Rhonda emerged around the end of Rebecca's former apartment building nearest the park and made her way down the hill, preceded by one trooper and flanked by two more. So, even she moved as part of a 4-soldier fire team... Rebecca wondered if she was part / in charge of First Suqd, or if that team was just its own separate command element or something. That would make Squadmore sense in a larger force though...

Ronnie gave a few orders to the two men and one woman walking with her, and they peeled off at the bottom of the shallow grassy slope between the building and sidewalk. The woman beelined straight to Epstein and the cargo truck, while the two men looked to be circulating amongst the various escort vehicles. Rhonda nodded to Patrick and Christine as she passed, and approached Sam and Rebecca solo, rifle (and grenade launcher) slung in a relaxed low carry.

"Hey kids. How'd it go?"

Rebecca shrugged. "It... went. We got what was left of what I was hoping to, so that's something."

"It sounds like there's a story there. Problems with the squatters?" Rebecca sighed, and Sam turned the rest of the way around to face Ronnie fully.

"There was a bit of a tussle, one of them tried to take Sam's gun. I feel like a dumbass about leaving her alone in the room like that while the girl was showing me where they'd boxed up my stuff. Everything seemed fine though!" Her voice rose in frustration, not defensiveness.

Sam chided her gently. "Sugar, I told you I'm okay. And you're right, they seemed perfectly chill before that."

Ronnie's voice was nonjudgmental, in that "yeah, something happened that maybe shouldn't have but you'll clearly learn from it" way. "Well, it seems to have turned out okay." (Her eyes scanned over Sam's intact gear and lingered on the bruise on her lip."

"Yeah, you shoulda seen the other guy."

Sam's mildly indignant facial reaction to this directed a loving accusation of plagiarism and line-stealing at Rebecca, but then she looked back to Ronnie. "Just like I said. And, as I said upstairs, he's definitely going to have a black eye. I'm also willing to bet he'll be pissing blood for a few days."

That got some respectful eyebrow arches and a few grim chuckles, but Rebecca's was halfhearted, and Rhonda could read her face, seeing that she was still troubled. "We saw plenty of that amongst the populace in both Iraq and Afghanistan. Everything would seem fine, and you were trying to build good relations, but you never knew whose brother or cousin got killed in an airstrike because he was an insurgent or just a poor sucker in the wrong place or something like that. You never really knew when you could not be on edge all the time." She paused briefly. "Anyway. Red, can I have a few minutes to talk to your girl here?"

Since Rhonda had lapsed into informal nickname use for the moment, Sam followed suit, whether consciously or not. "Sure, Sarge. Don't go too hard on her." Rhonda lifted her eyebrows briefly and quirked her mouth in noncommittal response as Sam pushed off the Humvee, glanced over at the cargo truck then back to Patrick and Christine, and made up her mind. "I'mma go talk to our head wrench over there about tools and notions about how to break down the solar stuff." She extended her elbow slightly to catch Rebecca's on the way by in a small love tap.

Both of the other women watched her go for a moment (not the usual treat that the experience would be, in the looser and thicker work pants and with Rebecca's mind so distantly elsewhere).

"Far more likely you'd be harder on yourself than me. You've got a good one there, kiddo." Ronnie's tone was lowered, pitched to not carry much beyond Rebecca standing a few feet away.

"Yeah. Believe me, I know. And, I bet she predicted that first part too, and was saying that to me as much as you." She sighed and shifted her gaze from Sam's back to the distant park road.

"So, what's up? Why did she make the call in? Looking at you, I'm guessing it's related to her fistfight somehow?"

Rebecca stopped herself from sighing again and changed it to just a slightly longer than usual respiration. "I almost lost it up there, Ronnie. Like, not breaking down in the middle of the scene, I mean losing it on the guy that tried to grab her gun. She kicked his ass and he was down for the count, but I was still inches away from putting lead in his face when she stopped me."

Ronnie looked at Rebecca contemplatively, with a slight squint and a tilt of her head. "It's good thing the two of you have been drilling so well. You know, it's natural for you to be pretty protective, especially after what you've been through."

"No..." Rebecca shook her head emphatically. "It's more than just that. For a minute there I was about to be on the other side of that, shooting that girl's... heck, I dunno, we never confirmed if they were related or dating or what." She sighed and looked up at the sky for a moment. "Either way. I was a couple millimeters of finger travel away from being like the guy that killed Jaime."

