The loud clang brought her back to attention.
She glared daggers at the guard with the maddening smirk on his face. Her meditations were growing increasingly disturbed and his interruption was especially unwelcome.
So much for prisoner Religious confidentiality. She thought.
"Nothing to say, as usual?" The guard taunted, his haunting sneer growing wider.
Her brow furrowed in anger, her jaw clenching to the point she thought her teeth might break.
A deafening crack of wood against his skull. Blood pouring; nervous, fearful sweat flying; the only sense in her brain working inside her is her hearing. She hears the agonized cry and cannot stifle the tears.
"Just as I thought. I warned you that the last time you talked back to me would be the last time." The guard spoke.
He unlocked the cell door and towered above the silent woman on her knees, hands and feet shackled. She knew if she were free, he would be pissing his pants in fear.
Daddy taught me that tough girls don't cry. Another crack against flesh and bone, another furious outburst of pain brings a fresh torrential outpouring of tears. Her sobs, she is certain, could be heard down to cell block D. Sorry daddy, I just can't help it.
Her eyes showed no fear and she would love to challenge him, cajole him, disgust him, anger him and demean him, but she would not speak to him; if only to save him from any more pain. She knew the corrupt guard's set of rules. If things were different… she tensed at the thought. She would… no! It was her duty, her destiny and her mission to kill him. She had to kill him. To leave him alive would be an oversight she could not live with upon the chance of escape.
"Listen when I speak to you!" The guard boomed, moving forward and striking her cheek, the force of the blow shoving her to the dirty concrete floor with a loud groan, her shackles clanging loudly as she fell.
"I told you to get up! UNSC command wants to speak to you!" The guard shouted into her face from inches away.
He grabbed her chains and forced her to her feet. She eyed the baton at his hip warily. His blood still remained on the nightstick.
BBBBBB
The hallway was long, no turns or corners. Only one long corridor. The monotony was broken every fifty feet or so by rooms lining both walls with solid metal doors. The dimensions of the room were unknown to her, but she felt like they were briefing and class rooms of all sorts. Perhaps some took on the duty of torture chambers due to the facility's predictable planning which mandated that the lower basement was reserved for solitary confinement.
She had spent her first two weeks as a captive in solitary confinement. Her former life was as undesirable to the UNSC as it had been for the men and women she had crossed.
She was mouthy, for sure. However she had never physically provoked the guards. Still she had been locked away in solitary for as long as her captors could get away with. She had been starved, beaten, spit on and verbally abused. Still she had bluster and downright rudeness to spare.
However, it had all changed when he had been captured as well. When they had him she had been brought to an unnamed and unknown location within the facility - blindfolded and shackled of course – and still as brash as ever.
But when she heard his voice the only retort she could think of was an astonished gasp. That was when the guard with the permanent sneer had uttered those words.
"You had better choose your next witticism carefully. The last time you talked back to me will be the last time."
She halted as the memory slammed unbidden full force into her conscience. She shuddered as she heard again her beloved's cries of anguish. She felt the guard's baton in her back once again before she shook her head free of her demons and marched onward to what she hoped was not her death.
She didn't want to face the reaper with the creature guarding her still walking the earth, nor with her beloved still rotting in his cell several cell blocks away from here.
There was no satisfactory response to her predicament. The march to office 213 was laden with apprehension. One thing was for sure, she would not let them kill her without giving them a reason to do so. Her mind filled with hopeful fantasies of breaking free that she knew she could never realize if she sat back and thought the feeble plans through professionally.
Even if she did escape, she would have never left him in that cold, dank cell to die alone. In every fantasy she imagined going back for him. In her rational, analytical mind, however, she knew she was deceiving herself. She knew she would never make it out of that facility alive.
And then, remote Africa was as hostile as Sang'helios, she knew. If it weren't the roving bands of marauders and gangs that threatened her life and that of her beloved, it was Africa's perilous wildlife. They would never make it off earth.
