I know I said one a week, but it's been more difficult than I thought to get the time. So I've given up on trying to keep any time of schedule, so these'll just come out when they come out. Sorry about that, but there's stuff going on, and these can take a while to write, and I'd rather not pump out shit just to get parts out.
Aya stepped into the room, the door hissing shut behind her. She held her shotgun at the ready as she advanced inside, a rhythmic beeping giving away the presence of some form of life support machine. She turned the corner, to see an extremely old man laying in something resembling a hospital bed, with numerous devices attached to him, clearly meant to monitor his life signs. The man was bald and liver-spotted from age. He looked up as Aya approached.
"At last, you arrive" the man's voice came out in a rasp, as if it was difficult to talk "I've been awaiting your arrival, for quite a long time"
"Who are you?" Aya asked
"I long ago left my name. Became a Mr. Right now, Mr Vegetable seems fitting" the man said this with a smile visible through the oxygen mask. "But that is not important, you came here to discover who you are"
"I came because I was told you could tell me more about where I came from"
"Indeed. Give me time, and I will tell you, talking isn't too easy for me in this state"
"I don't have time, reinforcements will be here soon"
"Of course, of course, in that case, I cannot tell you what you wish. But there's another way I can give you this information"
"Which is?"
"When I was brought here, I removed the information they desired from my mind, into a secondary compartment I had implanted. Upon my death, it would be purged, and it is extremely well protected, which is why I have been kept alive, I can give this to you, though I need something in return"
"Which is?"
"I want you to kill me"
"Deal"
"As quick as I expected. Allow me a moment" The man's eyes glazed over for a few moments, before returning to normal. He then looked over to Aya "Could you cut one of my arms fee?"
With one fluid movement, Aya drew her blade, and severed the numerous sensors and IV's on the man's left arm.
"My thanks" he reached behind his head, and, with a slight grunt, a sickening wrenching noise and burst of blood, he held out his hand to Aya, which contained a small chip. "It was well hidden, they had no idea it was on my person"
"So what do I do with this?"
"It will work like any USB, just plug it into a computer, and you will have access to the files with all the information you need"
"Now I'm to kill you"
"Yes. I tire of all of thi-"
"You don't need to justify it" Aya replied, drawing her blade and shotgun "Any preference?"
"Just make it painless"
Aya then quickly brought up the shotgun, and fired a blast into the mans head, instantly destroying his entire head, and a small amount of the upper torso.
She pocketed the chip, and headed back outside to rejoin the others.
Maxim fidgeted in the new armour "Wow this feels weird"
"Why does it feel weird, you had that Spider Suit before didn't you? That had servo's that helped movement didn't it?" Alice replied to his discomfort in the new Powered Armour
"Yeah, but only in the legs. This thing gets my arms as well. It's just weird. I'll get used to it. I still miss the grappling hook, the broken ribs were worth the positioning of the grappling hook... And it was cool to be able to grapple around like Batman"
"But that's not too helpful for you any more"
"Stop killing my dreams"
"I heard Shen's working on a suit with a grappling hook right now, for Aya and Sean"
"Are you trying to make me cry? Because I will cry"
"I saw some huge suit in the works for Punchy Mc Punchyson over there" William said, pointing to Harold, who, true to the name William just gave him, was in the process of punching the shit out of a wall.
"My Psionics go nuts when I cry. Do you want a Null Lance?"
The Commander stood before the huge screen In his room, a map of the world open on it, displaying all known military assets, belonging to both ADVENT and XCOM, unsurprisingly, there's more ADVENT assets than XCOM assets.
"I have no idea how you make heads or tails of that screen" Alice said, looking at the screen over the Commander's shoulder "It just looks like a bunch of random structures over the planet to me"
The Commander gazed at the screen for a few moments longer, before pressing a button on a remote, and the screen went back into the wall. "I'm not really sure either. It just, makes sense to me, I guess I just make connections in the chaos"
"I guess that's how you survived for so long hooked up to the ADVENT network"
"And how we've done so much damage to ADVENT after you got me back"
"Well, there's also Myself and the other soldiers who've done pretty well"
"You guys too, you're helpful"
"Uh huh"
The Commander looked at the table of paper work that Alice had come to help him deal with "I just hate how much paper work there is"
"We need to make sure they can't hack into it"
"But I just hate it. It's somehow even worse than when we were an official government operation. You'd think the paper work wouldn't be needed when we're a guerrilla fighting force"
"We're not a guerrilla fighting force. We're more of a rebellion movement"
"You know what I mean"
"Yes, yes I do"
They continued to work through the huge stacks of paper on the Commanders desk, after almost half an hour of methodical work, they had made it about half way through the stack.
"We're making good progress here" The Commander said "I can almost see if the desk is wood or metal now"
"It's wood"
"Stop killing my funnies"
"Your funnies?"
"I'm not good at the wordy things"
"The great Commander, saying wordy things"
"I know tactics, not human interactions"
"Apparently not"
"Oh, and, speaking of not knowing social things" The Commander began speaking rather rapidly "I've seen videos and movies and things where the guy just completely misses any hints and looks like an idiot, and anyways what i want to say here is just-"
"What are you saying here?"
