Chapter 107

Dan

After gathering enough ammo for everyone, Li suggested that the team still avoid fighting other teams and aim to complete the other mini-objectives to earn points and place in the top five. Dan followed closely behind Li along with Angie. All three were on alert for other teams as Li led them towards one of the objectives: Easter egg hunt.

Since the healing stims also reenergized fatigued agents, Li thought it would be a good idea to seek them out to help in Dan’s recovery from his overuse of the berserk ability. The team had already found the first stim and Li gave it to Dan

Li stopped in front of a tree that had a small hole in the bark. He tried reaching his hand through the opening but couldn’t fit through. He resorted to using his stengtht o tear off some of the bark around the hole tried again.

“Good,” he said. He took his hand out and found the second healing stim. Li handed the stim over to Angie.

“That’s two out of three,” Dan said. “One more and we get some points.”

“Yeah, but don’t pop a stim just yet. Since it’s going to be one each, only use yours when the time called for it,” Li instructed.

“Of course,” Dan replied.

Li stepped around the tree and continued walking. The stealth specialist walked another dozen steps before he stooped abruptly. Dan watched as Li froze in place. His arms were shaking and Li appeared to be looking down at something.

“Hey, is everything alright?” Dan said.

The stealth specialist made no reply to him. Dan tapped him on the shoulder and Li clutched the side of his head. He exhaled before he fell to his knees and collapsed to the ground.

“Woah what the hell?” Dan crouched down and flipped Li over. His body went limp

“Hey, what’s going on?” Angie said.

Dan frantically looked around, wondering if any enemies had spotted them. When he didn’t see anyone, he refocused on checking on Li’s condition. Dan didn’t see any wounds or punctures to Li’s armor and when he reached for his neck to feel a pulse, Dan breathed a sigh as he felt a faint and slow pulse.

“Dan, what’s happened to him,” Angie asked, her tone worried.

A grim realization sunk into Dan’s mind. Back at the weapons cache, Li complained about a minor headache. Li’s pace through the forest afterobtaining ammo also appeared more sluggish than usual. And just before Li collapsed, he clutched the side of his head as if in pain.

“Oh no,” Dan whispered. He turned to Angie. “Remember when I was out cold during the heist and when I woke up, I showed you guys these new powers I received from my dreams?”

Angie’s eyes widened then fell on Li’s body. “Don’t tell me…”

“This is the worst thing that could happen right now,” Dan muttered. “I was out for hours before I woke up. We were lucky I still bounced back and helped complete the mission. Who knows how long Li will be asleep.”

“Dan, you know neither of us can carry him through the entire round,” Angie said bluntly. “We need your brute power in case we come across those Prime Swords again. And if I’m worrying about lugging around Li, I can’t back you up if anything serious happens.”

Dan could tell Angie was biting her tongue. She didn’t want to admit that Li was now dead weight to them. But as strained as their relationship was, even she would never consider leaving him behind.

Only path forward came to mind for Dan. “Angie, here’s what we’re going to do.”

The strawberry blond looked at him, seemingly blocking out everything around her. Dan could feel the sweat dripping from the side of his face, knowing the situation they found themselves in.

“We need to find a hiding place and you’re going to look after Li for a bit. Keep a low profile while I go out and earn our team points,” Dan said. “That’s the only way we can still compete with the other teams.”

Angie’s face contorted. “Are you fucking crazy? You can’t go out there alone. We’re even weaker as a team if we split up.”

“No, I’m not crazy, but what choice do we have? We can’t carry him everywhere we go. And in a round like this, no one is pulling any punches. Do you trust that there’s not a single psycho around in this tournament who wouldn't pull the trigger on Li if they found him in this state? This is the only strategy that make sense.”

Angie opened her mouth but no words came out. She looked down at the ground. Dan could sense his teammate was near some breaking point.

Dan had never considered himself nurturing before in his life. He was friendly when it came to dealing with kids or elderly. But having to consol a girl his age who was emotionally distraught was something he never thought he had to prepare for. Even as an agent.

He closed the distance between them and awkwardly wrapped his arms around her. She responded by doing the same.

“Do you trust me?” Dan asked.

“I do Dan. This fucking sucks,” Angie replied with a shaky voice.

“I know, but we still have to make it work. We’re expected to push through no matter the circumstances. I’m putting all my trust in you in making sure Li gets taken care of.” Dan crouched down and picked up Li’s body. The stealth specialist was taller and leaner compared to Dan, so it was a surprise that Li was this heavy. “Let’s get going. Watch my back.”

As they walked, Dan recounted a peculiar tree they had passed during their hunt for the three healing stims that would have earned them points. A tree had a particularly thick trunk that was at least three time the thickness of the other surrounding trees.

