February 1, 2035

20:05 Central European Time

Avenger, Czech Countryside

"Menace 1-5 is in position, Commander," Shieldmaiden subvocalized into Van's earpiece. "Defcon has her little surprise ready and waiting at your order."

"Good. You have five minutes until your objective arrives."

"Copy that. Just spotted the secondary target, ma'am."

On one of the displays Van could see the officer stomping around issuing orders to some of the guards. "Just keep an eye on it for now. We still need to focus on the main goal. If we have to we can grab one some other time."

"Roger that, boss."

Central stepped up next to her as she took in the different angles of the area of operation. He quietly mused out loud. "They keep these trains running around the clock. But you never see them loading or unloading any cargo – at least not where anyone can see it."

Giving him a sideways glance she asked, "Is that really why you wanted us to do this raid? To see what might be there?"

"It wasn't just to satisfy my curiosity. Members of the resistance really do believe there's valuable cargo on there that can be used. Like I said before, this will send a message to the resistance that we're here to make a difference.

"Hmm and just possibly send a message to ADVENT as well," she replied.

There was a slight, sly grin at that.

A high pitched whistle sounded over the comms. "Sounds like our cue to see if this insane plan actually works or not."

As the train arrived at the entrance of the depot, the ADVENT officer chose that moment to pass by the area the team waited for their target. Three of them stepped forward to grab the officer and his two minions by wrapping arms around throats and free hands clamping over mouths. There were three soft cracks and the bodies were dragged away.

There were no alarms. The few guards still in the area seemed disinclined to move from their posts, continuing to survey the area calmly.

Van nodded to herself and said, "Very good."

The train pulled up with a hiss. It sat there without opening its doors. She frowned at it. "Defcon, don't set off your surprise just yet. I think it might attract too much attention in the wrong place."

"No problem, boss."

Something was very not right. "Menace 1-5, I want all four of you to scatter to your secondary positions."

It meant the ambush might not go off as expected, but it meant that a grenade or some other area of affect weapon wouldn't be able to get her entire team at once. She didn't quite scowl when she saw that Shieldmaiden had positioned herself behind some metal trunks that were sitting on the platform next to the tracks. That wasn't quite what she had in mind, but it would have to do.

Finally the doors opened and a trio of sectoids paused at the doorway, looking around and hissing. It looked like they were trying to sniff the air.

She could feel Central still at her side, staring at the displays, but not saying anything despite the tension that was pouring off of him. Van rolled her neck. "All right, Menace 1-5, this is what you're going to do…"

She left Shieldmaiden in her position, she'd be perfect for mop up. A strangled protest came out of Central as she had Defcon carefully drop a grenade on the three aliens to soften them. God, she loved the accuracy of modern day grenade launchers.

There was an explosion of sound as Shieldmaiden's shotgun barked and the assault rifles from Hause and Worley rattled out their attacks, shredding the aliens.

The ADVENT troops on guard seemed to freeze for a moment, as if unable to figure out what to do before they ducked for cover. That was…unexpected and to be considered after this over. In silence she watched as the squad repositioned themselves to deal with the threat. While it wasn't exactly what she would've chosen, it was close enough that it worked well enough.

Movement in the shadows nearby drew her attention. "Menace 1-5, it looks like you have additional company coming from the east."

One of the squad tapped their comms to confirm her comment, but were too busy with their firefight with the troopers in front of them.

This was the part she hated, she could give them direction on where to go, what to do, what the plan of attack was. But when the fight actually went down, she was powerless to do anything. She could only hope her soldiers had been given all the training they needed to do their jobs. That she'd given the best guidance possible.

They proved their training to be better than ADVENT's as the four soldiers neatly brought down their enemies. Hearing those alien wails from seemingly human mouths was the stuff of nightmares and couldn't help the shudder of revulsion.

Menace 1-5 had brought down the last of the troopers and were reloading as two more guards came running forward. Van silently shook her head. That few against clearly battled hardened troops was suicidal. They should have hunkered down and called for reinforcements. Instead they rain into a hail of bullets that cut them down.

Hause stood guard as the rest of the team began to quickly search the area for anything useful.

She propped the elbow of her left arm in the palm of her right hand as she cupped her left hand around her chin as she thought while staring at the display before her. Van didn't allow herself to think the obviously clichéd line, just in case. Yet she couldn't shake off an uneasy feeling about the whole thing.

Worley commented over the comms. "What's this over here? Oh shit, a prisoner!"

That drew her attention to the display showing his camera feed. Sure enough, there was a man in an undershirt and boxers with his hands bound behind him and his mouth gagged, his swarthy skin covered in cuts and bruises.

"Do we have a secure location we can put him in until I can decide what to do with him?" she asked.

Central nodded. "We can figure something out, Commander."

"Menace 1-5, bring the prisoner along with the rest, I don't want to leave him in their hands. If you feel comfortable enough, you can remove the gag, but don't let him go free just yet."

"Yes'm!"

Central nodded approvingly. "I'll make sure the arrangements are taken care of."

"Thank you."

"Commander?" One of the techs asked to get her attention. "There's a dropship on its way to the AO."

She walked briskly over to look at his display. "Can you project where it'll land?"

