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"'Cause I've got friends in low places,

Where the whiskey drowns and the beer chases

My blues away...and I'll be okay..."

~Garth Brooks, "I Got Friends In Low Places"

Chapter Sixty-five: Identities

Wham!

Pratal Mox hit the floor hard, thankful that at least it was padded rather than the direct decking. Bolt patterns jutting up into his skin were not a pleasant thought.

Then there was no time for woolgathering, because someone twisted hard on his wrist.

"Tap, Pratal." Elena Dragunova firmly planted a foot on his chest when he tried to twist out of her hold. "Tap. You're out of options."

"Am I?" Mox drove his knee into the back of hers, throwing her off-balance. That was enough, and he ripped his hand free and finished the sweep in the same motion. She landed even harder than he had. Mox seized her arm, locking her elbow and pushing until she yelped. "Tap, Elena. You are beaten."

"Go to hell, alien scum!"

"At least I have a place where I belong, wasteland drifter."

"You two are dweebs." That made them both pause. Their heads turned as one, and Aileen Quinn paused to very intricately mime priming the Bolt Caster and leveling it. "Bang. Now I can deadlift without getting interrupted by an interspecies courtship ritual."

"Interspecies?" Mox scoffed. "Once I was as human as you. I am enhanced, not alien."

"Yeah?" Aileen leaned back on the bench press, crossing her arms. "I've never met a guy with a name like Pratal."

"Perhaps it was not the name my human mother gave me." Mox shrugged. Aileen's blonde eyebrow clicked up a notch.

"You sound uncertain." She cocked her head to the side. "Who were you before you got modified, then?"

"Hm." Mox probed his memories most carefully. "I do not remember. I suspect the Elders removed those memories as might tempt me into disloyalty after they decided to reward me for service. Ironic, if so. The first thing I remember is awakening in some kind of genetic enhancement facility."

"Yes, it is much the same for me." Across the gym, another face very much like Mox's popped up from its own regimen. "I recall a red facility. One with long hallways lined with modification pods."

"Yes." Mox frowned. "Did we undergo this procedure at the same place, Barta?"

"Either that, or Advent's enhancement facilities are made to the same design." Barta Boktoa frowned thoughtfully, running a finger along her ritual scars. "It is entirely possible and eminently logical."

"When Betos said she was assigning another Skirmisher to the crew, I figured we'd get more badass in the fighty-fight department." Aileen stared at the ceiling for a minute. "I didn't think about how now, there's two of you."

"I do not understand."

"It's nothing, Barta." Mox waved her down. "Aileen is fond of–"

Wham!

"Tap, Pratal!" Dragunova pinned him hard, driving the blade of her arm into his throat. Mox choked, flailing. "You shouldn't have lost focus, but since you did..."

"Girl power!" Aileen beamed. "You're welcome, Outrider."

"I didn't need your help."

"Oh, still being Miss Ice Queen, yeah?" Aileen lay back down on the bench, cracking her knuckles and adjusting the weight. "Did you get enhanced in a facility with long red corridors?"

Mox smacked Dragunova's arm, and she grudgingly relented. He sucked in a long breath. "That was–"

"It was entirely fair and you know it. If you wanted to win, you should have paid attention. Cheating is what the losers whine about to make themselves feel better–"

"...I was going to say it was adroitly done, Elena." Mox rubbed at his throat. "One of the things I admire about Reapers is their willingness to use every advantage and damn the consequences."

"Is that so?" She tilted her head. "At least you're man enough to admit you lost."

"Ew!" Aileen made a show of shivering. "Get a room, dweebs!"

"I believe she is jealous." Barta's lips twitched. "But I am not the best at reading human emotions. This is all very new to me."

"Hah." Aileen turned her head away very deliberately.

"Come on." Dragunova rapped Mox's shoulder. "Another round."

"As you wish." He rose, dusting himself off. "Skirmisher versus Reaper."

Skirmisher. How much of his identity was bound up in that one word?

Questions, questions. Questions like...

Who was I before I became what I am today?

Bang!

"Shit!" Cameron Rogers scowled straight down for ten feet, sticking his hand through the gap in the metal in utterly useless fashion. "Stupid, stupid..."

"Ha, ha!" A brunette head popped out from below another set of metal mid-bolting, and the arm attached to it pointed as if to draw the entire ship's attention to one Canadian in particular. "Look at the dork who can't even hold a ratchet!"

