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"And here we...go!"

~The Joker, The Dark Knight

Chapter Fifty-five: Deep Breath

"Move!" John Bradford fairly hauled Charlotte out of the way. She stumbled into the far wall - then flattened herself against it when Shen and Tygan raced past, pushing their gurney at a dead run. Volk and Betos made up the rear, while soldiers peeled out of the bar to join the impromptu procession.

"Get the hell out of the way!" Bradford pitched Liang out of the way next, then bulldozed through the hissing pneumatic doors at the entrance to the infirmary. "Doc!"

"What happened?" The nurse bounded from her office, sheet-white. "Did he fall?"

"The Commander's entered cardiac arrest. He's having a goddamn heart attack." Bradford grabbed the gurney and hauled it into the center of the room. Shen and Tygan hovered, but he just grabbed at Gallant's shirt, snapping his combat knife from its sheath on his shoulder to start cutting. "Stabilize him!"

"I...oh, Lord..." She scrambled to her cabinets of medical supplies. "I don't...we don't..."

"Fix him!" Bradford finished cutting open Gallant's shirt, and he exposed the Commander's chest. Gallant didn't fight him, which frightened Bradford more than anything else: he was still, so still...

"Let me get my ECG gear-"

"He's in cardiac arrest, there's no time for that!" Shen grabbed random drawers and yanked them out of their housings. "He needs treatment, not a test. Are you a doctor or not?"

"I'm not..." The nurse's face paled even further. "I've never done this before-"

"Move, you stupid bimbo!"

A redheaded thunderbolt nearly flung the nurse off her feet, and then it tore into her medical supplies like a whirlwind. Bradford reached up to catch a long wire flung his way.

"Vital scanner. Fingertip!" Julie Richardson swept up a bottle and a syringe, and then she was back with both in hand. She tossed the former to the next person close to hand, who happened to be Tygan. "Aspirin. See if you can get him to swallow some of that." She kicked the nurse on the shin, none-too-gently. "If you've got any morphine or weed, now would kick ass."

"Hang in there, Commander." Bradford fixed the vital scanner to Gallant's finger, and a monitor beeped to life.

"What are you doing?" Shen demanded, as Julie inserted the syringe into Gallant's arm. The psi-op waved dismissively.

"Clotbuster. Now hush." She glanced up at the monitor. "Come on, let the drugs flow through you. Don't make me go to coronary agnioplasty-"

"Morphine!" The nurse hurried over with a syringe of it, and Julie plucked it from her hand without a word. She injected it, then dispatched the nurse on the hunt for more clotbusters.

"He's not swallowing," Tygan reported. He glanced up at the monitor. "His vitals are dropping. He's-"

Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep!

"Oh, fuck." Bradford clutched the edge of the gurney as the single loud tone he knew from shitty medical dramas filled the infirmary. "He's flatlining-"

"Can the panic or get out of my ward, old man." Julie checked the monitor herself, face screwing up. "Shit. Defibrilator!"

"We don't have one!"

"What?" Bradford nearly seized the nurse then and there. "What kind of infirmary is this?"

"We're not an ER, Central...we...we had to prioritize treatment for the wounded! We don't see a lot of heart attacks-"

"Get Junior up here!" Shen slapped Charlotte on the arm. "Or your GREMLIN. Maybe its shock can-"

"Not enough time. Fucking hell, this is shit!" Julie's eyes flashed purple, then glowed. "We lost how many people finding you?" She raised her hands, and Bradford had to take a step back as violet lightning arced between her fingers. "I don't care that you're a stuck-up arrogant prick, jackass, you're my stuck-up arrogant prick!"

She brought her palms down on his chest, and Gallant jerked as purple psi-energy shot over his whole body. Bradford shook, and Shen quivered.

"You're not fucking getting out of the job you hate this easily!" Julie shocked him again, then again, manic light filling her eyes. "She did not keep your stupid ass out of the grave for so long just for you to check out on a whim, dick!"

Julie's hands came down again, harder and more firmly. Enough power shot over Gallant's body that Bradford had to cover his eyes.

"Richardson, you're gonna kill him!" he cried. "Stand down-"

Beep! Beep!

