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Dr. Ryland Grace was, on the surface, an easy assignment. He didn’t do anything risky. He was genuinely pleasant to be around. He worked hard. But it was quickly becoming apparent to Stratt that he was difficult. She had requested and been granted agents from SHIELD to monitor and protect the main players in Project Hail Mary. That included Dr. Grace, despite his insistence that he was no one important. He had been through three agents in the several months at sea, which was two more than anyone else in the project had cycled through.
“Captain Wilson,” she greeted. “I need another bodyman for Dr. Grace.”
“Again? What is that guy doing to my agents?”
“He is a unique scientific mind.”
“He’s annoying is what you mean.”
Stratt paused before speaking.
“He feels uncomfortable with the supervision. You know how he is.”
Sam grinned.
“Yeah, I know. I think I have the perfect guy for this.”
“Will he stick?”
“Oh, he’s impossible to get rid of.”
When Sam had called him to ask for a “little favor,” Bucky hadn’t expected to be flown to a massive aircraft carrier in the middle of the ocean.
“All you have to do is watch a scientist while he works. It’ll be the easiest thing you’ve done this century,” Sam told him over lunch on the day he arrived.
“Then why do you need me? Can’t you get Torres to do it?”
“Torres is assigned to the engineer, Ilyukhina. I’ve got Commander Yao. You just have a molecular biologist. You get to sit in a lab, read a book, do a crossword puzzle, brood at the wall.”
Bucky glared at him.
“I knew you’d be perfect for this.”
Bucky reported to the lab at 8:00 a.m. promptly the next morning. Grace was already there, face in a microscope. He didn’t look up when Bucky came in.
“And that’s what I like to see! Breed, breed, breed, baby!”
“Excuse me?”
Grace’s head popped up.
“Oh. They sent someone new. Again.”
Bucky tilted his head.
“Again? How many people have been assigned to you?”
“Uh, there was Rollins and then Greer and then the last one was Hammond. Sorry, what was your name again?”
“Barnes. Bucky Barnes.”
Grace pushed his glasses back up his nose and walked across the room, hand extended.
“Dr. Ryland Grace. Nice to meet you. You really don’t have to stay.”
“Apparently, I really do.”
Bucky tried to establish his routine early. He took a small corner of the lab that Grace never seemed to occupy and arranged it to suit his needs. A chair, a table to set his coffee on, his backpack stuffed underneath the chair. Every fifteen minutes, he would take a lap. He inspected all entry points, of which there were only two. He paced the hallway perimeter. In between patrols, he skimmed his paperback or twirled his knife. The latter made Grace visibly uncomfortable. Bucky continued to do it anyway.
“What time do you normally get here in the mornings?” Bucky asked.
“Uh, it varies. Whenever inspiration strikes,” Grace replied.
And it did vary. The first few days, Bucky felt like he was chasing a target rather than guarding a scientist. He would show up and Grace would already be working. Never one to be beaten, Bucky adjusted. He was sitting in his chair, drinking his coffee on the first morning that he beat Grace to the lab.
“What the heck, Bucky?! You scared the mess out of me!” Grace yelled.
“Next time, just let me know when you’re coming to the lab and I can escort you.”
By the end of the first week, Bucky had made little progress in his book.
Grace hadn’t stopped talking for forty minutes. Bucky snapped his book shut with a loud sigh.
He wasn’t addressing Bucky specifically. He was facing the whiteboard and narrating his math. Bucky was relatively certain he was working on the reproductive rates of the astrophage, which Bucky had read about in his briefing file and understood approximately forty percent of.
Grace filled up two whiteboards and stood back to review his work. He clapped his hands together and turned around.
“Alright. What do you think?”
Bucky looked at him.
“About the life cycle. Or lack of one, these things haven’t died without me poking them yet.”
Bucky didn’t respond.
“Come on, what’s your instinct?”
“I don’t have instincts about the life cycle of astrophage. But if something is alive, something else can usually kill it.”
Grace nodded and tapped the marker against his nose.
“But what would kill little tiny space dots?” Grace muttered as he turned back to the whiteboard.
Bucky opened his book and began to read again.
It was 2:00 a.m. when Bucky texted Sam “what is this guy’s deal?”
Sam responded at the more reasonable hour of 6:30 a.m. Bucky was still awake and in the lab with Grace.
