Author's Notes: Reviews mean updates sooner rather then later; so keep on reviewing folks and I'll keep updating this story on a more regular basis. I hope you'll enjoy this chapter; it's going to be fairly tame compared to later ones, but fear not the actionm intrigue and stuff will pick up as time goes by. And now; without further ado... Taps Foot Impatiently.

We Now Return to GIJoe!


Early the next morning Rogue was jostled awake by Allyson; she looked decidedly nervous, glancing around in fear and confusion for a brief moment before offering a false smile of good cheer.

"What's wrong?" Rogue demanded moving quickly to change into a different shirt; Allyson shifted her gaze slightly uncertainly.

"Someone's here trying to take Al away." She finally revealed; Rogues' heart skipped a beat and she fumbled quickly with her shirt.

"Take mah to him, now!" She ordered a hint of anger and protectiveness creeping into her tone.


General Winters smiled as the young man was placed on the gurney for transport; like it or not General Flagg and Hawk couldn't do anything to prevent this, the paperwork was perfectly legal. And soon the information stored in those tiny little machines that made up his mutation would be theirs for the taking, for the unleashing upon a world of terrorists and other beings such as Doctor Doom; or even The Hulk. As his men were about to head out a woman with auburn hair and a white streak running through it bust in followed by Lady Jaye, she took one look at the men about to cart the young man off and her jaw set.

"What exactly dah yah think yah're doin'?" She demanded in an extremely thick southern accent; General Winters offered a small smile.

"This young man is being escorted to a more secure facility for questioning." He informed. "Rest assured nothing will happen to him while he is in our care." He attempted to placate the civilian; who shouldn't even be on base, he had to remember to have a word with General Flagg about that later.

"Yah ain't takin' him anywhere." The woman informed sagely a brief flash of a barely perceived emotion visible in her eyes.

"I'm sorry Ma'am, but my orders are clear; and they will be carried out." Winters returned indicating that his men should continue; the woman shook her head and flexed her muscles, before anyone could react both men were lying prone on the floor clutching at either their arm or their leg and the young man was back on the bed he'd been occupying earlier. "What is the meaning of this!" Winters demanded in a loud voice. "Young lady if you do not stand down I will have no recourse, but to arrest you and place you in a maximum security facility for obstructing justice with possible terrorist conspirators." He informed shrewdly; the woman trembled slightly with rage and would have attacked General Winters if another character hadn't appeared out of thin air.

"You will do nothing of the sort." He stated in a surprisingly dark tone; Rogue was surprised to hear Q talk in such a manner, and General Winters didn't have a chance to argue the point further. With a snap of his fingers all three men were gone; Q did not smile, or indeed appear to be very amused in the matter as he whirled to face Flagg. "That was not part of our arrangement, General Winters and those who saw the stolen information regarding my young charge have no recollection of these events; also I took the liberty of falsifying all records of his blood sample so that he will appear to be an ordinary X-Gene carrying mutant." He revealed with a brief sympathetic glance at Rogue who had collapsed beside Al and started crying not caring that there were others in the room.
"There is a far greater task that he must perform; and no petty bureaucrats are going to interfere with God's plans, do try and keep a tighter leash on your superiors… And I would strongly suggest that you remove their illegal taps on your computer systems for future reference." He finished with a dark glint passing across his features; it was very un-Q-like indeed, and in a flash he was gone. General Flagg and Hawk shared a look with one another; clearly they'd gotten involved with something a lot more complex then either of them felt comfortable with, Lady Jaye ushered both of them out of the room to leave Rogue alone with her grief.

"What the hell just happened General, sir?" Lady Jaye demanded concernedly. "I've never seen anyone put the Jugglers' in their place before, let alone make it so that to them none of this ever happened." She added her voice wavering slightly.

"I'm not exactly sure Allyson." Flagg returned gently. "But keep it to yourself please, I have a feeling there's something a lot bigger going on here then we ever realized and I don't think we're supposed to know just what that is." He added with a tiny sigh; removing his ever present sun glasses the general made his way back down the corridor, Hawk following his retreating form with a confused gaze.

"Hawk, who was that?" LJ asked turning to her superior.