"Can you just pass it up?" Cameron huffed. "It slipped. I'm sweaty."

"Sure, sure. Whatever you say." She pushed herself out into open space, and Cameron couldn't help but watch as she lazily wriggled over to the ratchet in question. Dark ponytail and green t-shirt up top, with every movement pulling a bit more of her ripped-up jeans into view...

"Think fast!"

"Wait!" Cameron yelped, twitching to the side as someone else snagged the ratchet and tossed it all at once. He covered his face when it shot up past him, hit the top of the drop bay, and nearly came back down on his nose. "Fuck you, Liang!"

"That's 'fuck you, Ma'am', Moose." Da-Xia Liang pulled up her welding mask to stick her tongue out. "I outrank you, dork."

"You stole my insult!" Still on the floor, Lilah whacked her on the back of the ankle. "Weren't you supposed to be attaching the stabilizers?"

"Junior's working on that." Liang shrugged. "Figured I'd tell you the rudder wires are still fucked up to high heaven. You stomp on the right pedal and the thrusters engage."

"Amateurs!" Lilah spitted Cameron with a glare. "What the fuck, Moose?"

"How is this suddenly my fault? You're the one who–"

"You didn't stop me, did you?" Lilah had to do a bit more wriggling to make her way out of the low space under the belly, and Cameron enjoyed every minute of it.

"You're supposed to be working, aren't you?" Her green eyes sparkled. "My, my, you're getting lazy."

"Lazy!" Cameron jumped. "Oh, no, I was just...um..." He scooted back over to his bolt pattern. "Just fix the wires, Firebrand."

"You know he's frightened when he goes back to calling you that." It sounded like Liang helped her up off the floor. "I'm due to talk to Central around lunch. He wants us done yesterday, if not sooner. What do I even tell him?"

"Tell him things are going great!"

"Didn't we just establish the rudder controls are shitted up?"

"No one asked you, Moose!" Lilah must have thrown something, because it clattered hard against the metal under his chest. Right under it, as a matter of fact: it was like she had a sixth sense about who was where on the skeleton at all times. "Don't come knocking on my door tonight!"

"I thought we were meeting at mine." That earned him another thrown something, this one substantially heavier. "Careful! You'll damage her."

"You're the one damaging her! You won't shut up, so I can't stop throwing things!" A very lifelike image of her stomping her foot and shaking her fist overdramatically popped into his mind's eye. "Liang, tell Central Cameron's a deadweight."

"I don't think that's a very good idea..."

"You shut up too, ground-pounder." Lilah paused to hum a few bars from Highway to the Danger Zone, which she did very well. "Don't make me shut your mouth for you."

"You're not woman enough by half."

"Careful..." Cameron lacked the sense not to say anything, but he had enough to keep it under his breath. He cleared his throat after a minute of terse silence. "Shouldn't we be worrying about what to tell Central?"

"Oh, yeah, him." Competition instantly forgotten in the most ADHD fashion imaginable, Lilah metaphorically tore off after the nearest shiny object. "In all seriousness, there's only one thing to tell him."

"That we're a shit-tier construction crew and he should get some real professionals in here?"

"Okay, there's only two things to tell him." Lilah made an annoyed shushing noise when Liang made as if to interrupt again. "Here's what you say, and you say it just like this." She cleared her throat, and her best impression of the Grenadier's Chinese accent was insultingly bad enough to be hilarious in the best possible way, so much that Liang and Cameron both burst out laughing. "Your new Skyranger will be ready in two weeks, Bradford-san."

"That's Japan you're thinking of. Racist." Whatever sting might have been in the words, Liang's giggling eradicated.

"Same thing, whatever. Tomato, tomahto." Lilah bent over, and Cameron, chuckling under his breath, returned to work. "The important thing is that he needs to know progress is-oof!" That came in tune with a flat whack, and the sound of cowgirl boots thumping hard on the hangar deck as Lilah spun. "Did you just?"

"Ha!" A flash of motion appeared through the plating as Liang started for the hangar doors. "Just you insinuate I'm Japanese again, why don't you? You'll get a lot more than a smack."

"Promises, promises!"

"Lord..." Cameron continued his work on the Mark Two Skyranger, chewing his lip thoughtfully. "I had to pick the crazy ones, didn't I? And they had to pick each other too...am I lucky or cursed?"

"It's dead?"

