end, whatever happened after. Even if they didn’t like you. When I was a neutral, nearly every group I encountered steered clear. I didn’t really care, it made my job easier. Less need to worry over ‘cons when the Autobots weren’t around.

I enlisted again for similar reasons, I suppose. I did what I did to protect innocents. The Autobots were so beaten down that they were doing the same thing, but safer. Figured if that wasn’t a reason to join up, for real, I’d never find another one.”

She glanced down at her scarred shoulder. “It had taken me that long anyways to forgive both sides for the war...and to get over the horror of what I’d seen in my first short stint as a soldier.”

Now she looked Avalanche in the eyes once more, her optics opaque. “Do you think you’ll ever see them again?” She wasn't sure if she was asking for the benefit of the femme in front of her, or her own. Because while there were some she hoped to never see again...other's from her old life would be a welcome sight, especially considering the hardships she'd already faced at the Outpost. Maybe other's would come to Earth, maybe they wouldn't. She wasn't sure how she felt about that.

[Avalanche]

Sometimes, the most obvious thing could still take you by surprise. Avalanche had reached out to touch Skystone, to offer just a little support to another femme that had suffered in ways that they both were too familiar with. Somehow, she hadn't expected Skystone to reach out in return, to touch her to offer support.

That wasn't the way things worked. Or - hadn't been the way things worked. Not when she was in command. When the mecha closest to her were worried, they showed it by teasing her, by playfully getting out of line, and she pushed back, in the same tone. Translation: we're worried about you, and in return, I'm fine.

It would have been the easiest thing to shift, to pull back a little to naturally break the connection. This femme didn't know her, and even if this outpost didn't seem to have a functioning hierarchy, that didn't mean their difference in rank didn't exist. Leaning on those you were meant to be leading wasn't fair. But the thing was...

...the thing was, Skystone wasn't under her command yet, if she ever even would be, and Avalanche was hurting. She was hurting bad. The destruction of the Pit on Canyon. Turning over her unit to Forgelight, because she couldn't protect them anymore. The isolation, afterwards. She'd opened up about some of her oldest wounds, and like a fool, she'd just encouraged all of her most recent injuries to rupture their fragile bindings.

So she didn't pull away. She listened to Skystone, a stillness settling over her, truly listening to the words the flier said, and the words that lay unspoken behind them. When Skystone's last question came, the duality of it was inescapable. No matter what answer Avalanche gave, it would be her verdict on both of their futures and the incomplete stories of their pasts.

Comforting lies had never been her way. Never could be.

Avalanche's orange gaze shifted downwards, the glow of her optics the colour of cooling metal, then flicked back up to meet the other femme's optics. "No," she said quietly. "I don't. The galaxy is a big place. And it's been a long time. There are so many things that could have happened, and so many paths they could have taken. The odds that they took one that matched mine; no. I don't believe it. Besides."

She paused, and her optics briefly closed, but it really was too late to pretend she was okay with the way things had worked out. "If they turned up again, I'd have closure. I'd know what the result of my decision was. I don't think we live in that kind of universe."

[Deleted]

When Skystone reached out to Avalanche, she hadn’t even considered rank. It wasn’t second nature to her, to look at life through the lens of hierarchy. She’d lived her life working with peers. She looked to Avalanche as another person, not a commanding officer.


To have her gesture reciprocated meant more to Skystone than she really knew how to properly articulate in the moment. For all the scraps she’d gotten herself and others out of, she wasn’t much for expressing emotion.


So instead, just as the other femme listened to her, Skystone kept her posture as soft as possible and gave all of her attention.


She knew her question had been direct and hadn’t been sure how Avalanche would respond. To hear her honest response, no matter how resigned, was encouraging- she didn’t feel the need to hide around Skystone.


As she was listening to the other femme, she subconsciously moved her helm and shoulders to continue listening to her, and maybe even catch her optics.


“A universe of closure? Yeah, have to agree with you on that. Not always sure what exactly closure would even look like sometimes. Pit, maybe it’s closure enough to know whatever happens, we’ll never see them again.”