On the way to the mess hall, Wren asks Kaine to cause a distraction during Tech. Later, while Lieutenant Hirai lectures on a voice-operated surveillance drone, Kaine provokes Anson into a loud scuffle. As Hirai intervenes, Wren slips into an unlocked supply cage and steals a signal jammer.

That night, Wren dresses in black, activates the jammer, and sneaks out of the barracks to the officers’ quarters. Trusting the device to blind cameras and suppress alarms, she evades guards and reaches Cross Redden’s building. Finding his door locked and hearing voices inside, she climbs down from the roof to his balcony and enters through an open door.

Wren discovers Cross in bed with a woman she recognizes from pit night. She puts a knife to Cross’s throat, drawing a line of blood, then lowers it and insists she is there to talk. Cross dismisses the woman. In the kitchen, he pours whiskey for them both while Wren confronts him about sabotaging her performance scores and declares she now has nothing to go back to and intends to try.

They trade barbs about her past behavior, including her staged wrist injury, Roe Redden’s killing of Betima, and Wren’s belief that Betima and Jim were not Aberrant. Cross reveals Command does not believe Jim worked active missions after deserting and notes he monitors Wren’s Nexus searches, including queries about Cross. Wren argues she deserves evaluation on merit and threatens to complain to Captain Radek.

After prolonged hesitation, Cross agrees to reassess her fairly on the condition she improves her written source tests, while acknowledging her “exceptional” fieldwork and marksmanship. When he asks where she learned to shoot, Wren attributes her skills to her uncle’s training on the ranch, masking details of her true childhood. She leaves through the front door, inwardly pleased at having secured a path forward if she raises her written scores.