"Q." He replied simply and then quickly took off to find Colonade; the resident psychologist might be needed to help Rogue recover.


Optimus Prime stood facing the monitor of Teletran-1's main communications station, on the other end was Nick Fury; agent of SHIELD and its current head. He wasn't wearing the out of place blue and white uniform at the moment, but rather a plainer looking ensemble of black and grey complete with a rather large trench coat.

"I'm sorry Fury, but we can't risk it falling into enemy hands." Prime stated a second time. "I am sending my own security team to your helicarrier, I fear that Operation Infinity will soon be ready and there are no defenses against Megatron." He finished in a commanding don't argue with me tone; he and Fury had been going back and forth on this for the past two days, Nick sighed and reluctantly nodded.

"Fine Optimus; you can send three members, I don't have the facilities for any more then that." He relented; Optimus nodded his optics flickering slightly with gratitude.

"I already have the team in mind, Jetfire, Wheeljack and Red Alert should be arriving in an hour." He informed. "But Primus help us all if the Decepticons get their hands on the engine." He added before signing off; Optimus turned away from the monitor and lowered his head placing a hand upon his chest where the Autobot Matrix was located. "Primus help us all." He repeated softly a hint of foreboding in his tone, little did the Autobot leader know that Primus was already doing his part; through the dreams of a young human lying prone at GIJoe headquarters.


Firefly watched as the HEAT Vipers and Techno-Vipers arrived; so far the Commander's plan had worked quite well, GIJoe was unaware of the small troop movements or gathering happening almost on their front door. The Pit was as good as breached; first however they had to wait for Rutherford to reawaken so that the tracer Storm Shadow slipped onto him on their last encounter would reactivate, Firefly had to admit the biorhythmic tracer Mindbender had perfected worked wonders. A small Cobra army was amassing; and soon enough GIJoe would feel its' bite, and maybe this time they'd actually manage to take a couple of them out in the retrieval process.
Rogue had gotten over the near kidnapping of Al; or whatever it was, she had a feeling they just wanted him for his nanoprobes and she knew that would be a bad thing considering how corrupt that man seemed to be. She was feeling a little hungry right now; so she figured she'd brave the Mess despite what Allyson had said yesterday, finding it however was something else altogether.
Fortunately everything was labeled around here for the new recruits who were undergoing physical training; so it didn't take her too long to find it, although it was way past lunch by the time she did. There weren't too many people around; she saw a small grouping of unfamiliar faces off in the far left and another group was just about to leave by the look of things, the tall African-American man who'd picked up Al was behind the counter in the kitchen area cooking up a storm by the looks of it.

"Hey Roadblock; ya sure this ain't gonna take much longer?" The short Chinese man asked from the end of the table; the African-American shot him a look.

"Patience is a virtue Tunnel Rat, but if you keep browbeating me for the chow I'll let Gung Ho or Heavy Duty take over." He retorted; Tunnel Rat was obviously cowed by this threat as he immediately shut up.

"Nobody likes my Gumbo." Gung Ho complained before his roving eyes fell upon the timid Rogue; the X-Man was eyeing the room for a place to sit and also obviously trying to see what kind of food was available. "Well; hello there ma'am, a pleasure to see ya out of your quarters." He called out in greeting, all eyes now turned to the newcomer and some of the men offered friendly smiles; Rogue smiled back.

"Ah'm glad yah don't automatically treat me lahke trash, considerin' how all ya'll feel about mah boyfriend." She returned with a slight frown; Gung Ho shook his head.

"It's nothing personal, but when dealin' with the snakes we don't exactly take kindly to secrets; or people who get the royal treatment by ol' chrome dome." He returned offering what passed for an apology from the Marine; Rogue shook her head with a slight laugh as she made her way closer to the group, yet still far enough away to make a retreat if necessary.

"I heard what ya did ta Winter's men; a lot of us have been wantin' ta do that for a long time." Tunnel Rat complimented with a wink; Rogue shook her head and blushed slightly.

"Well; Ah'm just a little over protective when it comes to Al." She admitted haltingly; Tunnel Rat had to nod in respect at that, meanwhile the chef came out leaden with a very large tray.

