The following morning, Zoey's alarm sounded and she shut it off as quickly as possible to prevent it disturbing Roxy. It still sucked that she had to do a shift in the laundry before she was scheduled to go back to her assessments, especially today since it was the assault course, an assessment everyone was warned they were expecting to lead to a lot of cuts. The field was already whittling down fast and she was keenly aware that right now she wasn't exactly standing out from the crowd. If anything, she was barely keeping her head above water.

As she was getting dressed, her gaze fell upon the stack of brand new textbooks. She still had a little bit of a lump on her head from when she hadn't noticed them in her bed and flopped face-first into them without checking. She didn't have any reason to think that someone would have put some big, thick textbooks in her bed, so really there wasn't any reason to think there was any reason she wouldn't be able to do so, but there they were, all the books she'd need, brand new straight out the bookshop.

She didn't like people feeling like she was a charity case. She didn't have the same advantages as other people, but she was so proud she didn't want to take handouts. She was grateful of course that she now had the reading materials meaning she could now catch up to the level everyone else had been on day one. She was grateful that Roxy was kind enough to get the books for her, but she was determined that she would pay her back.

As she was getting ready, she did hear something from Roxy's room. She was a little surprised that Roxy might actually be awake at all at this time, she really didn't have any reason to be awake at this time of the day, but she still didn't want to disturb her. She was just starting to make her way quietly out of the dorm they shared when she stumbled on something on the floor. It was a pair of boots, standard issue GB but they looked far too big to be Roxy's. They were placed by the door, another thing that was odd, because Roxy tended to take her things into her room, and her style of putting things away was more accurately described as throwing them in the air and seeing where they landed. These boots looked like they'd been taken off at the door and left there to prevent trailing anything from outside over the rest of the room, a little bit of an odd thing to care about since neither of the girls really worried too much about a little mess.

"Not yet." Roxy murmured.

"But I always go for my run at this time." Another voice came from her room. Zoey grimaced hearing this. Now she understood, the boots definitely weren't Roxy's! However, if it was another cadet, then both of them were consenting adults, so what they decided to do was really none of her business. Zoey decided to just quietly let herself out.

She made her way to the laundry past more than a few other cadets. Being the day of a major assessment, one where they were assured there would be many cuts, it wasn't a surprise there were a lot of cadets warming up and preparing for what was to come. No one was given advanced knowledge of what the assault course would be like, since it was as much of a test of their ability to react to the unknown as it was a physical test, but there were already people working out, heading out on runs or going to the gym. None of them really paid much attention to where Zoey was going, probably assuming that she would be doing the same. She went down into the basement, stepping off the elevator and finding Nate wandering around.

"Cruise? Cruise? Where are you?"

"Hey…you looking for something?" Zoey asked him.

"Oh…uh…yeah, but…um…"

"Classified?" Zoey asked him. He just nodded. "Right."

"Hey, what happened to your head? Are you OK?" Nate asked her. She lifted her hand up to the bump on her forehead.

"Yeah, just a little bump. My roommate thought she was doing me a favour by putting books on my bed, but just didn't tell me before I jumped in." She explained.

"Ouch." Nate said with a pained expression on his face. He wished he'd thought of that. He remembered Zoey saying she didn't have the books she needed and had got them himself to make sure she didn't fall behind. He had seen something in her he admired, and while he wasn't self-delusional enough to believe that his decisions surrounding Zoey were entirely innocent, he did see that she was a kind and thoughtful and helpful person. He'd grown up with stories about the Rangers of the past and he saw in her a lot of the qualities he thought would make a good Ranger. He did, however, realise that his decision making kind of went to hell around her. Why hadn't he just put the books on her desk? It was only a couple of paces away from the bed. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah, head like a rock." She responded. "Anyway, I'll let you go back to looking for your rabbit or…whatever it is you're looking for."

"Thanks…have a good day!" Nate called after her, before smacking himself on the head as she left. "Idiot! Why didn't you just leave the books on her desk? Cruise! Come on, where are you?"

Zoey got into the laundry, taking off her jacket to prepare for work. As she turned to the laundry though, she was a little bit surprised to find that she wasn't alone. Her shift started a little bit before the others so that she could set up for when people's laundry baskets started to get delivered.

"Ben?" She asked.

"Oh, hey Zoey!" Ben said cheerfully, waving from a large pile of clothing on the floor.

"Hey, Zoey!" Betty greeted her from a little further off as she was struggling to carry a couple of large bottles of laundry detergent. Grid Battleforce had a lot of employees, all of them uniformed officers, which meant a hell of a lot of laundry. The whole thing was industrial scale, including the volumes and strength of chemicals they used.