"Moira!" Gallant jerked convulsively, and Bradford lunged to catch his shoulder. Julie waved the lightning on her fingers away, and she grabbed Gallant's other arm.

"He's responding!" She grabbed the aspirin bottle. "Take this-"

"Moira-"

Bradford's jaw dropped when Julie slapped the Commander. Gallant's eyes glazed over, but he did quiet, staring at her in an entirely new light.

"Take the goddamn pills before I have to force-feed you." She offered the bottle, and Gallant mechanically reached for it. The redhead abandoned him to the task, stepping back and waving her hand until purple billowed around her face like a mask. She pursed her lips. "Stress-induced. Vitals are returning to normal. The busters are clearing it all up."

"And how do you know that without an X-ray?" the nurse demanded. Julie gave her a scathing sidelong look.

"I'm not dignifying that with a response." She lowered her hand. "Bed rest. And he doesn't spend a moment alone from here on out. He could have another attack at any moment."

"I'm not made of glass-"

"You're doped up on morphine and clotbusters, Commander: you don't get a say in these decisions." Julie leaned on the gurney, hair scattering around her face as she breathed out. "Put him in his room and move the medical gear up there. Anything happens, call me first."

Gallant's head thumped back down. He stared at the ceiling, and Bradford could only watch as his eyes hazed and glinted.

"Sir-"

"Just take me off and shut up." Gallant deliberately turned his head. "It doesn't matter anymore, does it?"

"Sir." Sylvie poked her head in, while Shen and Tygan took Gallant's gurney. "Central, Firebrand is on approach. Menace is standing by for debrief."

"Stupid piece of cow shit..."

"Shen can build you a better one." Jane examined the spindly knee joint in Irina's prosthetic leg. "Yeah, this is crappy. I would have expected Advent to make something that wasn't total-"

"They wanted it to break. It made me more dependent on them, and reduced the chance of my escaping. If you hadn't brought this ship in, I wouldn't have made it." Irina looked around the Skyranger's drop bay, wonder temporarily eclipsing the other lights in her eyes. "You really moved up in the world, Jane."

"Yeah." She shook her head. "Irina...I don't know how you could have survived that explosion."

"Makes two of us, doesn't it? But here I am, ornery as ever." She shifted her weight. "They told me you were dead."

"I helped Central extract the Commander from Paris." If Jane lived to be a hundred and five - as if - she would never stop being proud of that. "I was the first one into the black site in Switzerland."

"And you're very modest about it."

"This little catch-up session is nice and all, but..." Aileen glanced from one member of the crew to the next. "Just what the hell are we supposed to tell Gallant and Bradford? About..."

"You did everything you could." Mox put a hand on her shoulder. "No one here questions your ability as a medic."

"He's going to flip his shit." Fatima crossed her arms. She scowled, leaning against the drop bay door. "Gallant's never been the type to take bad news well. I bet he had a heart attack."

"Fatima." Zhang looked up, and there was warning in his eyes. "Don't speak of such things. Didn't you notice that he dropped off comms after Vahlen..."

Jane jumped. "Shit. Do you think he really..."

"Maybe we won't have to report to him after all," Dragunova mused. She got a pass. One, she was wounded, high on painkillers, and leaning on Mox's shoulder. Two, she could probably still kick Jane's ass, so she wasn't going to say anything.

"Nothing's ever broken that man before, much as he likes to piss and moan." Zhang stood. "He'll be fine."

"Unlike me."

"Aileen, no one blames you." Jane scoffed. "You did the best you could do under the circumstances."

"Yeah, so did Mariah, and look at her now."

Jane's veins flushed with ice. "Central won't."

"What happened tonight was a hundred times worse than anything Mariah ever did." Aileen's eyes filled with dark premonition. "Shit rolls downhill."

"Central won't. Won't." Jane's fists clenched. "He'd better not try it."

"This isn't helping anything." Mox paused to glance at Dragunova. "Firebrand, how much longer?"

"We're on approach now." She keyed her com. "Firebrand on approach. The word of the day is Horatius. How copy, over?"

"Five by five, Firebrand. Horatius it is." That was Shen's voice, not Bradford's. "Your end?"

"Five by five, Avenger, but I'm picking up an audio distortion. Sounds like metal fatigue. Channel thirteen."