"Damn right!" Jane slapped Anne Lawrence on the shoulder, beaming all the while. "Dead, gone, buried...maybe even killed."

"Yes!" She nearly jumped, pausing only when Avenger rocked in a spell of turbulence. "My people have done battle with this creature for a long time. That he is gone...this is an extraordinary gift."

"Believe it, sister." Jane paused to lean around the living quarters doorway. "Meysam's with his buddies."

"Oh, Nui and Kang?" Behind Jane, Irina Vasilieva nodded agreeably. "They spend most of their time together."

"Since Mariah's death, at least. Meysam had eyes for her like you wouldn't believe." Jane pulled back before anyone could spot her distinctive cap. She tugged on it, almost unconsciously. "At least we're getting some of our own back. Things have been bad these last few weeks."

"Yes." Anne pursed her lips. "Was this different before the Battle? I have only seen this aftermath."

"I'm not going to say shit was spectacular, but we had good days." Jane leaned on the wall. "And it looks like we'll have a few more now. No more Warlock dropping in from the sky to blow our missions to hell...these are going to be good times now. We're on the upshot."

"You should be careful saying things like that." Irina crossed her arms: one organic and one a mechanical prosthesis. "James wouldn't approve of tempting fate."

"Yes, he did have a thing about that, didn't he?"

"Who?" Anne blinked. "James?"

"Irina and I were in a Resistance cell before we joined XCOM." Jane punched the blonde Russian on the arm. "James was our leader. Kind man, but very sensitive to Murphy's Law and its corollaries."

"Ah." Anne nodded. "I hope he is well."

"He..." Jane's eyes flicked down. "He's dead."

"Oh." Hollow. It echoed from a long way away, even though Anne was within hugging distance. "My apologies."

"It was an ambush: some clever Advent fucker knew we were coming in on a raid, and encircled us." Irina's lip curled. "I blew it all up."

"Including me." Jane couldn't inject much vitriol into her tone: she was too busy trying to lock herself down. Faces in her mind's eye...

"And myself. Don't take it personally." Irina scoffed. "Blind luck we both made it through. Jane escaped, but I was captured."

"I think I know of this. The raid that recovered Doctor Vahlen." Anne nodded.

James and Obsidian. Carlos Mendoza. Nunez, Weber, MacLeod, Kowalski, Jiaying, Mariah, Zhang...

"Jane?"

David.

"What?" She got that far, but only barely. Her voice cracked on the vowel, and...and...

"Jane!" Irina caught her shoulder with mechanical fingers, even as her face went blurry.

"It's nothing!" Jane covered her eyes, trying to rein her tears back in. "It's nothing. I'm fine."

David. David White the jerk, quippy and snappy and macho and...and so protective, and so gentle when the mood took him...

"I keep thinking..." Jane sniffed. "I keep thinking I'll just pop over to his room and tell him something or the other. I see his face around every corner."

Neither Irina nor Anne seemed to know what to say. Jane used her sleeve to mop up her tears.

Sadness bore her down. The best cure was to fill herself up with something else: something hot rather than cold, that seared her into action.

"The Warlock deserved what he got. He deserved worse." Jane ground her teeth together, digging her nails into her palms. "And I swear to God...if I get my hands on the Advent bastard who arranged that ambush..." The noise that came out of her throat was far more animal than human. "He deserves to suffer too. Eaten from the inside by a miniature chryssalid, maybe." Hate boiled away grief, and Jane bared her teeth. "Whoever he is...he's next."

"Still can't believe it came to this." Edward Gallant leaned on his cane, shaking his head as he watched the recorded footage displayed on screen. "We did this planet a service when we went full Carthago Delenda Est on the Switzerland facility."

"Damn right." Bradford crossed his arms, poised at Gallant's right hand as usual. Around them, the computer processors of the SHADOW Chamber hummed and whirred in the darkness.

"I hope those gruesome images..." Tygan paused to massage his chest again, leaning with one hand on a control console. "Well. I hope they are the worst of what we discover today."

"The worst?" Bradford got it out before Gallant could. "They're slaughtering us." He gestured at the footage of a raven-haired woman floating in a chemical tank, flesh stripping away. "How does it get worse, Doctor?"

"We're about to find out."

"Is that a threat, Shen?" Gallant shivered. "That sounds like a threat." He chuckled, and if it was a bit nervous, who could blame him? "Are we going to find out this evil juice they were making in Switzerland is what they fed me when I was in the pickle jar running Advent's operations?"

