Please remember to favorite and follow!

"Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows."

~William Shakespeare

Chapter Thirty-one: Templar

"Good morning, Commander. 3:42 in the morning, to be precise."

Gallant did not commonly have visitors at such hours. Gallant did not commonly have visitors at all, actually, outside of his office. Bradford and occasionally Tygan were the only people who disturbed him here, in his sanctum of rest.

And he didn't think anyone had visitors whose voices they'd never heard before...coming while Avenger was in flight over the Atlantic Ocean.

"...good morning." Terribly stupid, but it was all he could think of. Of itself, his hand crawled under his pillow.

"Commander, I assure you that won't be-"

"Won't it?" Gallant sat up, and in the dark he leveled the original prototype for the first XCOM's laser pistol at the shape perched in his armchair. "You have until the count of ten to explain who you are and what you're doing here."

"Or?" She almost sounded like a man, with her voice that deep, but something about the scoff and the toss of her head reminded Gallant powerfully of his sisters.

They're dead, he reminded himself quite shortly. Move on and stop thinking about them or you're going to drive yourself even more nutty than you already are.

"Ten," was his best response. "Nine."

She sighed. "I'm not here to kill you."

"I notice you didn't say you're unarmed."

"I think you and I both know that no one is ever unarmed so long as she has her brain."

"One can try." Gallant shrugged slightly. "And no one with a brain and a laser pistol is unarmed either."

"I suppose." She leaned back, crossing her ankles and resting her elbows on the arms of his chair. "My name is Janet Ross."

"And is that supposed to mean something to me?"

"No, but the name of my master might."

Gallant's eyes narrowed. "Geist?"

Silence. She shifted her weight. "You are clever, aren't you?"

"Not really. It was down to Geist or the Elders - I had a fifty-fifty shot and I took it." Gallant didn't lower the pistol. "I also figured if you served the Chosen, you wouldn't have woken me up before killing me."

Ross remained silent for a moment. "He has been watching you from afar."

"I'm sure he has. I've heard some interesting stories."

"Commander, you should know that the Templars are tempted to provide support for your organization." She was putting all her cards on the table, without a shred of remorse. Gallant respected that...and he smelled bad medicine coming. "Some of them. Tempted."

"What's the problem?" He frowned. "We have a common enemy."

"You are allied to some of our enemies."

"Oh. Betos and Volk."

"The Skirmishers are Advent." Ross ground that word out with real anger and revulsion, and Gallant suspected it crawled up her face even in the dark. "To treat with them as if they were men, and to join hands with them in the face of their depravity..."

"It's war." Gallant had very little remorse himself. "You make alliances to win wars. Stalin was just as bad as Hitler - some say worse. But the American and British governments allied with him."

"And look how that turned out."

"Let me put this another way." Gallant drew equally on his knowledge of military geopolitical history and his father's science fiction collection. "You sound American?" His tone made it a question.

"Mississippi."

"Your state, along with a few others, rebelled against the authority of the United States government in 1861."

"Yes, I know this." Irritation crept into her tone. "The world has not lost its past for Advent's invasion, Commander-"

"It's not the fact that the South lost that interests me. It's the how." Gallant took a breath. "Britain and France were inclined to support the Confederacy - both to secure their cotton imports and to lay the upstart USA low. But successful diplomacy on Lincoln's part kept them out of the war, combined with their distaste for some of the South's...practices. As a result, the South lost." He gave that a moment to sink in. "Now, I'm from California, so I say good riddance and well done to that little episode in economic delusion and inhumanity. But if the British and French hadn't allowed their opinions of the South to intervene..."

Ross remained quiet. "You suggest an alliance of convenience."

"No. I suggest that your master meditate on what he and my allies have in common. Volk's a pain in the ass, but he and his know the back roads and paths better than anyone. Betos isn't the most charming to look at, but her kind fight harder than half a dozen lesser warriors, and they have the kind of honor that would put a samurai to shame."

Ross made a noncommittal noise. "We will consider this. But do not allow yourself much tempted hope."

"You are a ray of sunshine."

"Says the man pointing a gun."

