Chapter 3: Realignments

ON BOARD THE MOTHER OF INVENTION

THE DEPTHS OF SPACE

MANY YEARS AGO

As the Director made some brief consultations with the Counselor, Carolina took a moment to look at her fellow Freelancers. She noticed that South's posture was a little tense; she was always more nervous when she was in the Director's office. She then turned to North and gave him a small nod. The medical team had done a great job in helping him recover from his severe injuries, although he now had a scar on his left cheek. North noticed her looking at him and gave a quick thumbs-up. Rhode stood at attention regularly, but he looked at her and gave a quick smirk.

Carolina then looked up at the leader board behind the Director. She never understood why the Director was giving them scores based on their progress in the missions and what he was planning for all of them, but she was slightly worried of the competition that the other Freelancers would be trying, determined to get on the top of the list.

At the moment, Carolina was at the top of the list. At number two was Agent York, number three was Rhode, number four was Agent Wyoming, the very British fellow; he seemed harmless enough, but she was a little suspicious of him. At fifth and sixth place were South and North. And in seventh place was Agent Washington, the most trusting of all the Freelancers. That was how the leader board showed, but she knew that any action taken in the field could change their ratings, for better or worse.

At that moment, the Director turned to the Agents and Carolina quickly stood back to attention.

"The data you recovered has pinpointed the location of a very important target for Project Freelancer," The Director gave an approving smile, "Excellent work."

"Thank you, Sir!" the four Agents said at the same time.

The Director nodded then turned to the man beside him, "Counselor, please update the board."

With a nod, the Counselor pressed some buttons on his handheld pad. Carolina looked up at the board and was pleased to see her place at the top was still secure. She then looked down in time to see North's name swap places with South's so that he was now in fifth place.

The Director gave a little nod, "That is all. Dismissed."

North, Rhode, and Carolina nodded in reply, but South just stepped back in alarm.

Then she ripped off her helmet and glared at the Director, fury burning in her grey eyes, "I thought you said the mission was a success, Sir?"

"One of the mission objectives was stealth," the Director retorted, "Your carelessness revealed our intention and made our next mission more difficult. They'll be ready for us. Dismissed."

South looked despondent for a moment then she tossed back her short blonde hair, picked up her helmet and strode towards the door.

Carolina watched her go then she turned to North and Rhode, "Think I should talk to her?"

Rhode turned as South punched the door control panel so hard that she actually broke it and then stormed out the room then he turned back to Carolina, "Yeah... Maybe we should give her a minute."

XXX

Later on that week, North stood in the hallway and glanced out the window at the starry blackness of space. No matter how many times he'd seen it, the depths of the universe never ceased to amaze him. As a child, he and his sister South would sit in the backyard of their home and stare up at all the stars in the night sky, wondering what new worlds awaited them out in the cosmos.

North gave a little sigh at the memory. Those were the good old days, before the Great Wars came, before the Covenant came and destroyed everything, took their homes and their families. He and South lost their parents in the first wave, but now they were on Project Freelancer and they would get their chance at revenge...

At that moment, a Spartan in grey armor with yellow highlights stepped out of a room and made his way down the hallways.

As he passed the window, North ran to catch up with him, "Hey, Wash, wait up! Listen, I heard you had a meeting with Internals."

"Oh, you did?" Washington asked.

"Yeah, do you mind if I ask what it was about?"

"I'm not really supposed to talk about that."

"Help me out here," North pleaded, "I'm still getting heat about using equipment in the field."

Wash stopped in his tracks and turned to stare at North, "You did? Really? Without a pipeline back to the Command server?"

"I had to improvise. We had a problem."

"Let me guess, are you related to the problem?"

"Okay, now I don't want to talk about it," North sighed, setting off again.

"Equipment in the field," Wash muttered, "Y'know, don't forget what happened to Utah during training."

"Don't remind me," North said, recalling that day.

"You're lucky it didn't kill you," Wash said.

"If I was lucky, I wouldn't have needed to use it at all," North scoffed.

"Well, you can relax. Internals didn't ask about you."

While Wash was talking, several soldiers ran past them in a hurry.

"It was something else. Lots of questions about the Insurrection and transmissions coming out of our- Oof!" he suddenly gasped as a soldier bumped into him.

"Sorry Wash," Rhode said, stopping.

"Hey, what's going on?" Wash asked.

"New agent squaring off against Maine, Wyoming and York on the training room floor," Rhode explained, "I'm going to watch!"

North swapped an amazed look with Wash, "Three on one?"

"I gotta see this," Wash cried.

"Right behind you," North called as they ran off down the hall.

In the training room, three soldiers, colored white, tan and white with orange highlights, each grabbed a pugil stick and prepared themselves for combat.

"Five, four, three, two, one, Round begin," FILSS announced over the speakers.

With that, the three soldiers charged straight into battle... only to get knocked back by their black-armored opponent...

XXX

Here comes the woman in black... Sorry. Couldn't help it. Next up, Agent Texas! Till next time guys!