Solace & Taproots

1.9

Courtesy warning: Vulgar guy being hella misogynistic. (I promise the karma train's a-comin.)

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Ronnie nudged her as they rose from their rest break at the end of the cramped tunnel. Bex hadn't realized she'd been smiling to herself, but rolled her eyes at the imminent grilling.

"What're you looking all sunshiny about? Lately when your eyes go thoughtful like that, you come back all gloom and thunderstorms..."

Bex paused putting her mask back on so she could stick her tongue out in reply. "You who keep nagging me to go to my fucking happy place once in a while? And when I do... what, huh?"

"Pfft." Ronnie waved her hand about dismissively. "I'm just not accustomed to you listening to me n' shit. It's a new experience."

"Ugh. I told you, I'm making an effort. Put your hearing aids back in and let's go, grandma."

Ronnie's eyebrows went up, and she did slide her magic earmuffs back into position, but muttered loudly enough for Bex to hear without any amplification, "Tsk... I can still whoop you, girl. I'm as good once as I ever was."

Really, terminating a conversational dispute with a country song chorus? Wasn't that like bringing up Nazis in an internet argument? Was letting her win a round Ronnie's version of positive reinforcement? Either way, she'd take it. Next she just had to manage getting one in over Sam. Track record, not so good.

The time after the break went much like what came before. Less hunched over back pain though, and her headache had finally subsided. They reached the pumping station soon enough and paused on the ground floor before exiting. When Bex needed to change up weapons, she could set down the M4 or let it dangle in front of her body on its sling, and then reach behind her shoulder and slide the stupid scout rifle up and over. It was easy enough to put back loosely, though the velcro retention at the top was fiddly to cinch tight again by feel alone.

Rhonda, on the other hand... the SMG was easy enough to leave slung to free her hands, but her M249 SAW (not actually able to down a tree, per MythBusters...) was bulky and lumpy enough that had Bex remove it from behind for her if they wanted to avoid Ronnie taking her pack off entirely. It reminded Bex of how old-fashioned horse drawn artillery had to be unlimbered and positioned before use — a random tidbit she retained from field trips to all the old Civil War battlefields growing up. Maybe it was an apt enough comparison, given how much age-related humor was flying around of late. She wasn't about to make it out loud though.

Rhonda kept the P90 in her hands at the ready while Bex supported the "light" machine gun's nearly twenty pounds of weight, unclipped the straps, and wrestled it to the ground with a quiet grunt of relief. After Bex stood upright again to watch their surroundings, Ronnie knelt and her expert hands flowed across the dark metal of the larger gun, inspecting it and attaching a twist-lock suppressor to the aftermarket muzzle specifically designed for it. Before she picked up the LMG, she put the P90's suppressor into the backpack pouch its larger cousin had come from, and re-rigged herself to distribute the weight of the bigger gun with sling straps. A spare hand held out by Bex helped attach the P90 to the right side of Ronnie's backpack for easy tear-away.

After an exchange of nods, Bex felt for and held the push-to-talk button on her radio to transmit on a different preset than the one set up for voice activation — the radios could monitor both simultaneously, but transmissions were segregated for chaos reduction. "Control, Sierra Charlie. Proceeding from waypoint."

The reply came back with just a hint of crackle. "Sierra Charlie, Control. Copy, good hunting."

"Thanks, Control. Sierra Charlie clear." She hadn't had much formal training in radio protocol, but figured as long as she mirrored Ronnie's example she couldn't fail too epically. That plan seemed to have worked well enough so far for many things probably covered in the How to Be a Badass 101, so she stuck with it.