"What?" Gallant blinked, then glanced at his hands. Belatedly, he realized he'd never lowered the pistol. "Well-"

"Resume your sleep, Commander." Ross rose, and her darkened shape turned and swept across his quarters. "We will meet again."

"Hey!" Gallant threw the pistol aside, kicking off his covers. "Hey, I don't know if you figured this out, but that's my closet door-" He sighed when she marched right in anyway. Muttering under his breath, Gallant leaned on the wall and the various items of furniture he'd deliberately spaced around the room for just this purpose until he'd reached the sliding door.

He wasn't sure what he expected to find. Some kind of portal hovering between his undershirts? A commune of Templars hiding on the other side of a hidden panel? Ross, confused and trying to look serene about her wrong turn? A big wardrobe?

He knew what he wasn't expecting to find: absolutely nothing. Even when Gallant flicked on the light, grabbed his cane, and tapped the walls to check for echoes, he found absolutely nothing out of place.

"I need a panic button," he muttered. "I need a panic button, and Junior on standby in the hallway."

"My head still hurts."

"I'm sorry." Julie patted Sylvie's shoulder, while the ravenette massaged her temple. "Anything I can do?"

"No." Oh, she sounded miserable. Julie eyed her face, bathed in purple light glinting from the psi-lab's many gentle lights. Sylvie turned, gaze haunted and full. "I still see his face. His leer. He was taking what he wanted from me...just...just ripping it out..."

"I'll kill him," Julie promised. "I'll kill him in some extremely painful way. Unless you beat me to him."

"I do not think he will be so easy to kill. He had similarities with l'Assassin." Her accent turned the final I into an O. Julie thought it made her friend sound quite sophisticated.

"In the end, she went down too." The redhead scoffed over the sound of a psi-reader beeping for attention. "We'll get him. You and me, together: we'll make him regret laying hands on you. No one lays hands on you."

Sylvie glanced over her shoulder. Julie missed the glint in her eye. "You are laying hands on me right now, n'est ces pas?"

"Not...not like that..." Julie coughed. "Do you want me to stop? Because I can stop." She pulled her hand from the Frenchwoman's shoulder. "I wasn't thinking...I was just trying to be friendly. Sorry if-"

"Gotcha." Sylvie grinned. "You stammer, American."

"Only because you made me nervous!" Julie's next touch was a gentle punch to the shoulder. "Damn, woman. You freaked me out."

"Do not be concerned. You may lay hands on me any time you like." A moment later, Sylvie's cheeks flushed to something near the color of Julie's hair. "I mean...that sounded..."

"Now who's stammering?" Julie studiously pretended she wasn't as red as the lying reflection in the glass tried to make her believe. "People in glass houses..."

"This is a cell, even if it is made of glass-"

"Sylvie!" That was Hiroshi, bumbling and big as always, hurrying in with mustachios aquiver. "You have a visitor from the Commander!"

"He does not wish to make this trip himself?" She didn't sound hostile, merely curious. Hiroshi shrugged.

"Something about a break-in. Beats me. We were in flight over the Atlantic all last night."

"Where are we now?" Julie asked. Gossip about the ship's location was pretty common, but Hiroshi was high enough in the Know that he usually...knew.

"Black Sea!" Sure enough, he delivered as always. "On our way to some godforsaken little backwater in Korea, I think. Something about it's got the Commander's attention."

"Capital." Julie liked that word, and liked affecting an English accent to go along with it.

"You shouldn't do that. You're bad at it."

"Sergeant!" Julie snapped to attention. Sylvie was a little slower, but she also saluted as Elena Dragunova entered, mask forgone but trench coat still rustling around her. Belatedly, Julie realized she'd probably entered right along with Hiroshi, and neither psi-op had seen her because she was just that kickass.

I should have paid more attention to my sixth sense, she chastised herself. You could be going into combat soon! Don't forget things like that!

Sure enough, that was where Dragunova opened, after waving them back to a seat. She claimed a chair of her own, straddling it to sit backwards. "With Sylvie currently out of action, Julie, you realize you're back in the firing line as XCOM's only psionic?"

"I'll survive." She'd meant it flippantly, but Sylvie's stricken look convinced her she'd failed.

