Chapter 3: Agent School
Violet was awoken with a start, a blinding white light filled her vision for a minute, and then it was replaced with that of a man wearing gray fatigues, a flashlight in one hand and a baton in the other. "UP!" he shouted at her.
Staring at him, confused, Violet opened her mouth to ask him what was going on, only to be smacked in the face with the baton, sending her sprawling to the ground of her room, the stone floor bruising her elbows a bit as she impacted on the hard surface. "I SAID UP TRAINEE!" he barked and raised the baton again, this time it crackled with energy.
Immediately Violet jumped up a bit, and realized she was now in a gray set of fatigues, just like the man before her. "NOW MOVE IT!" He barked and hit her back with the baton, sending a shock through her spine, forcing her to run out the door before her. Outside of the room she had just been in, there was a hall filled with other people around her age, some younger, some older, all wearing the same Fatigues. She joined them as the men with the batons and flashlights herded them along the hall, towards a ramp that led up, the ceiling disappearing as they ran up it and found themselves outside, the sun not even up, the ground slick with dew and the dirt wet with it as well. Before them, was a massive obstacle course.
Violet wanted to go invisible right now and figure out what had happened, but all she got for her efforts was a hand slightly vanishing and then returning to normal, and a zap to the back.
Suddenly a man walked up to face them as they were organized into lines. She recognized him as the man that had been talking to her before she blacked out, though she couldn't see his face, she recognized the coat and hat. Then she remembered he had mentioned training to her. So was this a test? "Good Morning Recruits!" he shouted over the dead silent air. "Today you shall be tested! Today you will begin the journey that will make you strong! Today!" he then moved off, and a grim looking man in a sergeant's uniform walked up.
"Alright you trash. You all will be running this course behind me. You will reach the end. You will take a folder at the end. Then, you will bring it back to me!" he barked loudly. "GO!" he barked and blew on his whistle.
As if in a trance, all of the gathered teens ran forward, pushing and shoving towards the first part of the course. Jumping wooden walls that were waist level high. Violet was barely able to keep ahead of the main pack as she jumped the boards of wood sticking out of the ground. Once she passed that, she hit the wooden wall that had about seven ropes leading up it's thirty feet right to the top.
Just as she grabbed the thick, prickly rope, a paintball slammed into the wood next to her. Turning around to see where it had come from, she was just in time to see one fly past her ear, hitting the wood again, missing her by a hair. Deciding knowing really wasn't half the battle, Violet began climbing, just as the other teens arrived and started climbing, this time, a few were hit and fell down onto the ground. Groaning and screaming in pain as they were stepped on as the others shoved their way towards one of the ropes.
Violet was very aware of the paintball pellets hitting all around her and the other teens as they tried to climb their way up, some getting hit, others were not. It was like a crazy game of luck.
Once they made it to the top of the wall, some sweating and groaning, these were immediately picked off and fell all thirty feet with a sickening crunch, they found they now had to climb down the wall. And the paint ball gunners were on this side too. Violet however, feeling her powers beginning to work again, just jumped down and summoned a shield, the thing barely saved her life as she hit the ground hard and with a pain filled grunt. Slowly she extracted her body, noting that more teens were trying to get down as well, and a few were getting hit and falling down at an unnatural pace.
Deciding to move before the snipers realized she was still up and about, Violet ducked under the razor wire and began crawling through the mud, mentally asking herself why she was doing this, just as a pair of machine guns began firing over her head in a wide arc, causing her to shriek loudly, but she kept moving.
Once she passed that, there was just a simple sprint across a gravel rode, where she could see a handful of tables scattered around a field, yellow folders sitting atop of them. However it was not as easy as it looked. Just as she was ready to start running, another boy who had made it ahead of her ran out and immediately vanished in a flash. A second later and she saw him, laying near a pile of smoking gravel, shaking from the after affects of a stun mine, something she had only thought existed in science fiction novels. Immediately the boy was pelted by paint balls, screaming as they hit him.
Wrinkling her nose in disgust for this cruel action, Violet wanted to help him, but her instincts told her to reach the end as fast as she could, since the snipers would be aiming at her in a second. Wishing the boy luck in her mind, Violet managed to summon up another minor shield, barely doing any good as she ran across the gravel, so far so good.
Almost directly after she thought this, she hit a mine. The soft 'Chu-Chink' of the trip wire button made her wince as her entire body was covered in a golden light. Her shield fell and her body suffered a bit of the shock, sending her into a pile of gravel. As she lay there, she heard paint balls splattering around her prone body, the rocks now covered in green's, blue's and purples.
Once she was sure she could move again, Violet jumped up and summoned an even weaker shield, but it kept the paint at bay as she started noticing the slightly higher and more pointed edges of where a stun mine was hidden began to appear and after another few seconds she had crossed the end of the gravel and slid under a table, the paint balls momentarily stopped as the snipers began firing at the other teens that were trying to make it across the gravel, attempting to follow her path through, but they were failing at it.
Reaching up, tentatively, Violet managed to grab the edge of folder and bring it down, just as a paintball skinned her knuckle, leaving it sore and red, but still ok, and the paintball continued on it's course.
