"Now, why do we hang the saline bag here?" I stand before a small sea of blue scrubs. The blue in front of me is slightly less faded, the brand-new scrubs laying on the skin of brand-new recruits for the infirmary. It's been three days since Telenoch told us that we were now facing the imminent threat of The Loyalists. I've worked at all hours of the day to avoid thinking about it, only going home to rest when Astrid or Rose drag me there. Now, I'm three hours into my second shift of the day, exhaustion hanging over me.

After hanging the saline bag up, I cross my arms, waiting for someone to answer my question. I watch quietly as they all look at one another, murmuring rushed thoughts. Finally, a few people brave an answer and I get three variations of the same answer: something to do with the way the bag is built to empty and that it is just the way it was always done.

After a quick chuckle to myself, I pass out saline bags to each of the nine people in the group. "You're all over-complicating things." They each hold the bags with subtle curiosity, and I take the bag off the hook of the IV pole. "We hang the bags up because of gravity. Why would we have the bag lower than the patient and fight gravity to get the drip consistent? No, we hang the bags to simply use gravity to our advantage."

An odd color in my mass of blue catches my eye, so I call Rose to my side to take over the lesson. "This here is nurse Rosemary Herold; listen to everything she has to say. She is my second here in the infirmary and will be finishing the lesson for today. Anyone that doesn't take her seriously or doesn't take what she says to heart, will not be returning to the infirmary unless they are sick or injured. Is that clear?"

They all nod in an understanding of my threat, so I turn to Rose and give her a small smile with a quick pat on the shoulder. New recruits are a lot to deal with, most not knowing anything about medicine, but it's important that they learn everything they can, as quickly as they can.

I quickly move away from the group and a small figure in purple finds my side. "You seem to run a bit of a tight ship, Rina."

"I have to, Astrid, you know what's coming."

She nods with a slightly far-away look on her face, then grips my arm tightly and steers me in the direction of the door. "Right you are, but you can't keep the ship running if you collapse from exhaustion."

I try to pull myself from her grip, but don't slip from her hand at all. "Astrid, I'm fine. Let me get back to work."

"No, you've already finished your shift. At this point, you're just avoiding things—which is understandable, but you need some rest."

"Astrid—"

"Besides, you stink, you could use a shower."

I frown but lift the collar of my scrubs up to my nose and smell. I drop the material, stopping a grimace as the musty smell of old clothes and sweat welcomes my nose. "I guess you have a point."

"Good, when we get back, hop in the shower and get changed into something comfortable. I'll make you a sandwich and you can relax for a bit, maybe even get some sleep."

Images of our people dying, one after another, have kept me from sleeping more than thirty minutes at a time for the past three days. "I'll try."

I walk out of my room, combing through news threads on my Link with one hand and snacking on a sandwich with the other. Astrid had been true to her word and there was a nice turkey sandwich left on a plate in my room when I got out of the shower. Soon, a coughing sound pulls my attention to the den of our cabin and I notice three bodies, two of which I hadn't been expecting.

Astrid pats on a choking Will's back as what I can only assume is hot coffee drips from his mouth and puddles on the hardwood in front of him. I move my eyes to Raiden, he sits on a chair opposite them, quietly chuckling at his friend. "Well, what do we have here?" I ask.

Astrid looks up at me, a bright smile on her face. "Oh, the boys came by to talk about the Loyalist situation."

"Mhm, right. That seems like something we should get the other four involved in, yeah?"

"Well, yes, that's the plan, we were going to head out as soon as you're ready."

I look down at my black leggings and grey sports bra. "Sure, let me throw my hair up really quick and we can go."

Will finally seems to recover from his coffee situation and speaks up. "Don't you think you should put some clothes on?"

"Why? All my lady-bits are covered. What's the problem? And what was you're issue a second ago?"

"I—uh...I'm just not used to seeing you—an Aorian no less—in such little clothing."

I groan. "Oh my God, were you raised in a monastery? And what's up with the 'Aorian' shit? Yeah, we wore robes, but only when we had to be in the presence of people higher in authority. Oh yeah, and because it was fucking cold there!"

Raiden returns to laughing and I shoot him a hard look. "Shut up, Raiden." He raises a brow at me and I ignore him, looking back at Will. "I'm still adjusting to the different climate here. To me, this is hot, besides, I'm off the clock now, I feel like being comfortable. Now, let me be and get back to business."

I make a move to leave, but Astrid speaks, freezing my feet in their spot. "You need to wear blue because we're going out in public to find the others."

I huff and narrow my eyes at her. "Girl, what color do you think my hair ties are?"

Astrid smiles, Raiden stares, and Will nods, still looking away as if to refuse to meet my gaze. I roll my eyes and put the last bite of my sandwich in my mouth. I shut my Link off and turn on a heel, yelling over my shoulder. "I'll be right back, by the time I am, I expect that coffee to be cleaned up."

Once back in my room, I throw my hair up into a ponytail with one of my dark blue hair ties. I'm about to walk back out to the den but decide to humor Astrid and grab a zip-up jacket the same dark shade as my hair tie. Leaving it unzipped with my sunglasses in hand, I go out to the den to leave.

Finding the others is a quick process, especially once we found Jax and he was able to direct us to the others. Fifteen minutes after we left our cabin, we're all in the secure briefing room of the main hall.

Once the sound of the door sealing us in stops, we all take a collective breath, the pressure of leading was exhausting us all. We take a moment, all silent and in our own minds, to gather ourselves.

