Aya looked at the woman she'd come to introduce herself to. She was sat on a mat, small wooden figurines of varying shapes floating around her. Before she could announce herself, the Templar opened her eyes, the figurines floating to the floor. "You must be the Valkyrie," she said while standing in a single fluid motion, not needing to use her hands to help herself up.
"No. I'm Aya. I heard you were the liaison to the Templars"
"Of course. Tell me, do you know anything about a Vampire"
"What do you mean?"
"Humour me. Obviously not an actual vampire, but does the image bring anything to mind"
"Maxim. He was a soldier in XCOM before everything went to shit"
"Why does a vampire remind you of him?"
"That was his code name. He was really pale"
"What can you tell me about him"
"I'm sure the Commander has a file on him"
"Sure. But I want to know what you can tell me about him"
"He was the first or one of the firsts, I can't quite remember, human found with Psionic abilities"
"Where is he now"
"I'm not sure. Look, I didn't come here to tell you my life story. I came to say hello. I've done that. Goodbye"
"Farewell for now then, Aya"
Dancing fox smiled as Aya left. Years spent wondering as to the possibilities of this vision, now it was almost solved. If Maxim was one of the first psionics then he wouldn't really know what he was doing. Aya was the Valkyrie, she was sure of it. Aya ould be instrumental of bringing Maxim back to XCOM, and she would teach him how to control his powers.
She sat back down and returned to her meditation. This time extending her awareness out to encompass the entirety of the Avenger, to get a better feel for the ship. In this state, everything was different, the engines were silent, she still felt a soft thrumming, but this came from the people. Their life essence mingling with the air to create something akin to background radiation. The engine was curious. Alien technology. It had a psionic element to it, looking towards it was like looking towards the sun. But wait. It's moving. That powerful beacon of psionic energy wasn't the engine.
It moved further through the ship, up to the command center, then turning, and moving towards the barracks. There was something about this energy that reminded her of something but she couldn't quite put her finger on it. The essence was coming to her room. That much was obvious. She stood, shifting part of herself back to her physical being. In this state, she saw the nimbus of psychic energy moving towards her.
The Templar's taught caution in the face of new things, she moved across and took the bracers from her stand, affixing them to her wrists, and activating them. Thin blades of crackling purple energy extended from them, forming her hands into short blades, part physical and part psionic, these weapons could harm anything and only got more powerful the more they were used in a space of time. The door opened, and she ended her Psionic sight.
Standing before he was the Commander.
"We need to talk" The voice was the Commander's. But his mouth did not move, and the door slid shut behind him without him moving.
She tensed. The Templars had faced infiltrators from ADVENT before.
"I'm not going to harm you, I just need to explain some things so you don't freak out" The Commander's voice came from his mouth this time
"Then talk" she lowered herself into a combat-ready stance and prepared her mental shields.
"This might take some time. It's a long story"
"I have time"
The Commander smiled and leaned against the door "Honestly did not think that it'd come out like this. Before I tell you, you must swear to not tell anyone else. It won't threaten the safety of XCOM, the Templars, or anyone else to keep it secret, but will be very dangerous should it become widely known"
"If that is true, then I shall keep your secret. But if I deem that untrue, I shall not keep my council"
"Fair enough" The Commander began his story
Psycho dropped out of the Skyranger. Another Resistance Haven under attack. This time they had some new tech. The eggheads had finished up the Mag weapons. Her new shotgun strangely lighter than her previous one, but it had a slight vibration even at rest and went ballistic when it shot. It had taken quite a bit of training to keep her hands from going numb whenever she shot the damn thing, but damn if it wasn't powerful, even if the armor protected the target (no mean feat when it comes to the power of this thing) it'd still knock it on it';s ass with sheer concussive power.
They had mag versions of the rifles and pistols as well. But no Sniper rifle, Machine Gun, or the Reaper's sniper-thingy. They were still working on the new versions of those apparently.
Along behind her was Soldier, McDermot the sniper, Outrider, and, Dancing Fox, the new girl from the Templars. Well, Dancing Fox was her actual name, they'd all taken to calling her Bumble Bee thanks to her yellow and black armor.