"Ben, Betty, what are you guys doing here?" Zoey asked her.

"Oh, we work all over the base." Ben told her.

"Yeah, we do a bit of everything." Betty answered. "Admin, maintenance, security…even some research and development whenever Nate lets us into the lab."

"He gets a little touchy about some of his classified stuff." Ben added with a little nod.

"I didn't know you guys worked as well as trained here." Zoey said, a little surprised.

"The whole machine operates because of a lot of little cogs." Betty declared proudly. "Dad always said there's no such thing as a small job, just people too small to see that any job is important when it's not done. So we always try and help out whenever we can, whether it's washing dishes, changing lightbulbs or even scrubbing toilets."

"That's a really great way of looking at things." Zoey agreed. "My mom always said don't be afraid of big problems solve big problems."

"I think our dad would like your mom." Ben said thoughtfully, before a thought crossed his mind. "Uh…if he wasn't married of course. I mean, I don't mean like that or…"

"It's fine, I get what you mean." Zoey assured him. "Alright, the first baskets should be getting in soon. I guess it'll be nice to have a little help for once."

She then thought about something.

"Say guys, you…you want to try something a little different?" Zoey asked.

"Different?" Betty asked. "Like what?"

"I normally don't get time to reorganise, but I was just thinking…maybe there's a way to make all this a little more…" She went over to one of the benches. "Ben, can you help me move this?"

"What are you doing?" Ben asked her.

"I think maybe if we move things around a little, maybe we can maximise the space and it'll let us organise things into more manageable loads." Zoey told them. Zoey started to look around, getting an idea of the size of the room and the space she had to work with. "Betty, move that over there, so we've got a bench closer to the washer, and then if we put another one here between the washers and the dryers…yeah, I think that might work."

With that, she grabbed one of the benches and started dragging it across the floor. Ben and Betty just looked to each other, before shrugging and joining in.

In another part of the base, Commander Shaw was looking over some reports, but her mind was far from the task at hand. She was still troubled by what had happened the previous day.

It was a vain hope that no one would figure out the connection between herself and Ravi. If anything it was probably lucky that no one had figured it out for this long. The sad fact was that with her being involved in the program at all, anything that happened which benefited her son was bound to be under scrutiny. That she was the one that was ultimately making all the decisions regarding the Ranger selection only made it all the easier for people to point the finger.

The mere accusations of nepotism weren't just hurtful, but extremely difficult for anyone to do anything about. It didn't matter that she would be the first one to tell her son he was cut if she had any reason to believe he would be a threat to any team he was on. She'd served in combat before and on more than one occasion had sadly been left in the situation where people were put in positions of responsibility because they either knew the right people or were related to the right people. She had personally seen the results, and she had seen good people lose their lives when someone who was lacking ended up with the responsibility for people's lives. As proud as she would be to be the one to present her son with his morpher on graduation, she always valued the lives of those in her care over her own vanity, and would sooner see him writing reports or stocking stores than having to be the one delivering a folded flag to the loved ones of someone under his command because he wasn't up to the role.

She knew that there were bound to be things said about her. Whatever she did, whatever she said, if it somehow benefited Ravi, then it was going to invite scorn at best and calls for her dismissal at worse. She was prepared to face the slings and arrows people had for her. It wasn't as though she'd always had an easy career, but she worried how Ravi would deal with it. If anything, for him it would be worse. For all their bitterness or anger or even just self-serving spite in seeing a convenient way to remove a strong contender by getting Ravi drummed out on accusations of favouritism people would always have to be cautious how they spoke to her as when all was said and done she was an officer. Ravi, for the time being at least, was one of them, which meant he had to face it all without that filter.

She heard a knock on the door and turned to see General Burke standing in the doorway.

"I was wondering if you have a moment." He told said. She just gestured him inside. "So, today's the first big test eh?"

"Yes, the assault course will be a real eye-opener." She agreed. "I'm expecting at least a twenty five percent attrition rate today."

"The first big cull." He said bombastically, pounding his fist on the table. "Sort the wheat from the chaff and all that!"

"Yes, something like that." She replied. He opened up a folder.

"I did want to talk to you about a troubling…"

"Sir, if you're talking about the issue with my son, I promise I'll keep things well in hand." She assured him. "If nothing else, I'll inform you if you need to step in."

"Wait…what?" He asked. "What are you talking about?"

"You've not received complaints about my son?" She asked him.

