Fallout Equestria: Rough Water

Chapter. 3: All Our Failures

“Oorah! They’re droppin’ like bad habits!”

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“Really so I was viewing another ponies memories?” I asked Contingency who sat across from me. We were eating breakfast-er supper in the salvation’s galley. It was dusk now, I had slept through much of the day, and we were now nearing the co-ordinates I had found in the shack.

“Yup. You don’t get the hosts thoughts because that might cause duel personality disorder.” She replied, and took a sip of something that smelled decidedly unlike coconut water.

“Oh cool, so what are the risks of treasure hunting?” Swordfish asked. “I want to know in case I ever end up jumping ship.” she elaborated, ‘jumping ship’ was a slang term for disserting (ok it also refers to literally jumping off the ship when it’s sinking).

“Well let’s see, there’s traps, rival treasure hunters, all the normal threats posed by going to any island you’re not familiar with, and the treasure may be cursed.” Contingency explained, and we all laughed at the last part. “Well, I used to laugh at curses too, but I’ve seen things.” She said, and we stopped laughing.

“Really like what?” Signal Fire asked.

“The feeling of being watched, the a random chill that no one but me seems to feel, a blade that can hurt anyone who simply goes near it, a tablet that was thousands of years old yet was somehow irradiated, I once gave up a hunt because out of the corner of my eye I kept seeing a dark figure approaching me that disappeared each time I turned to face it directly, Once I checked up on some old clients and found that they had killed themselves and wrote ‘the past is alive’ on the walls with their own blood.” The things she described sent a chill down my spine.

“Wait, you said a tablet that was thousands of years old? The zebras only colonized these islands 800 years ago.” Brawny questioned.

“Well, I’m not surprised that you don’t know, given that the Zebra Empire tried it’s hardest to erase all trace of pre colonial civilization from the islands. However, before the Zebras came creatures called Alpaca inhabited the islands. The Alpaca lived in a tribe-based society, had boats made of reeds, and worshiped the krakens as gods of the sea. When the Zebra came they turned the different tribes against each other, herded the survivors into the ocean to drown, and destroyed almost every trace of their existence. Of course they missed a few hidden temples and mundane relics, otherwise I’d be out of a job.” Contingency explained and I noticed Xager seemed a bit disturbed by this.

“So Sword Fish what were you up to with the Captain? I heard that she made you stay behind.” I asked, causing her to spit out her drink of… some sort of alcohol.

She glanced down at the shredded coconut meat on her plate before answering. “Oh she just wanted to thank me for taking out the stealth sky tank, and asked about you.” Sure. I decided against pursuing the topic any further as I knew we had a mission a head and I wanted to see what would happen if we weren’t a dysfunctional mess squabbling over some issue or another during the op.

Instead I opened up a discussion about the mission. “So what, do think we’re going after? A ship, an unmapped island?”

“Maybe it’s an oil rig?” Contingency piped up. “I have a good stock off petrol, but I wouldn’t mind getting a few barrels.”

The PA system crackling to life halted our conversation. “Attention crew, we are with in seeing distance of our target, as it is a presumed biohazard we will be maintaining our current distance, while fire team-er-Sea Lion Squad is dispatched to investigate. All vessel guards are asked to be on alert at this time.” Ok show time.

As we made our way from the mess hall, to the armoury, then to the RHIB we’d be using I noticed the number of ponies that looked unrested, of course they did, they had been up the entire past night as well, and many of them didn’t get the luxury of a memory orb nap, or any form of rest for that matter. I also noticed that Swordfish didn’t seem that well rested either; yup, her and the captain.

Once at the RHIB launch Ironclad and his fire team greeted us. “Hey, good to see you all made it out alive. Shanty just wanted my guys to inspect your gas masks, and make sure that they’re all up to code.” We all removed our helmets and with hem our gas masks, except Xager who had one of those rubber masks that went over the entire head, and Brawny who’s mask was fused to his face. After they inspected our filters and made sure that there were no cracks we boarded the RHIB and Mooncalf violently hoisted us over the side and dropped us with the crane. After roughly hitting the water, Signal Fire piloted us towards the ship.

