A few more minutes went by, that felt like an eternity, and the door finally clicked open. It was Lt. Lee looking for Rosalind. He was shocked to see Rosalind pinned on the ground and surrounded by all the pilots. He pulled his firearm and pointed it at the pilot on Rosalind, demanding that he get up.

            “Lt. Anderson, step away from Miss Rosalind,” Lt. Lee demanded, trying to understand the situation.

            Lt. Anderson, keeping his gaze focused on Rosalind, relaxed his grip. Rosalind could see the anger that taken over him was subsiding.  

            “Lt. Lee, call the others’ names,” Rosalind whispered with her raspy voice.

            “Lieutenants Kapadia, Daniels, Martinez, Randolph, and Miller. Step away from Rosalind.”

            The pilots were coming out of their trance. Before they were able to move away from Rosalind, they shook their heads trying to understand what was going on and Lt. Anderson began to get off of Rosalind. When he was all the way off of her, she sat up, repeatedly formed a fist with her hands and then rubbing her forearms where Lt. Anderson had grabbed her. Lt. Lee moved to position himself between Rosalind and the pilots, keeping his gun out. Rosalind picked herself up and now the hand impression that Lt. Anderson had left was visible. It was definitely going to leave a bruise.  

            “There’s something wrong with them,” Rosalind tried to say to Lt. Lee, with her voice breaking. “They aren’t themselves. They were in a trance, until you called their names out.”

            “Okay, I’ll try to explain where they are, what their mission is, and use their names again,” Lt. Lee responded calmly to Rosalind. “Lieutenants Anderson and Martinez, you reside here at Reef 6.”

            The two lieutenants whose names were called stood upright, they were a few feet away from Lt. Lee. Rosalind was anticipating a salute from the way they were responding, but instead, they grabbed their head with their hands, closed their eyes, and started shaking their head, like they were trying to get something out of their head. Rosalind was wondering if this was because the mechas were still inside their heads or some sort of residual effect from being trapped by them for so long.

            “Keep going, I think it’s working,” Rosalind half whispered half mouthed to encourage Lt. Lee.

            “Lieutenants Kapadia and Daniels, your base is Reef 2, and Lieutenants Randolph and Miller, your base is Reef 3. You were all sent to Reef 6 to perform a training exercise with your mecha.”

            Upon hearing the word mecha, the pilots all froze. They snapped their heads up as if they had been thinking about a problem for a long time and finally, just now had the realization that gave them the solution they were looking for. All of the pilots seemed to have come back to their senses and were capable of maintaining eye contact with Lt. Lee, from where they were standing. Four of the pilots dropped to their hands and knees, exhausted from being in a controlled rage for so long. The other two, Rosalind now knew to be Lieutenants Anderson and Martinez were still able to stand. She wondered which one was Bleu’s pilot, and secretly hoped it was Martinez because she was terrified of Anderson at this point.

            Rosalind still coming down from her adrenaline high, reached slowly but shakily for Lt. Lee’s arm. She gently touched it to get his attention, “Uhm, can I go now? I want to be alone, I’ll be in my office.”

            “Are you sure you’re, okay? If you wait for a second, I can escort you there.”

            “I’m sure I’ll be fine. I’ll notify you when I get there.”

            Before Lt. Lee could even give his okay, Rosalind escaped out of the room. She quickly walked to the exit and then ran as fast as she could to her office. When she was inside, and the door shut behind her she sat in the open space beneath her desk and began to cry. After a few minutes of sobbing, she felt better than she had in a long time. It had been a while since she had cried, and she needed the release after all the anger she had accumulated over the last few years.

            ‘Ah, right, I forgot to notify Lt. Lee,’ Rosalind reminded herself.

            She peeked up over her desk and brought the monitor and keyboard down from it, and in her little nook, she used the computer to send a message indicating she made it fine to her lab. There was no response.

            ‘Everyone must be busy with the pilots,’ she thought exhaling with a sigh.

            Rosalind took this time to sneak out to the restroom and pat a cold towel on her puffy eyes. There was a reason why she didn’t allow herself to cry. It was because it was always obvious when you saw her red eyes and puffy eyelids.

            ‘Maybe I should go home,” she thought while looking at herself in the mirror. It was a good idea, she had just cause, and they were going to be dealing with the pilots. Not to mention she could unpack. With a little more pep in her step, Rosalind returned to her office, sent an email to her superior, and Lt. Lee that she would be returning home, grabbed her backpack, and left. She decided to wear her lab coat because bruises in the shape of hands were starting to appear, one on each of her arms and she didn’t want anyone to see them. The shuttle took no time at all to arrive at the stop near her home because everyone was still at work.

            She ran home. Somehow being attacked and held still against her will made her anxious about open areas. But her home was not any comfort either. Rosalind locked the door behind her and proceeded to clear every room. She knew that no one, in particular, was after her and that the people that hurt her didn’t mean to, but her logic couldn’t shake her feeling of being vulnerable and in danger. To take her mind off it all, she focused on unpacking her boxes. There weren’t any decorations or personal items packed, just the essentials: plates, cups, silverware, a lot of books, clothes, and cleaning supplies.

            Decorations never meant much to Rosalind. At the main base, her home was mainly used for sleeping. Now that she was using this home to hide from what happened at the base, she was wanting more from it. She needed more from it, but there was nothing that could be done about her bare home till the weekend. For now, she decided to retire to her bed and just let time pass her. Unfortunately, she didn’t have any food, so if she wanted to eat, she was going to have to go out and buy it. The idea of leaving made her uncomfortable enough to search online for alternatives, but there weren’t any options online for the base.

            ‘If only I hadn’t gone to see those pilots after that freaky dream,’ she yelled at herself.

            If anything, Rosalind was more curious about what might be happening to the pilots. She wondered if they would be allowed to continue as pilots and if they were, did they still want to pilot the mechas? Since the military began pilot testing the mechas, thousands of pilots have been worked through. The military had a standard for mecha pilots and that was simply they had to be able to maneuver it, but even after that standard was met countless pilots asked to be sent somewhere else. Every explanation the pilots gave made no sense and when they were tested for their ability to maneuver the mecha, the mecha would no longer acknowledge them. Rosalind always knew that they needed to raise the bar higher to include a sort of personality match, but it just wasn’t feasible with the mechas. They weren’t open books you could read and figure out, and then pair them up with a like-minded individual.