Chapter 7: Trial By Fire

Welcome back to Project Freelancer Sega. We have finally reached the cannon part of the story. I have decided to conclude this part in around 7-10 more chapter, but never fear it will be back and better than ever. I have also come to the conclusion that DC will return during season 9 of RvB (not in the Epsilon Unit). Anyways, enough of me talking, onto the story…

Zanzibar Outpost…

Agent Washington, Church and Caboose had just gotten to the location where the distress call, from the Meta, came from.

Church finally decided to speak up about something that was itching in the back of his head, "So how many of these AIs are there?"

Wash was about to answer, but was interrupted by Delta, "There are many of us, Beta, Eta, Iota, Omega-"

"Oh I remember him! He was a mean person!" Caboose interrupted in his usual 'I have no idea what is going on' voice.

"Yes Caboose he was mean." Delta started, "As I was saying the AIs you have met are fragment of the Alpha AI."

"Who's the Alpha?" Church asked.

Delta was about to respond, but Wash cut-in, "The Alpha's a ghost story. Just something all of the AI made up to give themselves false hope." He stated pessimistically.

"So, the Meta has all the AIs now except for Delta?" Church asked trying to comprehend the situation.

"Yes."

"Actually there is still one other left." Delta said.

"Really?"

"He's just another ghost story. There's no way he made it." Wash said remembering his old friend.

"Hmm…I don't really like ghost stories, but I love telling them." Caboose said. Everyone, including Delta stared at him in disbelief.

"Anyways, I'm going around to flank him, from the west. You two cover the east. Got it?"

"Got it." Church responded.

"Yes…but could you please repeat the end, middle and beginning?" Caboose asked.

Church groaned, "Just fallow me!"

After they were a bit away from Wash, Church continued his conversation with Delta, "So who is that other AI?"

"The only other remaining AI is Zeta." Delta responded.

"Zeta? Which Freelancer got him?"

"Agent DC received Zeta."

"DC? Is he still around?"

"No one knows. The last transmission received, from him, was a message saying the Meta has claimed another victim."

"Who?"

"The message did not come in clear enough for anyone to decrypt it, so it is unclear."

"That's pretty weird. Alright so now, what about the Alpha…"

Project Freelancer Debriefing Room (Many Years Ago)…

DC, Jersey, Carolina, Cal, Nevada, North, South, Maine, Wyoming, York, CT, Florida, and Alaska all surrounded the debriefing table where they would all find out what each of their assignments are.

After a minute or two the Director walked up to the table for mission debriefing, "Agents North and South, your assignment is to infiltrate a base in the Antarctic region of Earth. While here you will recover data from here." He said pointing at a red got on a hollo-projection of the facility, "Then you will report to this location for extraction."

"And what happens if something goes wrong?" DC asked leaning onto a table.

"That will be left to me agent." The Director responded in a cold tone.

"Are there any other missions available?" Wash asked.

"Fortunately for us, no there are not any other…disturbances happening as of now." The Consoler answered for his superior.

"You are all dismissed." The Director said rather aggressively. Everyone started to poor out, but before everyone left the Director asked for two of his Agents, "Agents DC and Carolina would you please stay for a moment?"

Carolina quickly turned around, but DC wanted to say goodbye to his brother, "I'll meet you at the mess hall, ok?"

"No prob." Jersey said casually.

DC then returned to the Director and Carolina who were waiting. When he got to the table the Director then proceeded to tell them his plan, "As Agent DC asked before, if the plan fails, you two will be their back up."

"Won't they notice if we're on the same Pelican as them?" DC questioned, trying to dig for more information.

"If you would let me finish, I will tell you that as well. Fifteen minutes after Agents North and South leave, the two of you will fallow. Once you arrive you will be positioned here and wait for anything to go awry." He said motioning to another red dot on the screen. He paused and looked up at the two agents, "This is your fist mission Agent, do not disappoint me."

"Will do sir."

"We'll see." He turned towards Carolina, "Carolina as the most experienced agent going on this mission you will grade DC on his performance."

"Yes sir."

"You are now dismissed." The Director said walking towards the bridge.

Later (Mother of Invention Hanger {15 Minutes After Mission Go})

Carolina and DC were getting into 479er's Pelican, and were waiting for her to arrive.

"Don't think I'm gonna go easy on your grading." Carolina said loading her grappling hook pistol.

"I wasn't planning on it. In fact I imagine you'll try to find anything that I could do wrong." DC said looking up, after he loaded his DMR. This was only met with a quick grumble from the veteran agent.

479er then walked into the Pelican, "What did I miss?" She looked at the two agents who looked as if they were completely ignoring each other, "What? Did I interrupt some kind of lover's quarrel?"

"What?" Carolina responded standing up.

"Hey, I was just kidding." The somewhat suicidal piolet said, holding her hands up. Again Carolina grumbled and this time she walked away and sat down in her seat. Meanwhile DC was chuckling the whole time.

7 Minutes Later (Bjørndal Cryogenics Research Facility)…

DC and Carolina were in their stand-by location, which was out of North's view, and were waiting for any possible thing to go wrong. Both agents started to get bored of waiting, until an alarm started to go off, and the whole place was on high alert.

Immediately after it had sounded two Insurrectionist soldiers can out of nowhere with snipers, and aimed them at the two agents. Carolina was attempting to grab her pistol from her side, but DC was faster; he pulled out his DMR and took out both soldiers within a second.

DC looked at Carolina with a smug look, underneath his armor, and was about to say something snarky, before Carolina interrupted him, "Don't say it."

"What? That I'm faster than you?" DC said with a slight chuckle, jumping off the roof, where they were positioned. Carolina let out a muffled grunt before chasing after the rookie agent.