As we approached the ship I made out the name pained on its bow, M.o.P. The Giant. I heard Brawny… make some sort of reactionary noise, it’s hard to tell since he’s a ghoul. “Huh, a Ministry of Peace ship? Can’t say I’m surprised with their ships being basically hospitals.” Contingency said. I had to think about that for a moment, a ship entirely for medical, it seemed redundant since most ships already had Med bays, but then again, I wasn’t entirely sure if even the Patriotic Fire’s med bay could support the casualties that occurred during the war. Our RHIB pulled along side The Giant, and we quickly tossed a grappling hook ladder onto the deck, and climbed aboard. The ship really was giant, 4 levels below deck our deck, 1 above, roughly 250 meters long.

“Ok, let’s make and entrance.” Brawny said and took up a breaching position by the door. We followed suite and stacked up behind him. The directional charges were set. “Three, two, BREACH!” The explosion knocked the reinforced metal door down, and through the small amount of smoke generated by the explosion we rushed, and made a defensive semi circle with our backs to the doorway.

“What the hell?!” Signal Fire’s question summarized my reaction as well, around the room skeletons were scattered, and bullet casings littered the ground like sand on a beach, most disturbing of all was the dark substance that that coated the walls in wild spatter like swaths. On top of that the room had been literally torn apart, doors ripped out of their doorways, bullet-ridden walls, busted vents, and an unsettling dent in the reinforced metal bulkhead.

“Crikey this is bad. Bad bad bad bad BAD.” Contingency muttered beside me, and I had to agree with her.

“Ok, Signal Fire, Xager, and myself will secure the bridge and turn get the PA system and elevator up and running so that we can communicate, Swordfish Rip Tide and Contingency will get a sample of what ever it is, then we get the hell off this ship, I know that the patient levels and labs are below us, so you guys should head under and start looking around.” Brawny explained. We nodded and went our separate ways, Brawny’s group making it’s way towards the bow where the bridge could be found,  my group walking through the damaged doorway further into the ship.

The room we found ourselves in a room that looked an awful lot like the waiting room to he Patriotic Fire’s med bay, however it had been decorated with the same level of damage and gore as the last room. I stopped to look at the notices and propaganda posters behind the secretary’s desk, in no particular order a few stood out; “Lost Dog”, not sure why there’d be a dog on a ship but what ever, “Brighter Futures –MoP”, yes because the end of the world is certainly a bright future now isn’t it, “Ministry of Peace: Our Business is life itself” that’s not creepy at all, “Lab section 2 off limits to all non essential personal: Biohazard”, Bingo. I tore down the last notification and galloped after the rest of my group to catch up with them, only to crash head long into Swordfish since it turns out that her and Contingency stopped 2 meters beyond where I had.

“Ow. My head…” Swordfish groaned as she rubbed her head and with a flap of her wings set her self back up on her hooves. “Any reason you decided to practice you’re 100m sprint right while I was looking over the deck layout of the ship?” I looked up at the wall and noticed that there was a framed deck layout map with a spatter of what I assume to be blood across it.

I passed her the notice, “Well if you can find lab section 2, that’s where we’re most likely going to find what we’re looking for.” I said.

“yeah yeah, give us a moment.” She replied, and I took a quick glance around the room, and noticed something disturbing behind the secretary desk.

It was bones, a mixture of pony bones, and something decidedly not, long hook-like claws, multiple spinal cords, a split lower jaw, bone forming around the right eye, while the left eye seemed to be noticeably larger, and .50 cal rounds lay amongst the bones. “What the fuck?” I questioned over and over again as I tried to take my eyes off it and failed.

I guess Swordfish must have heard me, because turned to check on me, “Hey Rip Tide is something wro- oh that’s just great. Fucking wonderful. Hey Contingency, have you ever seen any shit this fucked?”

“Uh… well, I’ve seen mutations and mutilations, but this… wow.” Great even the treasure hunter who believes in ghosts can wrap their head around this.

“Let’s just get what we need and get off this boat so we can send this ship to the bottom of the ocean from the safety of the salvation.” I suggested, and both my companions nodded in agreement.

After finding lab 2 on the map, taking the map, and going through the next door into the medical ward itself we were greeted by a much worse room, the dark nearly ancient blood spatters were everywhere, the once white bed sheets of the ward had been drenched in the sanguine liquid and shredded to ribbons, on top of that the florescent tubes of the room flickered in that most chilling way. A chilling wind from a shattered porthole blew past us, and door abruptly slammed shut behind us.