“he’s a unique scientific mind or something”
“more like a unique pain in my ass”
Bucky looked up from his phone and saw Grace swaying slightly in front of the whiteboard.
“You wanna call it a night, Doc?” Bucky asked quietly. Grace still jumped at the sound of his voice. He scrubbed his eyes and shook his head.
“Almost got something,” he murmured. “You can go, though.”
Bucky performed his patrol and texted Sam to bring two cups of coffee.
Bucky got one evening off a week and on this particular day, he ended up in the ship bar with Sam and Torres nursing a drink that he had selected for the burn and not the taste.
He was watching Sam and Torres bicker about whether or not the Olympics should be held next year when the primary crew walked through the door.
“Joaquin!” Ilyukhina called. She practically skipped over to hug Torres. Torres’s face flushed slightly and Bucky raised his eyebrows at Sam who shrugged.
“Ты тренировался?” she asked.
“Da,” Torres said.
“Твой акцент ужасен,” Bucky said. Ilyukhina laughed and grabbed his arm.
“I didn’t know you spoke Russian!”
“Buck speaks everything,” Sam told her with a grin.
“Dr. Grace said you were impressive. I thought he meant your knife skills,” Yao chimed in. Bucky moved down a few stools at the bar to make room. DuBois sat next to him.
Sam was explaining the difference between cajun and creole food to Yao, who was listening intently. Ilyukhina was teaching new Russian words to Torres who was desperately trying to be a good student.
“Чтоб у тебя хуй во лбу вырос,” Torres repeated. Ilyukhina cackled and nodded.
“Yes, you should say that to Stratt when you see her next.”
Bucky chuckled into his drink.
“You really shouldn’t do that, kid,” he called down to Torres. Ilyukhina waved him off.
DuBois was quiet next to him.
“We appreciate you all coming all this way to help us,” he said to Bucky. Bucky shrugged.
“Least we could do, I guess. The world’s ending and I don’t exactly have the resume to help fix it. This, at least, I can do.”
Another wave of people came through the door. DuBois smiled as Shapiro entered.
“You and Shapiro, huh?” Bucky asked. DuBois nodded. “That sounds tough.”
“Actually, it’s quite simple. We understand how this ends. We’ve both accepted it.”
“That sounds like way too healthy of a relationship for me. Best of luck to you both,” Bucky said dryly, tipping his glass towards DuBois. DuBois laughed and clinked his glass with Bucky’s before standing to go meet Shapiro.
Bucky looked around the bar and saw that Grace had arrived at some point between the crass Russian lesson and his conversation with DuBois. He was looking at the group and Bucky saw a line appear on Grace’s forehead. It was the same line he got when he stared at an impossible problem on his whiteboard. Bucky nodded towards Grace, who fixed a smile and made his way over.
“Hey guys,” Grace greeted. Ilyukhina ordered Grace a drink and he settled into DuBois’s empty seat next to Bucky. He leaned in towards Bucky.
“If I’m bothering you on your evening off, I can go away.”
Bucky looked at him from the corner of his eye.
“Doc, you’re fine. We’re just hanging out.”
“I didn’t know you did that,” Grace muttered softly into his beer bottle. Bucky pretended he didn’t.
Grace had been staring at the whiteboard for two hours.
“Every star in the system,” he muttered. “Every one except Tau Ceti. Why won’t it go there?”
Bucky turned the page in his book.
“Do you think it doesn’t see it? Or it doesn’t need it? Or it can’t get to it?” Grace circled the star on his whiteboard.
Bucky closed his book and rubbed his face.
“The astrophage does the same exact thing at every star, right?” Bucky asked.
Grace dropped his marker and turned around with a puzzled look on his face.
“Right.”
“And Tau Ceti is just a regular star, same as the sun, right?”
“You have been listening,” Grace said, starting to smile. Bucky rolled his eyes.
“Okay, so stop looking at the things that don’t change. The astrophage doesn’t have the decision making ability to just scoot around the star, right? So look around Tau Ceti to see what’s different.”
Grace picked up his marker and pointed at Bucky with it, bouncing on his toes slightly.
“Yes, yes, stop thinking that Tau Ceti is the answer. What if it’s not avoiding the star but something else entirely!” He started scribbling on the board. “Can I call this the Barnes Hypothesis?”
“No.”
“The Bucky Belief?”
“No.”
