452max: Thanks again and you're gonna find out here!

Taeniaea: Always there! Thank you.

JOUNOUCHI sama: I will see about that but I can't make any promises although I understand your point of view; Zack has never been one of my favorite characters either.

Alan Grey: There you are again! I wasn't sure if you would stick with me after the last chapters but I'm glad you're still here! Lydecker and Logan are gonna have a talk sooner than you think, don't worry. I know stratagem's story and I just have to say sorry for the recent delays, but RL is just a little bit more difficult at the moment than it was when I began this story. Thank you nevertheless. You'll know more about Renfro and the attackers in this and the next chapters, however you will not (yet) see big changes in Wolf's behavior as they're still 'home' and in an environment he feels safe with. But don't worry, you will see about it later. I've been thinking about letting Renfro go after Logan but at the moment I'm not sure yet I will do so. Also that episode with the killer drone has been on my mind but for the moment I think I let it be as it is. Have not definitely decided yet, however. Thanks again for your review and your opinions, keeps me on track (most of the time) and now I can finally say it:

No, this one's not gonna be M/A. They're very good friends and you'll get enough of their friendly or sometimes not so friendly bickering we all liked in the series but I will not let them come together in this story.

When he woke up his mind was all foggy and unfocused. It was something he didn't experience often for he rarely slept and when he did he almost always woke up quickly just like the soldier he had been since the very first day of his life. Not this time, however. It took him a few seconds to register the familiar surroundings of his own cell. He was lying in his own bed again. Slowly the memories of the previous day started to float back into his conscious mind. The release from PsyOps, Kyla helping him get back here, the shower…

When he thought about that he couldn't help but smile remembering his partner's actions and concern. Almost fully awake now he tried to get up but found out he couldn't as something was holding him around the chest. He quickly suppressed the feeling of a rising panic. He wasn't in PsyOps anymore and this certainly didn't feel like the restraints he had felt during the last four weeks. He frowned when he got aware of a warm body snuggled up against his own. He turned around trying not to make a sound.

When he recognized who he was sharing his bunk with he grinned. Kyla had her eyes still closed and despite all his moving and shifting she was still asleep. This made him realize how tired she must have been and he looked at his sleeping partner in concern. But not for long. She looked fine and he admired her even features which looked much more peaceful in her sleep than when she was awake. And more beautiful. He chuckled quietly when he caught himself thinking about that and now she suddenly woke up. Her green eyes met his grey ones and for a long time neither of them said anything or even moved, they just were lost in each other's eyes and both transgenics felt a calm happiness and safety.

Just like him she didn't wake up at once but kept looking at him sleepily and for the first seconds almost confused. When she realized where she was and what had happened she looked at him with sudden worry and Wolf could see barely suppressed fear in her eyes.

"What…" she began but got cut off when he sealed her lips with his own. After her first surprise she almost immediately relaxed and responded to his soft touch. Gods, how she had missed him!

When they broke the kiss after a long time she could see a strange mixture of seriousness and amusement in his eyes.

"Don't worry" he whispered quietly, "I'm okay."

She looked at him and still she could see the aftermath of PsyOps but she could also see they hadn't broken and destroyed him. He was still Wolf, not some brainwashed and simple-minded drone. With this fear and her strain finally gone she suddenly felt tears in her eyes and she pressed herself against him as hard as she could trying to hide her moist eyes from him.

"I missed you!" she whispered in a hoarse voice.

"I missed you, too" he admitted.

No more words were needed. They knew each other since they could remember. Kyla had been afraid to lose him to PsyOps, that she would never see the true Wolf again and he had been afraid that he would never see her again at all. But it was over now, he had made it and they were back together. It was all they needed to know even if their conscious minds didn't fully understand what their actions towards each other really meant.

"What did they do to you?" she suddenly asked. She knew she shouldn't; it would be better to give him some time but she wanted to know, she wanted to help him.

