A/N: This chapter's been written for a while, just forgot to upload it, and it's intentionally short.
"All drones are down, squad leader, give us a sitrep!"
"Miss Wong, what do we do? All of our Dragonfly drones are gone, and the P-36's are getting wiped out just as fast!"
Carla knew the problem with their plan at that very moment; Their own jammer was cutting them off from the assault teams.
"Prep for a counterattack on our position, our jammer is our Achilles! All personnel, grab weapons and tactical gear, prepare for possible attack from Valentine!" Carla ordered, spinning on her heel and grabbed her nearby G36c. Unlike the rest of the Syndicate, she didn't care for the full sized version of the venerable German firearm, rather, she was fond of the compact model, which was more fitting to her admittedly shorter arms than her older sister, Ada.
The technicians all had the standard Syndicate training, so they abandoned their computers and hurried to don their gear and grab weapons. By the time they were all ready, Carla had called in for an emergency extraction, and all they had to do was hold out and pray that Valentine didn't arrive before they did.
"All personnel in defensive positions, ma'am. Structural armour plating is electrically grounded and demagnetized in preparation for Valentine's arrival."
"And our exfil method?" Carla asked to the speaking soldier.
"Second floor will be target by a precision strike, we escape by helicopter extraction."
"Strike package and exact location?"
"Upper bathroom, standard ordnance missile." The soldier continued. "This is an extraction, not an attack, so the missile isn't loaded for Quinque shrapnel to take him down."
"Alright, hold position." Carla declared, taking her place in the middle of the room, behind an overturned table.
"DTT 500 meters, shall I begin to sprint?" Rico asked, since for the travel portion he was in autopilot.
"DTT?" Sheva asked, since the acronym was new to her.
"Distance To Target." Valentine answered from his perch on Rico's upper back as he locked himself to Rico's hull with his Magnokinesis. "Alright, I'm sticky, run for it and break down the wall."
"Sheva?" Rico asked, and she gave a sound of affirmation, so Rico started running to the target house. One of the closest civilian buildings to the Nightfall's shipyard, only a few kilometers away, but well within LA's city limits.
"Scanning structure, bypassing known structural augmentation... Armour panels are employing countermeasures, sir... Demagnetization and electrical grounding. I do detect a chink in their armour, upstairs bathroom. Shall we exploit that?" Rico put up the overlay for Sheva to see.
"No, Dad mentioned this trick to me; it's their exit, they're going to use it to escape by chopper, it'll blow a hole for them. They're most likely in the basement or the first floor." Valentine explained. "Rico, kick down the front door."
"On it." Rico replied, reaching over his shoulder to grab his Uppercut C66 and charged it up as he neared the building at full speed. "Brace for impact."
With a low shoulder, Rico charged straight into the wall, bringing rubble and armour plates exploding into the alarmed Syndicate personnel, shattering part of the upper floor as he pulled back and shoved his C66's large barrel into the crater he'd carved through the wall, firing two blasts before the soldiers inside could recover from his sudden arrival.
"Fuck 'em up, and take down their chopper when it arrives." Valentine repelled himself from Rico's hull and launched right through the hole, rolling on impact and brought his P90 to bear, the 5.7x28mm Q-bullets making quick work of their Kevlar vests. "I'm going after their leader!"
"You don't have to look far." A woman's voice spoke up from behind some hastily arranged - but completely useless - cover. "So come and get me, you magnetic freak!"
"Rico, she's mine. You handle the men." Valentine wasted no time in getting close to the woman, smacking her G36c aside with one hand, the other wrenching the knife on her shoulder out of the sheath, then he threw both aside as the woman immediately tried to pull out her sidearm, the USP.45 that he was expecting.
Since the gun was mostly polymer, he didn't have as much influence over it as he'd liked, but that didn't mean he was at her mercy either. With a grin he forced his Magnokinesis to swing the gun's metal barrel away from himself in a wide swing, and then again on the firing assembly, making this oddly familiar looking Asian woman shoot one of the remaining men in the back of the head before the gun was wrenched out of her hand by the same influence on the barrel and clattered far out of reach.
"Now then... You and I are going to have a little chat once Rico deals with your chopper. In the meantime, just remember you shot one of your own men in the back of the head without any sort of provocation... You freak." Valentine grabbed the woman by the vest she wore and lifted her up with one hand, surrounding them in a bubble of repelling magnetism to divert or catch the stray gunfire from the Syndicate men.
Rico and Sheva make quick work of the surviving men, and after Sheva personally climbed out and checked to make sure none were playing dead, both stood at the ready for the arrival of the chopper.
Meanwhile, Valentine had the woman pinned to the wall with several scrap pieces of metal from Rico's wall breach.
"Let's start simple... Name and rank, please." Valentine pulled up a slightly banged up chair and sat in front of the woman.
"Carla Wong, Lieutenant First Class." Carla replied tersely.
"By any chance, are you related to Ada Wong?" Valentine asked, still cradling his P90 in hand while he sat there.
"She's my sister. I already know she's among your ranks." Carla sneered.
"Next question: What was your assigned objective for this mission?" Valentine asked his next question without pause.
"Assassinate Sheva Alomar." Carla scowled. "Seeing as you brought along that huge tin can, I can safely assume she's inside, controlling the damn thing."
"I can hear you, Lieutenant..." Rico's voice came through the hole in the wall.
"Now, if she was your target, why would you try to assassinate her while I was present?" Valentine raised an eyebrow pointedly. "Seems somewhat suicidal, considering your equipment and forces, especially considering you didn't account for Rico's involvement."
"Rico? You mean the tin can?" Carla glared in the direction of the crater, where Rico's leg was slightly visible.
"Call me a tin can one more time, Lieutenant..."
"Rico, that won't be necessary." Valentine spoke warningly. "Just take down their helicopter when it arrives."
"Yes, sir." Rico replied, only for Sheva to disembark and Boost down to the ground, marching up to the crater, vaulting through until she was face to face with the captive woman.
"So this is the bitch in charge, huh?" Sheva spoke through her T-15's mask without opening it. "Huh, reminds me of what's-her-name... Ada. Y'know... Leon's wife."
"They're sisters, actually." Valentine replied. "But that doesn't really matter, considering that Ada was part of Dad's Syndicate, not Alex Wesker's mockery of it..."
"It is not a mockery! It's an improvement!" Carla barked out suddenly at the commentary.
"The real Syndicate is gone... has been for almost 19 years. Whatever bullshit that Wesker put into your head about it being brought back is probably wrong or likely false propaganda." Valentine glared at Carla, silencing her in an instant. "With that being said, you're officially considered a terrorist, not a bioterrorist, for leading an armed assault on BSAA property, as well as attempted murder. Rico's already called the proper authorities, and we have direct records, plus statements and of course, your own fingerprints on your weaponry, as evidence. Do svidaniya, Miss Wong, you dug your own grave by joining the Syndicate, but this attack... you walked in of your own damn accord."