"I protest," the ravenette cut in quickly. "What about my request to be returned to active status?"

"I'm afraid we can't do that." Dragunova was at least gentle about it. She produced a cigarette, then showed one of the reasons why, despite her abrasiveness, she was relatively popular among the soldiers. "Anyone?"

"I don't smoke," Julie told her. "But thank you." Sylvie shook her head.

"Suit yourselves." The Russian paused to light up. She took a pull, and the end of her cigarette glowed the brightest orange to contrast the purple pallor. "The Commander isn't sure, Sylvie, that the Warlock isn't still in your head somewhere."

"The psi-reader says she's clear," Hiroshi notified the Reaper, bending over to check the device. "Clean as a whistle."

"We're dealing with heretofore-unknown abilities and strengths. Until you've been under observation for a little longer, we can't be positive that it would be safe." Dragunova shrugged. "I'm sorry, Sylvie. Your request was denied at the top."

"But..." She lapsed into her native tongue for a moment, which no one else in the room understood. Julie, listening to the note in her friend's voice, decided that she was probably fortunate she didn't.

"Is there anything you remember?" Dragunova breathed a cloud of smoke into the air, which made Julie grateful for the cell's glass. She appreciated the Reaper's kindness, but her aunt had drilled a merciless distaste for tobacco into her very bones. Medical professionals were like that.

"He was taking things." Sylvie had repeated that phrase a few times in her complaints to Julie, but she elaborated now in a way that made the redhead kick herself for not prodding. "Under his hand, it was like certain thoughts kept...flying to the surface. If I thought about it, he took it."

"Took it?" That was Hiroshi, while Dragunova frowned. "It's gone?"

"Not...gone...just weaker. Like a memory from childhood, even if it was something that happened only moments prior. Fuzzy details, questions lingering in my head about whether it happened in the first place or I invented it." Sylvie shrugged slowly. "He took many things, but there was purpose in his touch. I knew what he wanted, and I tried desperately not to think of it...but not thinking of it was thinking of it, in a way. It was impossible to resist him." She sounded so bitter, so disappointed in herself...

"It's all right." Julie wrapped an arm around her. "It'll be fine, Sylvie. No one could resist under something like that."

"What did he want?" Dragunova's eyes burned cold. "What, specifically?"

Sylvie looked up slowly. Her jaw worked, and she shivered - whether from fear or the chill, Julie didn't know.

"He wants Commander Gallant," the Frenchwoman said. "He wants him, and he's willing to destroy the Avenger to get him."

"Well, this certainly looks intimidating." Jiaying lifted the enormous head sitting on Lily's worktable. "Is that a viper?"

"A viper hopped up on crazy juice, but yeah." Lily herself laid out a set of blueprints, chewing on her lip. "It's part of Design T609."

"Huh?" Jiaying tucked the Viper King's head under her arm, then hurried over. "Oh. Some kind of Serpent Suit."

"That's one way of describing it," Lily allowed. "It's supposed to have a grapple hook, see? And we can convert a combination of the Viper King's recovered venom and Vahlen's frost bomb's internal chemicals-"

"To ice up the line." Jiaying nodded, and Lily delighted in seeing someone else with the same innate understanding of these things. "Weight will be an issue, if you want to add a launching apparatus and keep a reasonable amount of line in the spools. Not to mention a winch mechanism to wind it back in - one that won't jam up easily."

"Yeah, that would be problematic." Lily sighed. "There'll probably only be enough of the juice for one use of the ice shot. That's the bad news."

"The good news is that it looks like it's a quick-fire thing." Jiaying studied Lily's scribbled research notes with a little smile. "Your handwriting hasn't improved since we were kids."

"I've had bigger problems." Lily hesitated. "I...I have to ask..."

"Yes?"

"What about your parents?" She gestured a little helplessly. "I've heard nothing since the end of the war. Do you have a boyfriend?"

"Not anymore." Jiaying's eyes got a little distant. "I had a fiancé for a while - until he was caught up in a raid."

"Oh, no." Lily looked down. "I'm sorry, Jiaying."

"Thanks." There was something in her tone Lily couldn't place, but then her cousin moved on. "As far as I know, my parents are fine, and hopefully they'll stay that way. They're well away from any war zones, I know that for a fact."