Oh that did it. A half rotting lump of over muscular flesh dragged it’s self to it’s hooves, I watched as muscle spasms shook every part of it turning the beast into a twitching mass, the hulk turned towards us, it’s right eyes seemed sealed shut, while it’s left had bloated out of it’s socket and extended out like a tube, it opened it’s mouth and let out a long hollow roar. Said roar echoed and reechoed throughout the ship, and more of the creatures began twitching to life around the room. “Fuck! Weapons free!” Swordfish yelled, and who was I to disagree I raised my LMG and fried about ten rounds into the center of mass of the first monster, which in response came barreling towards us. Swordfish fired directly into its center of mass with her shot gun which merely staggered it long enough for Contingency to take its head off with her machete. Fortunately that killed it. “Fuck it run!” Swordfish shouted and we dashed across the room as fast as we could and through the door on the opposite side. Upon getting through the door way and slamming the door behind us we found our selves on a stairway leading down deeper into the ship.

The next level was clearly worse as the metal partitions between the different rooms had been reduced to little more than ribbons, the fact that the howl was louder down there made everything worse. Another of the creatures rushed towards me and I fired the remaining twenty rounds I had in my clip into it, the good news was that headshots apparently still kill them. “Keep pressing towards lab 2!” Swordfish ordered and we moved in a loose formation down the hall of the ship, I reloaded as quickly as I could then returned fired a quick burst at a creature I saw lurking in the shadows behind one of the slashed up partitions. Just as I felt like we could make it a large tentacle like formation of pony flesh lashed out from the ceiling and grabbed Swordfish. When Contingency and myself ran over to free her the metal floor we stood on gave out and wee fell through, we hit the next level and fell through again, this continued until we broke through into the boiler room. Contingency landed on a catwalk that ran above the boilers, I kept falling.

I landed on something, something warm and cushy… Fortunately my, “WTF? ew ew ew ew ew ew!” reaction got me off of whatever it was before a half ton of steel flooring and structural material fell on it. Thus there I was, alone in the dark, with only the continuing bellows of those creatures to accompany me. I stumbled around in the dark for a while; too scared that turning on my flashlight might attract one of the creatures, before I bumped into something metal on the ground. Feeling around it was roughly the size of a small bowel I telekinetically picked it up with my telekinesis, in it’s feeble glow I noticed that the object was some sort of lamp, well since my horns glow was probably attracting everything any ways I flicked it’s switch and immediately had to turn away from it’s obscenely bright light. I tuned and noticed that pile of metal was shifting. I raised my LMG and got ready to fight what ever it was. What emerged could only be described as massive; I unloaded my entire clip into it, yet it wasn’t bothered in the slightest, not even by the headshots. As I hastily reloaded my gun it dove at me, I wouldn’t be able to dodge on time, so instead I levitated my LMG off me and caught the creature right in the neck with it. The action was enough to halt the creature’s advance, but the weight of the creature snapped my gun in two.

Now let’s see, I still have a knife and an underwater pistol… fuck it run! I ran as fast as I could and soon found myself running out of boiler room. Luckily I spotted a substructure of sheet metal set up, I rushed in and suddenly the sounds of the creature’s pursuit stopped, I heard the sound of it moving around, but it wasn’t chasing me, if anything it sounded confused as it lumbered about, eventually I heard it walk away. Then I heard a crack like thunder, after a few moments I heard it again, it wasn’t close but it was certainly loud.  I settled down in my small shack and began to take in my surroundings. A sign on the wall read “security substation 3” I looked around the room and noticed a skeleton in the corner. I flicked on my flashlight for a better look at it. I noticed two .44 casings on the ground and two holes in the pony’s skull.

The skeleton seemed to be clutching two things, a piece of paper and… oh my… A top loading LMG! Strangely convenient… I Picked up the gun and looked over it, The first thing I noticed was it’s considerable heft, it didn’t take long for me to realize why, some sort of metal I don’t know what covered it, complete with wires and some sort of slot. I turned my attention to the note.

Dear: Reader

I’m a coward. As I write this note I’m too scared to fight the outbreak, too scared to kill myself, and too scared to starve with out leaving a note. I signed up for this because I thought I would find purpose in serving Luna. Now I know what my purpose is, I’m a slave to my fear, and honestly I don’t really care, back in Equestria I would have probably just been killed in a munitions production accident. My only regret at this moment is that I didn’t listen to my fear when it told me that what was going on here was wrong. I heard that poor stallion scream and beg for his life, I should have ran, but no, I ended up being the vessel guard that restrained him when they gave him the shot. Now look what’s happened.