"I'll have someone look into it."

"I'm very curious." Irina couldn't stand on her own, so she tried to crane her neck to peer out the windshield. "I've heard a lot about the Avenger, but I've never seen her."

"Just you wait." Jane reached over to put a hand on her shoulder. "Just you wait."

Meysam Saleh paused. "Hey, Corporal."

"That's no longer accurate." Mariah Bradford continued mopping, eyes locked on the trail of cleaning fluid she left behind with every stroke. "I don't have a rank anymore."

"Well, whatever may be the case in that department-"

"Don't take my word for it, Meysam: take Central's-"

"That's hardly relevant to-"

"I don't need everyone looking after me!" Mariah's eyes darkened, and now she deliberately turned her shoulder. "I'm fine! It is what it is, and if it's what's necessary for the war, Central was right to do it. I'm not a baby who needs coddling-"

"Mariah!" Meysam cleared his throat. "Mariah, I'm sorry, bu this has nothing to do with you!"

"...what?" She finally looked his way...and paused. "...Meysam?"

"It's not for you, it's for me. I'm selfish, that's the truth of it." He held up the bottle and glasses he'd brought from below. "If you can be spared from your action station for fifteen minutes, I thought I would enjoy having a drink with you."

"...selfish, huh?" Mariah slowly leaned her mop against the wall. "That's not usually how you're supposed to ask a girl for a drink."

"Most girls I've talked to don't start yelling at me for insinuating I'm not selfish."

"I'm more trouble than I'm worth."

"You're a woman: that comes with the territory."

"Yet here you are."

"Are we going to stand here in the hall until Angelis personally comes a-matchmaking, or are we going to drink?" Meysam gestured with the bottle. "It's good stuff - well, as good as you can get on the Avenger. It's a lot better than the best I ever wooed with back in Syria."

"I'm on-duty-"

"You're mopping the corridor. I'm dead positive that your taking ten won't cost us the war." Meysam did pause to give a show of thinking about it, thought. "If you think differently, though, maybe I should grab a mop and help."

"Oh, all right! You win." Mariah shot a worried glance over her shoulder. "I just hope..."

"How much of an enophile are you?" Whatever Meysam had to do to get Bradford off of his daughter's mind, he would do it in a heartbeat. As long as she was thinking about Central, she would be anxious and tense. Not to mention she wouldn't be thinking about him. Maybe he was more selfish than not. At least he didn't pretend otherwise.

"Enophile?" She frowned. Meysam wished she'd let her curls fall free like she had in her soldiering days - a neat little bun made her look about ten years older and appropriately devoid of personality.

"Means wine-lover."

"Big word. I like big words." She taste-tested that one for a moment. "I don't think I've ever drunk wine before, to be honest."

"You-" Meysam sighed. "I keep forgetting how young you are."

A flash of Mariah appeared in her eyes, if only for a moment. "Guess that makes you a pervert, huh?"

"You know what, Bradford?" Meysam stuck his tongue out, and she made as if to grab her mop.

Then they laughed. And Meysam handed her a glass, and he pulled the cork from the bottle.

They never got the chance to drink.

"Oh...good Lord, Sylvie, that hits the spot." Julie made a catlike noise, reflexively throwing her head back. She inhaled, relishing the moment. "Why don't you do this for me more often?"

"Because you insist on cooking everything yourself, American." Sylvie, seated at Julie's right, waited until she'd collected herself before forking up another bite of her homemade waffles and proffering it. Julie bit it off in a flash, and then she was all in heaven again.

"You two are beyond disgusting. Get a psi-cubicle." Shen shot them a rude gesture on top of everything else.

"Go back to your room of robots. Program a GREMLIN to make you feel better." Julie gave the finger right back.

"Bah." The engineer scoffed, then returned to her work station monitoring Avenger's diagnostics. Around them, the bridge chuckled. Ribbing aside, they gave Julie and Sylvie space. They also muttered about what had happened in the infirmary, and that was embarrassing.

"Do you two know how many fraternization regs you're breaking right now?"

"Sixteen." Sylvie forked up another bite, and Julie wasn't stupid enough to turn it down. "Any more foolish questions, Central?"