"Allyson… I mean Lady Jaye told me to expect you, so I saved some of this from the lunch rush in case you don't like your food spicy." He explained; Rogue smiled gratefully and accepted the tray without even buckling under the weight, this caused one of the others to raise his eyes in surprise.

"Don't recognize mah?" Rogue asked with a smirk; he shook his head. "Well; Ah suppose you GIJoe ain't exactly up on all the Mutants around, considerin' yah have tah deal with Cobra twenty-four seven." She remarked taking a seat and eyeing the piping hot bowl of soup, or at least what might have been soup; and the roast beef sandwich on rye.

"You better not snub my cooking." Roadblock warned though his tone lacked any hint of a threat and he was beaming; Rogue chuckled and took a hearty spoonful of the broth, it was delicious and her eyes closed as her mouth watered at the taste.

"I think she likes it." Gung Ho remarked with a smirk; Roadblock chuckled and returned to his work in the kitchen, Rogue quietly continued eating and examined the others in the room. Gung Ho and Tunnel Rat were sitting with two other men; an average height Caucasian with close cropped brown hair and another tall muscular man wearing a shirt that had the word Survival etched across the chest.

"Outback and Footloose; they're just visiting today, they've been on reserve status for a couple years now." Tunnel Rat introduced and explained all at once; Rogue nodded.

"Ah guess there's a lot on yah're roster considerin' how big Cobra is." She observed; Tunnel Rat nodded and Outback chuckled.

"That's an understatement if ever I heard one." He stated in kind; Footloose shrugged.

"I don't know, you X-Men must have your own kinds of troubles." He remarked thoughtfully; Rogue nodded in agreement with that.

"What with Sentinels, Magneto, the Brotherhood and who knows what else." Gung Ho observed. "Hey; how is my ol' friend Gambit dese days anyway?" He asked with a sudden look of genuine interest; Rogue smiled at that, naturally she'd run into Remy's old friend being at GIJoe headquarters.

"Just fine; he wanted tah thank yah fer givin' him that info on BATs." She returned. "Came in real handy when Red Skull used'em on us." She added sagely.

"Aw shucks; tell that scrappy thief that still doesn't mean we're even for him tryin' ta steal my mother's broach." He shot back with a good natured laugh; Rogue shook her head, trust Remy to meet new friends by trying to steal from them. Turning back to her meal she tuned out the Joes as they no longer seemed interested in conversing with her; thoughts returned to Al and whether or not he'd be alright, but with Q watchin' out for him she strongly believed everything would work out great.


Alarm bells shot off in my head and I screamed as white hot fire coursed through every circuit, system, organ and blood vessel in my body. My optics blurred under the intense pain as my eyelids fluttered open, someone was at my side struggling to hold me down, I couldn't help myself I lashed out with my powers hurling them away from me.

"Cybertron! Infinity Engine, must stop Decepticons!" I cried leaping into the air my mind lagging; it was as if I was delusional, at least for a few more seconds. Everything snapped back into crystal clear focus and I returned to the bed laying my head down in exhaustion.

"What's going on here?" A commanding voice demanded as others entered the room; a woman's voice cried out in joy and I felt strong arms wrap around my neck as familiar tasting lips pressed up against mine.

"Nothing sir." A woman's voice replied to the question. "He just regained consciousness and appeared to be delirious, he was speaking a language I didn't recognize; he's calm now though." She finished.

"Ready to answer questions then." The same voice stated; I was finally free of the kiss and could look up to find Rogue eyeing me with a desperate longing and fear in her eyes.

"I wouldn't rush him sir, he's obviously been very traumatized by the forced shut down." The feminine voice cautioned; I did not bother correcting her, I was feeling perfectly fine at the moment as evidenced by my strong grasp around Rogue's waist.

"All right; I'll give him another few hours, but we'd better get some answers soon." The first voice reluctantly agreed before the other presences left the room and I was alone save for Rogue and the woman who had come to my defense in a way.

"Yah know he's perfectly fine right now." My love stated; I finally took this opportunity to examine the room I was in, it looked as much as I expected a military hospital to look like. At least it was less cold and impartial then the X-Men's facility; the woman came over to us both and placed a hand on my forehead for some reason.