"Yes, Commander." He tapped a couple of keys and an outline came up on screen. A small, vicious smile curved her mouth at the location.

"Menace 1-5, you'll have to speed up loading Firebrand, you have incoming. Defcon, you get to use your little surprise after all." She suspected that the place would be a likely spot for reinforcements to drop, it was good to know that her instincts for that still worked.

"When did you want it set off?"

"As soon as the incoming dropship delivers its cargo."

Van could easily see the feral grin in her mind's eye as Defcon eagerly replied. "Sure thing, boss!"

The last of the portable cargo, including the oh-so-important corpse of the officer, was loaded as the dropship approached. The dropship was a massive, boxy thing that was sleekly black with red accents. Really, did they have to so blatantly rip off the clichéd evil overlords in such a manner?

The doors of the dropship opened to reveal another officer with two additional troopers. They were promptly consumed by a blast of flame and cacophonous sound as the corner of the building that held the explosives collapsed. The blast even affected the dropship, sending it careening into a nearby building causing part of it to collapse with the ship into the street below.

"Central, remind me to have a word with Defcon about 'loud and flashy, but not much damage'."

"I'm pretty sure you don't need the reminder."

"All right, remind me to make sure it's a civil conversation."

"No promises on that score, but she might not survive Shieldmaiden's wrath to have a conversation with you. Civil or not."

"This is Firebrand, the children are safely stowed in the back along with all of their toys. Though Defcon seems to be in the timeout corner."

Van just barely managed to stifle her smile at that.

What sounded suspiciously like a chuckle came out of Central. He cleared his throat. "As soon as Firebrand lands, we'll head out."

"So what area did you intend for us to go to ground?"

"Resistance HQ, give our people a chance to stretch their legs without worrying about attracting unwonted attention."

The Commander slowly swiveled on the heel of one foot to stare at her Central Officer. This was the first she'd heard of anything like that. Until now she assumed Avenger was it. "Resistance HQ?"

"Shit," Central said. "Sorry about that, Commander." He gestured for her to walk with him and as she did she saw that he was limping more. Hopefully Tygan's research would come up with something useful. He grunted. "I'll live, Commander."

"Maybe so, Central, but taking a break would be a good idea. You urge me to do that often enough."

"Why do you think we're going to the bridge?"

Van couldn't help smiling back in return.

Soon enough they were ensconced in the chairs and she marveled that it had just been that morning that she'd unloaded onto him in this room. It felt like more than just a half day since the easiness between them seemed to be back as he stretched out his legs with a quiet sigh. He leaned forward to start tapping at the screens. "Don't fuss, Van, I'll be all right."

"I didn't say anything."

John eyed her. "You were thinking plenty."

Of course she was thinking plenty, but she was allowed to worry about people she cared about. There weren't many left and they were all on the Avenger. The most important one by her side. Van was never one to make many friends, but she'd had a few that were worth it. Unfortunately, Bradford was the last of those friends left.

So yes, she was feeling a bit overprotective.

"All right, I'll make a deal with you. If you promise not to fuss over me, I won't fuss over you."

John blinked at her. "I haven't fussed over you."

"Uh huh." She deepened her voice, though there was no way she was going to abuse her throat by trying to fully mimic his broken-glass-in-whiskey voice. "'Maybe you should get some rest. Commander.' 'Van, have you eaten recently?'"

"I'm allowed to express concern for your wellbeing since you're my friend besides the Commander of XCOM."

"And I'm not allowed to feel the same over my second in command and probably the last friend I have?" Shit. She hadn't meant the last part slip out, but there it was.

He winced. "All right. Maybe you have a point."

"Thank you," she said in all seriousness.

After giving her another long look, he said, "As for Resistance HQ, it's not much. The Resistance is pretty scattered with no real leadership. Valley does what he can, but he doesn't have the means to organize the entire globe."

"But now that the Avenger is up and running the way she should be, we do."

"Not just the Avenger, Van, we have you also."

She just looked at him. He gave her a sheepish one in return. Hoping to get back into less dangerous conversational waters, Van asked, "So is Valley his nickname or something?"

"No. That's his last name. His name is Bartholomew Valley, not surprisingly he prefers to be known by his last name than any version of his first. So when you meet him, stick to his last name."

"With a name like that, I can see why."

"Exactly."

"Anything else I should know about this HQ?" Van asked hesitantly.

"It's an old Russian installation, might even date back to the USSR days."

"Okay?" She wasn't quite sure where he was going with that.

"That's because it's in the Ural Mountains."

She thought that over. "I'm going to guess it's probably not in the southern section of the range."

"No, it's up in the Arctic region."

Of course it would be in a place that even she, who loved the cold, considered a frozen hell. "I'm hoping there's some sort of cold weather gear around here somewhere?"

"Yeah. There should be a box at the bottom of your closet, if not, let me know and I'll make sure you're set up with some."

She took that as her cue to leave. "I'll see you in the morning then. Have a good night and make sure you get some sleep yourself."

Instead of huffing at her for fussing, he just smiled a little. "G'night, Van. Don't worry, I will. If I'm dealing with Valley tomorrow, I'm going to need all of my wits about me."

Great, just great. Before she got any further into the conversational quagmire she headed off to her quarters for more catching up while waiting for the team to return with the prisoner and supplies.