Escape, Assassination, and Freelancer Things.

Massachusetts lay on the floor, her legs spread wide, a soldier kneeling painfully on her spine, and a shotgun pressed hard into the back of her neck. She wondered how the day's events had taken such an unexpected turn. One minute she was sat in the little questioning room, waiting for Sigma to pick up her wristband signal, the next a guard walked in and turned his back to her. So, of course, she swiftly broke his neck, and then stole his guns. She left the body armour. It was a flimsy piece of shit anyway, compared to her Spartan armour. Within minutes she was out on the white narrow corridor, shooting the hell out of everything that moved, and giving the walls a new red paint job.

She got as far as three corridors from where she started from, before being overwhelmed by infantry, forcing her to back into a store cupboard. Nobody could get near her without a bullet to the head, so a gas canister was thrown in, and then, whilst she was distracted with her coughing fit, someone shot her down with a tranquiliser dart. Apparently one of the higher ranking officers had been insistent on her been caught alive, no matter what the cost. They seemed to think she was going to tell them who all her employers had been.

Well, she might have done, had they asked nicely enough.

And, of course, if the price had been right.

When Massachusetts had awoken, she found herself in the uncomfortable position she was in now. It was quite unnecessary really. What did they think she was; a psycho killer? The guard noticed her stirring, showing that she was awake, and grabbed her by the hair, pulling her head up sharply.

"You killed twenty of our men, and injured another five, you bitch!" he hissed, his face twisted in fury.

My kill injury ratio was twenty to five? Awesome, she thought happily to herself. The man who was kneeling on her saw her grinning, and so slammed her face onto the floor in retaliation, before pulling her neck back again. Massachusetts scowled, her forehead and nose throbbing, and blood trickling freely from her nostrils.

She didn't deserve that.

After being sat on for several hours, Massachusetts was eventually dragged to a high security cell, surrounded by many armed officers as they went. As they pushed her in, they noticed her wrist band, and demanded she take it off.

"It has sentimental value to me," she said, trying to pull away as one of the guards took hold of her, "and if you persist to try to take it from me, I'll break you arm."

"It's boiling hot! There must be some sort of mechanism in it to make it that temperature," he retorted.

"I've had my arms underneath me for god knows how long! Of course it's going to be heated! Body temperature spreads you know!"

There was an awkward silence, and another soldier called out to his comrade.

­"Leave it, Gav. What harm can a little wristband do?"

Gav paused, and then nodded slowly, letting go of the Freelancer, and leaving the cell, locking it behind him. Massachusetts waited until they had all left, and their footsteps had faded away, before ripping the wristband of in agony. The places where the wristband had touched her skin were blistered, as it had overheated immensely and had burnt her. She gritted her teeth, and then looked at the band. Sigma hadn't followed the signal, which was strange, so perhaps she was unable to track it, though that would be highly unlikely.

They wouldn't... destroy her... would they?

Massachusetts had to get the hell out of this place. Now.

Sigma waited patiently inside the armour as the guards carried it with difficulty through the complex. They had taken the long route, so as to avoid any places where she could jump from the suit and into their mainframe. They'd also put a device on the suit, which prevented Sigma from straying more than a metre away from her source. For over half an hour they walked, and eventually the soldiers began to get disgruntled.

"Let's take a shortcut," one whispered to the other, pulling a face as water from an old leaky pipe above them dripped onto his head.

"But what about the A.I.? It could escape," his partner replied.

"Nah, it won't. It's got the restriction on it. Come on, if we go this way, we can get there in about ten minutes, and there's no computer shit for it to go into anyway."

There was a pause, and then the guard nodded.

"Good point. Let's go."

The two men made a swift turn to the left, and lo and behold, there stood a sparking generator! They didn't seem to think it a risk, which was good for Sigma. Now, all she had to do was break the restrictor around her long enough to leave an energy trace on the generator. And she had the perfect idea. In an instant she shot out a holographic projection of herself, before morphing into the form Omega had chosen. The men that were carrying her turned to the source of the bright light, and then let out a yell of horror as the purple creature of nightmares loomed over them menacingly. The armour fell to the floor with a clunk, jolting the restrictor, cutting its power for a second. That was all the time Sigma needed, and faster than a person could think, she left a trace of herself on the generator's system, before the restrictor flickered back on and dragged her back into the suit.

The soldiers approached her warily, and she laughed, allowing herself to be heard by them. They scowled, and then dragged the armour up, continuing on their way. In an attempt to anger them further, Sigma sent out a small holographic projection of her normal self in front of them.

"Aww," she cooed sweetly, "did the little A.I. girl scare you big, bad soldiers?"

"Turn the restrictor up," the taller of the two growled. His partner nodded, and touched the device. Sigma suddenly detected a pulling pressure on herself, before being snatched deep into the A.I. slot she was sourced from and forcefully held there.