Outrider ran on ahead. Quickly vanishing among the buildings, while the rest of them fanned out under the direction of Soldier. It felt weird to be sharing point with someone else, but the bee only had an Uzi (or some kind of Mag variant of an Uzi anyway) and these gauntlet-blade things. Things were pretty quiet. Most of the Resistance guys probably got wiped pretty quickly in this attack, so the rest would probably be hiding around while ADVENT tried to find them. As they came up to the edge of the first building, Bumble Bee's head suddenly snapped up, and she whispered over the coms "Dawnkiller"
Before anyone could ask what the hell she was on about, a voice echoed in the back of her head, a deep voice, resonating like the speaker was in a cave. "Heretics! Come forth! - Meet the face of your damnation"
"The hell was that" McDermot spoke from the roof of the building, beating her to the punch.
"One of the Chosen, a powerful psionic"
"He announced himself and wasted the element of surprise. Keep an eye out. We'll be ready for him. Concentrated fire hurt the last one before she fled, it'll work on this one too. Fan out, search for survivors or ADVENT. Outrider, keep us informed"
The voice echoed in her head again "The Elder's grant me their legions!" and purple mist formed in front of her into a hunched humanoid shape and began to step towards her. One blast of her shotgun saw the mist dissipate back into the air. The new Rail weapons were surprisingly quiet. Just a soft whirring and a pop as it fired. They were quieter than their silenced guns had been.
"Wow, that thing went down like a bitch"
"Muton and Mec coming towards you" Outriders voice came over the coms, and, punctual as ever, the creatures rounded the building further ahead just as they all ducked behind cover.
"Psycho. Use the frag" Soldier ordered
"Gotcha boss" she pulled the pin, cooked it for a second, then tossed it over the crate she was behind. She didn't need to look, Mec's weren't exactly known for their stealth. The grenade exploded, and Soldier fired at the same time. The 2 were dead before the shrapnel had finished falling to the floor.
They continued moving ahead. Outrider pinging the ADVENT units she located with a ping on their HUD's. Before they got to position to get a shot on them, another of those mist zombie things appeared in front of Psycho. She again put it down in 1 blast.
"So much for the face of damnation" she shouted to the air, alerting the group of ADVENT ahead of them, but, before either side could bring their guns to bear, a claymore flew into the middle of the group, and detonated, the soldiers and Mec dropping instantly.
"This is too easy," McDermot remarked "Haven't even fired a shot yet"
"The Elder's Judgement is almost upon you" the Chosen spoke again
"Oh stop being a fucking pussy and get out here!" Psycho shouted again. So far, this chosen was seeming to be nothing but talk.
"Located the chosen, he just summoned in a Trooper to help out" Outrider supplied over the coms.
"Everyone, into position. McDermot, get a position. Fox, get a flanking route. Outrider, keep scouting around, make sure there's no extra pods. Psycho, get a grenade ready" Soldier ordered.
Everyone move to follow the instructions. Psycho noticed McDermot standing by the ladder looking confused and smacked her on the back of the head as she went "You alright?"
"Yeah, I forgot where I was for a second"
"Psionic Attack" Dancing Fox supplied.
"Explosive attack" Psycho replied, launching a grenade over the building to where Outrider supplied the Chosen was sitting. Before the smoke fully cleared, the others opened fire. Dancing fox taking out the Trooper with her Uzi-thing, while the others focused on the Chosen. Psycho went to move up, but the Chosen guy appeared in the building she was next to, summoning what looked like a Lancer made of purple smoke, and, since she hadn't changed to her shotgun yet, shrugged, and fired another grenade.
The smoke cleared and the Lancer-Ghost was clearly wounded, bits of it missing from the explosion, but the Chosen was in what she could only describe as a Psionic Cocoon. She pulled out her shotgun but, again, before she could fire, Dancing Fox jumped through a window (thankfully with no glass in it due to the explosion), produced those psionic sword things from her gauntlets, and sliced the Lancer Ghost into mist.