"Why would I? From what I see here he's well on his way to top of the class!" He responded.

"So, you haven't heard about the…incident?"

"Whatever it is, I'm sure you have it well in hand." He told her. "No, I was actually talking about another cadet, the…um…the Reeves girl."

"Zoey?" She asked. It took her a moment to remember the previous conversation she'd had with General Burke regarding Zoey. He'd taken a little bit of an issue with finding out her mother was a reporter. While there was no real proof that she was a security risk she could definitely understand why someone who had a direct family link to the media, albeit a woman whose most hard-hitting story of the last six months was about dog owners who looked like their pets, would present him with some concern about giving her access to classified information. "General Burke, I've been monitoring her…"

"Oh, I'm sure you have, I have as well." He responded. "A write-up for attending training out of uniform? Falling asleep in class? Not having the required reading? This doesn't speak well to the girl's commitment."

Commander Shaw had known General Burke a long time. The two families were close, and she didn't ever think of him as a malicious or vindictive person. Just like her, he'd been in combat zones and seen what happened when gambles were taken with people's safety. His concern was likely genuine concern about those that would be on the program, but having seen how hard Zoey was willing to work, she understood a lot of the extenuating circumstances in some of her slips. General Burke did bring up some good points in some of the things instructors had commented on, but it sounded to her like he was fishing for excuses to send Zoey packing for something that was entirely beyond her control.

"Sometimes the best soldiers are the ones that take a little longer to smooth off the rough edges." She declared, before leaning on the desk and raising an eyebrow. "I remember someone not too far from here that was written up more than a few times back in the day for conduct unbecoming."

"Yes…well…that's as may be." General Burke spluttered, a little surprised that Shaw was willing to go to bat quite so aggressively for Zoey. It was only one cadet, there had to be about a dozen or more she'd already seen something in. Even this early she had to have her eye on some of the candidates as possible Rangers. "But her grades…"

"Could do with a little work." Shaw interrupted him. He just sighed.

"You see something I don't, don't you?" He asked. Shaw just smiled.

"Perhaps." She answered. "It's a little early to tell for sure."

"Well, like you said, the assault course will be telling." He answered. "I'll leave you to it."

"Thank you sir." Commander Shaw replied as he left. She sat in her chair, and composed her thoughts about the task ahead.

Later in the day, Zoey was finishing up her shift in the laundry. She thanked Ben and Betty for their help before turning to head back to her dorm. She was just about to go when she ran straight into someone.

"Watch it!" He protested. "Anyway, I was just passing the lab and that kid with the glasses couldn't see a couple of feet in front of him so he spilled…"

She looked up and gulped, seeing him standing over her. Blaze just gave her a little smirk.

"Wait…you work down here?" He asked. "You work in the laundry?"

"Yeah." She answered. "What's it to you?"

"Oh my God, this is great!" He laughed derisively as she stood before him. Zoey was rarely self-conscious, she had always prided herself on earning everything she had, but Blaze's mocking was getting to her. "You do know we're training to be super soldier here, right? Not washer women."

Zoey folded her arms, refusing to say anything to him. She could already see the wheels turning in his head about what his next insult was going to be.

"Look, can you just get out of my way? I'd like to go get changed before the assessment and…"

"Why are you working in the laundry?" He asked her, looking like this was the funniest thing in the world to him.

"Well, not everyone can have mommy and daddy buy us everything!" Zoey snapped at him. "Now, do you want something or can I get past?"

"Well, you are the laundry aren't you?" He asked, shoving his clothing towards her. Zoey just rolled her eyes.

"Put it in the basket like everyone else!" She told him.

"Oh, but I'm not like everyone else am I?" He asked. He pulled some cash out of his pocket. "And some of us can pay for premium service."

"Put it in the damn basket!" She growled, before shoving her way past. Blaze just watched her go.

"See you around laundry girl!" He mocked her, before dumping his clothes in one of the baskets.

Later in the day, the cadets were assembling for the latest assessment. Zoey arrived, finding Roxy stretching off as they waited for Commander Shaw to come and oversee the assault course.

"Hey, there you are." Roxy greeted her. "You mind?"

Zoey offered her a hand, helping her up.

"Someone seems full of energy today." Roxy commented. "Like a big old Energizer bunny!"

"I pretty much had the run of things today." Zoey told her. "So, I decided to re-organise things a little and it turns out I made things a little easier. I finished up the shift's work a lot faster and without almost killing myself."

"That's great." Roxy stated.

"So, instead of wiping me out it was just a good workout." Zoey said proudly.