“The Grace-Barnes Proposition."
“Doc.”
“You’re right, the Barnes-Grace Proposition.”
“Don’t include me in any proposition with you.”
Grace laughed and turned back around.
“How do you think like that?” he asked Bucky.
Bucky adjusted his hold on his book.
“I watched a lot of people. When their routine changed, I didn’t look at the person. I looked for what acted on them.”
Grace recapped his marker and crossed his arms.
“What kind of work did you do exactly?”
Bucky just turned another page.
As the launch date grew closer, Grace began teaching the primary and secondary crew everything he knew about astrophage. The lessons were not what Bucky had expected.
“Buck, I asked you if you wanted to come to dinner with us,” Sam repeated, nudging Bucky’s ribs.
“No. No, I think we’ll be here for a while tonight. He’s got that look,” Bucky replied, leaning against the wall and watching Grace teach.
Grace in the lab and Grace in the classroom were different. In the lab, Grace was chaotic. He zipped between equipment, elbows knocking tables, narrating his thoughts, second guessing everything he did. In the classroom, he was methodical. Organized. Impressive. The six members of the primary and secondary crew gave him their rapt attention and he easily answered their complex questions without batting an eye.
“I can’t imagine being assigned to Grace. Seems like a real handful,” Torres commented. Sam snorted.
“Like Ilyukhina is any better? Half the time when I see her she has a glass of vodka in her hand,” Sam said.
“She’s Russian,” Bucky and Torres said at the same time. Torres flashed a smile. Bucky rolled his eyes and absentmindedly began twirling his knife in his fingers.
“Besides, at least Ilyukhina is fun. I’m getting better with my Russian,” Torres continued.
“Из-за её уроков тебе когда-нибудь набьют морду,” Bucky muttered.
“Okay, she’s only taught me a little. But she’s picking up Spanish pretty well.”
“She should be focusing on this mission, not on flirting,” Sam said. “It’s not like Spanish is going to come in handy up there.”
Bucky glanced at Sam. Sam just stared at the crew in the classroom, arms crossed. Torres settled back against the wall and examined his shoes.
“You’re fine, Torres.” Bucky’s eyes stayed on the classroom. “Ilyukhina wouldn’t be here if she couldn’t handle a little socialization.” Sam’s mouth drew into a thin line.
“You and Grace seem to be getting along pretty well,” Torres said. “Better than the last three people, at least.”
“He’s annoying. But I have experience with annoying know-it-alls.”
“Is he going to go back to teaching after the launch?” Sam asked. Bucky flipped the knife into the air. Grace stumbled over his words at the lectern and Bucky looked up. Grace kept looking over to the knife. Bucky sheathed it and put his hands in his pockets.
“No idea what his plans are.”
Grace had been working for sixteen hours on new astrophage tests. Bucky slid a protein bar across the lab table towards him. Grace unwrapped it and took a bite without looking away from the computer.
“Have I told you about the new thing the astrophage are doing?” Grace asked.
“Nope,” Bucky replied. Grace threw his glasses on the table.
“Because they aren’t doing anything new.”
Bucky hummed in acknowledgement. Grace spun around in his chair, head tilted back to stare at the ceiling.
“Alright. Let me clean up and we can call it,” Grace finally said. He stood and gathered his armful of notepads, various pens, coffee mug, and the half-eaten protein bar. He dumped them on a desk. He turned to where he had dragged several of the heavy steel tables together and sighed.
“Don’t worry about it, Doc.” Bucky stood and reset the tables, making the lab look how it always did before Grace’s ideas ran rampant. Grace watched with tired eyes.
“Just how strong are you?”
“Decently, I guess.”
“And you let me drag those around nine hours ago because it’s fun to watch the nerd struggle?”
Bucky’s mouth twitched.
“A little. And you didn’t ask.”
Grace laughed.
“This is why you like DuBois better, isn’t it?” he asked, gathering his mug and jacket.
“What are you talking about?”
“He’s efficient. Doesn’t talk much. You seem like you’d appreciate that in a person.”
Bucky ran his tongue over his lips and waited for Grace to face him again before speaking.
“I appreciate that in some people.” He pulled his backpack out from under the chair and shrugged it on. “But I’m also friends with Sam Wilson and Joaquin Torres, who never shut up. Besides, in my experience, being too efficient can just be…cold.”
