A Viper is taken down and taken captive by a team including Sniper Corporal 'Zero' on a mission to destroy an Advent radio transmitter. After Dr. Tygan refuses to experiment on a live subject, everyone, the Commander included, is unsure of what to do with their new hostage.

When XCOM removed the biochip of a living Viper, they unintentionally gave her something else: Freedom. No longer a brainwashed servant of the Elders, Natasatch asked to join XCOM, much to the project's surprise. However, the prospect of integrating an alien into such an anti-alien organization may just be XCOM's most ambitious experiment yet.

Ryder, fresh meat to the Mojave, finds himself in company of one of the most vicious beasts to walk the land, a Deathclaw. He is forced to raise it, and could it have picked a stupider person to imprint on? To survive they must gather allies, all the way from robot geniuses to drug-induced animals, to combat the Purifiers that want to burn the Mojave back to the Old World ways.

With the Vipers now openly rebelling against Advent, XCOM's fight against Advent seems to have gained momentum. However, as new shadows rise to break the will of the resistance, the Commander himself now finds it difficult to maintain his high confidence and will. With a growing sense of self doubt, can the Commander fight not only Advent, but also to keep his humanity?

Sometimes I wished this never happened. sometimes I would pray to God wishing that it wasn't real...but it happened. I was put in a video game called X-Com 2 and what happened to me...changed my life for good. I was turned into some crazy alien and was almost forced to do horrendous things...but I refused. I deserted their cause and decided to fight them for what they have done.

Tim is a simple desk worker who got a promotion to work as the assistant of an Advent Commander. Commander Tassali is a viper with an agenda of her own. How will the two survive dealing with the other, and more importantly, who'll snap first.

XCOM continues to battle even after five years of being re birthed, under the command of it's greatest Commander. Yet while war rages on against Earth's 'guests', another war is beginning to stir. The war for Earth continues, but the war to understand one another is about to begin, as a nervous and fearful Viper struggles to understand her undiscovered feelings toward a ranger.

The aliens have thwarted the earthen military's and now bring peace to the planet. But bullets and plasma won't save the humans from there assimilation, the mind is a powerful thing, and a certain alien will help a human in unlocking the potential to save everyone, no matter how long it will take.