Now Violet was stuck. How was she supposed to make it back across...across that? The other teens were mostly gone now, only a handful remained as they were picked apart by the snipers, stun mines and one another. The few that were making it towards her, were starting to freeze up. They were starting to think this was crazy. Violet had to chuckle at that. Her entire life had been nothing but crazy.
Deciding to simply screw the whole thing, Violet ran back across the gravel, once again a shield being barely formed as she managed to once again cross the gravel yard, though it was a major hassle to do it, with a dozen bodies strewn around. She noticed a few that were groaning loudly, who had been shot into the air from one mine, only to land on another. And there were even some who fate seemed to hate, who had landed on three or more because of ill trajectories. She felt a bit bad for all of them, being pelted mercilessly by the 'Enemy' snipers as they lay in pain form the jagged rocks digging into their backs, chests and sides.
As she once again dived under the wire into mud, Violet shoved her way through the thick mineral as the wire dug into her back, the machine guns overhead were already whirring to life once again and resumed their firing. This, as well, was passed quickly. What really took her time, was climbing the bloody wall. Thirty more feet of climbing a itchy rope, was pure torture to her aching body. But despite the paint balls missing her every few centimeters, she made it to the top and slung herself down another rope to the other side. Then it was simple jumping. And on the last one she got nailed in the leg, but she continued on anyways, making it to the end, where a white line said 'Finnish' on one side and 'Start' on the other. She crossed the former one, a sweaty mess, with mud and bits of paint all over her, the only real indicator of her being hit was on her left leg, right below the knee on the back side.
The sergeant looked at her, impressed. "Recruit your name?" he asked, his voice sounding rather soft when he wasn't yelling.
"Vi..Vio..Violet" She said, unable to say anymore. The sergeant nodded and two men came over and carried her over to a bench, giving her a water canteen and a green pill before taking the folder from her, which she had held in a vice like grip, her knuckles white.. Violet greedily drank most of the water first, then took the pill and drank the rest. Immediately she felt a bit of her strength return to her, rejuvenated.
Suddenly a chair was pulled up before her and the man from before sat down. "You honestly are the daughter of the Incredible's" he muttered as he studied her drenched face, the very picture of weariness.
Violet's eyes locked with his, which were a gray-blue. "How do you know who I am? Where am I?" she managed to say, the pill giving her the strength really.
The Man chuckled. "Like I said, the Agency is above NSA. I know of every super in the world, and every one that is willing to join the Agency is instantly recruited" he stated. "As for where you are. You are at a secret Agency base in New Mexico. Like I said, if you want to join the Agency, you must pass the training. I can't just send young, untested supers out into the cold world and expect them to face the difficult missions, now can I?" he asked.
Violet nodded. In a way, it made sense. A bit extreme, but still it made sense. "So. This was really just a test?" she asked.
"Yes" he stated. "A Test you passed. I hope you continue to impress us here. Your future among the Agency looks bright already, it would be a shame for you to leave because you wanted to go home..." he said.
Violet shook her head. "Never. I don't ever want to go home" she said sternly, what was there for her anyways? Angry parents and a pooping machine. That's what.
The man grinned again. "Just what I wanted to hear" he said and stood up. "The name's Shade, by the way" he said as a parting shot, then left.
For the next ten minutes, Violet was allowed to relax and was given another bottle of water to drink, which she took her time in enjoying this time. Then the sergeant took in a breath full of air. "CEASE FIRE! COLLECT THE RECRUITS!" he barked and over a dozen men and women in black stealth suits, sporting paintball guns with REALLY big paint canisters, emerged on either side of the course from the bushes and began picking up the groaning teens and lifting them like sacks of potatoes. They then carried them towards another ramp, to the left of the ramp they had entered in, which led back underground. "RECRUIT! MOVE YOUR ARSE AND CATCH UP! PLAY TIME IS OVER GIRLY!" The sergeant barked.
Violet, now understanding this was some sort of training, quickly followed the rest of the trainees down the other ramp, which led down another hall, which led to showers. They were forced to quickly strip down, wash, dress in fresh fatigues and then move down another hall towards a dojo, where they removed their boots and lined up in three rows of seven on two sides of the mats.
A half dozen men wearing the same fatigues as everyone Violet had seen today, except Shade, as he called himself, were standing in the center of the mats. "I am instructor Jason Mawr" one of the instructors stated. "Let us begin Hand To Hand" he stated and six trainee's moved onto the mats to begin.
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Three hours later and Violet slowly entered the area that looked just like a school cafeteria, where she was given a plate full of food and another water bottle, then set down at a table. There was complete silence among those sitting at the table as they began eating, all of them too tired to talk. After hand to hand, they had been sent off to a gun class and were instructed in striping a .308 rifle, rebuilding it, then they had to fire it, hitting the target dead center. Whether because she came from two supers, or because she just had a special talent she had never known about, Violet came out the best or semi best in the other two classes.
This worried her. What would the other trainee's reactio...
her daydreaming was cut short by the sergeant stalking in with his instructors and blowing on that dang whistle. "FALL OUT! STEALTH CLASS IS NEXT!" he barked as they all groaned and began standing up and moving towards the door. "THAT'S NOT MOVING! DOUBLE TIME IT RECRUITS!" he barked.
Violet just moved a bit faster, as did everyone else, then sighed. This was going to take some getting used to...
