”Yep. She’s served me well. Modded it myself in fact.” Or at least Nine thought he had modded it himself, it was always hard to tell what was a real memory and what was a fake memory about his time before he quit working for GenCorp. He grabbed the gear as the others of Kirk’s team offered it, ”Thanks.” he spoke with a smile; it was nice to be back in his element, infiltrating a fortified enemy base. He hoped he was on the right side of the fight this time though.<br/><br/>He took a passing look through the equipment as they handed it to him; most of it was pretty basic stuff, a pair of smoke grenades, some tear gas, a gas mask, even a couple flashbangs, a Kevlar vest, ect. He doubted it was nearly as basic to the rebels though, no matter how well equipped it looked like they’d emptied half their armory for him. He was happy to even have the basics though, his equipment had been made to work together and they lost a good part of their functionality when used separately. Then he saw the small laptop (http://www.biztoolbelt.com/uploads/fujitsu_u2010-thumb.jpg) at the bottom. He thought they probably used it to hack and store data when they broke in to GenCorp bases but he had an even better purpose for it and it made him grin. This was going to be more like old times then he’d imagined.<br/><br/>He took out his rifle (http://s3.amazonaws.com/gamervision_production/1242350192JumSTwOpvp.jpg) and tossed the case in the pack full of equipment before shouldering the pack. ”Okay, I’ll clear the way here. Then I need to go change into that vest and set up a surprise for our friends in security.” That was more an excuse than anything; he wanted to lag behind a bit to work on salvaging parts from the laptop but he didn’t have time to waste telling them the full ten minute story.<br/><br/>He peeked around the corner, memorized the placing of the turrets and then took a deep breath before spinning out from around the corner and leveling his rifle. It took him but a few seconds to line up the shot and fire, the sound making his sensitive ears ring, but even so the turrets were set on hair triggers and they started throwing fire even though he was outside their range. It got pretty hot pretty quick though, until they turned off, when Nine stepped back around the corner. His first shot had hit home, and one turret was disabled. He repeated the movements, peeking around the corner, breathing, turning, firing, getting hot from superheated plasma spewing to the ground about 3 feet away, and hiding behind the corner.<br/><br/>He walked around the corner, to see if the turrets would still fire, only to hear the faint hiss of gas. ”Shit!” Nine cursed loudly and ran back around the corner, ”Everyone take cover! It’s not happy!”he rolled to a stop, hands over his head, near the wall. Not three seconds later the gas leak caught fire and exploded, sending a fireball down the corridor the turrets had been in and making Nine sweat even more from the heat. After a few seconds to caught his breath he stood up and dusted himself off. ”Well. I certainly didn’t see that coming. Why have a flammable gas line so near plasma turrets? Remind me to have a word with the secret GenCorp base designer when we finish here, he’s obviously not been thinking straight.”   He grinned at his own joke before starting for the nearest lab he could remember,<em>”A left, two right’s and two doors down.”</em><br/><br/>”Don’t worry about me. I’ll catch up soon enough.” Nine called over his shoulder to Kirk before disappearing around the corner. He slowly walked towards the lab, rifle still at the ready. He would have ran but he knew it paid to be careful so he slowly peeked around every corner before walking quickly to the next corner and repeating the process.<br/><br/>His mind was racing with the possibilities. They would have left the satellite up there, of course they would, in their mind he’d been captured so if their fail-safe destroyed both the satellite and the rest of his gear at the same time then someone might put two and two together and figure out that the satellite wasn’t just for geological research. Worse, they could recover the satellite before GenCorp and then GenCorp world be in a world of hurt. That wouldn’t take such a high risk when they could simply leave the satellite up there and use it for the next Athena model. Nine didn’t plan on letting them get that far but they didn’t know that. They might now though. Worse, if they were watching the camera’s they’d watch him repair his S.I.S. (Satellite Interface System, his sis for short) and they might shoot down the satellite, with any luck though he could take control of it long enough to set the defenses to stop GenCorp before they got word of his betrayal. That’d only happen if they’d really performed a full lockdown and all communication between this station and the others were cut.