He sighed heavily and she could feel it was hard for him to even think about it.

"The laser" he finally stated.

"Did they make you…" she hesitated for a moment almost dreading his answer, "…forget?"

"No" he shook his head. "I remember everything. First they came up with different scenarios of what could have happened that night when I let Max and Jondy go. It wasn't pretty. We are soldiers. We've been born and will die as soldiers. First of all we have to think about our mission and our unit, that's something I haven't always focused on in the last months. They made me remember."

'They made me remember.' He said it in a calm and controlled voice but Kyla remembered very well how painful that procedure was. The laser itself didn't hurt but the mind tried to protect itself out of instinct and while the body was not injured the brain received false information about injuries and pain. She knew it was agonizing.

"I'm sorry" she whispered finally speaking out loud what had been tormenting her since the night he had left. "I was afraid I had lost you."

"You haven't" he assured her softly. "I'm still the same. They just showed me that when it comes to tactical decisions I have to be a soldier first."

She nodded seemingly much calmer now and the lay together in comfortable silence.

"Kyla?" he asked quietly after they had rested like that for some minutes.

"Hm?"

"I think I should put some clothes on, what do you think?"

She laughed quietly against his chest and that sound alone made him grin happily. Yes, things were definitely going to be alright again.

They got up and he quickly put on a black uniform similar to hers.

"Where are the others?"

She glanced at her watch. "Probably in the mess."

"Good, I'm hungry as a hunter" he said with a wry smile. "Let's go."

Max poked around in her food without any real appetite. She was sitting in Manticore's mess with her unit and most of the other X5s but while the others ate she couldn't help but not feeling hungry at all. Wolf had been released yesterday, that she knew, but until now she hadn't seen him and his cell had been closed when she'd come past it this morning.

It bothered her not to know where he was and what was going on but at the same time she felt a little bit anxious how he would react to her and Jondy when she would see him again.

"Stop looking like your cat died, Max" Nova said. "Kyla's with him, he'll be okay."

"Am I that obvious?"

"Can't say you're making a big secret out of it" Bear mumbled. Both women shot him a warning glare. "What? Just because I'm bigger than you two doesn't mean I'm stupid!"

"Kids" Alec said with mock annoyance in his voice, "behave!"

"Sure, daddy!" Nova retorted.

Alec just shook his head and returned his attention to his meal but Max couldn't help but notice that he had been grinning like mad the whole morning just like he knew something she and the others didn't.

"Speak of the devil!" Blade suddenly exclaimed. Everybody looked at her and then followed her gaze. A split second later the whole unit was on their feet. There they were!

Wolf and Kyla had entered the mess and made their way towards them. Almost the whole mess had become quiet everybody noticing the arrival of the two transgenics. Most of the other X5 just acknowledged Wolf's return but there were many who smiled quietly and nodded to him; they all knew about his reputation and most of all the other units' COs were glad to have him back as they knew about his skills and combat experience.

When the two transgenics finally got to their unit's table they all embraced Wolf in a fraternal hug one after the other welcoming him back. They knew nothing more was possible at the moment as they were observed by the always present security cameras. Jondy and Max were the last to welcome their CO and when he turned towards them they looked at him with incertitude. He just smiled and shook his head before he embraced them.

"It's okay" he assured them quietly. "Don't worry."

They didn't look fully convinced but felt a little bit better. After Wolf had gotten himself a tray with food and started to eat the conversations returned almost to the normal and of course they all wanted to know how he felt and what had been going on, but everybody tried not to sound too curious. He answered their questions as good as he could. He understood they wanted to know what had happened to him but also tried not to think about the past four weeks too intensely. He also noticed Jondy and Max kept looking at him with wary eyes but he decided to talk to them later. Finally Max spoke up and her question almost startled him a little bit.

"Where have you been after you've been released yesterday? None of us has seen you or Kyla after she came to get you out of PsyOps and this morning your cell was closed, too."