"God only knows." Shen spent a moment typing, eyes darkening. "Jiaying would know."

"She wouldn't tell us, though." Gallant sighed. "If only."

"The nightmares, still?" Bradford had never sounded that subdued. Wordlessly, Shen nodded. Bradford sighed, kicking at the deck. "Yeah. Me too."

Silence lingered in the SHADOW Chamber.

Gallant cleared his throat after close to half a minute. "Tygan...is there any reason we can't have more lights in here? I mean, this place looks like a nightclub without the disco ball. Do you get off on techs banging their shins on things in the dark?"

"I've been running chemical analysis on the substance Julie brought back from the black site whenever I have time since our return. Breaking down the component elements." Shen typed quickly, bringing up several dialogue boxes. "Cataloguing sequences."

"Genetic sequences." Tygan settled in front of his own computer, and Gallant's lips thinned. "In near-infinite combinations. All bearing human genetic markers."

"If you've been looking since the return from Switzerland..." Gallant whistled. "There must be thousands of them."

"Tens of thousands. And the procedure is still in the beginning stages."

"What?" Gallant's eyes bulged. "Doctor...are you serious?"

"Unfortunately, he is." Shen finished her work, stepping back while the computer worked. "Which is why I've patched us into the ship's computer: so we can cross-reference these signatures with the data on the drives we took from the Warlock's lair."

"Logical." Gallant waited, rapping his fingers on the chipped handle of his cane. "Come on, Clippy."

"'It looks like you're trying to save the world from alien overlords. Would you like some help?'" Bradford snickered.

"Some days..." Gallant chuckled too.

His mirth faded.

"What is that?" He frowned at the holodisplay. "Shen?"

"That's...an admission file." If she understood what it meant, she did a good job of hiding it. "From a gene therapy clinic. Evangeline Moreau..."

"Oh..." Gallant's eyes widened when a red icon popped up at the corner of the file, flashing as if to show prominence. "Avatar."

"Just what exactly is in that vial?" Bradford clutched the rail he leaned on with white knuckles.

"I would never...in my worst nightmares..." Tygan settled in at Gallant's left, and even his dark face was remarkably pale. "...dear Lord."

"Doctor?" Gallant traded looks with Bradford. "Doctor, you're scaring me."

"...I believe we have found the missing civilians."

"What?" Bradford's eyes bulged. "That's...that's impossible."

"All those people...just looking for help..." Gallant sucked in breath. "Medically screened and selected."

"Suitable candidates taken to that contemptible facility." Tygan's tone dripped with revulsion.

"To be refined into the material we now possess." Shen shivered.

"But...but..." Bradford shook his head. "But..."

"Why?" Gallant caught Tygan's shoulder. "What's Angelis' play?"

"I could not even begin to fathom a guess." Tygan swallowed. "There exists no research...no cause that would justify this...this brand of science."

"Science? This is genocide, Doctor! Call it what it is!" Shen's eyes blazed. "If this is what Jiaying's husband was working on...bastard deserved what he got." She spun, and her fingers flew over the keyboard.

"What are you doing?" Gallant took a half-step in her direction. If she was deleting the files in a mad frenzy...

"Maybe I can't figure out why, but that material has to be shipped somewhere." She hit one last button, and a red face appeared in the display. "Julian?"

"I heard." He hummed for a minute. "The material is being shipped to a facility in Tennessee, referenced as 'the Forge'." The image of a large, sprawling complex appeared, as if a construction blueprint. "Standard defensive complement."

"Well, then." Bradford might not have gotten over his distrust for the AI, but the rage in his eyes was a clear sign that he was choosing his battles. "I strongly suggest we pay them a visit, Commander."

"Plot a course." Gallant nodded. "I'll pick out a squad–"

"Commander!" Janet appeared in the doorway, pausing to sketch a salute. "Sir!"

"What?" Gallant took a steadying breath. "I don't like the sound of this."

"So...the Warlock turned to...stone?"

"Honestly, Sylvie?" Julie blew at her bangs. "I was right there, watching the whole thing, and I really couldn't tell you what happened. It was very unclear."

"Hah." Charlotte Moineau tossed a chess piece to herself, something cold and satisfied shining in her eyes. "At least it is dead. It is dead, it is gone, and this is the start of repayment for the debts to be paid."

"We all have a lot of those." Julie paused to stir. "Sylvie, do we have any spray for the pans?"