"I just wanna know, so I'm not seeming like an idiot to everyone. Have you been dropping any hints at anything?"
"What?"
"Like, have you actually been flirting with me, and I've been thinking you're just being friendly or something"
"Why would you-"
"Because i just have to say that if there is then, I'm sorry, i like you, as a friend, you're like a sister and a friend, but i don't feel that-"
"Commander"
"I don't really feel that way about-"
"Ryan!"
The Commander jumped as she shouted to shut him up.
"To answer your question, no, I have not been, dropping hints, I don't know where this is coming from, and I don't get how your head went to that place right now"
"Well... I've wanted to ask that for a while, because, you know, I don't want to have been being an idiot for a few months without realizing it, and then we weren't talking about anything else, so this seemed like a good time to bring it up, like I said, I'm not good at the social"
"It's fine, I wasn't hinting at anything, and now i know there's no point to even thinking about hinting"
"Look, it's not about you or anything"
"It's about you?"
"Well, yes"
"You know that's why you say when you break up with someone right"
"Yeah, but, it's true. Look. You're a very attractive, smart woman, and any man would be lucky to have a partner like you. But it's just, I"
"I get it, you're gay, There's no need to be so weird-"
"No, that's not it. I've never been interested in, well, anyone before, I've just never felt that need for anything"
"So you just don't get sexually attracted to people?"
"No. I mean, I still like people, and you're a great person to hang around, I've just, never been, into that"
"You know there's a name for that, right?"
"What?"
"Can't remember it off the top of my head, but it's a kind of sexuality where you just don't get sexually attracted to people"
"Wait.. You don't know the name off the top of your head. The great Archive doesn't know something?"
"Do you still want me to help you with these papers"
"Yes please"
Aya sat in her room, at the computer, and inserted the chip the old man had given her. The screen was quickly filled with documents which she began to read through. This would take a while.
The Commander once again sat at his desk, the screen back up with all the various assets. "This was so much easier when we were government-funded"
He took a deep breath, and cracked his knuckles. "We've gotta find where Hammer and Anvil are based. They're the biggest threat ADVENT has"
"Just finding it is only half the battle, we'd then have to fight into a heavily defended headquarters" the Chairman's epic voice came through the screen
"And finding it will not be easy, they have it extremely well hidden" the metallic voice of Miss Lost came through "And we don't have the numbers to brute force through the front door even if we do find it"
"Just knowing where they operate from will help me anticipate what they're likely to do" the Commander replied "But it's not like there's some obvious gap that the base could be. It doesn't have to be huge to work as their headquarters, and be well defended"
"Well Commander, you're the tactical mind here. I will return to managing the Resistance cells we have contact with until you have an idea" The Chairman's voice winked out.
"I love his voice so much"
"So you say almost every time you talk to him"
"It's just so cool"
"So do you have any ideas as to where to go from here?"
"Shen and Tygan are working on a Facility on the Avenger that will let us investigate that vial from the first Facility we hit, which I just realized has been pretty much sitting in storage for a couple months, and the brain thing of that Codex guy"
"Sounds rather promising. Keep us informed. We will continue attempting to draw out information from ADVENT. Lost out"
The Commander slumped down in his chair. "Ughhh, I haven't slept in 3 days. I need a nap". He turned to the side, and pressed a button "Central, I'm gonna get some sleep, wake me up if anything happens"
"Will do Commander" Bradford's voice came back through the intercom "You should really get more sleep, I managed things without you for 20 years, I can handle a day or 2 without you"
"I'll get some proper rest when we've killed ADVENT" The Commander replied
"Just don't burn yourself out, we'll need you at the end"
"I know my limits. I can manage" He clicked off the intercom, got up, and headed over to his bed, which had not seen much real use, and promptly collapsed onto it
Maxim stood in his room, wispy purplish figures floated about the room, all of them looking like a creature from a different game he's played. Dozens of the things floated around, some aimlessly floating, some doing complicated manoeuvres, and some engaged in fights.
To any with Psionic abilities themselves, they would also see what seems to be a small purple flame within his pupils, the sign that he's using his Psionic Vision as well, and a light purple glow around his entire body betraying the fact that he's also using his 'Passive Abilities' as he calls them.
"To think there was a time I struggled to keep the Psi Vision up"
Maxim gazed around the room, looking at all the Psi Figures floating around. He held up his hand and a ball of purple and black energy formed. He passed the Psi Energy ball back and forth in his hands "I wish I could juggle, this would look so cool. But if I drop it, I'll destroy the floor".
Sorry that this took so long, like I said, finding the time is a bit difficult, and finding time with ideas of how to start the next part is even more difficult (Starting it is the hardest part, after that, I just kind of follow it along and the story guides me, but thinking of how to start it is a bit difficult). But I'm getting back into XCOM, and that makes me want to write, since in order to continue on the game, I need to get the story caught up so I don't completely forget what happened, or get missions confused.
And I know this is thinking a bit far ahead, but I was worried about what I'd do after this ends, as I do enjoy writing these. But with the new DLC/Update thing, War of the Chosen, that really changes the game, I'm pretty sure I'll do another one of these, in another XCOM World, with new characters. But this is going to be quite a while before this comes up anyway. Just wanted to mention my idea.