Wolf briefly looked at Kyla and was trying to decide what to answer when Alec suddenly chuckled. Everybody at the table looked at him in surprise.

"What's so funny?" Artemis demanded to know.

"Ah, nothing much" he replied and looked at his CO and 2IC with an amused expression. "I just came past Wolf's cell this morning and decided it would be best if somebody closed the door before any of you would see what I saw."

Everybody looked at him in confusion.

"Would you please say this again in a way somebody could actually understand what you're trying to tell us?" Havoc asked.

"Let's just say our two top dogs finally got through their thick skulls what they mean to each other."

"In English!" Blade growled annoyed.

"Oh, for god's sake, they lay in his bunk together!" Despite his choice of words Alec's voice was quiet so only his unit would hear what he said.

Everybody looked first at him in disbelief, then at Wolf and Kyla who currently shot daggers at their third in command. After a few seconds Blade shrugged.

"About damned time" the Asian X5 stated simply and returned her attention to her meal. Her teammates grinned fully agreeing with her after the first shock of Alec's announcement had worn off.

"It was not like that!" Wolf objected but the grinning faces told him it was a futile attempt. 'Alec, you're a dead man!'

Suddenly he got aware of Major Coleman making his way towards him and stood up.

"X5-451, at your command, sir!" he announced.

"At ease, 451 and welcome back." The instructor had an honest smile on his face when he saw his soldier had made it. "How are you?"

"Good, sir."

"Excellent. I have new orders for all of you."

Upon hearing this the whole unit stood up and gathered around their instructor.

"451, you have to go to the medical wing, Doc Cottle wants to check you first before we send you out again. After this the whole unit has to report to the Colonel in classroom seven in two hours. I don't know what's it going to be about but I suggest that in the meantime you prepare your equipment."

"Understood, sir" Wolf replied. "Anything else?"

"Nothing. Dismissed!"

"You heard it!" he said to his teammates and Max couldn't help but notice his voice and behavior were almost like it had been back in Seattle when she had been captured. He was still the Wolf they knew but apparently PsyOps had done a good job in reminding him that he was first of all a soldier. "Go start packing and I will see to get my medical clearance. Meeting in classroom seven in one hour fifty minutes!"

"Are you sure about that?" the male voice asked sounding skeptically. "The last encounter cost us a whole team."

"I gave you the information about the Joliet operation as soon as I could" Renfro replied into her phone while looking out of the windows of her office in Washington D.C. "There's nothing I can do about it if you didn't get it in time."

"Careful, Elizabeth" the man warned her sternly. "The council is still a little bit angry for your past failures."

"I know" she tried to sound friendlier. "But Joliet as been partly successful after all and this time Lydecker wants to dispatch an entire unit again. I don't know about the specifics yet but as it looks to me they're going to attack several of our bases in Europe. This could be a perfect opportunity to capture one or even several X5. That's even better than in Joliet because as far as I know Lydecker has almost no contacts in Europe."

"True. And what about Lydecker himself?"

"His position is already weakened. The committee has grown suspicious about his relationship to the X-series. If we manage to turn this operation into a disaster we might be able to get rid of him once and for all."

"I have to ask the council about this. You'll hear from us."

The line went dead and Elizabeth Renfro put her cell phone away. The look in her eyes was one of pure and dangerous joy. She grinned almost madly when she thought about how soon she would possibly have her revenge.

As soon as Wolf and his unit entered the classroom they got aware of the two X5 already standing behind their chairs. One was X5-798 or Jace as Max had called her, the other one was 734 who's name had been Brin before PsyOps had stripped that memory – almost every memory to be correct – from her mind.

He didn't show how much he didn't like them to be there; it almost certainly meant they would be on his team for this mission and he didn't want them to. Unit two was fine as it was. They had everything the needed from a sniper to a demolition specialist and a medic. Hell, since Max and Jondy were on the team they had even had two transgenics who were ingenious with computers.