Grace nodded and his eyes moved to Bucky’s left arm. He flexed it out of habit and Grace tore his eyes away.
“Sorry,” Grace said.
“Don’t be,” Bucky replied. “Surprised you haven’t been asking to poke it with a stick or something.”
“That seems inefficient and equally as cold.”
Bucky’s lips lifted in a smile. Grace stood up straighter.
“Everybody thinks this is the second mechanical arm, but it’s at least the fourth. Hydra had to rebuild it sometimes. It would get damaged or the cryo would make it stick. But this one seems to be hanging in there,” Bucky said. He held out his arm towards Grace who examined it.
“It’s beautiful, really,” Grace murmured as the lights from the lab caught the gold accents. “It’s fully integrated with your neural pathways? Was it always like this?”
“No. Not at all. When I…when I fell, my arm was torn away above the elbow. They took the rest of it and replaced it with titanium.” Grace nodded along.
“Right, I remember seeing that one on the news. Talked about prosthetics with my students later that semester.”
“I’m sorry,” Bucky said automatically.
“Don’t be, I like using real world stuff with them. They always have good questions.”
Bucky’s shoulders tensed.
“One of them asked if it hurt you,” Grace continued. “I said yes, probably.”
Bucky cleared his throat.
“You can tell them it did. I’d come out of cryo and be confused why my shoulder hurt every time. And then they’d wipe me and I’d forget to care.”
Grace pushed his glasses up his nose.
“Wipe you?”
“So I’d forget who I was, so I could do what they told me to do.”
“I thought that was what the trigger words were for. The news after your pardon talked a lot about the words.” Bucky shrugged.
“Words only made me comply. I’d still remember, even with the words, so they had to figure that part out.”
“So you just never knew who you were?” Bucky shook his head. “That’s terrifying. I can’t imagine.”
“Not my idea of a good way to spend several decades,” Bucky replied, bringing his arm back to his side. “Let’s get you to bed, Doc.”
Bucky walked Grace to his quarters. Before he opened the door, Grace turned to Bucky.
“Thank you,” he said. Bucky adjusted his backpack.
“If you tell Torres I called him a friend, I’ll throw you overboard.”
“Goodnight, Bucky.”
“Goodnight, Grace.”
When the project moved off the ship, Sam asked Bucky if he wanted to be reassigned.
“Other agents needed breaks. I’d understand if you wanted a change.”
“Nah, I’m fine where I am.”
Sam smirked.
“Whatever you say.”
The setup on land was enormous. Bucky could watch the construction of the Hail Mary from his spot in the corner of Grace’s lab. The days grew colder as winter approached.
“DuBois called me Stratt’s second-in-command the other day,” Grace said, not looking up from his microscope.
“And you’re surprised by this?” Bucky asked, not looking away from the window.
“I mean, yeah. Surprising because it’s fundamentally untrue.”
“He’s right.”
Grace looked up.
“Think about it,” Bucky said. “She has you in every meeting. She needs your opinion on everything. I see it. DuBois is right about most things.”
“I knew you liked him more than me,” Grace grumbled. Bucky laughed.
Nine days before the launch, Grace was working in his temporary quarters on a list of last minute logistical issues that Stratt had given him. Bucky had found another corner.
Bucky felt it before he heard it. The ground beneath him vibrated and the air split and he knew something was deeply wrong. He had Grace on the ground under a table before Grace could react. He covered Grace with his own body, his vibranium hand cradling his head until the temporary quarters stopped shaking. Bucky rolled off of Grace, who was trying to pull himself up. Bucky shoved him back down.
“Stay there!” he barked.
“What is happening? Are we being bombed? Are we dead? I can’t hear anything!” Grace babbled, still in shock, still trying to stand. Bucky pushed him down and held his hand to Grace’s chest until Grace stopped talking.
“Stay here. Do not move until I come to get you.” Grace nodded, finally silent.
Bucky unsheathed his knife and pulled a gun from his backpack.
“Have you always had that?!” Grace called. Bucky shot him a withering stare.
“I don’t bring guns to the lab.”
Bucky slipped his head through the door and saw the fire and smoke. He radioed Sam.
“Wilson, what happened?”
“I don’t know yet.”
Stratt’s voice came through the radio.
“Primary crew, report.”
“Yao, present and safe,” Sam called in.