The rest of the trip went without event, but that wasn't surprising to Sigma, now that she was contained. She wondered why they hadn't done it in the first place, but her questioned was quickly answered.

"Commander Brandes, we have the A.I."

"Good. Place the armour in the extraction mechanism, and then take guard outside," the Commander ordered. The soldiers nodded, and then, with difficulty, loaded the Spartan armour onto a glowing platform. The Commander waved them away, before checking a database on his computer and then activated the headset he was wearing.

"Sir? The A.I. is in our possession, and scans show that it hasn't corrupted our system."

"Good, Joseph." Downing's voice could be faintly heard crackling from the headset. "Now extract it. I'll reroute power to your sector to give you substantial energy supply needed."

A large panel suddenly flashed green, and Brandes smiled, before returning to his computer interface. Then he scowled.

"Idiots put the restrictor on full, even though I told them not to! Don't they realise just how much it costs us?" he muttered to himself, shaking his head irritably. The restrictor disappeared around Sigma, but as she went to jump into Brandes' console, she was ripped out of the suit's A.I. slot. She was sure, that if she could actually feel pain, she would be in agony. Sigma's thought were cut short when she found herself in a strange little cylinder on a completely different platform.

Then the pressure started again, and everything began to fade to black.

"A.I. has been transferred and put into hibernation," Brandes said. Sigma could feel the darkness closing in around her. If she could just reroute all of the power to this room, the rest of the complex would shut down, allowing Massa some freedom, and the consoles here would overload, damaging them. It wouldn't release her from her capsule though, as it was self powered. Massa would have to figure that one out herself. As quick as a few nanoseconds, she activated the trace of herself she had left on the generator, and moved it through the system, directing it to the mainframe, whilst at the same time presetting a list of instructions for it to follow once she was completely contained. As the trace hit its destination, the cylinder beeped, and Sigma's code was shut down.

The Freelancer would be on her own for now.

Massachusetts stared dully at the ceiling, bored out of her mind. The wristband blinked every few minutes in the background, a sign that Sigma wasn't there. She couldn't start her mad, psychotic dash for freedom until she had her A.I. back. It came as a great shock to her when the lights all around her cut out, and the electronic metal and glass doors loosened.

Nice one, Sig, she thought, sticking her wristwatch in her pocket, and then pushing the now inactive door open as much as she could manage, before creeping off down the corridor. Ten minutes later, Massachusetts found she was lost.

"Great," she muttered grumpily to herself, before running smack into a glass door, which she had missed in the gloom.

"What was that?" a guard said loudly to his friend on the opposite side of the door. He opened it, swinging it into Massachusetts face, knocking her over with a loud bang.

"Fucking idiot!" she yelled, kicking it back at him so that the edge of the door hit his groin with a dull thud. His eyes widened, and he keeled over backwards, cracking his head on the tiles. The Freelancer rubbed her nose irritably, bunching up the sleeve of her shirt to stem the blood pouring out.

"Frank?"

The second guard came to inspect the noise, unable to see in the dark. In one swift movement, Massachusetts dove forwards and delivered a swift right hook to his face, causing him to stagger. A jumping kick to the stomach followed, but by then the guard had prepared himself. He caught her leg, and twisted it so that she fell over, before pointing his gun. The Freelancer flicked her legs at the back of his knees, and he toppled over, accidently firing at the ceiling in surprise. Massachusetts then tried to wrestle the gun off him, forcing her knee into his elbow, breaking it. He screamed in agony, and snatched it off her, hitting her in the face, but then losing his grip so that it clattered away down the corridor just out of reach.

The guard grabbed the front of her shirt and threw her backwards next to his fallen comrade, before staggering up blindly and groping about for the gun. Massachusetts scrabbled about on the man on the floor next to her, searching for his gun, but it wasn't there. Instead, she only found a combat knife.

That'll do.

Quickly she sprinted down the corridor, tackled the soldier just as he picked up his gun, and then slit his throat. He made slight pathetic noises, wriggling weakly under her weight as the blood gushed out all over the Freelancer's lap. Eventually he lay still, and she got up. The other guard groaned in the background, coming out of his unconscious stupor. He would have to be dealt with. Massachusetts strode over, the knife still in hand, and watched with a slight smile as he tried to get away. She recognised him as the one who had slammed her face into the floor.

"Remember me?" she hissed, grabbing his hair the way he had hers, snapping his neck back. He stared groggily at her, a glint of fear in his eyes.

"Thought so," she smirked and then drove his face into tiles.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

The Freelancer held his head up again, paused for a moment and the dragged the knife across his neck the same way she had to his friend, before dropping him carelessly. Then she noticed something else on his belt. She plucked it off, and took a good long look at it. It was a tracker, and it pinpointed all unidentified energy sources in the complex. Just north of her was an energy that looked exactly like Sigma's.