Bradford let out a strangled chuckle. "You are unflappable, Richard."

"No. I just pretend very well."

"Yeah, she convinced the entire ship she wasn't-" Julie showed the sense to shut up right there, before Sylvie's warning eye could become something a lot worse. She cleared her throat. "Anyway. Central. Do you need something?"

"I..." He shifted his weight. "I just wanted to thank you. For what you did in the medbay earlier."

"It's..." Julie coughed. "I probably humiliated our poor nurse."

"She'll get over it. And so will the Commander, all thanks to you." Bradford let out a low sigh. "I know...I'm not the best suited to say this, but..."

"You're scaring me." Julie braced. "Mop duty?"

"No!" He bit back down on himself a moment later. "I just wanted to say you reminded me a lot of your aunt, that's all. Penny would have done exactly what you did."

"I mean, I'd think so. She's the one who taught me." Julie, cheeks hot, studied her shoes very intently. "She'd have done it better. She was with him for years. I've got months, maybe."

"That may be, but she'd be proud of you." Bradford hesitantly reached out and patted Julie's shoulders. "It may not be my place to say it, but-"

"Central, you're the one who took care of me for those years after Aunt Penny..." Julie cleared her throat. "She's all I had, and after she died, that left me with-"

"I'm proud of you, Julie." Bradford took his own turn to clear his throat. "You've really done well here."

"Well, thank you, sir." Awkward was one thing, but this was another level. Unbidden, her mind flicked back to her brownie-conversation with Mariah, and Julie licked her lips. "Uh, sir..."

"Julie?"

"I..." She braced herself, drawing on Sylvie's presence for strength even if her girlfriend had no idea what was about to happen. "The thing about all that..."

She never got the chance to finish her thought.

"You look well, considering what just happened, Commander."

"Thanks for the fucking..." Gallant broke off, massaging his chest. "I don't know what Julie did with her witchery, but I don't recall being this spry after a heart attack before."

"Modern medicine is more developed than that of our time." Shaojie Zhang sat backwards on Gallant's bedroom chair, while the Commander himself lounged in his bed, propped up by fifteen thousand pillows. "I'm quite hale for having been rescued last night."

"Maybe." Gallant left it there, because he had more to worry about. "Moira."

"Ah, yes." Zhang shifted his weight. "My condolences, Commander. She was my friend too."

"Hm." Gallant fought the pain pricking at the backs of his eyes, and he fought the shaking in his hands and shoulders. He focused on the Heavy to the exclusion of all else, from agony to weakness to thought, and all that mattered were the simple questions. "Where are the rest of her resources?"

"There are none, Commander. She pulled everything together in Poland, and when the Hunter struck, that was everything we had."

"Fuck." Gallant growled under his breath. Business, that was the key: that would keep his mind off of the fact that the only woman he would ever love was... "Your team? Fatima only knew about Said."

"Annette is dead, Commander." Haunted light filled Zhang's eyes. "I know because I killed her." With a few terse sentences, he explained himself.

"Damn it." Gallant thought of some of his own experiences in Iraq. "I like to think I'd have had the guts to do the same thing."

"War. War hardens us all." Zhang shifted his weight. "Marcel and Matthew are dead as well. Carlock and Van Doorn."

"Whatever happened to Hutch?"

"He helped us set up the base, but Advent caught on to him before too long. Shadow Man sent us in to extract him, but we were too late. He blew himself up to avoid being taken alive." Zhang sighed. "That was the op when we lost Malin Larsen."

"Shit." Gallant contemplated the few broken tools in his arsenal. No Moira...no Furies, no Annette...just Fatima and a badly scarred Zhang. "What did they want from you?"

"They asked general questions. Confirming that they'd eliminated the Doctor's cell, mostly. I didn't know she was in the same facility."

"What's the next move?" Gallant leaned forward. "The aliens have never played softball. A body in motion stays in motion, and a force on the attack remains on the attack unless repulsed by a stiff defense. Where are they going next?"

"I don't know for certain. I know they took Dragunova to Data Extraction - the torture center. She might be able to tell you more." Zhang paused. "The Warlock interrogated her personally at least twice."

