"A safer location?" Simmons asked.

"Yes. Now stop gaping like you've never seen a girl before and let's get going."

I raised an eyebrow. "Yeah, because you're the only girl here."

Tex stopped and looked at me as though for the first time. She stared.

"You," she said softly. "You survived." Her eyes flickered down to my rib cage.

"It's been a while," I replied stonily. "I've had the time to."

"Apparently."

She turned and strode off through the woods, and Church ran to catch up, falling into step beside her. She didn't seem to take much notice of him, though he attempted to start up a conversation with her. I was about to go up and join them—I wanted to speak to Tex more myself—when a maroon arm reached out and grabbed my shoulder from behind, slowing me down.

"What the hell was that?" Simmons asked me. The other Reds and Blues were watching me, wide-eyed. "Was she talking about—"

"Simmons, I really don't want to discuss this right now," I interrupted irritably. "Haven't you all had enough of gaping at my ribs?"

"How does Tex know about it though?" Grif asked. "The only way she could is if it happened… happened…"

"Happened during Project Freelancer," Wash finished flatly. I glared at him.

"You—you went to Project Freelancer?" Donut yelped. "You never told us that!"

"There was no reason for you to know," I said. I looked over at Church, whose face was emotionless.

"No reason?" Donut repeated, amazed. "Are you joking? You couldn't have at least let us know at one point that you went to visit the place?"

"Oh, don't sugar-coat it," Tex said, not turning around from her lead. "She didn't just come and see what was happening. It wasn't a field trip. She worked there."

Silence.

"Wh… why didn't you tell us this?" Simmons gaped.

"It's what comes with being a secret agent, if you haven't noticed. There's a reason you guys don't know anything about me."

It was true. Through the time I spent with the guys, I had never wanted them to know what had happened to me. First, they found out about my ribs—that was bad enough, but had I figured they would notice the uneven bones eventually.

However, I had been keeping my previous missions a secret on purpose. I didn't want them to know what had happened. I certainly didn't want to force those memories upon my friends. Having them in my own mind was bad enough.

"We know plenty about you, missy!" Sarge objected.

"Yeah?" I challenged. "What's my real name then?"

They fell quiet again.

"Listen," I said to them. "There are things about me you are better off not knowing."

"But—"

"No! I don't want to hear you asking me about this again, do you understand?"

They nodded silently and continued following Tex. I made sure to avoid any eye contact with the two Freelancers.

"Tex, where are we going?" asked Church, changing the subject. "Our vehicles are in the opposite direction. That's where we'll be the safest."

"That may be so, but that's exactly where Meta will expect you," she said.

"So he knows we're here too, then? "

"You're kind of hard to miss, especially with how freaking loud you idiots always argue."

We continued walking through the greenery, but I didn't have a good feeling about this. I didn't like being so far away from the Puma and Sheila. I knew Sheila would be able to protect Caboose if Meta showed up, but I wished we could have that extra protection as well.

We seemed to be going toward a deeper and darker part of the woods. I wasn't sure I liked this, but I fingered my gun protectively and followed the black soldier, staring at her suspiciously from behind. Once or twice, I caught Wash's eye and knew he and I both didn't feel something was right.

She led us to a small patch of trees and sat down. We did as well, and I perched on a rock where I could observe everyone equally.

"Okay, I need an explanation right now," I said. "What's the meaning of all this? Why are you back?" My tone wasn't impolite, but it was firm. Tex looked at me, and I wondered if she were going to challenge my command. However, she just took a deep breath and started talking.

"I'm here for the same reason you are," she said carefully. "I want to bring down the AIs and deliver them to Command."

"Why?" Wash asked, frowning. "You're one of them."

"So is Church," she countered, gesturing to the powder-blue soldier. "I didn't want to come back," she continued icily. "Because of the Director, I don't even know who I really am. So if turning in the AIs means hurting him, then I want in."

"Then why did you take O'Malley?" I asked, perplexed. "And then you ran off with Meta!"

"I had to get on their good sides," she said emotionlessly. "I had to get O'Malley to trust me again. Without him, it will be impossible to capture them. The same goes with Meta."

"But you could hide your thoughts from the AI?" I continued. She nodded, and my eyebrows furrowed. Maybe that wasn't such a large feat for another AI, but for a human, blocking thoughts from the fragments was immensely difficult.

"Where is O'Malley now?" asked Church.

"Meta."

"O'Malley worked his entire plan just to get to you," I said to her. "Wash was just his second choice. Why would he leave so soon?"

She shrugged. "He trusted me."

Hmm.

"And where's Meta?"

"Looking for you guys somewhere else. We split up and I sent him in a completely different direction."

"How did you know where we were?"

She looked at him disparagingly. "Seriously? You guys are so damn loud the whole forest could hear you. Lucky for you, I caught where you were before Meta did."

"Yes, thank you, we've already discussed how loud we are," I replied frostily. "Now, what's your plan for actually taking the AIs? All we are doing right now is sitting here waiting for Meta and the AIs to find us. If I'm not mistaken, that's not going to do us much good."

"I have a plan," she responded, her voice hard. I had touched a nerve. "Once I go through it all in my mind and finalize it, I'll tell you exactly how we're going to steal the AIs. If we just work together—and you guys follow my lead—we can make it through this successfully."