"I think that we need to just bite the bullet and tell them." Jax crosses his arms, having been the first to brave his opinion.

"There's a fuck-ton of things that can go wrong if we do that," Elena says, moving a hand to her brow to rub the stress from her face.

"Wow, that's like ten shit-tons." Nobody reacts to my joke, all looking between Jax and Elena. "What do you think we should do then? Not tell them? That will bring a whole number of problems also."

"Serina's right, if we don't tell them and we're attacked, they won't trust us anymore." Raiden seems to have been the only person to hear me. So much for being the head of the council.

"Yeah, and what if we tell them and it leads to wide-spread panic?"

"But we need them to—"

"We can't let—"

"What if—"

There are too many voices speaking all at once, to the point that I can't tell who says what. A migraine starts to chip at my skull, coming in waves of sharp pain each worse than the last. I move my hands to my ears, trying to quiet their voices, hoping the headache would work itself away, but it's all too loud. Nothing will help this.

"Everybody. Shut. Up!" I yell at everyone in the room, hands still on my head.

They all look at me with varying degrees of surprise, but I take a moment to breathe and will the pain away. Finally moving my hands back to my sides, I send each of them their own glare. "Arguing is not going to solve our problem here, is it? No, I didn't think so. Now, let's just put it to a vote and go from there, yeah?"

They all nod, silent from my outburst. "Everyone who wants to tell the colonists, raise your hand." Raiden, Jax, Lorna, and I all raise our hands. Great, four of eight. This is looking good. "Now those that think we shouldn't tell them." The others each raise their hand and I rake a hand through my ponytail, trying to think of what we're going to do.

"What now?! We're split down the middle!"

"Elena, unless you're going to add anything helpful, keep your fucking mouth shut." I clench my jaw to keep from saying anything else.

"Wow, Serina. Aren't you supposed to be the caring one of the group?" Lorna snorts at her own question and I sigh.

"Listen," I look at everyone individually then stop with my gaze on Elena. "I'm sorry. I've spent every moment of every day at the infirmary, trying to get everyone ready should an attack come. If we can't keep people alive, we might as well just wait for them to come."

"We get it, we're all tired, but we can't be going at each other's throats every time something like this comes up." Astrid sets a hand on my arm after Leon speaks, knowing full well just how little I've been sleeping.

"What if we had a ninth member that we only included in the case of a tie?" All eyes turn to Will for an explanation of his idea. "It could be a general colony member whose job is to solely vote on split decisions. They aren't included in these meetings; it's only when there's a split vote that we fill them in and get their vote to break the tie."

"How often are we really going to half split votes? We're usually on the same page, at least most of the time. We can't have someone that doesn't work unless we call them in for the occasional vote."

Silence. Lorna had reasoned a good point. At first, the idea of a ninth, possibly unofficial member to solve split disputes like this sounded good. Then, more and more questions were raised. We were all stuck, trying to think of our own solutions. Biting my lip, I don't come up with anything, so I look to my side and meet gazes with Astrid, hoping the brainiac had come up with something.

We look at each other for a moment before I see a familiar light in her eyes and her lips curve up at the edges. "They would need to be a neutral party, right? Someone that wouldn't feel loyal to one of us just because they work under us." A round of nods flows about us, a picture starting to paint in the air. "What if we told everyone that we were looking for someone to apply for the position then each held individual interviews with the person we feel most confident about. Then, once we've found the person we want, they do rounds in every occupational field, that way they don't work under just one of us and they are a true neutral to all decisions with insight to every side as well as the side of the average colonist."

"That could work." Elena's mood brightens after finally hearing a solution after all the fighting.

"I like it; what does everybody else think?" I ask and receive numerous forms of 'yes', everybody agrees. "Great, I think we should make an announcement to—"

I'm cut off by the sound of pounding on the sealed door. All sound is absorbed by the walls—well, all except sound that involves the walls apparently. When in the secure room, only we can open the door from this side; Bartlett said it was to prevent distraction during important meetings. The idea of the room was that we wouldn't be bothered until we opened the doors again, so why was someone pounding on the door?

We all look between one another, trying to decide how to react. It sounds like there's an urgent message to get to one of us and my heart is gripped by the grasp of panic. I'd left the infirmary and now there's a problem.

Falling victim to the panic, I rush to the door and press the button beside it to open the door. "Serina!" Everyone yells at me, knowing that we're not supposed to open the door until we've finished all discussion.

When the door finally opens, their cries die away, everyone taking in the blue of Rosemary's scrubs. She takes a step into the room and bends over, resting her hands on her knees as she struggles to catch her breath.

I gently take her hands and stand her up straight, putting her hands behind her head. "This will help better." I murmur quietly and feel my face twist in concern. Had she run here all the way from the infirmary?

Once she catches her breath, I set a hand on her shoulder. "Rosemary, what is it? You know to only find me when there's an emergency. How quick should I be there?"

She shakes her head then looks around at everyone else, knowing that she can't say too much with their ears open. "It's not too urgent, we just don't know what to do...we don't have the necessary personnel." Her eyes meet mine and I can see the beg to come back shining in them. She wouldn't ask me back unless it was important.

I look back at everyone else. "We'll make the announcement tonight."

"Serina, we can't—" Jax starts, but Rosemary's voice raises and cuts him off.

"The patient is pregnant!"