"Good." Lily didn't really know how to continue. "It's...it's really nice to have you around again."

"So you've said once or twice." Jiaying turned back to the plans. "I'm sensing a problem with your grand schemes."

"Really? Mine?" Lily scoffed, perversely grateful for the change of topic. "That's a strong accusation."

"Namely, you're using a lot of that...alloy material." Jiaying underlined the metal selection with her fingernail. "Last I checked, you don't have much at all. And it's tied up between different priorities: there's this, there's the EXO project, there's the Predator program..."

"Not to mention expanding the psi-lab, repurposing those Advent turrets in the hold for ship defense, and upgrading our GREMLINs?" Lily laughed dryly...and a little sourly. "There's only so much to go around, and all of these projects are critical. We're going to have to prioritize somewhere. Or..."

Jiaying slowly tilted her head. Lily grinned, and after a moment, her cousin did too.

"Or," the other Shen finally allowed, "you could go get some more."

"Mission Alert! Mission Alert! All hands to General Quarters!"

"Son of a-"

Wham!

Jane Kelly tumbled on her rear, clutching her head. She swore more and more inventively for a long moment, accusing a large swathe of the ship's officer corps of certain highly immoral and anatonomically impossible acts involving their mothers and chryssalids. She chose not to dwell on the fact that said officer corps included her.

"Can't be helped." David studiously ignored her outburst, but she got perverse satisfaction from hearing how irritated he sounded. Still muttering unkind thoughts, the Ranger climbed to her feet.

"Give me that." She swept her shirt from the floor, an instant before the Grenadier could reach it. "And I'll need my trousers too." She stewed as she pushed her arms through the sleeves. "Of all the bloody times..."

"Bradford must have a camera in here," David theorized, grinning as he tossed Jane's remaining clothes. She donned them quickly, pretending not to notice the way he ogled her until she did...and for a bit thereafter. "Man's too uptight and military for the times. I bet we're breaking almost seventy Air Force rules."

"Good." Jane sat on David's bed and pulled her boots on. She paused to massage her head. "Your goddamn table..."

"You're the one who thought the floor was a good enough place to-"

"Yeah, yeah, shut up." Jane stood. "Get dressed and report to the barracks. Stand by for briefing at oh-whenever-the-hell-I-find-out-what's-going-on."

"Yes, ma'am, Captain Kelly." David stood to attention and saluted, which made an interesting picture given his current condition.

"Careful, now," Jane warned, giving him a once-over. "Captain Kelly's not as nice as Jane."

"Good," David echoed, and that made her chuckle as she left the room.

"There's a mission alert going on now." Mariah Bradford threw her shirt on, messing with the buttons as quickly as she could. "I was in the shower, but they say when the alarm goes off...you've got to go. Future me, you're probably laughing at me right now, but if that means we lived, isn't that a good thing?"

Her datapad, recording light blinking, didn't respond. It never responded, which was a mixed bag of good and bad like most things in the brunette's life. She finished with her buttons, then dropped onto her bunk and fished for her boots, skipping half the holes in her hurry to get them laced.

"We're going to be dropping into heavy fire," she predicted, almost giddy. "I've practiced with my sword and I imagine I'm pretty good with it." She pouted for a moment. "I've been told I couldn't name it Glamdring. I wonder if that's what Captain Kelly did - she's the only other Ranger on staff as far as I know. I really wanted to, so I was kind of left at loose ends until I went browsing through the Lord of the Rings - it's so great that the Doctor and the Chief remembered that preserving humanity means preserving its culture, too, in the databanks." She finished with her boots, then grabbed a band and tied her hair back as efficiently as she could. She had to repeat the process three times because her hands shook so badly. "Anyway, I read around a bit, and I hit on some really exciting information that just answered all my questions. So, even if I can't have Glamdring-"

"Bradford!" A heavy knock preceded that. "Get your ass out here, kid! The alert's going!"

"I'm coming!" She turned back to her datapad. "Gotta go." She turned off the recording, stowed her audio diary in her drawer, then raced out into the living quarters common room, skidding past a glowering Sergeant Liang. "I was getting ready!"

