One of my resolutions is to finish this story.
Seriously.
Enjoy!
Snake Eyes strode into the command hub, Cat right on his heels and sticking close. This was a new environment for her; she hadn't been granted clearance to enter yet, but she supposed with what information she knew it was now within her ability. Trailing behind the ninja she observed the room and calmly activated CIRIS, which then proceeded to scan the room, find her exits and the fastest escape routes, in case she needed them. She was already beginning to feel the room press in on her, and for the umpteenth time that month she wished she could be outside under the blue sky. All these eyes on her and she felt her breathing begin to become rapid.
For her benefit, she kept her eyes on the vitals displayed in the HUD that CIRIS was providing. They weren't hers, however; CIRIS had brought up Snake Eyes and his heart rate, and Cat watched the EKG line bleep over and over again to keep her anxiety from surfacing. Up and down the line went, and she knew that the people in the room were staring at her funny because her eyes were following nothing that they could see, but she didn't care. Her heart rate was slowing to match Snake Eyes's own. With it, her anxiety was disappearing and the room was not closing in on her.
"Snake Eyes, what can I help you with?" Roadblock rumbled from upon the catwalk, nodding at Cat. He was still slightly miffed at her for attempting to take down Cobra Commander by herself, but with her becoming more social with the soldiers of the base, it was difficult for him to maintain a stone cold face around her.
Snake Eyes took the stairs two at a time, connecting Cat's phone with the interface system. Quickly, mentally, she activated encryptions that would only allow them to see the information they needed. CIRIS bleeped quietly in response, carrying out the orders subtly, and Cat continued to watch Snake Eyes's heart rate for a semblance of peace.
Roadblock analyzed the evidence that scrolled across the screen with a tense face; he was just as eager to get his hands on Cobra Commander as Cat was. To his trained eyes, there was evidence, enough for the JOES to at least take a look at it. But the evidence was coming from Cat, a girl the higher ups had deemed to be a "person of interest."
"Snake Eyes," Roadblock cautioned, keeping his face as smooth as possible, moving away from Cat's inquisitive gaze. "I know you want to catch him as much as I want to, but I can't go to the higher ups with this little information. I need more in order to investigate, you know that."
Snake Eyes signed quickly, trying to defend their case, while Cat trotted up the catwalk stairs. She cautiously took her phone off the system and disconnected it, and it went unnoticed by the two Alpha team members. Snake Eyes was still desperately signing to Roadblock and the Alpha commander was shaking his head.
Just as she was about to sneak back down the catwalk and out of the room in general, Snake Eyes's hand snapped back and gently but firmly caught Cat's wrist, preventing her from going anywhere. Anxiety spiked and she felt everyone's eyes on her as she twisted feebly. The aura exuding from the ninja suggested that he knew exactly what she was going to do, and was not pleased. Panicked from the eyes and anxiety and the trapped feeling, Cat's breathing spiked, and she tugged more forcibly on Snake Eye's unmovable arm.
"I have to get out," she wheezed, stomping her metal foot. "Please, please, please..."
Sensing her panic, Snake let her go and held his hands up and backed way. Before Roadblock could make to grab at her, she leaped down the stairs and bolted out the door, past camouflage uniforms and mail carriers, down a side hallway as CIRIS directed her. She skidded into the wall and slid downwards, trying to take deep breaths to calm down.
She succeeded after only a half hour, CIRIS assisting with returning her bodily functions to normal. She also activated her elevated logical thinking processes, and she stood up and began walking to her room on autopilot as she thought about the information they had unearthed. Why wouldn't Roadblock agree to a recon mission, at the very least?
Hacking into the camera of the intel room, she listened in as she turned down her hallway to her room.
"I see your point, Snake Eyes, I really do, but the higher ups won't authorize a mission that can have anything to do with Cat right now. They don't trust her, I told you this. That's why you were assigned to be her mentor," Roadblock ran a hand over his bald head as Cat's hand froze on the handle of her door. Snake Eyes hadn't wanted to help her, he had been forced. She understood now; why else would a top ranked ninja take on a handicapped science experiment? "You need to keep her put, figure out just what is going on inside her head. You've seen the weird shit in her eyes that happens when she zones out. The sooner we figure out just what the experiments did to her mental state, the better for all of us."
It felt like the wind was knocked out of her chest. So much for family; if Roadblock was behind this plan, then no doubt that the rest of Alpha knew as well. No wonder why they kept her in a basic level job; she didn't learn any secrets, and by socializing she met more people that could serve to keep an extra pair of eyes on her. And just what did they want to find out about her? Surely they didn't want to use this technology on someone else?
Unwarranted memories sprung back up, of times from when she was in Cobra Commander's forces and it was extraction day. It was a special technique to extract the information. Chelation of the data storing nanites had to occur within the blood-brain barrier, because Cat's brain, at the time, had been so dependent on the advanced systems the nanites provided to her that they didn't travel past the barrier once entered into it. Roughly ten needles had to be used, stuck in at different parts of her body. While the blood was being drawn from the brain, more was put in through the femoral artery and carotid artery, so that new nanites would have a vehicle cell into the brain. It was painful, it was dangerous, and Cat often had nightmares about the chair they used to strap her down and the size of the needles they used.
CIRIS ticked furiously, countering the heightened levels of cortisone and adrenaline which had just flooded her body. Cat couldn't keep up with her whirring thoughts; CIRIS was loosing control, the stress was causing more of COBRA's activator to expand, and the pale blue HUD of CIRIS she had come to know was swirling into the vibrant, angry yellow of the VIPER system.
Cat stood up straight, popping her joints as the once forgotten cold rush of the VIPER system flooded her veins. Across the vibrant yellow HUD in her eyes, a breezy phrase flashed across the screen.
Welcome back, Number Four.