A/N- I had started posting this story about a year ago but I took it down when I realized how much work it really needed. Now that my writing has improved, and I believe I'm better at character and plot development I finally feel ready to start posting it again.

Prologue

Agent Arizona surveyed the base critically from her crouched position on the stony ridge. Below the base teemed with sentries patrolling along the walls, assured that not a thing could get past them and gather their secrets. They were always like this. Prepped and prepared, delusional in thinking that they were safe.

Pushing back from the edge of the ridge Arizona stood up to leave. Her heart began pounding in her chest in anticipation of the mission before her. There was a time when she was naive enough to worry that her thumping heart would give her away as she stole past guards. As missions passed by she soon realized it was just from nervous excitement for what lay ahead and no risk at all to her mission.

Slinging her shotgun over her back, she began the perilous decent down the ridge. She was careful to stay out of the sight line of the base, as well as to avoid any loose rock that could tumble down the cliff face and alert others to her position.

Once on the ground it was a short sprint from the base of the ridge to the wall of the base. Lifting her eyes to walls above she watched the round of sentries as they went along their route. She waited as one passed, then another, timing everything just right. As the last went by she left her hiding spot and flew across the ground as fast as she could.

Throwing all her momentum behind her she jumped at the wall, caught a handhold that was little more than a groove in the smooth stone and scaled up the few remaining feet until her hands grasped the edge of the wall.

Quick as lightning she sprung herself up onto the walkway atop the wall, and as she had planned landed in front of an unsuspecting sentry.

Before he could even think to raise an alarm, she shot forward, grasped his helmet and twisted until she heard the satisfying crunch of his spinal cord snapping.

She dragged the limp body with her into the shadows of the inner wall. Stealing his pass key from the ring at his side she opened the door to enter the main of the base, storing the body inside so that his fellow guardsmen wouldn't happen across it during their rounds.

Once inside the base she reviewed the mental map she had drilled into her mind of the layout of the base and set off down the bleak hallway. Doors barred with heavy steel and opened only by pass keys like the one she now held lined the way but she ignored them all. Her objective was deeper in the base and would need more than a pass key stolen from a guard to unlock.

Stealing down the hall, Arizona stopped at each corner and fork, listening for any sound that would herald the approach of an unwanted visitor, but the only sounds that met her ears were that of her hushed breathing, and her heart which still hammered against her breastbone.

When only a final corner stood between her and the objective Arizona stopped to collect herself. She pulled her shotgun from over her back, ensuring it was loaded and ready. She took a steadying breath to calm herself, and her heart, which had increased its tempo tenfold in anticipation of how close she was. It did no good, she was too keyed up with adrenaline.

Hoisting her shotgun to the ready position she swung around the corner ready to complete her mission.

A huge steel door, laced with wiring and electronics to keep its secrets hidden stood at the end of a long hallway. It was her final objective. Between Arizona and the door stood twelve soldiers, two abreast, arms at the ready.

At the sight of her all twelve raised their weapons, prepared to defend the door and its secrets at all costs.

A savage grin, hidden behind her face shield split across Arizona's face. This was what she was here for. Stealing secrets for Command was one thing, but a good fight, now that was what she had been looking for.

Racing down the hall at a breakneck pace, she dodged the first round of bullets fired at her, a spare round glancing harmlessly off of the thick metal armoring her shoulder.

She leaped into the air, catching the first soldier with a blow from her foot that exploded his helmet and sent him sprawling into the soldier behind him. At the same time she whipped her shotgun around and fired a round into the chest of his partner.

Her leap sent her flying toward the wall, but rather than bounce off it uselessly, she maneuvered herself into a crouching position, and used her legs to propel herself off of the wall. She got off another round of her shotgun, before ducking into a ball to evade another spray of bullets.

She rolled into the midst of the rows of soldiers. Springing back to her feet she sent out a flurry of punches and kicks.

Her adrenaline was running higher than ever. She was drunk on fighting, on the thrill of overpowering opponents. She cracked the butt of her shotgun into the face of one soldier before shooting another in the knee who cried out in agony before falling behind his comrades.

She kept her feet moving, warding off any would be attackers, and finishing them off as easy as if she were swatting away flies.

It had been so long since she'd been able to let go all restraints and attack with savage fury, mindless of the lives she was destroying, obeying without questions the orders from Command to take out anyone who opposed her, and she relished the sense of freedom.

Finally only one remained, the one she had wounded in the knee. Though she couldn't see his face, his ragged, clipped breathing was all the indication she needed to know of the fear he was feeling.

Slowly and deliberately she walked toward him. She reloaded the shotgun. The metallic clicks as everything fell into place made a morbid kind of music. She raised the shotgun to his face, holding it there for a moment as she heard his ragged breathing break into fearful sobs.

"No! Stop that!"

The words ripped through her senses and jolted her into wakefulness.

She sat up to a dark room, the sobbing soldier and the carnage around him gone, a dream and nothing more. She could still hear the screaming though. It wasn't audible to her ears, but instead rang through her skull.

"How could you Katelyn? Didn't you realize what you were doing?"

Arizona wiped her hair back from her brow to find it slick with sweat. Her heart was pounding harder than it had all through the fighting in her dream, but how could it have been a dream? It felt so real, so right to fight again without this insistent voice telling her it was wrong.

Still it didn't stop.

"Katelyn, are you even listening to me? How could you do that to them? You didn't even feel bad that you were hurting them, killing them even."

"It was just a dream Kappa, no one was actually hurt," Arizona replied, not even trying to keep the irritation out of her voice.

The AI persisted. "But you were enjoying it weren't you?" Kappa asked accusatorially.

"Yes Kappa, I was enjoying it!" Arizona replied angrily. "I was enjoying fighting. Enjoying what it was like to have my thoughts to myself. Enjoying the ability to do what I was trained to do without feeling bad for every bruise I dealt out. I was enjoying what it was like before you."