"Well, those are pretty good." Roxy answered with a smile. "I had quite a good workout myself."

"Oh, I know." Zoey told her. Roxy just smirked as she said this.

"Shaw!" One of the cadets called out. "Shaw!"

"My name's Ravi." He corrected him.

"So, tell us, how many practice runs did your mom let you have at this course?" He asked.

"I've not seen it before, just like the rest of you." Ravi told him. "Maybe if you worried more about your own performance instead of making unfounded accusations you might find your scores improving."

"You know, I used to wonder how one guy could ace pretty much everything." Another cadet mocked him. "I guess it's pretty easy when you get the tests in advance."

"I do all the exact same tests you do. The fact I'm doing better is because…"

"Oh, I think we all know why you're doing better." The other cadet interrupted him. Ravi looked livid, stiff, like he was about to lose it. Commander Shaw arrived before anything could escalate though.

"Alright cadets, as you know today is the assault course. This is designed to test your physical strength, speed and endurance, as well as your ability to adapt to unknown situations." Commander Shaw told them. "We will send you into the course in groups of ten. At the end of the course, you will find a blaster range which will include both static and moving targets in a combat setting. Now, this is a major test so be aware that the stakes are high. If you fail to complete the assault course in under four minutes, you will be cut. If you fire on a target designated an innocent or fail to register a score of above seventy percent on the blaster range, you will be cut. If you fail to complete the entire exercise in under seven minutes, you will be cut."

"I guess it's easier when you know what's coming." One of the cadets whispered. Commander Shaw didn't hear what was said, but could see the way Ravi was tensing up. Nate was getting ready to say something, but she just held up a hand to silence him.

"Alright, before we begin, I think we need to clear the air and get rid of an elephant in the room." She said, at which Ravi looked like he wanted the ground to swallow him whole. "I know that by now you've no doubt all heard that my son is indeed one of the cadets in this program. Just know this, I do not take the implications of favouritism lightly."

She started pacing.

"Rest assured, the only reason you will be cut here is if you are not making the grade and I do not care one bit if your surname is Anderson or Carter or even Shaw." She assured them. "If any of you at any time feel my conduct at any time shows bias or prejudice, the procedure for putting in a complaint to my direct superior is documented in the GB code of conduct."

She then stood before them sternly.

"But I will NOT tolerate anyone making baseless accusations behind my back." She told them. "IS THAT CLEAR?"

"Yes Commander." They all chorused. Commander Shaw just sighed and stepped away. She doubted that what she had said would end things, but she did hope that at least it might make people think twice about trying to press the matter in public.

"Alright, first group, line up!" Commander Shaw instructed them. Ten of them all lined up ready to go. "Mr Silva, on my mark, open the door and let them into the testing area."

"All right, here you go…all together…on my mark…together!" Nate said, looking to Zoey as he put his hand on the switch. He threw the lever, opening the door and letting the first group in.

Ravi and Blaze took an early lead, and it was clear that they were going to be the ones to beat. It didn't matter if it was a cargo net, a balance beam, a crawl tube, they shot through every obstacle almost as though it was open ground. They were both out to prove their dominance, neither one wanted to come in second.

Zoey struggled a little with some of the obstacles. They were all designed to sap the strength so that by the time they got to the end, it was a real gut-check to see who still had anything left. By the time they were almost at the end though, her heart fell as she saw the wall. A literal 15 foot wall directly in their path.

She had no idea how Ravi, Blaze and Roxy managed to make it up. Both Ravi and Blaze almost looked like they ran right up it, even though she knew that was physically impossible. They managed to drive up high enough to grab the top and nimbly flip themselves over. Roxy took the slightly more unique approach of running at the corner, being able to spring between two walls to boost herself up from each in quick succession to be able to get over the top. Zoey didn't have anything like that level of gymnastic ability, so she was left with the option of trying to jump.

She leapt at the wall again and again trying to get some purchase, but it just wasn't happening. She was keenly aware time was ticking down. She saw Ben and Betty similarly having issue. Ben's attempts to jump got him little higher than the height of his own knees and Betty was so short that even if she managed to jump her own height she'd still be nearly six feet short.

She was beginning to lose hope, when something occurred to her.

"Ben, give me a boost!" Zoey told him. Ben just looked at her.

"What?" He asked.

"Stand against the wall and bend over!" She told him. He just stared at her blankly. "They sent us in as a group! No one said we had to do the course alone!"

