"Gotta have faith." He smiled back, watching her eyes close. Justin wanted desperately to do the same, but what he had seen on their excursion here was so mindblowing, so utterly shocking that the memories danced in front of his eyes repeatedly, reminding him that there was a small group of humanity that had purposefully hid themselves from the rest of their kind so that they could save themselves. He sat on the ground, knees up. Scratching, clawing, biting their way through existence only to fall by the wayside, hoping that the generation afterward would have it better. Cowards. All of them. Bloody cowards. He could hear Ryken's voice bouncing around his skull, booming:
"Never lose faith in humanity. He never did, even after they nailed Him on a cross. He kept believing that they were worth saving." 

"No, they weren't, Ryk. Never have been." His hands balled into fists, knuckles turning white, teeth grinding. He wanted to shriek, feel his soul rip out of his lungs, leave this sick, twisted world. His eyes darted from the ceiling of the cell to the wall across from him to Cam who-

Who was sleeping so peacefully. 

His fists uncurled. Her ebony hair rose and fell gently with her upper body, lips slightly open. If she knew he was gawking at her while she slept, Cam would have more than likely voiced her utter disdain, but thankfully she wasn't aware of what was going on. He moved closer to the bars separating the duo. She was peaceful, more peaceful than he had seen her since they had met. And he would admit to himself that she was indeed a very beautiful woman. He laughed lightly at what Cam would have thought of THAT sentiment. She was modest, pragmatic and pretty jaded when it came to men, so maybe she would shirk the thought...or maybe she would've actually liked hearing it. Probably would've liked hearing it from Smooth soldier-boy Sam. 

Oh shut up. 

_______________

Justin had managed to close his eyes for what felt like a brief period of time when he was awoken by a clutter of voices echoing towards them. He opened his eyes to find a rather tall, reedy man looming in front of their cells flanked by two women, one with greyish-white hair...
"Why am I not surprised?" He snorted a laugh as Avery shook her head. 
"The deceit was a necessary one. We needed a better plan to attack Omega and you both delivered it splendidly." He cocked a brow.
"So those tribespeople...earth mother and all that-"
"We exploited their weaknesses. They needed food and water and we needed a number of settlements out of the way, Omega being foremost." He rose from his seated position, jaw clenched. 
"Made innocent people mercenaries." Avery uttered a deep, throaty laugh. 
"Innocent? They were cannibals. You should be thanking us. If it wasn't for us, your people would have eventually become food sources." The tall man interjected: 
"Let's not carry this along any further. We need to have them prepped for genome extraction." 
"Genome whatnow?" 
"We brought you both here for a very, very specific purpose." The other woman grinned broadly. 
"You two will do nicely for the next batch of experiments."