"Perhaps physically, but his mental state might not be up to the usual question and answer session just yet." She replied with a smile aimed at Rogue. "And besides he might want to get cleaned up and change clothes before going before the board of inquiry." She added with a wink.
The woman in particular was an attractive five foot nine ebony Goddess, at least to those who didn't already have a girl like my Rogue; she had a light black hair coloring and her eyes were a combination of blue-green borderline violet. She was at least in her twenties or thirties judging by her appearance, and dressed in a doctor's white coat; though with a tank top underneath that had the word Misfits printed on it as well as a pair of beige shorts that revealed her leggy nature.

"Sorry." I apologized automatically.

"For what?" She wondered confusedly.

"For shoving you into the wall." I replied; Rogue was rubbing my chest now under my shirt and had shifted so that she was partially laying beside me, the woman smiled and shook her head revealing perfect white teeth.

"I've experienced worse." She quipped with a light chuckle; I shook my head at that and sat up slightly.

"Considering I'm accused of being in league with your nation's sworn enemy, you are rather cheerful towards me." I remarked slipping my fingers under Rogue's shirt in the process and stroking her waist in a show of apology to her for making her worry like that.

"Everyone is innocent until proven guilty; some of the more prominent members tend to forget these things." She returned briefly glancing over to one of the large mirrors situated in the room; I chuckled to myself, two way mirror how unpredictable.
"My name is Colonade by the way." She introduced reaching out to shake hands, which was a little awkward since my right hand was currently entangled with Rogue.

"Al Rutherford, everybody call's me Al." I returned glancing at Rogue who was surprisingly very quiet. "Hey baby what's wrong?" I asked feeling a tad odd using that term, she averted her gaze.

"Why didn't yah tell us?" She demanded in a soft voice; I sighed at that and brought my hand up to stroke her hair.

"Hey don't think like that please; I did it because I wanted to protect all of you, I'm not averse to being inventive in order to get this job for Roma done, but I don't want the X-Men to get into trouble with GIJoe because of my semi-ties to Cobra." I explained in a soft voice; she turned back to me tears evident in her eyes, she shook her head.

"Yah're one who takes a lot o' risks." She said with a sigh; I nodded at that and sighed myself, it seemed like a good idea at the time, but then again I knew Cobra more as a childish harmless thing, not the real threat it probably was here.

"So, where can a guy freshen up around here?" I asked of both women; Colonade had respectively moved aside when we started talking together by ourselves, Rogue smiled.

"Ah know exactly where yah can go." She said her cheeks flushing slightly; I smiled up at her and rubbed her waist yet again.

"Lead the way Goddess of my life." I returned eliciting her blush to spread further; she averted her gaze and climbed to her feet and I followed, I had a pretty good idea what she had in mind.


"Lucky bastard." Shipwreck grumbled from the opposite side of the mirror, Duke shot him a glare and he instantly shut up; how had he gotten stuck with this duty anyway? And with mister personality here to boot, Duke was acting really oddly when it came to this guy, as if he might know something most of the others didn't.
Firefly smiled beneath his ski mask; an ever present symbol of his desire to remain anonymous as well as to keep his face a secret, it was said he even wore a false face over his real one using makeup and other sophisticated elements. According to the life indicators Mister Rutherford was active once again; raising his hand he signaled the lead Techno-Viper.

"You know what to do, the HEAT Vipers and Flack Vipers will follow." He stated; the Techno-Viper nodded and signaled his squadron, instantly movement began and the Cobra assault on the Pit was set to launch. "Inform the Commander." He ordered the personal Tele-Viper to his left.

"As you command sir." He returned; Firefly's smile broadened, he did so enjoy the military life of Cobra.


After showering and getting cleaned up Rogue and I were both escorted to the room where my interrogation was to take place; it was a large circular room devoid of any amenities, three men sat behind a raised desk looking down upon me. The one to my right was Hawk, to his left was an older man with thick looking sunglasses and the standard General's uniform, this must be General Flagg whom I knew precious little about. The third seat was occupied by the man known as Stalker; judging by their facial expressions all three looked to have already condemned me, we weren't alone in the room either. Flint, Lady Jaye and who I assumed was another Joe; though I couldn't place a face to his name due to my inherent lack of knowledge concerning every single member on the duty roster of GIJoe, which was considerable going from the years the toys were made alone.

