Xenos

i. Underestimation: July 16, 2126

Day Forty-six

At some point last night Galen had decided that they were going to miss vital information if they continued looking at the videos late into the night. Cin had been grateful at the time, but now that she was starting her second day of watching the videos she was a little less so. Sitting down in front of the screen again took more willpower than Cin expected.

Keying up the commands to bring up the videos, Cin pressed the button to begin. Luckily she was able to jump to where they'd left off the night before, otherwise she wasn't sure she'd be able to continue. She rested her head on her hand as the footage streamed by, slightly wavy as she sped through it. She paused it whenever someone showed up on screen, but so far it had only been Della and Lex.

"Hey, you're starting early," Galen said as he came up behind her, an offering of warm coffee in his hand. Cin took the packet from him and took a drink, the bitterness warming her insides.

"I just want to be done."

"Understandable." Galen took a seat next to her and Cin resumed the video after she'd taken another gulp of coffee. They were now up to the 14th, which was the day after Miles, Lixue, and Cin had been released from the medbay. "Think we're close?"

Cin didn't take her eyes off the screen as she answered. "The window of time where this happened isn't that large, so we'll probably figure out who did it pretty soon." She paused the video again when Della showed up. They watched as Della walked down the hall, but she turned toward the brig. Cin turned her attention to the video outside of the brig, where Della appeared. She sighed and set the video to reverse again. This wasn't exactly how she had pictured spending her days when she became a Communications Officer.

She watched the clock on the recording tick backward until they finished the 14th and started on the 13th.

"Stop it," Galen said suddenly.

A figure was frozen on the screen, and both Galen and Cin peered at it incredulously.

"Why is he down there?" Cin asked.

"He shouldn't be." Galen reached over, rewound it a bit more, then started the recording again.

Miles crept down the hallway, glancing over his shoulder periodically as he went down it. At the brig hallway he paused to look down it, then continued to the end of the hallway. He disappeared from the video as he went into the camera's blindspot, but he didn't reappear by the airlock.

Cin glanced at the time this recording had been taken and realized it was just after they'd been released from the medbay.

"Is he working with Gray?" Galen murmured softly. Cin wasn't sure if she was supposed to answer, but she did anyway.

"He doesn't go down to the brig."

Minutes passed as they waited for Miles to reappear. When he did, he was stuffing something into the pocket of his black pants as he headed back up toward the med bay.

"So it was him," Cin said quietly, disturbed by his actions. "What do we do now?"

Galen stood up and went to the pilot's cockpit. Cin could hear him talking to Zo and moments later a ship wide announcement went out over the intercom, which were guaranteed to still be working.

"McFarline, Volkov, and Nuez, please report to the bridge. Immediately." Galen repeated the message and then the line clicked off. Galen returned to the open area of the bridge with Zo behind him.

Cin stood to attention when they returned, looking to Galen for instructions. Zo jogged over to the Communications Center and looked at the video frozen on Miles putting something into his pocket.