Then she grinned.

Sigma felt trapped. Her trackers were blocked, her files inaccessible, and the coding that gave her 'sight' scrambled. From being one of the most powerful pieces of equipment in the government, and then suddenly becoming… well, nothing.

She wished Massa would hurry up.

The pressure all around her suddenly disappeared, the rush of her coding being available again stunned her, and all she could do for a moment is clutch at her head as her files flew about wildly. Then her sight focused, and she saw the destruction her actions had caused. The console room was in flames, most of the computers were in bits, and Commander Brandes was dead, the upper half of his body incinerated. Then she noticed the person holding her opened capsule.

"Welcome back," Massachusetts smiled, her face covered in blood.

The Freelancer drove the stolen prototype Mongoose full speed through the complex, humming happily to herself as bullets flew over her head and clanged off her armour, not even flinching as soldiers hit and bounced off the windscreen.

"That's the seventeenth person you've mowed down in the space of ten minutes," Sigma said as another poor soul found the Mongoose running him over at full pelt. "One would think you are aiming for these people on purpose."

"What makes you think that?" Massachusetts replied cheerily, swerving deliberately towards a fleeing person and knocking him flying. Sigma didn't reply, but instead calculated an escape route.

"Turn left at the next junction. It leads straight to a shuttle car which will take us back to the bay we left our Warthog at."

Massachusetts nodded, and turned sharply, splattering a guard against the wall as she went. They drove straight over half an hour, while pot shots were fired at them, before reaching the shuttle cars. Abandoning the vehicle, the Freelancer pulled out her shotgun, blasting anyone who came within range as they made a dash for the shuttle. Sigma even went so far as to overload any electrical equipment that wasn't necessary for the operation of the cars, so that whoever was unfortunate enough to be stood close by was killed instantly.

"Move, fucker!" she yelled, breaking the neck of the guard who tried to block their way, and then tossing him aside like a rag doll. Once inside the shuttle, Sigma sealed the doors behind them, and activated the engines. The car shot off, and Massachusetts relaxed.

"How the fuck," she exclaimed, "did we get out of that mess?"

It was nice to be back home, and so Massachusetts did what she always did; dumped her armour in a pile, staining the carpet with grime and blood. Slowly she trudged into the bathroom, and filled the bathtub with hot, steaming water, before stripping, and then sinking into it wearily.

"You have a message, by the way," Sigma said, flitting through the home system and appearing beside her host.

"Fuck off," she replied bluntly, not even bothering to open her eyes. Sigma didn't seem to mind.

"It's from Downing. It seems he has a job for you."

"Then doubly fuck off."

"Wow… he wants us to assassinate Lar-"

"I know. He told me when him and his tosser brigade were questioning me."

"Look, just listen to the damn thing so that I can throw it away and then I can say 'I told you so' when you realise what an opportunity you've missed."

"Fine, fine! Can I get a moment of peace after that?!"

"Shut up and listen."

The voice message played.

"So, Massachusetts, you escaped. I'm impressed. This proves you are competent. Now I am here to make you an offer, an offer I hope you will consider seriously. I am known as Richard Downing to the authorities, to my government, to the police that I am head of. That is a lie. I am, in fact, the head of one of the largest illegal weapon and drug dealing syndicates in the world. Larson is my rival, and has been a thorn in my side for too long. Being such a high figure of good in society has allowed myself to conduct business without hitch. Usually I would leave my competitors alone – a bit of healthy competition adds some spice to life – but Larson is different. He has discovered who I am, and now is trying to blackmail me out of the game. This is unacceptable, and I think he needs to be taught a lesson. Permanently.

So I leave the choice with you. Help me, and you will be paid well. However, if you refuse, I will get someone else to do it, and you will be out of a job. You would never hear from me again. All details covering expenses and where to find me are on a separate file included in this request. Choose wisely.

One final thing. Do not try to turn me in. This message is corrupted, and comes from an unworthy source, so cannot be used as evidence.

Farewell."

"How much is he offering?" Massachusetts asked, picking up a bar of soap and rubbing it between her hands. Sigma looked at the file, and then gasped, a look of shock on her face.

"What is it?" the Freelancer said. Sigma told her, and Massachusetts dropped the soap back into the water with a plunk, her eyes widening. Then she sat up abruptly.

"Get my armour cleaned and repaired, and the damaged equipment replaced. Make sure all weapons are fully loaded, and the Warthog usable. I'll get some rest, and then we go to see Mr Downing."

"So we're not going to assassinate Larson immediately? When did we discuss?"

"Well, he might want it done in a specific method."

"You know no matter what he tells you, you'll just do it your own way."

"True. I was thinking of beating him to death with his own skull."

"…Beating him to death with his own skull? That's impossible."

"Agent Texas pulled it off."

"But-"

"It's a Freelancer thing. You wouldn't understand."