"You are Allan Rutherford." Flagg stated rather than questioned, I nodded already having clasped my hands behind my back out of reflex; Rogue was eyeing the assembly with uncertain eyes and a hint of protectiveness.

"You were seen on the twelfth of this month speaking with Cobra Commander and the assassin known as Suicide." Stalker called out; ah, now I have a name to go with the face, another character I knew nothing about. "What reason did you have for this meeting?" He demanded; Rogue took a step forward about to speak on my behalf, but she didn't know the full story and so I began in her stead.

"I had no reason whatsoever General." I stated speaking clearly to Flagg as my gaze held him evenly. "They approached me on the matter, rather forcefully I might add on Suicide's part; it was only much later that evening upon my first encounter with Tomax and Xamot." I continued keeping my voice even and rather flat emotionally speaking.

"Ok fine." Stalker interrupted. "Why did they approach you?" He asked; I glanced briefly to the other gentleman and then returned to the General knowing that he alone could decide my true fate.

"The Commander wished to congratulate me personally for killing the Red Skull; he further claimed that Cobra was now in my debt and were willing to grant me a single favor to be called upon whenever I so chose, for annulling their connection to the BAT incident in New York." I explained with a sneer; a sneer directed towards the absent leader of Cobra.

"That holds with what we overheard." Flint whispered to Lady Jaye; Rogue was eyeing me as if I was a completely different person, and I sighed inwardly, could our relationship take a hit because of my incompetence?

"So this is the reason for your visit to Extensive Enterprises the following day, to call on this favor?" Hawk demanded eyes narrowing; the conversation inside that office was something they weren't privy to and whatever I may say next could either confirm their worst fears about me or give them a breath of fresh air.

"Yes." I confirmed knowing there was no sense in denying this allegation either.

"Why?" Flagg blurted slamming the palm of his hand on the desk top and interrupting me before I could continue.

"Because I can no more deny my interactions with Cobra then I can deny my need for Oxygen; when one is under the employ of the Omniversal Guardian one must use all the tools open to them in order to solve the problem." I stated matter of factly; Rogue was clearly surprised by this, as were the other occupants of the room. "Cobra is a Terrorist organization and I will not deny this; however they are also tied into the dark underbelly of society, they have a means to gather intel on those who wish to remain invisible, something that SHEILD and GIJoe can not hope to assist me on. There is a great danger to this reality; Chaos has unbalanced the entire universe and caused a backlash into the surrounding realities, if left unchecked this spreading cancer could destroy the very Omniverse itself." I paused to let this information sink in; GIJoe wasn't really afraid of my motivations, not after Q's little visit and I could tell that by the lack of aggressiveness in their handling of me.
"I need to find the one who is causing this unbalance; and only someone like Cobra can help, it is often said that to catch a thief you should employ a thief…" I trailed off with a smirk. "In this case I believe it would be more along the lines of; To catch an egomaniacal terrorist, you need an egomaniacal terrorist." I finished my smirk spreading slightly at the appropriateness of my wisdom and the humor I found in my own words.

"Then you have no desires to join forces with Cobra, you are not one of a secret underground faction of mutants intent on granting Cobra a new army to use as they see fit?" Stalker asked; I eyed him clearly amused by his question.

"If I had any intention of joining Cobra; do you honestly think I would have allowed you to place me into a helpless comatose state, possibly even kill me with that stupid little gadget you used?" I retorted in that aristocratic tone I had come to adopt whenever I was starting to feel a little superior; I shook my head briefly and offered an apologetic expression. "Forgive me; the Borg in me is hard to suppress sometimes, absolute perfection has a habit of doing that even to one such as I who possesses an innocent soul." I added before recovering fully. "I don't know why Cobra Commander is so interested in me; however I can assure you I would never willingly join Cobra, it may have been fun watching the cartoons when I was growing up. But reality is nothing like that harmless child entertainment of my youth; and I probably confused you to no end with that, but that was a little bit more for Rogue then you." I finished with a sheepish grin; the members of GIJoe surrounding me eyed me with clear confusion or bemusement, however they seemed to lose whatever chip was on their shoulder.

