As Carolina and Washington got onto the pelican she noticed he had basically loaded it up with the maximum amount of weaponry and ammo he could. She just turned and looked at him. As the back doors closed, he threw his arms up and defensively said, "WHAT?" She just started laughing uncontrollably and said, "nothing just glad to see that your paranoia is healthy."
"Ha ha ha, very funny Carolina. You won't be complaining about it when shit goes south." Carolina just shook her head, "Just tell Four Seven Niner to get us out of here before Tucker threatens to blow something else up." Wash shakes his head and heads to the front of the pelican. Fer a few minutes, Carolina feels the familiar hum and whine as the ship changes direction and pitch as they ascend and get on course.
A few moments later, Wash comes to the back in a hurry and whispers so only the freelancers can hear him, "I forgot to remind you, did you turn your recovery beacon off? We don't need them tracking and finding us too soon." Carolina had completely forgot, of course Wash had remembered. After all ,he was on the recovery team. The whole idea of being track bugged the crap out of him. "We can turn those off? I thought those were like hard-wired into the technology of the suits?" York was right, that's why they had to take the suits off to turn off the beacon, but before she could convey this to him Delta popped up. "Actually, Theta and I can bypass the hard-wired system and turn off the beacon and keep it off." York turned to the small holographic green soldier, "well it's nice of you to join us D, have you been enjoying the show?"
"You seemed to be operating within normal parameters York-"
"That was sarcasm D we've talked about this."
"Oh, would you like me to turn your recovery beacon off?"
"That would be lovely D." At this point York was rubbing his helmet, like that would make his head feel better. Theta came out and asked after shuffling his feet anxiously, "North do you want me to do that too?"
"Please Theta, Thank you."
"You're welcome!" Theta disappeared.
As Theta went away, Delta brought up another point, "This still leaves agent Carolina unaccounted for, since she is without an AI, her recover beacon will have to be turned off manually." York stopped rubbing his helmet and looked up at Delta, "What does that mean?" York and North have never had to do this before, they were both looked slightly concerned while their eyes flicked between Delta, Wash, and Carolina.
Carolina got up, "It means all of you go to the front of the pelican and if I see any helmets back here, I'm bashing them in. Got it?" Wash was already half way to front as he shouted back, "You know, I'm the one that knows how to turn it off, right?" Carolina didn't answer until York and North were up there with Wash, "I'll throw it up there when I'm done." The guys looked at each other and at the small space in the cabin, "Carolina there isn't that much room up here, it doesn't make much sen-"the doors shut half way through Wash's sentence. Wash shrugged and sat down on the floor. A couple of seconds went by and the door opened for a split second as Carolina slid her helmet across the floor. It just took a couple of seconds for Wash to fix it and then sit it by the door for her to retrieve.
After Carolina came back to the front of the pelican, everyone was huddled around Four Seven Niner discussing something that looked important. "What's going on?" North turned around, "We're being hailed by an unknown ship that isn't using anything type of clearance Four Seven Niner knows." Four Seven Niner pipes up, "It makes no sense! It's like they are just pressing fucking buttons!"
Wash and Carolina look at each other, "No way…" they say simultaneously. Four Seven Niner looks at them both, "What? Do you know an idiot who would fly around in space just pressing buttons?" Wash sighed, "Carolina, what you think? Did he make friends with the spaceship, have it fly him, and he's been pressing buttons when it told him not to? Or did he annoy his superiors to the point they sent him away and he's just been pressing buttons up until this point?" Carolina put her finger up her lip thinking, " I'm going to have to go with choice number two, especially after hearing about commands keyboard shortcut for reporting his team kills" Wash nodded his head, "Good argument, I'm going to go with one because of freckles." Carolina nod, "Ahhh good point." Four Seven Niner just looked back and forth from Wash to Carolina like they were psycho, "WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU GUYS EVEN TALKING ABOUT… HAVE YOU GONE COME COMPLETELY INSANE?" Wash looked at Carolina to get permission to take the call, she nodded her head, "Put him through"
Four Seven Niner started whispering under her breath at that point, "Jesus Christ these people are crazy." She got the transmission ready to send to the ship, "This is Four Seven Niner do you copy?" Silence. "This is Four Seven Niner, do you copy?" Wash leaned next to her, "Try saying, 'Hello my name is Four Seven Niner, what is your name?'" Four Seven Niner squints at him in confusion," That is retarded, why?" Carolina climbed up into the seat about her to enjoy the show, "Just trust him, ok?" Four Seven Niner throws her hands in the air, "What happened to you two? You guys are speaking some kind of weird language." She turned around to face North and York, "are you guys really ok with this?" They both nodded their heads. "I don't get paid enough to do this." She turned the transmission back on and took a deep breath and gritting her teeth she said, "Hello, my name is Four Seven Niner, what is your name?"
To Four Seven Niner's amazement someone answered. "Hello! Four Seven Niner my name is Michael J. Caboose but you can just call me Caboose, everyone else does… I am lost and I'm looking for my friends, can you help me?" Wash turns the transmission on to his helmet so he can talk to him. "Hey Caboose…"
"AGENT WASHINGTON! YOU'RE ALIVE! I'm so happy I was scared… I didn't think you would be the first person I would find!"
"Carolina's with me too"
"OH MY GOD CAROLINA" Carolina turned on her the transmission in her helmet and said warmly, which surprised everyone except Wash, "hello Caboose, are doing ok?"
"YES! GUESS WHAT! I MADE A NEW FRIEND! Well when the drill went off… all the sudden I was back with my old unit… and they were never very nice to me… and they started yelling at me like they always did… and it was making me sad… then I remembered how I talked to Shelia… so I went out and found Bob and Bob is very nice. Do you want to meet Bob?"
Wash looks at Carolina, "I would love to meet Bob, Caboose. He sounds amazing!" Carolina grumbles, "yea, yea you win."
"Yea he's really great but Agent Washington he's been kinda sleepy lately. Can you come here?"
"Yea Caboose we'll come get you." Wash turns off his transmitter, "Hey can we track his location?"
They reset their trajectory and in a couple of minutes found a pelican on fire with Caboose standing on the roof. Four Seven Niner looked at him, "When did you meet someone like that?" Wash laughed, "That's a long story."