He wasn't given much time to think about that because Lydecker entered just when he had reached his usual position in the front row.

"Be seated!" he ordered and the twelve transgenics obeyed. "First of all, welcome back, 451. You all know 734 and 798, they're gonna be on your team for this mission."

Wolf internally frowned. Sometimes he hated it to be correct most of the time.

"Our scientific division has identified the men that attacked you in Joliet." Once again the screen behind Lydecker came to life and showed the faces of the men unit two had killed during the mission near Chicago. The next image however showed them something else, something that looked like a human upper arm only sliced open. Despite all the blood that could be seen on the picture the transgenics could make out something metallic where the bone should have been.

"When we dissected them the scientists found out that several body modifications had been made. Some of their bones have been reinforced with metal just like you see it on this picture. Several modifications have been made to their nervous system and their muscular structure. That's why they were much stronger and able to move faster than an ordinary human being." Lydecker stopped for a second trying to find out how his kids took the news. None of them moved but he could see they followed his explanations with the highest attention. He had read the reports and even when only reading about the battle that had taken place back then it had become clear that while Nitro's dead had been tragic his children could have easily lost more lives to the unknown attackers. "These modifications however are nothing genetic. Everything we found out until now is the result of bioengineering."

"Sir, are you talking about some sort of cyborg?" Wolf suddenly asked. "And if yes who would have the knowledge and the resources to perform such modifications?"

"It's possible to see it like that, yes" Lydecker answered the question. "Manticore has tried to come up with some kind of similar augmentations during the last years but until now we have not been successful. There are several other fractions that have the resources to try something like that but we contacted all of them and until now it looks like they're clean. So for now we don't know yet who exactly is behind this."

He could almost see how a mixture of frustration and anger flared up in twelve pairs of eyes; the feral side of the transgenic soldiers had already been preparing itself for another hunt and now he was telling them he didn't have a target.

"We do however know about several locations where some of the men you killed in Joliet have been seen before they entered the United States; that's where you will go. Recon mission. We need to know who is behind his, what their objectives are and if this hostile force is a threat to us. 494, 210, 452, 734 and 798: You will go to Montpellier, a village in the south of France. You will get more detailed information before you leave."

Alec, Jondy and Max nodded as well as Brin and Jace. Max could tell Alec wasn't too happy to have the two women from other units in his team but she was looking forward to spend some time with the members of her old unit. She hadn't had much chance to talk to Jace and had almost had no contact to Brin.

"154, 194, 367, 439 and 526" Lydecker continued, "your target location is Edinburgh. You'll get detailed information later, too."

Nova, Blade, Havoc, Artemis and Bear nodded silently.

"Are there any questions?" As usual nobody said anything. "Good. Now remember, you will be on recon missions in foreign countries, so try to avoid contact with the enemy. You won't have any sort of backup out there and if you get caught we probably won't be able to help you. If there are no questions you can start with your preparations now. Both teams will leave in four hours. 451 and 301 stay in here, the rest of you: Dismissed!"

Without a word the ten soldiers stood up and left the room but Lydecker didn't miss their curious and surprised glances towards him, Wolf and Kyla. Of course, it was more than just unusual that he hadn't assigned them to a team, they had the most experience in this sort of operation, but what he had to tell them was just too risky to say out loud while the others – first of all Brin – were still around.

When the doors were closed again Lydecker turned towards the two waiting soldiers.

"451, 301: What I will tell you now has to stay in this room!"

48 hours later – Montpellier, France

The hot sun of southern France felt good on her skin and Max felt glad once again she had been on the team that went to Montpellier instead to the rainy and cold Edingburgh. They had landed yesterday and had just finished preparing their improvised command center. Now Alec, who was in charge of this mission, had sent her, Jace and Jondy out to do some scouting.