In summary, listen to your fear, fear is normal there is no dishonor in it, in your fear you can find strength, I was weak, I did what I was told by other rather than what my fear told me was right, now… this. I was sent down to retrieve the key for the megaspell, but now I find myself here petrified with fear. If you feel like it the key is on the key rack by the entrance, good luck.

P.S.

Since you found me have my gun, Lead Storm, pop a spark pack it the slot for something a bit more powerful.

-Pipsqueak, rank doesn’t matter when I’m dead.

I closed the letter and pocketed it. I loaded my pan mag into my new LMG and rooted around in the small room until I round a radio that I dismantled and retrieved its spark pack. I inserted the spark in to the slot and was amused by the slight blue glow the gun began to give off. I turned to the entrance way and took the large yellow key, then I turned to the door, I won’t claim to not have been scared, but at the time I was more scared for the safety of my friends.

I stepped out of the small shelter and once again into the boiler room that was still lit by the lamp I had turned on. I made my way along the perimeter of the boiler room looking for some form of ladder to climb. I noticed the hulking beast pacing around the pile of metal that now took up the space it once inhabited, I quietly raised Lead Storm to my right shoulder, aimed down the sight, aimed for the head, and pulled the trigger. The sound the gun made was by no means a ‘bang’, if anything it was more of a ‘PA-TEW’. I didn’t both question the odd sound, because the creature no longer had a head. I continued my way around the perimeter and found a stepladder up to the catwalk. After climbing the ladder I found myself in a somewhat mazelike system of catwalks overlooking the boilers. I started to make my way down the catwalk in hopes of at least finding Contingency, but after no more than three steps I heard that thunderous noise again, and I felt something whizz by me. I felt the shock wave of impact on something behind me, and some fluid spattered out on to me. I turned and noticed one of the regular sized creatures blown in half be hind me. I Ran further down the catwalk and began to make something out in the dark. “Hey Rip Tide! I was afraid you wouldn’t make it!” Contingency’s voice sounded through the darkness. I was glad to here her voice.

“Ok, let’s get Swordfish, the sample, then well, I have something of interest.” I replied, “and what the hell kind of gun are you using? It’s not a standard issue sniper rifle, is it an anti-machine rifle?”

“Naw, the AM rifle’s for plebs. I got this .75 Cal wall rifle from a long lost zebra weapons dump. Also I agree, this is getting out of hand.” I let my hang open in my gas mask for a moment, .75?! “Um if it’s not to much to ask would you mind covering me while I re chamber and swap the barrel of my rifle over, being able to use a clip of .308 rounds would be better than have to reload after every shot with my fortress rifle.” I nodded and returned to my thoughts, if it needs to be reloaded after each shot then it’s not totally over powered… oh who am I kidding it’s a one pony artillery piece. I watched her fiddle with parts of the gun and things from her saddles bags, and then she levitated up a standard issue sniper rifle, “Ok let’s go.”

We made our way down the catwalk, eventually finding a door that lead to some stairs going up. We ascended quickly and found ourselves in the ship’s living quarters. The unending roar was louder here, Once again the lighting was flickering and large tears were slashed into the walls. We made our way down the hallway looking for a way to the next level. I noticed a creature lurking at the end of the hall, *PATEW* one less voice in the roar. We continued, taking out the creatures whenever they emerged from the shadows. As we made our way down seemingly the hundredth hallway we stopped as a the PA system made a sound like it was breaking, “ALL HAIL RIO RULER OF DEATH!”

“Signal Fire stop messing around and try to get in contact with the others.” Brawny’s voice abruptly cut in.

I dashed over to the nearest speaker and hit the reply button underneath of it, “Signal! Brawny! It’s me and Contingency, we’re on the living quarters deck!”

“Uh huh, where’s Swordfish?” Brawny asked.

“I don’t know for sure we were separated by the creature attack.” I answered.

“Well find her, the a sample, and let’s get off this ship.” Brawny replied.

“Oh I’ll send down the elevator for you guys.” Signal Fire added, “Having captain Rio’s keycard is so great!”