"The Warlock..." Gallant bit his lip. "That son of a bitch has been all over my ops for months."

"And the Doctor's. Of all the Chosen, I think he is the most dangerous." Zhang paused. "That's what put us under Advent's hammer, actually."

"Come again?" Gallant frowned.

"Just before the base assault..." Zhang let out a low breath. "We recovered intel that pinpointed the location of the Warlock's hideaway: on a remote island in the South Pacific. And we deduced how to breach the security protocols and enter."

"You what?" Gallant's eyes widened. His grief melted quickly into obsessive rage. "You mean to tell me-"

He never got the chance to finish the sentence.

"Anything?" Cameron Rogers stood in the hangar bay, partner in crime on his left. Together, they admired the sky outside of the great viewscreen.

"No. I don't think it's Kelly, and I really don't think it's Central." Da-Xia Liang ground her teeth. "Leaves the Shens, really: the Shens, Kipler, and Tygan."

"We focus on Kipler next, then. What brought him here, what makes him tick...he's the most likely suspect." Cameron thrust his hands into his pockets. "I don't trust strangers bearing gifts. He comes in out of nowhere...he could have sold us out."

"He could have." Liang nodded judiciously. "I'll dig through his refuse."

"I'll tail him around the ship, see where he goes."

"We meet again in two days with results. Or if we find anything."

"And the codeword is rainbow." Cameron shrugged. "I just picked one at random."

"I'll try to remember it if I've been coerced." Liang hesitated. "Cameron...suppose we do find out that we were set up?"

He grunted. "The Commander-"

"Is not in his right mind or best health."

"Central-"

"-could be the agent. Not to mention Mariah."

Cameron let out a low breath. "We settle it ourselves. Maybe bring Captain Kelly on board. Or Mariah herself."

"It's something." Liang's jaw worked. "Cameron...something's wrong. There's a spy on the ship and the op in Canada went to hell..."

"I know." He made sure his pistol was still holstered under his jacket, even if it violated every regulation the Armory had. "Liang-"

"Wait." She caught his arm. "Let me get something off my chest first."

"What?" Cameron turned-

She kissed him. She popped up on tip-toe and put her lips to his, and for a moment there they stood.

"...what?" Cameron blinked, reaching up to touch his mouth the instant she let go. "Liang-"

"I hope that's not a problem." She managed a tight smile.

"Well..."

He never got the chance to respond.

"Wait." Cameron stared out the rear viewscreen, and he narrowed his eyes. "Liang..."

"What?" She blinked. "I'm sorry...Cameron, I didn't mean-"

"No...no!" He frowned harder. "I could have sworn I saw..."

"Target is locked, Mighty Hunter. All weapons systems are at full capacity."

"Can I borrow them for a moment?" He popped another lemon drop, thumbs flying as he worked on his datapad. "Curse the hole you spawned from, Pinky!"

The weapons tech seemed more than a little nonplussed. "General?"

"Yes." Din Dourde cleared her throat. "Sir?"

"Oh, yes. What's the movie quote?" He cleared his throat. "'You may fire when ready.'"

"Very well." The reference went right over Dourde's head, which was probably for the best. She turned to the weapons tech, and her eyes went to the silhouette on the targeting screen. "All forward EMP batteries, on my mark."

Her lips parted as she examined the Avenger, docile and defenseless and in her sights.

"Fire."

Author's Note 55: Best Mission Ever

I realize I'm in the minority, but I love this mission. Base defense has that thrill of death and devastation to make it matter more than your aggressive field ops. I wish it could happen more than once per game.

I've always suspected XCOM's on-board medical team must be incompetent. How else do you explain a soldier getting nicked by a single shot for 1 damage...and needing 30 days in the infirmary? Bullshit, all of it. Clearly he's malingering to hit on the cute nurse.

Now, the elephant in the room: you all know that, no matter what happens next, the Avenger is getting off the ground, otherwise this fic is over - although I did have an idea for an XCOM fic based on the aliens taking the ship and the survivors of the Resistance fleeing into the wilds. If you want to write that, consider it a prompt: I'm not doing it.

What you don't know? Exactly who's coming off the ground with the ship.

I'll leave you to mull over that.

Until next time, Vigilo Confido.