The three young women were dressed like common tourists and walked through the picturesque Old Town of the city stopping here and there to look at the shop windows.

"You know that you're suggested to do recon and not shopping" they suddenly heard Brin over wireless. The Asian was somewhere behind them to provide cover if necessary.

"We do, Brin" Jace answered into her hidden micro with a hint of annoyance in her voice, "don't worry."

"It's 734!" The answer was brisk and cold before the connection was terminated.

The three women looked at each other and sighed.

"That woman is an iceberg" Jondy said quietly and Max could clearly hear the sadness in her voice. They had known their sister had changed but seeing how extreme the change was had been hard.

"What do you expect?" Jace asked. "PsyOps has practically destroyed her personality."

"Don't think about it too much" Max said. It pained her too to see Brin like that but she also knew they had to focus on their task. If their enemies – if they were there at all – surprised them they wouldn't stand a chance. "We'll deal with that later."

And Brin had a point; there were enough things that could distract an ordinary woman. Europe had not been hit as badly by the Pulse as the American continent and although for some years life had also been extremely rough to say the least it seemed like good old Europe had almost fully recovered from the hard years and there were certainly enough things in the stores that would make an average girl more than just interested and the three female transgenics were more than able to display the image of curious tourist girls. Behind their black sunglasses however their eyes were searching the streets and windows for any suspicious sign but although they slowly approached their destination there was no sign of those weird men who apparently had been turned into walking cyborgs.

They casually walked past the house in which Manticore's intelligence division suspected their new enemies Max couldn't see anything that would indicate that a bunch of walking spare parts storages was living there. She cursed silently and looked at Jondy. Her sister flashed her a wry smile and both had the same thought.

Not another wall-climbing night!

At the same time – Airport of Geneva, Switzerland

Wolf and Kyla were standing in the huge terminal of the airport waiting for their contact to arrive. They wore civilian clothing and if it hadn't been for their extremely short hair and attentive eyes they would have looked just like the other people around them.

"Don't tell me they forgot about us!" Kyla growled quietly and shot her partner an annoyed glance when she heard him chuckle. Before she was able to tell him what she thought of his behavior however a tall and slender yet well trained man approached them. He was about their age and wore dark blue jeans and a black jacket but if the haircut of his dark brown hair which was similar to theirs would not have been enough the friendly but attentive look in his eyes and the way he moved would have been enough to tell her he was military.

"Captain Anderson?" the young man asked when he was close enough. Wolf nodded; it was the name he would be known under for this mission. "So you must be Lieutenant Myers?"

Kyla nodded and decided that she would perhaps be able to like this one. Straightforward and concentrated. His English was almost perfect and even she had to listen carefully to hear some accent.

"Welcome to my country" the young man continued. "I'm Lieutenant Linder, your contact. Please follow me."

The two transgenics grabbed their bags and followed the young soldier who led them out of the terminal and onto the airfield again. All the way Kyla noticed how the young officer's eyes searched his surroundings for any sort of possible danger and she had to acknowledge he did it in a way nobody would notice it if not very well trained. Yes, she was definitely going to like this one.

When on the airfield again they approached a helicopter with military camouflage painting; she recognized it as an EC 725 Cougar, a transport helicopter for short and medium range. Two soldiers in dark green camouflage uniforms watched them approach attentively but relaxed and opened the door as soon as Lieutenant Linder gave them a short nod.

Not a minute later the helicopter took off towards the east. The Lieutenant and the two soldiers didn't try and talk to the two American officers and so Wolf had a lot of time to think. When they were over Lake Geneva and quickly approached the Alps he thought back to the conversation that had taken place after his team had left that classroom.

For all of you who wanted to see some action in this chapter:

1. sorry

2. the fight (at least part of it) will be in the next chapter. Haven't decided yet but perhaps there will be character death. Not to shock but to warn you.

And then again some motivation in the form of reviews would be nice (very subtle, I know;))