By this time our helmets had begun to phase out the roar, so I could clearly hear a motor start to hum followed by a tone. “Thanks for the lift, literally.” The sound had come from down two halls and to the left, after we stepped into the elevator and started heading up I finally started to relax, then my mind noted something that it had previously ignored, the note said that he was too scared to kill himself, he wasn’t a unicorn yet the bullet casings weren’t near the body, there was no pistol to be found, and there were two shots, both to the head, fired. Clearly it wasn’t a suicide, the next most logical explanation would be that another vessel guard found him huddled up in the corner, and executed him for cowardice, however that wouldn’t explain why the executioner didn’t take the megaspell activation key to complete the mission, I was getting a strong feeling that the outbreak was more than what meets the eye, when the elevator tone notified us that we had reached our destination, the lab deck. I put aside my worries of dark treacherous conspiracies and stepped out on to the new deck. Even with my gasmask the air felt heavier, I noticed that the entire floor was a deep crimson as where much of the walls. “What the fuck?” I whispered to myself.

I continued ahead, my mind came up with a million nightmare-fueling scenarios of how the out break started. The one that came up most often was the concept of the test subject having not died, and becoming the catalyst of the outbreak. I tried to push those ideas out of my head as I rounded the corner, what confronted around said corner made me almost jump out of my skin. A marine, drenched in blood leaned against the wall; blood dripping from it’s uniform in large drops. As I continued to stare I noticed that it was a Pegasus, and that it was armed with a shotgun. My brain finally made the connection, “Swordfish?!” As the name left my tongue the marine collapsed to the floor. I rushed to her side. “Swordfish! Speak to me!” I urged, I had already lost my sister; Swordfish was the closest thing I had to family now.

“Ugh… Rip Tide… don’t tell… Rip Tide, but Shanty and me… I though true love… was a lie.” At I quickly pieced together the reason for her discombobulated state, cuts all over her; the Kevlar of her uniform had offered no resistance to the claws of the creatures. At that moment I realized that she could very well be infected. I noticed a sign that read ‘lab 2’ and made my towards it. “Contingency guard Swordfish! I’m getting the sample.”

The lab was in disarray; the room I was in was some form of monitoring room. I peaked through the shattered glass window to the first room, there was a bed covered in broken restraints. I looked into the next room and noticed it was full of vials and other such lab and medicinal equipment, rather than trying to pick the lock on the door I just used Lead Storm to shoot out the bolt, then to my disappointment the blue glow cut out and the spark pack was ejected, either this thing used a lot of power per shot, or the spark pack was mostly spent by the time I found it.

I entered the room and quickly noted the massive yellow box with the biohazard symbol, I opened it and noticed that the shelf labeled samples was empty; of course the Enclave took everything! However there was a test tube labeled ‘Experimental Sample’. I took the vial and found a large quantity of airtight sealing plastic bags to stick the vial in. I tucked the sample into my satchel and on my way out into the hall noticed another memory orb; I telekinetically opened a bag, and put the orb into the bag with a hoof. After that I noticed that in the room across from the hall there was a large yellow box with 2 of the megaspell keys in it I made my way to it, inserted my own key and noticed the display change,

All keys present, activate countdown for M.o.P. biological hazard containment last resort?

Y/N

I selected Y and was relived at that the countdown started at 45 minutes. Then I exited the room. Back in the hallway I rushed to where Contingency stood over Swordfish, I telekinetically lifted Swordfish on to my back, and went over to the nearest PA system speaker. I hit the button and spoke up to the machine, “Hey Signal after we return to the deck we came in on, you guys come down ok.”

“Signal fire isn’t here anymore! The death lord Rio will be addressed by his real name!” Signal Fire’s voice replied, really? FUCKING REALLY?!

“Stop joking around! Swordfish could die, and I just activated a megaspell!” I shouted at the speaker.

“Wait did crazy pony just mention mega bomb?!”

“What the fuck? This isn’t following procedure!”

“Ok! No more joking! No more joking!”

The other three exclaimed, but Contingency and I were already in the elevator waiting for the door to close, “I know you said that you had something of interest, but I sure wasn’t expecting a megaspell.” Contingency joked as the elevator moved two floors up to the floor we had come in on. I checked Swordfish’s heart beat, it was faint but still there.