A hint of a frown crossed Rhonda face. "Okay, I can see why that's an upsetting thought. But first off, you have no idea what kind of asshole that guy was. He was probably a real shitbag, and you are definitely not. Second, you were driven by emotions that came from protecting Sam, pumped full of adrenaline. I've seen bad shoots before, believe me, sometimes from people you could totally see it coming from, others that were a surprise. But you are a far cry from that jackass. I think there's a good chance you'd have stopped even if Sam didn't intervene, and even if you didn't, you're not that."

Rebecca tried her very best to be convinced. "I dunno about if I'd have stopped, but the rest of it... yeah, I hear you."

"Even so, it didn't happen. Look, we live too on the edge to dwell heavily on the near misses. You'll get paralyzed staring into that abyss and lose your mind."

Rebecca sighed. "Yeah... if anybody would be credible telling me that, it's you. Listen, I'll be good and not hug you in front of all your subordinates here, but... pretend I did, okay?"

That convinced Rhonda that she was feeling a little better, or at least headed in the right direction. "Okay, kiddo. You ready to call your friend and get this show on the road?"

"Yes ma'am, let's keep me from having the opportunity to sit and stew."

Ronnie nodded and gestured towards the front of the Humvee. "Well, you know where the radio is."

Ah, got it. Talking about feelings time was over and it was back to gruff bossy Ronnie. Okay. The routine was somewhat comforting, really, and Rebecca suspected Rhonda knew that perfectly well. There was something... convenient about her directness. It took a little getting used to, but she said what needed to, even if it was sappy and reassuring, and then moved on as soon as that was done. There didn't need to be any sort of awkward backtracking from the sentimental conversation, just right down to business.

"That I do, boss. I totally hugged you." Rebecca mirrored Ronnie's smirk and rolled into a turn, pushing her weight off of the Humvee's rear. Adams nodded at her when she opened the front right door — she acknowledged his greeting as she sat halfway into the seat, her right foot still on the ground outside, and reached for the radio handset. A few button pushes later, she was transmitting on the right frequency through the tall whip antenna sticking up from the back of the truck.

"Phoenix, Phoenix, do you copy?"

It only took a half minute for Catherine to reply, a slight background hiss to her signal. "Hey, if it isn't my best customer. You about ready for me to bring over my homework so you can copy it?"

Rebecca scoffed and chuckled for a moment before replying. "I seem to remember the copying being pretty reciprocal. But yeah, the pizza's here if you wanna bring a bottle of wine with you."

"Sounds good, I can be there in around twenty minutes." There was a short pause. "Listen, we heard what sounded like a fuckton of gunfire and explosions in the distance a while ago. Was that you? Did you run into trouble?"

"Ahh... yeah. I guess you could say trouble ran into us. Listen, don't be mad, but when you get here... there's gonna be a bunch of military vehicles. They're on our side, can you play nice?"

There was another pause, and Rebecca could imagine the disapproving faces Cat was giving her nomadic minions. "Shit, girl. You really do make friends everywhere you go, don't you."

"There's upsides, I promise. I can fill you in when I see you."

"Fine, fine. Listen, let your friends know some of our vehicles are armed, okay? I don't want them getting trigger happy, especially after the ruckus we heard this morning. Tell them to look for that truck you wanted so they know it's us."

"Armed?"

"Yup."

"O-kaay. Play nice, alright?"

"Oh, I won't start nothin'."

"I guess I'll take it. See you in a bit."

"Roger that... Phoenix out."

Rebecca shrugged at Adams where he lounged as best he could in the spartan driver's seat and rose to her feet. Ever so conveniently, Sam's conversation with Epstein seemed to have wrapped up shortly after Ronnie finished talking to her, and she was only a few steps away from the Humvee when Rebecca stood.

'Hey you." Sam reached out for Rebecca with both hands, and Rebecca took them in hers. "Good talk?"

Rebecca ran her thumbs over Sam's as she replied. "Of course, it's Ronnie we're talking about here. She could tell something was off and wanted to know about it. And to straighten me out enough to finish the job, I reckon."

"Mmm. Cat on her way?"

"Yeah, she said she'd be here in about twenty minutes."

"Sounds like just enough time to tell Ronnie and break into lunch. I think the adrenaline is making my body demand a refuel."

Rebecca squeezed Sam's hands. "You really did kick his ass, huh?"

"Like a hunk of S7 steel through another bot's aluminum shell."

That made Rebecca chuckle. "You're such a nerd. A deadly little nerd."

"You love me." Sam displayed her trademark impish smirk.

"I do."

Sam's grin broadened. "As you are so fond of saying, 'phrasing'. Go talk to Ronnie so I can eat already!"

Rebecca released Sam's hands and started towards where Rhonda now talked to Epstein. "So YOU can eat... sure, okay."

She heard the laugh in Sam's voice as she called after her. "You know you don't want me hangry!"