"Well I don't see any reason for keeping you here further." Flagg began only to be interrupted by sudden alarms exploding all around; Rogue jumped slightly and wrapped my hand in hers.

"Oh this is just what we need." Hawk complained. "Who'd be stupid enough to attack the Pit?" He asked eyeing Flagg knowingly; of course there was only one answer to that question.

"Sugah, what's this?" Rogue suddenly asked reaching into my ear and plucking something out.

"Ouch." I exclaimed, grabbing the device I ran a quick scan. "Arashikage." I cursed under my breath.

"Is that what I think it is?" Lady Jaye asked coming up beside me; I nodded and passed it to her.

"Looks like Cobra bugged you." The unknown man remarked with a slight look of distrust; I shook my head.

"Hawk, Duke, Flint, Stalker we need to see to this attack, Lady Jaye fetch some of the new recruits and Colonade to keep an eye on our guests; I will not involve civilians in this." Flagg stated rising to his feet and making his way towards the rooms exit. "We'll deal with this new development later." He added eyeing me pointedly; I sighed and moved to sit down on one of the seats, which was reserved for when they brought in an audience probably.

"This is just prime." I muttered sarcastically as Rogue joined me squeezing my shoulder; I should have known about that bug; whatever it was, I must have been a tad too complacent during my stay at Jerrica's.


"Report!" General Flagg ordered as he dashed into the command room; Mainframe glanced up for about five seconds before going into a very detailed report.

"Cobra has sent about two dozen squadrons of attackers Sir; they have Techno-Vipers, HEAT Vipers, Flak Vipers, Troopers, Officers, Night Raven aircraft and HISS tanks. It's a very large scale force Sir; they took us by complete surprise, effectively they have us outgunned and outmanned." He finished with a sigh.

"Outmanned?" Flagg repeated incredulously; turning to face his command staff he shot them an inquisitive glare. "I wasn't aware we had any team missions scheduled today or for that matter for the rest of this week, Cobra's been a tad too quiet; where are the base personnel?" He demanded.

"We received a tip that the Pentagon was going to be attacked; it seemed legit at the time Sir." Hawk returned knowing that they had been had; Cobra must have sent that tip in preparation for this.

"Who's on base?" Duke asked coming around Mainframe and eyeing the duty roster.

"The Greenshirts, Colonade, Bazooka, Quick Kick, Lift-Ticket, Airtight, Gung Ho, Outback, Tunnel Rat, Roadblock, Slipstream, Barbecue and us, Sir." He informed listing off the names from his heads up display rather then the computer monitor list, which was scrolling less rapidly due to standard assault protocols.

"And how do we hold off Cobra with only seventeen of us and the new recruits?" The nineteen year old with the pink dyed hair and tiny oval framed glasses wondered sarcastically; Hi-Fi wasn't much of a fighter currently due to her status as base technician, but General Flagg knew she had to join the field operatives one of these days and he didn't need her usual wit to gum things up.

"None of that Mister." He snapped. "Cobra hasn't beaten us yet and they won't be taking down the Pit as long as I'm in command, scramble all available ops' and get Airtight, Lift-Ticket and Slipstream into the air to offer our ground support cover fire." He barked; Hi-Fi nodded and rapidly input commands, the alarms pitch changed and a pre-recorded message began to play over the intercom.

"All personnel this is not a drill; repeat this is not a drill, the Pit is under heavy Cobra assault. All available personnel topside to repel enemy invaders." It ordered. "Flight group to the runway." It added; General Flagg nodded as he assumed a central position from which to command the entire operation, turning to the men who'd followed him he offered a large smile.

"We'll lick these snakes so bad they'll be cryin' fer momma." He stated assuredly; the others laughed and headed out, they knew sometimes the General did what he did to lighten the mood, he was an old saw horse if ever there was and he knew how to keep his troops' morale up.

"Should we ask Lady Jaye to move those civilians to a more secure area?" Mainframe wondered; Flagg shook his head.

"If Cobra gets far enough to reach'em I doubt they'll get back out again." He returned with a knowing gleam in his eye; seeing that Rogue person take on some Vipers might actually be amusing.

To Be Continued; Next Chapter, the battle for the Pit; be here... GIJoe Will Return After These Messages.