She sighed and set herself for whatever came her way. The dark institutional grey of the door before her was interrupted periodically by the crimson rust and green mildew. The iron door handle loomed in front of her as uneasily as the sneering guard loomed behind her. She took a deep breath and pushed the door open.
The only light in the room came from a bare hanging bulb swinging directly above a worn out olive-wood conference table and a small bank of monitors against the far wall. Every other part of the room was completely dull and lifeless; from the morose concrete floor to the walls which seemed to unanimously scream from boredom.
A tall black man in a beige business suit and understated blue tie, the tie tack carefully chosen to be conveniently unflashy, grinned at her with pearlescent teeth and an impeccably trimmed goatee. His dark eyes focused on her pale and sickly face glaring back at him. His large callused hand passed his prickly-looking close shaven head once over before he began speaking, his accent doubtlessly British.
"I am very pleased to meet you. My name is Malcolm Hargrove. However due to your present circumstance you may address me as Director." The man began. The woman's mouth dropped open.
"You… you were the chairman of Project Freelancer's Oversight Subcommittee!" She declared, not quite believing his presence even as her mind registered his voice from briefing holotapes.
"And you are the former freelancer designated Arkansas." Malcolm said, that perfect smile never leaving his face.
The woman could not speak. She hadn't been called Arkansas even by Project Freelancer's Director. She balked as she tried to wrap her mind around this shocking new turn of events.
"It's 479'er to you." She croaked as confusion died to anger.
"479. I have a mission for you that you cannot afford to turn down. Think of it as a work-release program. Both for yourself and for a certain man you have a very keen interest in; and a very fond history with. I believe he is currently residing in solitary confinement." Malcolm announced, that reassuring smile becoming an eerie crocodile grin at the mention of her beloved.
Malcolm Hargrove had said the magic words. Arkansas moved to her knees in a show of humility.
"Agent 479'er reporting for duty, Director." She said softly.
"Amenable. However for the duration of your UNSC work you shall be deemed Earth's Speartip." Malcolm announced.
Arkansas nodded her head slowly.
"What are your orders, Director?"
BBBBBB
Carolina's green eyes never left her face. The dark blonde hair, green eyes, pale skin and short frame she had come to know so well.
"479'er… Arkansas. Why?" Carolina stammered in disbelief.
"This isn't what you think. It isn't personal." Speartip said, her eyes setting hard on Carolina's amber visor.
"You are attacking my friends. This is plenty personal, Arkansas." Carolina retorted.
"Since when does the great Carolina get soft due to a bunch of ragtag idiots?" 479'er groused.
Carolina shook her head slowly and refused to answer.
Not to her. Never to a traitor. Carolina thought.
"No matter though," Arkansas said after a lengthy silence, "This is something I have to do. I am sorry, but I cannot… I will not fail."
"You were my friend, 479'er." Carolina said in a rare moment of sadness.
Speartip sighed.
"Don't you get it? For the last time this isn't about you. I didn't even know you were here! I thought my friend was dead! They want Missouri and the AI designated Lambda dead and buried. Now, where are they Carolina?" 479'er demanded.
Carolina raised herself from the ground, dusted off her haunches and set her stance. She raised her hands in a defensive position as she glared at her friend.
"It doesn't have to be this way." 479'er warned.
"You're not taking Missouri or Lambda without a fight." Carolina said with finality. Her helmet was tilted forward in a sign of defiance. Arkansas sighed.
"Well, old friend. You should know that you won't be rescuing Missouri and Lambda without a fight." 479'er said, a grin spreading across her lips. She pointed over the teal commando's head and into the sky.
Carolina turned to look at the pair of hornet starships incoming. She noticed them just in time to roll out of the trajectory of two incoming rockets.
Carolina turned back to look in Speartip's direction, only to find that the long lost freelancer pilot had disappeared into the trees.
And so Carolina scrambled toward Grif's position, hefted the overweight orange soldier onto her shoulders and sprinted as fast as she could without the use of her speed unit toward Blue base.
