Mary has been sitting in a paste of her own humid sweat for about six or so minutes. Gaping at the ceiling. The ceiling drapes itself in pitch black, so one would assume that there's nothing to see.

Mary's mind compensates. Images of viscera project onto the top of the room. A woman drags her bloated stomach across the insipid, a familiar woman. She's smiling through gritting, lips opening and folding, opening and folding, teasing at words that Mary can't hear. Mary doesn't dare to move.

"Oh, you're up too?"

Mary's about to rejoice, but she turns to her left. One of the quint. They read her agape mouth and hooded eyes.

"Are you sure you wanna do this?" They chuckle.

"...I mean...I guess someone's gotta." She falters. "She's all by herself..."

Six hours after, or for Mary, five seconds after, the sun rises with the infantry. Mary burrows herself deeper under the pillows and blankets, as noises belonging to each individual girl attempt to dig her from bed.

From the top of the bunk bed, the noise of a weight being released unto the ground is muffled by Mary's thoughts. Her mind flips between the scene of the dragging fecund and Hadewig tending to her son, the scratching and the word, "problem children" meshing together to create a score. It ends with Mary's fortress of cloth and bird feathers being compromised by a familiar face.

"Come on, what's the big idea?"

"Oh, forgive me, I was just so tired and—"

"Hurry up, get cleaned and meet us behind base, it's only a matter of time before Hadewig  chokes you with her thighs."

The face leaves their giggling behind them, becoming one with the line of girls leading to the washrooms. She follows.

The wall tiles are lined with molds that seemed as if they couldn't be washed away, even with the pressure of the shower heads. That's all she could bare looking at as she showered. Mary feared that if she looked at any if the girls, she'd see a stillborn laying between their feet.

Barely even lathering soap on herself the thirty minutes she stood there, she drags herself out of the showers, eyes pinned to the ground.

As she stepped out of base, the sun and the cold immediately stung her body—Mary couldn't tell if her uniform was going to burn or freeze. Her quinate of friends gathered around her.

"Well, I hope you realize there's no turning back now."

"Remember what we said about information!"

One of them leans into her ear and whispers, "Don't encourage any delusion."

They turned her loose, watching her as she ambled over to Hadewig's office.

She opens the door. Hadewig turns to her with a smile. "You really did take me up on that offer, you crazy bastard!"

Too numb to act surprised, Mary responds with a "Yeah."

"Man, I was joking before, but sure, I mean...what's the harm?"

As soon as Hadewig's lips stop moving, it hits Mary that the Vahagn wasn't in the office. Another realization hits— she didn't tell them about the Vahagn. 

"Uh... Miss Hadewig?"

"Yeah? What is it?"

"Where's the kid?"

"What happened to the old Mary? Do you know how the old Mary would've said that?"

"...No?"

"She would've said, 'Oh, Miss Hadewig, where ever is that dear charming boy?'"