<br/><br/>That would mean E.V.I. (Enhanced Virtual Interface, Evi for short.) was still alive, if only Nine could get his sis up and working again. He reached the lab, peeked inside and looked around, and then slowly entered, rifle ready. After a few seconds of seeing and hearing nothing he started searching for a screwdriver or anything that would work as one. He found a scalpel pretty soon and cleared off a counter by throwing all the vials and beakers over the edge before using the scalpel to pry the laptop open and taking off his trench coat to set it on the table. He then used the scalpel to make a circular hole in his coat, and then he reached inside the coat’s lining and pulled out his sis (http://www.techfresh.net/wp-content/uploads/2007/07/paying_device.jpg) model.<br/><br/>Nine grinned and pulled it open, he wasn’t sure he could fix it but just the thought of maybe fixing it made him happy. The fail-safe had fried the battery, ruined three or four wires, and destroyed the better half of the graphics board. Luckily they’d been quiet cheap with his sis’s graphics card, as they didn’t think it needed to look good so long as it worked, so the laptop had a better graphics processor in it, otherwise he’d be downgrading his poor sis and he’d make Evi upset. She’d probably be mad for betraying GenCorp even as it was. He just hoped he could get her to listen anyway. To his own surprise, with a bit more looking around, he found electrical tape in the lab. He considered for a second what they would use it for before deciding it might be best if he didn’t know and forgetting about it.<br/><br/>Twenty minutes and a ton of tape later he thought he’d down it, his sis was fixed. He knew he should have soldered it but hopefully tape would work for now. The poor thing was nearly a bundle of tape now but he’d been careful to avoid taping the fingerprint scanner and microphone. He grabbed up the Kevlar vest (http://www.sourcemilitary.com/images/fdyii-y-l-hard-bulletproof-clothes-2.jpg) from his pack and put it on over his muscular, if a bit feminine (Although he always insisted it wasn’t feminine, it was feline, not that that made a difference) chest.  He took his sunglasses (http://www.panamajack.com/images/2009/det_PJ75S9395DIS.jpg) and pistol (http://www.rookscastle.com/props/anime/G_CX_01.jpg) out of his trench coat as well as a pair of grenades, a tear gas and smoke gas canisters, and an ammo belt from the pack.<br/><br/>Nine slammed the butt of his pistol against the desk once to loosen the panel covering the small secret compartment in the gun. He pulled a pair of magnetic strips and attached them about an inch apart on the lower left part of his vest. He took another strip and attached this one to his right hip. He took another pair and put one vertically on his back, about three inches below his right shoulder, and put the other horizontally on his lower back, about three-fourths or a full foot below the other strip. Then he put the case back on the pistol’s compartment and put the pistol over the two strips on his left-side abs. There was a snap as the magnets on the gun engaged and met the ones in the strips. The gun then compacted, the barrel retracting and the stock flipping up under the main part of the gun. It was a programmed reaction to the specific magnets that only worked if the strips came in contact with certain parts of the gun. His rifle was programmed to do the same thing and when he hefted it over his shoulder and attached it to his back he felt the barrel and stocks compact and retract. He waited to attack his sis last and instead pulled a small needle out of it that was attack to a string, he strung it through the pair of his grenades and pulled another out for his tear gas and smoke canisters. Then he pushed the needles into the fabric on the left side of the Kevlar and tied it tight, one he put high, nearly to his armpit, and the other he put about 2 inches above his pistol. Whenever he finally put his sis on it’s magnetic strip on his right hip it would hold the grenades to his back by the pins. He’d only need to reach one, pull it off it’s line, and toss it to use it.<br/><br/>He grabbed his sunglasses and seemingly snapped the left temple tip off only to reveal it was still attached by a small monofilament wire. He pushed it down under the back of his Kevlar and attached it to his sis before taking out his contacts and donning his sunglasses. He took off his pants and cut a hole in the back for his tail even before donning the gun belt. That left only turning on his sis and donning it. He breathed deep, trying to stay calm, before pressing his finger against the scanner. After a few seconds it came to life and scanned his finger, ”Vocal I.D. required.” a robotic voice spoke through the miniature speaker in the right temple tip of his sunglasses.