“Ilyukhina, present and safe,” Torres’s voice came across the radio, static and tense.
The radio silence after was deafening.
“Oh God,” Grace said from under the table.
“DuBois, does anyone have eyes on DuBois?” Stratt demanded. “What about Shapiro? Who has eyes on Shapiro?”
Bucky grabbed his file folder with the daily schedule.
“DuBois and Shapiro were supposed to be in the astrophage lab right now,” he radioed.
“All security personnel, secure your people and rendezvous at the lab,” Sam called.
“Does someone have Grace?” Stratt asked.
“Dr. Grace, present and safe,” Bucky replied, staring at Grace, still under the table.
“Stay with him,” Stratt ordered.
“Copy.”
Later that same day, Bucky stood in the back of the conference room next to Sam and Torres as Stratt, Grace, and the two remaining primary crew members decided what to do next.
“You will find me a new science officer,” Stratt told Grace. “Immediately.”
“I can’t get someone up to speed in, what, nine days?!” Grace yelled back. “We have to delay the launch.”
“If we delay, people will die. Someone has to be ready.”
“News flash! People have already died!”
Bucky remained still against the wall and watched Stratt. Sam stood next to him, equally as still. Torres kept staring at the ceiling.
“You okay, kid?” Bucky asked under his breath. Torres nodded, but Bucky noticed how his jaw ticked.
“Is this all going to fall apart right now? When we’re this close?” Sam whispered.
“No way Stratt lets that happen,” Torres said, voice tight.
“I don’t know what her options are right now,” Bucky added.
“Sergeant Barnes.” Stratt’s voice cut through the room. Bucky stood up straight.
“Please escort Dr. Grace back to his quarters.”
Bucky nodded and he and Grace left the conference room. Grace’s face twisted. He opened his mouth to speak.
“Not yet, she can still hear you,” Bucky said quietly. He pulled Grace down the hallway and through the door. He kept a hold of Grace’s arm as they walked across the campus, his head swiveling from side to side. Bucky made Grace wait in the doorway as he inspected the quarters. Once satisfied, he shut the door behind Grace.
“It was probably an accident in the lab, I don’t think anyone is out to assassinate us.”
“That’s how I would’ve done it,” Bucky replied. Grace threw himself down into a chair and held his head in his hands.
“DuBois was going to save the world. Shapiro, too. And now what’s going to happen?” Grace cried.
“You’re going to figure out who is going to save the world instead.”
There was a knock on the door. Bucky held his hand out to Grace to tell him to stay put. He flattened against the wall and looked out the window before opening the door.
“Buck, I need you with me. Agent Levi is going to take over watching Grace while we figure out what happened in the lab,” Sam told him.
“No,” Bucky said, crossing his arms. Sam’s eyebrows shot up.
“No? Bucky, this is serious. I need your help on this. Until we figure out otherwise, I have to assume this was intentional.”
“And that’s why I stay with Grace.”
“You have direct orders from Stratt and from me to switch with Levi until further notice.”
Bucky gritted his teeth.
“You think I feel good about leaving Yao with someone else? But you and me are the most qualified for this. We’ll figure it out and then you can come back here,” Sam pressed.
Bucky looked toward Levi, who was hovering behind Sam.
“Anything happens to him, I’m coming for you,” Bucky told her. “Grace, I’ll check in.”
Grace waved his hand and didn’t look up. Levi nodded her head and stepped inside the quarters. Bucky scanned the quarters one more time before closing the door behind him and following Sam.
It took four long days to exhaust the theory that this was anything more than a lab mistake.
“You’re saying that the difference between giving DuBois and Shapiro a nanogram and a milligram of astrophage was the equivalent of a bomb going off? And that’s what they want to send into space?” Sam asked. Bucky nodded.
“Man, they really aren’t calling it Hail Mary for laughs, are they?” Sam said with a scoff.
“I need to check in on Grace,” Bucky said.
“He’s in a meeting with Stratt. Why don’t we get some sleep? We’ve been going for days.” Bucky shook his head and made his way towards the conference room.
He opened the conference room door and found only Stratt and Grace at the table.
“Sorry, just here to resume my position.”
“That’s unnecessary, Sergeant Barnes,” Stratt told him.
“Respectfully, this is my job.” Bucky looked around the room. “Where’s Levi?”
“Levi didn’t stick,” Grace supplied. “They’ve been cycling agents.”
