Chapter 3

He who makes a beast out of himself...

Gets rid of the pain of being a man...

I wasn't sure what to make of my next mission objective. I was going along with two other agents to this 'Flippy' person in hopes of killing him. I made my way to the agency office to meet with the others about the task at hand. Pandora was there right when I entered, and there was a fire red hedgehog with a cowboy hat on. A tall man stood in the center of the room, the juggernaut that was actually our boss; Colonel Xavier. The hulking falcon was about seven feet tall, probably weighing in at 350lbs or so. But his other features were perfect, his black feathers nicely trimmed and groomed to perfection. His long pure white hair reaching his waist, no knots or curls or anything. This guy was the epitome of the perfect man. As soon as I walked in, he gestured to me to sit in a chair. Which I did. I didn't want to offend him, but we all knew he had a high tolerance for us, especially Pandora and her fucking kindergarden pranks.

"Ah, Damian. Nice of you to arrive early. Very commendable." He said, his voice an angelic tone.

"Yeah, well I woke up earlier than normal and I didn't feel like going back to sleep." I answered, trying to remain respectful of the Colonel.

"Well, now that we're all here, let's get better aquainted. Damian, Pandora, I'd like to introduce our newest sharpshooter Timothy Hunter." The red hedgehog stood up, and tipped his hat towards us. Pandora waved at him with a smirk, no doubt flirting with him already. Just fuck and get it over with I thought. I nodded towards him. He turned back to Xavier and nodded again.

"He has a record of being the best sniper that the world has ever seen, so we invited him to our agency three weeks ago and now it's time for his first kill mission." The colonel said, maintaining a serious tone. It made me uncomfortable to see him emphisize the word kill. Timothy turned to me with half a smile on his face. "You ready to bash that mother fucker's head in?" I looked around a bit to check if he was talking to someone else. Nope, he means me. I shrugged. "I guess. Have you heard of the killings this guy has done?"

Tim's expression went down, almost confused. "Actually, no. This is the first time I've heard of this damn bear killing someone." His southern accent was evident in his voice.

"Seriously? But Colonel X said that this guy's a serial killer?" I was a bit confused. Flippy was supposed to have been a killer, maybe I tracked the wrong guy and Shifty misled me? But that didn't make any damn sense either, why would Shifty do this shit especially after his brother died? Unless Lifty wasn't killed. But then-

"Something wrong Damian?" Xavier's angel voice was right in my ear. I jumped a bit and turned to him, his hand at my waist as if we were dancing. He backed it off and smiled at me. I just shook my head, better not to involve the Colonel in this.

"Nah, I'm alright. So when's the takeoff?" I responded. He laughed a little bit.

"Anxious are we? I like that. We're about to leave soon, just hang here a bit. Have a drink." He said, holding a glass of what appeared to be water. Turned out to be 7-UP. "We need to discuss our tactics a bit before you go anyway. Can't have you running into danger now can we? No, I need to keep you perfectly safe." I was, I'll admit, flattered that he actually worried about my safety. But at the same time, I felt like he was pushing something on me. I backed away and almost snatched the soda from him, getting a chuckle out of him. He left the room and I walked over to Tim and Pandora, already engaged in conversation.

"So that means..." Tim said.

"Yep!" Pandora added.

"But that can't mean..."

"Uh-huh! Sure does!"

"Amazin'. So how'd it feel? I mean, was it better or worse than being with a guy?"

I decided to intervene now, since I had a slight understanding of their topic. I walked next to them and sat on the edge of a table, sipping my drink. "What's up?" I asked casually. Pandora shrugged and giggled. Tim sighed and looked away. "We all ready to go?" I continued. Pandora nodded and Tim just replied "Sure."

We all walked to our respective offices to stock up. I searched for whatever weapons I could get my paws on and overload them if possible. Even with Pandora's perfect agility and speed and Tim's perfect eyesight and aim, I felt that we were going to have a very tough fight. I grabbed a rifle, a handgun, damn near every weapon that wasn't nailed down. I put on bulletproof clothes, headset to communicate with my allies, and all other agency protocol equipment. I walked out and found the other two decked out in the same overexaggerated fashion. We shared a laugh before heading to the helicopter.

As we were walking towards the landing pad, I passed the colonels office and saw something on his computer monitor. It was the same description page that I saw when I was researching Flippy.

"Just calm down, he's looking for the same info you were..." I told myself.

It did make sense though, maybe I'm being sent to kill Flippy because Colonel X hates the man. I threw that thought out, the Colonel was too good a man and respected his position far too much to pull something like this. I walked away and ran towards the helipad, nearly falling down and smacking the ledge of the chopper.

And we were off. We boarded shortly before 4:20pm so we should be landing in about an hour and a half. Pandora whipped out a Sony PSP while Tim tipped his hat down and took a nap. I stared out the window and watched the clouds go by us.

"Damn, are you friend or foe Flippy?" I asked myself, it was hard to tell now.