<br/><br/>”Athena Nine. Authorization key omega six six six. Password; Double o nine.”<br/>”Authorization key accepted. Connecting to E.V.I….. Connected. Interface engaging…. Engaged. Voice uplink initializing….. Initialized.”  Nine watched as the sunglasses came to life before him, his overlay slowly coming to life. Grenade types and numbers were shown, as well as their placing on his back, in the lower left corner of his glasses while the lower right had a question mark next to his current ammo status. It could use weight sensors on the lines to know what grenades he had but it couldn’t guess at his ammo. A few seconds later it connected wirelessly to his guns and they too appeared on the overlay, each pure green to symbolize their good condition. Not long after Evi’s voice came through his speakers, a female and kind voice. Evi had always been his friend when he was in trouble, she’d been through it all with him, and he hoped she’d be with him this time.<br/><br/>”Athena?! Is that really you? GenCorp lists you as dead in action. What happened?” Evi was the only one he ever let call him Athena, she, at least, didn’t think him feminine for having a name like Athena.<br/>”God is it nice to hear your voice Evi. Yah, it’s me. GenCorp betrayed me, they’ve been using me. There’s no time for the full story. They’re bad people and I need you to cut communication with them and change your security protocols to make sure they don’t stab you in the back as well. Okay? Can you do that for me?”<br/>”I… I don’t know Athena… I can try.” They’d made the program to run his sunglasses as the computer required to work it was too big to be carried. It also served as a companion to a person they feared might crack from stress one day. They hadn’t quiet meant to give the A.I. in the computer full free will but it had gotten it anyway. Multiple scientists had studied Evi and used their finding to make more AIs as well as to improve their GenMod brain design. After a few more moments Evi returned with an affirmative, she’d done as asked. Nine spent the next 10 minutes just describing what all had happened since his last mission. What he’d found out, how GenCorp had poisoned the earth for profit, and how they made sex slaves that were intentionally unable to think on their own. Even after that Evi was hesitant; it didn’t have much to do with her, so why should she risk everything so some organic machines could have freedom? However she refused to betray Nine, and, eventually, agreed to help him take down GenCorp.<br/><br/>”Good. Thank you Evi. You’re a real life-saver. So then do you mind scanning this facility for structural weaknesses? Maybe a vent or secret hatch that goes down a bit quicker would be nice.”<br/>”One moment. Scanning……. Scanning…….. I’m sorry Athena but only I’m only able to scan the first three levels. The rest seem to be heavily jammed.” A 3-D picture of the top three levels appeared on his sunglasses.”A vent leads from the top floor to the third, however I’m unsure if it goes further. Scans also indicate it’s an exhaust vent, meaning if they decide to turn it back on they could choke you to death.” The vent was highlighted in red before his eyes; it looked like it ran from the surface do to a lower level, it skipped all three of the levels on his screen but he knew he could get inside with Evi to guide him right where to go and break into it.<br/><br/>He took his rifle off his back and Evi painted targets automatically. Immediately four pin-sized cameras were highlighted in bright red. Nine chuckled. ”Forget the camera’s Evi. There’s too many, I couldn’t pick them all off even if I had the ammo. Just focus on painting anything living and any active defenses.”  He’d need to paint the rebels as friendly the next time he met them, Evi would show them as bright red until he did, but he wasn’t about to go back just to do that. Evi also put a crosshair on his sunglasses where his rifle was pointed. It made aiming quiet easier, especially when Evi zoomed the image in a bit. It was quiet a cool system, it used an infrared laser emitter on his gun to shoot a dot where it’s pointed and a infrared sensor on his sis to pick up the dot and transfer the information to Evi for processing before Evi transmitted back the correct overlay information. The best part about it was how seamless it was, a small map and ammo counter in one corner, equipment on a different one, leaving his view clear. And it updated so quickly even his senses didn’t notice lag.<br/><br/>Nine didn’t waste time in exiting the lab and making his way towards the vent. He’d need to blast his way inside, and finding a way out may be tricky as well, but he could do it. With Evi and a gun by his side he felt nearly invincible.<br/>