A/N: Well…Chapter 41. How this came to be this long, I don't know. I'm sticking with the excuse of, 'I just work here' and that's it.

Paradox Effect

Summary: Dying sucked. Dying and being killed by the same teammate again? That sucked even more. Dying and being thrown back into Blood Gulch as a girl? That REALLY sucked. Now, Leona Church will have to deal with Tucker's perverted looks, Caboose's stupidity, and worst of all, Tex's laughter…

*Chapter 41*

Leona pulled her hands down her cheeks as slow as humanly possible, trying to fully comprehend the news that York had given her. "You mean to tell me…that you woke me at four in the fucking morning to tell me that Tucker is nowhere to be seen after falling through the teleporter?"

York sighed, drew a hip flask and tossed it to her. "Before you ask, yes I did check to see if he just ended up by the cliffs. He didn't. Someone fucked with our teleporter which means he could honestly be anywhere in the galaxy."

Leona caught the flask, unscrewed it, and drank every last drop of whatever alcohol was inside.

Sometimes, she really hated her team.

The blue haired woman began to smile, worryingly so. York looked longingly at his bed and was definitely regretting several life choices. Such as waking her to tell her this.

Forget being heard on the other side of the canyon. Leona's rage carried over to another freaking star system.

"TUCKERRRRRRR!"

Tucker groaned and sat up, shaking sand out of his hair. "W-what the…where the fuck am I?" He looked around and saw he was on a sandy beach somewhere and for a brief moment, he wondered if he got lucky. "Sweet! Is this the part where hot babes come to greet me with cocktails?"

"Mwahahaha! No you fool!" Oh fuck…he knew that maniacal laughter anywhere. It was O'Malley. The son of a bitch was like a cockroach.

"Fuck me." Tucker didn't even bother to try avoiding the fist aiming for his head. Just before it made contact, he heard a piercing scream of honest to God sheer irritation and shuddered. Better to be unconscious when whoever or whatever that was came around.

Once Leona was done tearing an actual hole through space and time with a single scream, she got armored up and dragged Tex and Caboose with her, along with a very reluctant York. With all of her team accounted for minus Tucker, she made sure Caboose was the first one through the teleporter. If he got lost in an ocean and drowned, oh well no big loss.

"So, are we sure this will actually work?" York asked skeptically.

"Nope. Hence why I pushed Caboose through first," Leona answered. "If he dies, oh well. I'm not losing sleep over it."

"Damn, you're in a bad mood."

"One of my teammates is God knows where, I have a hangover, and it seems nearly impossible to get laid without one of you cockblocking me. So yes, I'm pissed off."

York put his hands up and wisely didn't have anything to say. He merely went over to the teleporter and checked to make sure it was locked on Tucker's last known location. "We're all set. You want to go…?"

Leona yanked his shotgun out of his hands and walked through, prepared to shoot just about anything that irritated her. She had cracked.

God, now she knew how Church felt.

"Yeah, now you're getting it. Be glad you didn't have to deal with Flowers' sappy bullshit." Church snorted.

On the other side of the teleporter, Leona found herself on a beach and lowered her shotgun. "Huh…beach resort. I did not see that one coming…" The sound of the waves lapping at the shore was a nice change of pace from the endless chirping of insects and sweltering heat of Blood Gulch. The breeze was nice too.

York and Tex followed through and she looked over her shoulder, shrugging. "Doesn't look too bad. Any idea what this place is?"

"A Freelancer outpost. One that was abandoned years ago, mind you," York answered, taking his shotgun back. "How the hell did Tucker find the coordinates?"

Leona rolled her eyes and tried to bring up Tucker on the Blue Team's COMs. "Tucker do you read? Where the hell are you?"

She heard nothing but static for a few moments before she got an answer. "Ugh…inside. O'Malley's made this into his base or something."

"Yeah, real helpful. Where inside?"

"I don't fucking know, I was unconscious!"

Leona sighed and wished she became a farmer instead. "Tell me what you can see. That'll give us something to work with."

"Well I'm in a hole and there's a giant spinning fan outside. Looks like a wind turbine. I can also see the way out and a stone walkway with decent cover. Should be able to sneak in if you're quiet," Tucker replied. "Huh…I didn't notice that glowing thing. What the hell is that?"

"Tucker? What are you doing?" For some reason, Leona began to worry.

"It's a sword? Fucking awesome!" Tucker cheered, sounding way too happy for someone who had been basically taken hostage.

Great. Now he was going to act like he was a Jedi for the next month. Perfect.

Leona sighed and looked at Tex, hanging up on the aqua idiot. Or was it turquoise? Teal? The fuck color was that supposed to be?

It was giving her a headache just thinking about it.

"He's fine," she deadpanned. "O'Malley's made this his new base by the sound of it. Anything stored in here that we should be worried about? Like a nuke?"

"Doubtful." Tex shook her head. "This was a research facility to study local flora. No point out in having a nuke way out here."

"Why would Project Freelancer waste their time looking at plants?"

"Studying them. Experiments to see if we could use some for medical purposes, making sure our brains won't rot if we eat them, that kind of thing."

"Dear God, did they do anything normal?" Leona groaned. No one answered her, mainly because they all knew it was a rhetorical question.

As if today hadn't been stressful enough, Tucker landed in front of her in a heap. He was holding on to his shiny new toy and he lifted his head, spitting out sand. "Ugh. Anyone got any food?"

Leona kicked him.

"Ow! The fuck did I do!?" Tucker hauled himself up with a groan.

"I know there is a reason why I haven't killed you and sold your corpse for aliens to study, but for the life of me I can't remember it." Leona growled. "I got dragged out of bed at four in the fucking morning to rescue your ass, and you're wondering why I'm pissed off!?"

"Keep it down, O'Malley might hear you!" Tucker hissed.

"Fuck off; he's like a half mile away." Leona scoffed.

"MWAHAHA! More fools to incinerate! Prepare to taste annihilation!" O'Malley cackled in the distance.

…

Everyone stared at Leona as if to ask, "You were saying?"

Leona groaned, looked over at Tex, and sighed.

"Just…make him go away. Permanently this time…" Rocket launcher was the answer to this problem.

She really should have just fucked off to live the rest of her life in a cave away from everyone.

A/N: Poor Leona. She's so not paid enough to deal with everyone's shit.

-Kagerou#0007