“So where’s your agent now?”
“None of the agents currently available have the clearance level for this meeting,” Stratt said. “You look terrible, Sergeant Barnes. I would suggest getting some rest. You can resume your duties tomorrow.”
“Everything’s fine, Bucky,” Grace assured him. “We’re just still talking about who’s going to be the new science officer.”
Bucky hesitated.
“Okay. I’ll come get you tomorrow. 7:00 a.m., like normal.” Grace smiled at him and waved as the conference room door closed.
Bucky made it back to his quarters and fell into a fitful sleep.
He woke up and made his way to Grace’s quarters a little before 6:00 a.m. The quarters were empty.
“Who has eyes on Dr. Grace?” he called across the radio.
“He is occupied,” Stratt replied.
“Nice!” Ilyukhina’s voice came through the radio.
“What’s his position? I’m coming to him,” Bucky continued.
“He is in the medical facility performing his pre-launch protocols. He cannot be disturbed.”
Bucky started to head towards the medical facility. Sam appeared by his side.
“Shit, I didn’t think that’s how she was going to tell you,” Sam started.
“Tell me what?” Bucky asked.
“That Grace agreed to go. He’s the science officer, he’s replacing DuBois.” Bucky shook his head.
“No. No way he agreed to that.”
“Buck, the whole world is at stake, of course he agreed to that. Yao told me,” Sam continued.
“I need to talk to him.” Bucky took off at a run.
The medical facility was quiet. Bucky slowly pushed through the doors and crept down the hall, looking for Grace or for anyone. He entered the last room on the left and found Stratt sitting at a desk with her hands folded in front of her.
“I’m very sorry that it’s come to this, Sergeant Barnes,” she said.
“Where is he?” he started to ask and then the needle hit his neck and the world went dark.
He came to with a start, tried to get to his feet on instinct, and was jerked back down. The room tilted. He reached up to rub his eyes and his arms moved sluggishly. He had to think them into motion instead of just acting on instinct, the way he hadn’t had to think in decades. His hands only moved a few inches before the chain bit into him. His wrists were cuffed to a chain at his waist. He recognized it immediately. Vibranium.
She’d had this made for him. Not recently. Months ago, for the possibility of this scenario, before DuBois and Shapiro and before Grace.
An IV sat in the crook of his right elbow. He was still fighting the drag of the sedative when Stratt walked in.
“Hello, Sergeant Barnes.”
“Where is he?” He blinked, trying to clear his mind.
“The sedative is formulated especially for people like you. You will only wear yourself out if you continue to fight.”
“Where is Grace? What did you do?”
“I did what needed to be done.”
He felt the sedative tug him back under. The last thing he saw was Stratt, watching him with the same expression she gave a data set that had come back exactly as predicted.
When he woke again, he took inventory of the room. It was sparse, only a chair by the door and a small window. He could see the sun setting and he tried to think about how much time might have passed. He tried to call for her and nothing came. The words caught in his throat, hoarse and dry. He swallowed and tried again.
“Stratt.” His voice cracked. He ran his tongue over his lips.
“Stratt!”
The door knob twisted and she appeared. She sat in the chair and studied him. He stared back, unflinching.
“I do not understand why you are upset. This is for the best. For everyone.”
“Not for him.”
“The needs of the many outweigh the wants of the one. I thought a soldier would understand that.” Bucky scoffed.
“You didn’t give him the option.”
“There were no options. It was this or the world dies.”
She let the words hang in the silence.
“Where does Sam think I am?” he asked. She shrugged.
“Are you hungry?” she asked as she stood. “I can get someone to start intravenous feeding, but I was told you could go days without food.”
She rapped her knuckles twice on the door and Bucky felt the sedative hit again. He struggled against the restraints before the darkness came once again.
“Sergeant Barnes.”
His limbs felt too heavy.
“You should wake up and witness history.”
He forced his eyes open and Stratt was there again. She stood by the window with her arms crossed.
“I don’t regret what I’ve done. There was no other way. I don’t regret it.”
From his seat on the floor, Bucky watched as the Hail Mary launched into the atmosphere with Yao, Ilyukhina, and Grace aboard. When the ship disappeared from view, Stratt’s shoulders slumped.
“You’ll burn in hell for this, Stratt.”
“Just one of many reasons, Sergeant Barnes.”