Meanwhile (Mother of Invention Bridge)…

The Director and the Consoler were watching all that was happening on the projection table. Once everything went haywire they sent in DC and Carolina. The Consoler looked to his superior, "Should we initiate the failsafe?"

The Director, without even looking up, responded, "Yes."

"Roger that, initiating Beta Protocol." He reported, typing a few keys on his tablet.

Meanwhile (Back at Bjørndal Cryogenics Research Facility)…

DC was on route to the evac zone, while Carolina sped past him, using her armor enhancement and took position behind a group of Indies that were readying to ambush North and South, "I gotta get me one of those." DC said out loud watching the veteran agent speed past him.

While DC was trying to catch up to his supervisor, he passed a building that seemed to have a black Spartan inside of it, but he decided that he was only seeing things and kept moving towards the area Carolina was positioned.

By the time he reached the evac zone North and South were surrounded by at least one hundred Indies, so DC had to hide behind a wall until all hell broke loose.

"Well, out of the frying pan and into the fire." North said, down below, looking at the Indies that were surrounding him and his sister.

"Eh, think I could take about 50 of 'em. How 'bout you?" South joked.

"How about you save your jokes until we get out of this?" North said, getting ready for a hard fight to come.

"Where the hell is extraction?!" South questioned.

Back up top, an ODST Indie, meaning that he was one of the commanders, pointed a deployed turret at them, "Attention assholes, stand down! You're surrounded! Give us the data file now! You will be taken into custody! We can do this the easy way or the hard way! There is no escape, so give us the damn data file!"

At this point Carolina snuck behind the soldiers, camouflaged in the background. She then attacked the soldiers, grabbed the turret and shot at the support beams, causing the platform, and the soldiers standing on it, to fall. DC also came out of his hiding place and started to shoot at the soldiers as they were falling.

"Get down!" North yelled shielding his sister, with his body, in the process. The two then get up and look at Carolina and DC attacking the soldiers, "Son of a bitch." North comments.

"What's going on?" South asks, wondering what in the world is happening.

North points up to where the two new arrivals are, "It's Carolina and DC."

"What? What're they doing here?" South questions, not really appreciating that they saved them.

Carolina then back flipped down to North and South, her colors changing from black to a light blue color, leaving a spinning turret to kill soldiers, "Okay, my turn." Carolina proceeds to kill soldiers on the ground.

DC continues to take pot-shots, from above, while watching Carolina, thinking, 'Show-off.'

Meanwhile a soldier is looking for a gun, while the chaos insures behind him, "Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. Oh, yes! A rifle! I'm saved!" He picked it up and tried to shoot the Freelancers all around him.

"Uh, hey man." The unknown soldier's friend walks up to him casually, as if all the chaos around them isn't happening, "Uh, I hate to bother you but I think that's my rifle you're holding."

"What the hell are you talking about?" He questions his friend, "Just grab any rifle! Like look at that, there is seriously a pile of rifles..." He motions his head towards a literally pile of rifles two feet from them.

"No, that's my good luck rifle. That's the one I sleep with every night." His friend retorts.

"Are you kidding me, man?!" He questions before South kicks the two of them right off of the platform.

As the Freelancers fight below, the red ODST gets back on his turret and aims it at South. North noticed this last second and pushed him out of the way, "South, look out!" After he saved her he got shot several times in the chest and visor.

"North! No!" She screams running to her brother.

Carolina fires a grappling hook at the turret. The Indie commander only had time to say, "What the?" before the turret fires beneath him, collapsing the catwalk beneath them. Most of the soldiers fall, but the ODST fell on a ledge jutting out under the catwalk, and attempts to get up.

At this point DC jumped down and was using his pistol to take out as many of the soldiers as possible, and out of the corner of his eye he thought he saw the black Spartan he saw before. He once again thought he was seeing things and didn't want to lose sight of the battle at hand.

"I got you. Move." South told her brother, helping him to the back of the platform. She tossed North against the railing. The twins then both fire their weapons at the remaining soldiers, "Come in, command! We have wounded, you need to get us out of here right now!" She yelled into her com device.

"Come on you two. We're leaving." She said tossingherself, North, and South over the edge, while DC jumped off, and they all landed on the roof of a pelican. "Sorry about the mess, fellas. Package is secure. Everybody on board." She said with a slight wave.

Carolina climbs down a ladder leading into the Pelican's troop bay. She enters the cockpit and climbs into the co-pilot's seat. 479er was in the pilot's seat and motioned to the Freelancer, "Somebody call for a ride?"

"You're late." Carolina commented.

"Ah well, you can take it out of my tip." 479er joked.

"It would have helped if you had actually arrived on time." DC added to Carolina's previous statement.

"Wow! Both of you are perfect for each other." 479er says getting ready to take off.

"What?" Carolina questions.

"What? All I'm saying is that both of you like to be mean to me and are always arguing, so it's bound to happen."

"No way in hell is that ever gonna happen!" Carolina motioned to both 479er and DC, who was about to make a comment.

"Whatever you say sweetheart." DC said, walking back into the hull, as Carolina growled behind him. They then flew off, in the pelican, as the base explodes behind them.

Well, that took a long time to post. I'm trying to finish a chapter for all of my different stories before the end of the weekend, because I have midterms all of next week, and the means nonstop studying. Also I was contemplating making this story an OCxCarolina thing (not anytime soon, only after the Freelancer Saga), and I was wondering what you guys think. If yay then I'll do it; if nay then I just won't, simple as that. Please follow/favorite for updates, and review so I can get better and so that you guys can tell me what you want.