"Doing a shitload of talking for getting ready." Yeah, she took no crap from anyone. Scuttlebutt said she carried her incendiary grenade while off-duty, and Mariah wasn't inclined to find out by pissing her off. Hell, she dressed like a ninja and had the second-place title in the ship's hand-to-hand ring. She and Captain Kelly had never had a bout to prove who was better in all rather than in score, but Mariah wasn't sure she'd put it past the Grenadier.

"Sorry!" Mariah escaped close range as quickly as possible, bolting for the briefing room. She heard the sergeant behind her, muttering something about youth, and it filled her with cheer. Maybe she was inspiring people.

She passed the weapon racks, pausing to eye her shard gun and arc blade. They called to her, but for all she knew, she wasn't on mission. She couldn't just grab them now.

"Finally here, are you?" Lieutenant White wasn't much bigger on shit-taking than Sergeant Liang. "Were you in bed with someone?"

"No!" Mariah's heart nearly stopped. "Why would I...who would I..."

"God, rookies." The Australian's features split into a craggy grin. "You're so much fun to pick on."

"I'm not a rookie," Mariah said stiffly.

"Leave it," advised Sergeant Mox, tapping her on the shoulder. "Central's coming in. We're about to find out what this is about."

"Central?" It was far easier to think about him like that, wasn't it? Mariah hurried to join the throng of soldiers taking seats - there was Lieutenant Quinn, there was the redheaded psi-op whose name she still didn't know...oh, there was Charlotte! She sat quietly, with murder written in her eyes, and Mariah thought twice about sharing a row with her.

"Thought you weren't coming." Lieutenant Quinn nodded to Mariah's father as he marched in. "You're late, sir."

"Late to my own party? Impossible." Bradford scoffed. "Morning, Mox."

"Good morning, Central." The Skirmisher nodded politely. "I am ready to strike a blow against the Elders."

"Good. We need more of that around here." Bradford almost physically ground to a halt after the former Advent soldier. "...Squaddie."

"...Central." Mariah bit down a nervous gulp. Instead, she snapped to attention. "I mean, Central, sir."

"I saw your name request." He nodded, a little slowly. "Glamdring is taken, but I like the thought."

"I've heard, sir." Mariah fidgeted. "I, uh, came up with another idea."

"Anduril?"

"No, sir. Uh." She reached up to rub at the back of her head. "Narya."

"Really?" Oh, God, he got the reference! Her father was a Tolkien fan too? "That's good. I like it. Pity it can't set anyone on fire."

"Ah, yes, sir. Pity." Mariah cleared her throat. "I, um..."

"All right." Bradford turned his back on her, and she distinctly thought that was a bit of relief in his tone. Mariah exhaled as surreptitiously as she could. Compared to the ordeal of talking to her father...what was fighting a few aliens? "Sergeant Mox will take command. What we have is a supply raid. Resistance hit an Advent train, its route provided by information delivered by our new engineer, Jiaying Shen."

"Sit down!" Lieutenant White urged under his breath, and Mariah jumped.

"Oh, shit...yeah, sorry..." She took a seat in between the giant hairy Australian and the giant hairy Scotsman, which wasn't exactly her favorite idea in the world.

"The train is carrying a large supply of alien alloys and elerium crystals, in addition to other resources." Bradford looked grave and serious, standing on the little raised platform before the benches, XCOM flag hanging behind him, hands clasped with military precision. "I once again remind all of you of the prohibition on use of elerium crystals as a recreational substance." Was he glaring in particular at anyone specific? Mariah wasn't sure. "We will drop in, secure the area from the alien response force, and bring the materials back to Firebrand for extraction."

"It's gonna be cramped," warned the pilot herself, and Mariah turned her head to see her leaning casually in the doorway, in full flight gear and helmet. "Cargo compartment's not that big, so you'll be sitting on alien who-knows-what on the return trip. Maybe it'll explode if you fart on it."

"Yes. Thank you, Firebrand." Bradford looked like he wished he could shoot her on the spot. "You are a credit to the organization." He moved on quickly. "As I said, Sergeant Mox is in command. This is because Advent is deploying high-level scanners on the area - facial recognition scanners that will detect any of our more notorious personnel before they have the chance to get the drop on the aliens. That rules out Captain Kelly or any of our Lieutenants."