Dan’s thoughts flashed to a memory of him checking out that tree and inspecting its base. The tree was seemingly hollowed out at the bottom with enough room to fit one maybe two fully grown adults lying down. Dan walked toward a section of the forest that had a relatively steep incline.

“Dan, where are we going?” Angie asked behind him.

“Recall when Li hounded me about keeping up the pace because I stopped to look at a tree. Remember when I pointed out the big tree with the opening at the bottom?”

Angie raised an eyebrow, picking up on what Dan implied. “So that’s the spot where I’m going to keep watch over Li.”

“That’s right. We’ll put Li into that section in the base of that tree and he’ll be out of sight. That’s the best we can do for him,” Dan said.

“Wow. Good thinking,” she said.

After walking up the incline, the team finally found the tree. The tree itself stood near the top of the elevated ground and the Dan inspected the opened section at the base of the tree and reconfirmed this was the perfect spot for Li to rest.

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He poked his head into the tree and could see more than enough room to put Li inside and push him a bit further so that he wouldn’t immediately be spotted from a distance. Dan gently lowered the stealth specialist from his shoulder and carried him in his arms. He placed Li head first into the gap within the tree and pushed his body and legs in.

As soon as his unconscious teammate was inside the tree, Dan looked up and around at the surrounding trees and could already tell that luck had smiled on them.

“What is it?” Angie asked.

Dan looked at his teammate and smiled. “I have the perfect position for you to take up while you keep watch.” He pointed his finger upward towards a pair of trees that stood in close proximity to each other and only a few meters away from the tree where Li was. “You can use those two trees to climb up and have yourself a makeshift look out post. You’ll have the high ground over this incline as well as the land in the opposite direction. The terrain is in your favor, plus you have your enchanted firearms that can curve bullets. You’ll be a force to be reckoned with if anyone crosses this site.”

Angie stared at him blankly for a moment.

“Something wrong?”

“No, it’s just… you’re really analytical. I would have never seen those kind of opportunities in a situation,” she admitted.

“That’s what happens when you panic. You can’t think clearly to focus on coming up with a solution for problems you face,” Dan said. His memories brought him back to his first mission with Jane, Allen and the others to crush a rebellion. Then his experiences during the heist when he and his two teammates almost didn’t make it out.

Dan assumed he could now safely leave Angie to her own devices and venture out on his own to earn more points for the team.

But her reaction perplexed him. Angie stared down at the ground and then exhaled before turning. She walked up to the pair of trees and simply put her hand against one of the trunks.

Angie was clearly afflicted by something. Dan feared the worst and assume Angie might go unconscious just like Li because of new supernatural abilities manifesting within her.

“Angie, are you up for the job? Because if I don’t have you on board, even I don’t think I can do this by myself. This isn’t the best plan, but I know what I’m doing,” Dan said.

“Uh, I’m okay. It’s just…” Angie trailed off and exhaled, but she regained her composure. “I’ve never admitted it out loud. And I almost wanted to kill Miles for saying it, but I really do take you guys for granted. There’s no way I would have gotten to this point without you or Li.” She looked back at him with tears welling up in her eyes, “You guys have been carrying me on your backs.”

“Angie, we're a team. I’m sure someone like Jane would be strong and experienced enough to do a round like this solo. But none of us are anywhere near her level. We got here because we worked together. If any one agent was missing from the team and it was just the two of us, regardless of who was missing, we wouldn’t be here in the fourth round of the Combat Games.”

The strawberry blond stared at him, but slumped down against the tree behind her. She rubbed her eyes before continuing.

“You may know what you’re doing, but sometimes I feel like a fucking loser. I feel like I’m letting you guys down.” She looked up at him. “Do you want to know why the rest of Miles’ team hates my guts?”

Dan looked around and checked his surroundings. Confirming the area was clear, he slowly walked over to Angie and crouched down in front of her.

“You know that I’m always looking for action right?”

“It seemed pretty obvious. I still remember you having a big shit-eating grin about using the rocket launcher during the heist,” Dan said.

“When I was with Miles and his squad, it was the five of us. Miles himself, then me, the big guy James and the that chick Zara, you’ve met those two already. We had a fifth member, his name was Nathaniel.” Angie took a deep breath before she continued. “Nathaniel has a lot in common with Li, especially since I got lectured the most by that guy. He was transferred from one of the Alpha Corp’s borders and so he’s seen a lot of action, more so than any of us in the team. We got assigned our first dangerous mission as a team.”

Dan remained silent, but could already anticipate that a horrible tragedy had occured and broke up the team, thus explaining why Angie was no longer apart of Miles’ crew.