Psycho heard the groaning of a Faceless revealing itself but was a bit busy as the cocoon dissipated and the Chosen stood up and moved further into the building, pointing at Dancing Fox as he did. McDermot appeared in the window and brought up her pistol, but Psycho wasn't about to let her get the kill, and jumped inside, shotgunning the Chosen in the face.
The Chosen fell to the floor, hand reaching to his face as orange blood sprayed out. She was surprised he still had a face after a blast from that close. Before either she or McDermot could get another shot on it though, the chosen vanished in a blast of purple mist.
"I will re-educate myself to the Elder's vision. I will use this defeat to improve my abilities" the voice of the Chosen came into their heads again.
"Awww, I wanted his ears" McDermot replied, holstering her pistol
"Why do you want his ears?" Psycho asked, throwing a rock at Dancing Fox, which hit her in the chest, and knocked her out of the daze the Chosen had put her in.
"I'm making a necklace"
"Has anyone ever told you you're terrifying"
"ADVENT forces neutralized, the last Resistance guys are reporting the dropships pulling out," Soldier said, entering through the hole in the wall "I guess the Chosen escaped"
"How many civilians were killed?" Dancing Fox asked
"They haven't gotten a count yet, but not too many, we got here a lot quicker than last time"
"Well that's a positive from this" Dancing Fox said, moving over to where the Chosen had vanished and bowing her head.
"What are you doing?" Psycho asked
"Trying to learn what I can from his Psionic imprint"
"Wait, where's McDermot gone?" Soldier asked, noticing her missing
"Can someone ask Tygan if Faceless have ears"
"You wanted to talk to me?" The Commander asked Shen as he arrived in engineering
Shen seemed a lot more animated than normal "Commander! I picked up a transmission left by my father"
"I thought you said he died a few years ago"
"He did. I can't think of why this message was so delayed, but I've tracked its origins to a facility in the middle of nowhere... Commander, I haven't asked for much-"
"You wanna go there and find out what caused it"
"Yes Commander"
"I'll assemble a team"
"Wait what"
"Well I'm not letting you go alone"
"I thought I'd have to convince you... I prepared a speech"
The Commander smiled "Since when have i done things the way people expect me to"
"I'm going as well, Commander"
"I know, that's why I said to go with you"
"My father told me a lot about you, but not nearly enough to know anything about you"
"Bradford has known me for years, even before XCOM was fully set up we knew each other, I even surprise him sometimes"
"Now go get your shit, I'll get the squad"
Aya approached the Skyranger, her first fight with XCOM in 20 years or so. They were going to some long abandoned facility, not life signs detected, so either a scavenging mission or robots. Before she reached the Skyranger, Mox approached her.
"May I talk with you, miss Haidar?"
She shrugged "Sure, what's up Mox"
"I spoke with the Commander and understand you're a mobile fighter"
"I guess that's one way to put it, I'm pretty fast"
"Well, i wished to provide you with some assistance in that" Mox produced an object and held it out to her, it was a RipJack, the gauntlet the Skirmishers used, containing a set of blades and a grappling hook "Consider this a gift"
She took the gear "Thanks. How do i use it?"
"It's a neural connection, just think about what you want it to do"
She nodded " Thanks Mox, I'll put this to good use"
"See that you do" Mox bowed and made his exit
"What was that about?" Psycho asked
"Mox gave me a RipJack" Aya showed the gauntlet
Raul approached her "Just so we're clear, I'm in tactical command on the ground. You follow my orders. Got it!?"
Aya looked at him "I was with XCOM long before you. I know how to fight. I'll follow orders but i know what I'm doing"
He backed up a half step at her voice, the complete lack of emotion in it taking him off guard, she just rolled her eyes and went to get on the Skyranger.
"I like her" Psycho put in, following her on the craft
"You'll get used to her" The Commander put in "Just treat her as you do Psycho and you'll get along great"
"I'm not sure if I should be offended by that" Psycho put in.
"Shouldn't we be going by now?" Savvina asked as she climbed up the ramp, hefting her new Gauss LMG.
Chapter's a little shorter than normal, but the Shen's Last Gift mission needs it's own Chapter and It'll likely be a good bit longer than a regular Chapter.