"No." As usual, her accent added an extra N on the end. "We used the last of it on the brownies."

"Fiddlesticks. Butter?"

"Oui." Sylvie Richard plucked a stick of that out of the refrigerator. "I'll take care of it."

"You're the best." Julie patted her on the shoulder without looking. "This is going to be the best we-just-murdered-a-guy-so-let's-party cake I've ever made..." She started coughing when warm lips pecked on her cheek. "Oh. Okay."

"You did not like?" Sylvie lazily began buttering the pans. "It seemed like the thing to do."

"You two are just adorable."

"Shut up and do something useful, Charlotte." Julie gave her a venomous glare. "I don't see you helping make the victory cake."

"I cannot cook to save my life. I have been known to burn salads." She nodded very seriously. "There are reasons I went to Evangeline's for dinner as often as I could. She was a stupendous cook." Her eyes dimmed. "All she ever wanted was to be a wife and mother."

"I'm sorry." Julie sighed. "I think I'd like that too. I mean, I like kicking ass, and I like...you know." She snapped her fingers, and her nails glowed purple for a minute. "But getting married, maybe kids...that's not so bad. In another life..."

"Oui." That wasn't Charlotte. Sylvie studiously kept her eyes on the pan as she worked. "When I was a little girl, I often dreamed of a husband and a life well away from madness. Even when I became old enough to understand a husband was not for me, the idea of something not born of war and revolution...I think it is everyone's dream, deep down. Most simply cannot admit it."

"Yeah." Julie continued stirring, morose and thoughtful. "I always liked the idea of kids. I mean, living the life I did, even before coming on Avenger with Bradford...I knew it couldn't happen. But that didn't mean I stopped dreaming. Doesn't, present tense, I suppose."

"I often wonder." Charlotte's lips thinned. "Her husband and her son. What do they believe happened to us? What became of them in the aftermath of our disappearances? Did Advent come for them as well?"

"Jeez." Julie shivered. "We'll have to mention it to the Commander. Maybe we can look into their status. Leaving anyone in Advent's clutches...then again, they weren't radicals, right?"

"Not in the slightest. Evangeline was a stickler for the rules. Her only crime was existing." Charlotte didn't look any happier. "I wonder if Nathan will prove just as tempting a target."

"I'll talk to Central." Julie nodded firmly. "I don't know if we'll be able to do anything for them, but at least we can try."

Ding!

"The oven is ready." Sylvie checked it, as if distrustful of the preheat timer. "Let me go over the pans one more time–"

"Mission Alert!" The klaxon echoed through the ship's corridors, harsh and sudden. Julie nearly dropped her bowl.

"What the hell!" It wasn't a question. She thrust her slough of cake batter back onto the counter. "Can't it wait ten fucking minutes–"

"Hey!" Nui Tashiro leaned around the door, Meysam and Kang Ho-Jun on her heels. "It's a bad one, ladies."

"Are we about to be shot down again?" Charlotte jumped to her feet.

"Worse." Meysam's eyes glittered with fury. "Advent's retaliating for the Warlock. They just hit a Haven in China."

Author's Note 65: The Blacksite Vial Is Full Of Alien Cake Batter(Talk About Devil's Food Cake)

The idea of refining people down into a concentrate is icky at best. I don't quite understand the physics of it, though I can hazard a few guesses. Regardless, it certainly makes for an interesting plot development. Though it took a while for me to figure out that the admission file and the location of the Forge were not actually contained in the Vial, but it was a cross-reference with other data.

The whole Skirmisher thing doesn't work well with the fact that XCOM initially thinks the Advent soldiers are actually modified humans. Oh no! Spoilers! Yeah, if you're this far into the fanfic, I'm going out on a limb and assuming you've played the game this far. You would think that it wouldn't be a surprise later when we find out the Advent are manufactured, since...you know...we have Advent on our team. Yet there's no change to the dialogue there. Missed opportunity and logical plot hole. I won't say it's the only plot hole in XCOM 2, but it's one of the more glaring ones. As far as plots go, XCOM 2 is actually at an advantage over most other games because the whole "distant omniscient perspective of a mostly player-created plot" thing means they don't have to supply all of the answers. I mean, notice how much I've been able to tweak and add and remove without affecting damn near anything! I should stop padding this AN out and actually work on the next chapter. Sigh.

Until next time, Vigilo Confido.