Ben and Betty both nodded in agreement. Ben hunched over, allowing Zoey to use his back as a launch pad, managing to get her hands onto the top of the wall. She felt something under her feet as she scrambled and looked down, seeing that Betty had climbed onto Ben's back and was pushing her up. She took the boost gratefully, getting to the top, balancing herself as she reached down.

"Betty, come on!" She called out. Betty jumped as high as she could, grabbing Zoey's hand. She pulled Betty up leaving only Ben at the bottom. They both reached down, beckoning him up, but after a couple of attempts, he just slumped down and shook his head.

"Ben, come on!" Betty called to her brother.

"No, I'm done!" He told her. "There's no reason for you to fail too. Go on!"

They both looked reluctant. It didn't seem right to leave Ben behind to fail the course and be cut after he had helped them, but he just waved them on.

"Go on, it's alright!" He assured them. Betty and Zoey reluctantly leapt down the other side.

Ravi and Blaze were on the final stretch to the firing range, and Blaze could see Ravi was a couple of steps ahead. He knew that people would be monitoring what happened in the assessment, so he couldn't be too obvious about trying to mess up Ravi's performance, but he did stray a little, 'stumbling' into him and shoving him. Ravi hit the table with the blasters on it, knocking one of them off the table to the ground. He rounded on Blaze, but he had already picked up his blaster and was on his way to the range. He knew damn fine it was deliberate, but he figured the best revenge would be out on the range. Picking up the blaster from the ground, he checked it, seeing it was damaged, so he put it back on the table and grabbed another, running after Blaze.

Zoey kept a good pace, encouraging Betty along. They already knew that Ben was being cut, so she didn't want Betty to get cut too if she could help it. Although it meant they were at the back of the group, they were fast enough to complete the course before the time elapsed, even if Zoey did have to grab Betty and drag her the last few feet to make sure they beat the buzzer.

They took a second to catch a breath, at which Betty went to the table to collect a blaster. There were only two left, but when she picked hers up, she saw a malfunction light blinking. The blaster was damaged and would not function. Safety was paramount in Grid Battleforce, so Nate's tech was naturally built with a failsafe that the weapons would simply not function if they were damaged rather than risk them misfiring or exploding. Zoey finally caught her breath.

"OK, time for the range." Zoey gasped. "That my blaster?"

Betty didn't think about her decision long at all. She picked up the other blaster from the table and handed it to Zoey.

"Here." She told her. They both ran into the range, where holographic targets started to flash up. Some of them were shaped like armed assailants, others like innocent civilians. Zoey fired for all she was worth, hoping that more of her blasts landed than missed. By now her head was spinning, and she could hardly breathe, but she could see the end of the course in sight. She got to the end, at which the buzzer sounded. Both she and Betty almost collapsed in exhaustion at the end.

"Nicely done Zoey." Commander Shaw congratulated her. "It was not the premium run by anyone's standard, but I do have to commend you and your group for being the only ones to figure out you could work as a group. Seventy two percent, you pass."

Zoey cried out in jubilation, looking up from the ground as Betty stood up. Commander Shaw looked to her, holding out a hand.

"Betty…you didn't shoot a single target." Commander Shaw told her. "You know what that means."

Betty just nodded, before handing over the blaster.

"Wait…what?" Zoey asked. "You didn't shoot any targets? Why not?"

"It helps if the blaster works." Betty told her. Zoey just looked to Commander Shaw.

"This isn't right, if the blaster didn't work, you have to let her run again…"

"I'm sorry Zoey, that's not how things work. Sometimes things aren't fair." Commander Shaw told her. She looked to Betty regretfully. "You and your brother did very well to make it this far. Your father will be very proud."

As she left to oversee other groups, Zoey came to Ben and Betty, who were consoling each other over their disappointment.

"Guys, I'm sorry, I…" She stammered. "It…I'll quit…"

"Why?" Betty asked her.

"It's not right for you guys to get cut and not me." Zoey told them. "I wouldn't have got through the course without you."

"Zoey, it's OK. You'd be a great Ranger." Betty told her. "And…there are no small jobs right?"

"Right." Ben sighed. "I'd have loved to be a Ranger, but that doesn't mean we aren't going to help."

"You guys…"

"Zoey, if you quit then none of what happened today means anything." Betty told her. "Please, promise me you'll stay."

Zoey didn't know what to say, so she did the only thing she could think of and beckoned them both in, hugging them both tightly. For them, the journey might be over, but now Zoey owed it to them to make it as far as possible. If she became a Ranger, she wouldn't just be doing it for herself, she'd be doing it for Ben and Betty too.