The door slid open and we exited into a room that heavily resembled the room we came in through. I set Swordfish in a semi prone position and set up Lead Storm’s bipod on an over turned crate, “Get ready, we’re waiting for Brawny and the others, and I have a feeling the creatures are going to want to keep us company.”

Contingency nodded and unsheathed her machete. As predicted a number of the creatures began rushing in shortly after, As I fired I noticed that without a spark pack Lead Rain behaved like a normal top fed LMG. I gunned down a few more creatures as they ran in, but it was nowhere near enough to stop the tide, just as we ere about to be over run, a painful vibration began pounding my eardrum, and my helmet quickly worked to cancel it out. The creatures however turned tail and ran. I looked over at Contingency and noticed that from her right fetlock a blade had been extended out about 20 centimeters, and I could see the air distorting around the blade, a blade that can hurt anyone who simply go near it. Once the creatures were gone Contingency returned the blade to her fetlock. “What was that?” I panted out and shook my head to clear the ringing from my ears.

Contingency leaned back against the elevator door, “Sonic vibrations, I figured that with such messed up eyes the creatures must be pretty reliant on hearing, I didn’t try it before because it’s pretty tax-whoa!” As she finished explaining the elevator tone sounded and the door opened causing her to fall back into the elevator.

“Hello grave robber.” Xager greeted her then helped her to her hooves.

Signal Fire ran up to me and shoved the key card in my face. “See doesn’t that Rio fellow look kinda like me?” I had to admit, the face on the key card bared a striking resemblance to Signal Fire.

Brawny simply shoved past us, “Grab Swordfish and let’s go.”

I heaved her on to my back, and I heard her mumbling something along the lines of Brawny being an asshole. Clearly she would be ok.

It turns out that the next room over was in fact the room we came in through, and just a quick dash out the door and down the ladder put us in the RHIB. Signal Fire piloted us back to the Salvation as fast as possible. When we were hauled on board the ship ponies in HAZMAT gear immediately swarmed us. However the clock was ticking, “There’s an active megaspell on the ship!” I yelled out, and after some confusion I noticed that the Salvation began to move away from the ship, I relaxed and let the HAZMAT ponies strip me of my tainted clothing and begin to scrub me down.

Behind us there was a blinding light emitting from the ship, so bright that it was shining through the ship’s hull. After about a minute of such blinding light, it stopped, and a cool night ocean breeze blew the ashes of what had once been The Giant away. At this time I slowly drifted off as the HAZMAT team continued to sanitize us.

I awoke in the medical bay of the Salvation, I noticed Swordfish lying on a bed near me, literally mummified with healing bandages. I recognized Test Tubes, the head of the med bay, “Hey Doc, will Swordfish be alright?” I asked.

Test Tubes looked over at me and gave a small chuckle. “Define alright.” He stated, and seeing my worried look added, “Well her blood-alcohol level was high enough to qualify as a micro disinfectant. In all honesty I’m more worried about that then the actual disease.” Ok, I guess I’ll have to have a talk with her about her drinking then, but then again her cutiemark was a shotgun shell at the bottom of a shot glass.

“I’m not in quarantine or anything?” I asked.

“Nope you’re free to go.” He replied, “In fact I’d prefer it.”

I knew what I was going to do. As I made my way to the bridge I thought to myself; I had almost lost Swordfish that night, and it put things in perspective. I noticed that Shanty wasn’t on the bridge, so I trotted over to the door to her office, and knocked. “Come in, the door’s unlocked.” Her accented voice sounded from the other side. I entered the room and took a seat at the chair on my side of her desk. “So Rip Tide, what’s on yer mind?” she asked.

My answer was simple, “I know about you and Swordfish.”

She blushed a bit, “Oh, y’all know ‘bout that? Did she tell ya, or did ya figure it out?”

I replied quickly and fairly calmly, “She was suffering from blood loss, and told me not to tell me… Look anyways, she likes you, I mean really likes you, if I find out that you’re playing with her, pulling her along, or anything of the sort, I’ll make you regret it.” I’m pretty sure that a powered round from Lead Storm could put a hole in the hull of the Salvation.

“Yeah that sounds pretty reasonable.” Shanty replied in her usual laid back tone. “Although I’m mighty offended that you’d suspect me of such. Remember my honour code?”

I slumped back in the chair and exhaled, "Sure, sorry for doubting you."