Alaska declared that they were leaving and South staggered back slightly as the door closed. Outside everything was loud but to her it all sounded fuzzy, like she was underwater. Her eyes were glued to Cal as he lay there in a pool of blood. Iowa had stopped the bleeding but that didn’t stop the images from flashing through her mind. She felt a hand on her shoulder suddenly and looked up to see North. Slowly the girl stood, unsteadily, her brother’s firm footing the only thing keeping her upright as he led her into the cockpit.

“I want you to stay up here, okay?” He knew how distressing it was for her, seeing a teammate injured like that for the first time. However he was surprised when all she did was nod back and sit down, strapping herself in. North was hesitant about leaving her up here, but Alaska was there so it wasn’t like she was alone and he needed to get secured in case they ran into trouble. Making his way back he moved quickly to help Iowa. “We should get him strapped down so he doesn’t move too much.” He said, looking worriedly at Cal.

Theoretically this had been a successful mission, they’d achieved their objective. But if they lost someone… it hardly felt worth it. He felt a small surge of anger bubble up, but quickly suppressed it. Apart from situations involving his sister North rarely let anger cloud him. It rarely helped anything. “You’ll be alright.” He said softly as they got Cal secured. There wasn’t much to do now except sit around and wait. There was this ominous silence that filled the hull as they made their way back to The Mother of Invention.