“A group of gangsters had kidnapped the nine-year-old daughter of an Alpha executive. We just so happen to be near the area where those gangsters were last spotted so we were sent to find her and rescue her. Tracking them down was pretty easy since gangsters are anything but quiet.”

“Oh I can certainly agree with that,” Dan said.

“We tracked them through an abandoned warehouse and we spotted them. Normally, we would have just shot them on sight, but of course, those thugs used the little girl as a meat shield. Now we have a hostage situation.”

Dan narrowed his eyes and exhaled in annoyance. Hostage scenarios within his training were, in his opinion, the worst type of situation for an agent. Extremely high risk and screwing it up could end up with a dead hostage and a failed mission. He recalled Jane constantly drilling into him at the importance of deescalation if the hostage was an important asset.

“Miles wanted to play it by the book and deescalate the situation. It’s supposed to be the ‘diplomatic’ approach, but secretly I hated it. At the time, I asked myself why badass agents like us had to placate to these criminals. These assholes didn’t care about the wellbeing of that girl or any of us, so why would they deserve any grace.”

Dan found it difficult to disagree with the sentiment.

“I communicated my thoughts to Miles through the private channel and he said that starting a fight here and now was way too risky. We had to do it the right way, he said.” Angie looked down at the ground and let the last sentence hang. “Well… I didn’t listen.”

Those few words alone widened Dan’s eyes. He assumed that Angie disopbeyed and tried something reckless that got someone hurt or killed. He didn’t want to imagine if he had tried the same bullshit while under Jane’s command.

“While Miles had those fools cornered and tried to talk them down, I had the brilliant idea of getting into an ideal position and pumping those assholes full of lead. Of course, I didn’t tell anyone what I was about to do. I acted on my own. And that’s when it went fucking downhill.”

Dan looked around and had his hand hovering over his coat, ready to grab his pistol in case an enemy was nearby.

“Nathaniel caught on to what I was about to do and followed me, trying to plead with me to stop. Of course, I didn’t listen and told him to get off my ass numerous times. I got myself onto a catwalk and aimed my rifle down. By the time Nathanial got on the same catwalk, I already pulled the trigger and killed two of those fuckers. The rest of them scattered and left the poor girl. Now the situation devolved into a mindless shootout.”

Dan tried to anticipated what happened next. His unfortunate bet was on the little girl getting killed in the crossfire.

“Miles and the others were pinned down on the ground and couldn’t get to the girl. I was too busy peppering the remaining thugs with gunfire from the catwalk. So Nathaniel took it upon himself to jump down and go in for the girl while everyone else was busy shooting each other. He grabs the girl and makes a run for it. One of those thugs gets a lucky shot and Nathaniel goes down with a bullet through the dome.”

A brief flashback of the events in Amethyst popped up in Dan’s mind. He had lost two teammates and a third betrayed him. Losing a teammate was rough.

Angie wiped away tears running down her cheeks before he continued. “We took out the last of those gangsters and the girl was safe. Nathaniel was dead and everyone except for Miles blamed me for his death. I was shunned and none of them ever wanted to work with me again. James, Zara, nobody. Zara was especially nasty to me since her and Nathaniel were dating at the time. The team was never the same after that and I was forced to transfer out. You can’t operate with such bad blood between each other.”

“How exactly did you meet Michael and got on the heist with us?” Dan asked.

“An agent you might know. His name is Bobby Obsidian. He’s a family friend and put in a good word for me. That’s how I got my second chance.”

Dan remembered Bobby from his training before he joined Jane’s team. That agent moved faster than his eyes could follow and snuck up on him from behind.

“Hey Dan, I’m sorry for breaking into your apartment earlier. As you could guess, I have a bad habit of doing stupid things without thinking of how it would affect my teammates. And about Li, I snip at him at lot since that was the dynamic I shared with Nathaniel.”

“That’s a pretty messed up way of trying to relive the good old days,” Dan said.

“It is,” Angie admitted. “I’m fucking up so much. I don’t deserve people like you always coming to my rescue.”

“That’s a lot,” Dan said. He slowly stood back up. “But you need to keep your chin up. If we fail this round, you won’t be getting that Deathdealer grenade launcher.”

Angie blinked and stared blankly at him. “Me?”

“I would imagine Li would have no use for such a loud and bombastic weapon. You seem a bit more passionate than me about guns that cause explosions so I’ll let you have it. It might make a decent pairing with your enchanted firearm ability.”

Angie immediately got up rushed over to Dan. She wrapped her arms around and embraced him. “Thanks Dan. I mean it.”

Dan returned the hug and for a moment, he experienced true peace and quiet during the Combat Games. He slowly let go of her and backed away. “I need to get going. I can trust you to handle yourself and look after Li, right?”

Angie flashed him a grin. “I won’t let you down.”