"Then why the hell'd you drag me out of bed?" White grumbled, but it was under his breath so Mariah supposed that was all right.

"I will lead this mission to glory and victory," Mox promised, before rising and hurrying to the forefront of the room. "Who is coming with me?"

"I'll leave that to you, Sergeant."

"Very well." Mox ignored the rush of words that flew at him, impossible to separate into component parts. Mariah didn't join in, but she did hover on the edge of her seat, biting her lip and trying not to bounce up and down with her hand in the air. Mox waved to two soldiers quickly. "Outrider and Warlock Richardson."

Up went the Reaper and the psi-op. Mariah swallowed.

"Cameron Rogers." Mox waved to the Canadian. "We could use your sharpshooting."

"Who else?" Bradford asked, while Rogers hurried to the front. "We don't have that many people who won't trip Advent's scanners."

"I would like to volunteer." That was Mordecai, the new Reaper. He came to his feet, saluting. "I can offer much in the way of support."

"I already have one Reaper," Mox said. "Two would hardly be fair to our enemies." A general murmur of mirth ran through the room, and the Skirmisher continued more seriously. "I would like to take Rookie MacLeod. There is no time like the present for your first action."

"Finally!" The Scotsman bounded to his feet. "I've been stuck on this ship for thirty whole-"

"And me!" Mariah couldn't hold it in anymore, and she bounced to her feet. "I want to go!"

Bradford's eye twitched. "Now, I know that-"

"Actually, I believe a Ranger would be the perfect rounding for my team."

Silence descended like a cloud. Bradford's gaze turned to Mox, and his large eyes remained steady as he met the XO's gaze.

"You...do?" Was Mariah imagining it, or was her father's tone that of a man who sincerely hoped Mox was playing a joke?

"I do." No such note in his voice. "She is my choice, Central." Was that a bit of rebuke?

"Yes!" Mariah coughed a second later, as all eyes turned to her, and her face heated on cue. "I mean, yes, I'll go. I'm ready and willing. It's what I came here to do."

Her father wanted to protest. Mariah's gut churned for a moment - was he going to overrule her and Mox? She quivered with rage just at the thought. Who did he think he was?

"...very well." Maybe Bradford suspected Gallant would have words for him if he did any such thing. Maybe he did actually think Mox was right. Maybe Mariah had imagined all of his hesitation and it was all tactical.

Maybe. But it didn't matter, because she was going into action. She wanted to crow at the thought.

"Gear up," Bradford ordered, and his gaze lingered on her. "It's time to go to war."

Author's Note 31: On the Art and Science of What I Do

So, let's diverge from comments on XCOM as a game, and do something I should do more of. Teaching. No, don't leave!

For those of you who are prospective writers, I want to highlight one thing in particular: literally every scene in this chapter serves a purpose for the overall metaplot of Season Two, and in some cases the entire fanfic. Yes, I have rough ideas for S3 and S4 already in mind. God willing, S4 is going to be the last season, but I haven't ruled out a bit of creep into a fifth - though that decision will be made in S4, so likely well into 2019.

Some of these scenes are funny. Some are romantic. Others are badass. Less on that last in this chapter than some, but go back to Season One. I'm going to cite Evangeline's subplot: literally the first thing I conceived of about her character was her death. Every single other scene - which were all but one added after I had written the rest of those chapters, by the way - was done entirely to drum up audience sympathy to give weight to Evangeline's murder. Every one of those scenes serves a purpose on the road to her death. Go back and look! If you study them, you'll pick out the step-by-step of the plot fairly easily. Study some other scenes and you'll find the same is true for Jane and Gallant, at least in large part.

Bear that in mind: if you're keeping a scene because it's funny? Kill it. Because it's badass? Kill it. Because it's romantic/sweet? Kill it. It's only worth keeping if it contains a fundamental plot step or two...and if it has those other traits in addition to that, that's as it should be. But in and of themselves, emotional responses are not reasons to keep scenes.

Until next time, Vigilo Confido.