Operation: Bright Tablet

The first test

Denver's pov
       I sat in the up armored SUV with Gates as we drove and she spoke "You're going to be tested once we arrive, from what I understand it's a 1v1 engagement and they slowly add more operators until you lose. Get that?" I looked over and replied "yes Gates, I got it" she snipped "don't get mouthy with me" I countered teasingly "sounds like you're more worried than I am" she replied "this is a big contract, the biggest one we've ever had" I replied tiredly "Gates, I get it. Don't worry about it, this contract is ours" she scoffed and I looked over and replied "I haven't let you down yet, don't think I'll start now" she nodded and replied "there's a reason I picked you for this contract" I smirked confidently as I double checked my gun. Just in case. Gates asked "when are you going to get a more modern platform?" I replied simply "never, this Car-15 has carried me through everything" she chuckled and said "I knew you'd say that" I nodded and looked out as the front gate came into view, I sighed and asked "are you and bear gonna come visit?"
        She lifted the pass Harry gave her as the gate guard waved his hand up and the gate lifted, she replied after a minute "I'll come by every now and again and check on you" I leaned over and joked "you do care" she chuckled as we drove to the main building. Gates parked the SUV and adjusted her Shemagh as I shifted my Aviators down from my forehead to my nose. I opened the door and slid out as my Car slid so it hung across my chest at a 45 degree angle. I put my hands in my pockets as we walked to the front door, I gripped the door handle and pulled the door open holding it as Gates walked through. I walked in after her and saw Harry and a older man with mutton chops standing there waiting, immediately the older man was on edge when he saw my kit. Harry spoke jovially "I'm glad to see you didn't have any trouble at the gate, the guards can be a tad over cautious." Gates replied matter of factly "indeed, although they seemed more than willing to let us in after the card was shown"
      The older man asked "Right Harry, what the fucks all this? I don't see any unit patches on their uniforms, their uniforms are different and they have different weapon systems" Harry replied pridefully "good eye Mike, these are our new.... coworkers. Gates, The 6-4's commanding officer and Denver their leading operator." The man now named Mike was heard mumbling "The 6-4? Who the hell goes by the.... wait, Harry you don't mean. Harry you hired another PMC?!" Harry replied after a second, Gates and I stepped off to the side to watch how this played out, "yes, I did. Especially after they brought a mask's identity and location to the negotiation table as well as a contract for Grace's life. They have earned the contract" he paused as the information was processed and Harry began to walk again. Gates shrugged and began walking as I followed her, Mike took his time before following us. We reached a training center and Harry spoke into the PA "all operators to training center 2, all operators to training center 2" Harry looked at me "I'll bring you to the armory and get you set up with Simmunition" I replied "lead the way"
       As we walked I heard Harry "I apologize for Mike's outburst, he's rather opposed to having any PMCs here at Rainbow. He's one of the old team members from before the revival" I replied by asking slowly "is it gonna be a problem?" He replied after a bit "no, I don't believe so. Mike is a very professional man, I'd be surprised if he let it go beyond a couple grumblings" I nodded as I looked around and inspected the base. I heard a door infront of me open and saw Harry waiting, I walked through and saw an arsenal of weapons and what looked like prison cells with operators names and call signs on signs above their small rooms. I commented "interesting look" Harry looked around and replied "they like having the personalized areas, I allow it to keep them happy." I nodded as we got to a counter and Harry walked around it. I looked around as he pulled out a box of simmunition and said "Load all of your magazines with this, I don't want you accidentally shooting a teammate" I pulled every magazine out of their sleeves and put them on the counter pushing the 5.56 out of the stack before putting in the simmunition.
      About 10 minutes later all magazines had been stacked and I slid the first one into the magazine well clicking the lock and pulling the priming handle back catching the 5.56 live round that had patiently sat in the chamber. Harry sighed in relief "glad to see my operators won't be getting shot on accident now" I replied cheekily as I did the same with my Mk22 "now it's only on purpose" as we walked back we talked and I got a better feel for the leader of team Rainbow. When we got back I took up my position next to Gates as she asked "how'd it go?" I replied simply "not bad, Harry seems like an honest man. I don't think we'll have any problems with this contract" she nodded before asking "ready to show off?" I answered confidently "always" as Harry began to explain why he had called the operators to this room "We have a new recruit, Denver is from The 6-4's. I hired them onto the team as a result of the information Denver and Gates brought to my attention regarding a contract on Grace's life. We'll do the standard induction test starting with the 1 v 1 training simulation"
I heard Grace in the crowd "there was a contract on me?" As another unknown operator asked "Hired? Don't tell me there's another PMC here" Harry answered sharply "Yes Ash, there is another PMC here and I expect everyone at this organization to be a professional about it" I heard Harry "Denver, head down to the arena floor. I will select your first opponent" I nodded and walked past the group of operators seeing a few looking at me inquisitively, my old friend Erik looked at me in recognition and the rest of the operators looked at me in suspicion. I slid down the side of the arena until I hit the main floor, I looked around and saw the layout an 8x8 grid of pillars about 2 meters in width with about a meter and a half between each pillar. I smirked to myself as I commented "this is perfect" and I heard "Caveira is your opponent" I watched her walk down the stairs to the arena floor. She looked calm and ready, her face paint made it hard to decipher her emotions but her body language told me she was confident.
She walked to the far side of the room and I heard Harry speak "First one to hit a round wins" I switched my car-15 from safe to semi and when the signal went off I rushed forward to the pillar in front of me before walking slowly into the maze of them. I stopped every couple meters listening for footsteps, I was pleasantly surprised to not hear them. She was going to be a fun opponent, I saw a flash of black and pressed myself against a pillar as I heard the faintest of footsteps to my right, I slowly turned and then saw her pistol come around the the corner. I grabbed her wrist and spun so her arm was across my back as I pulled her into my hip and pushed up flipping her before I lifted my car-15 and put a round center mass. I heard a few gasps from the crowd as Harry stammered "Buck, you're on caveira's team" I saw the man walking down the steps, he wore bright white and had the Canadian flag on his chest plate. I nodded before speaking "now it's getting fun" I heard a scoff behind me and watched as Caveira walked away.
I smirked as I picked up the spent sim round and put it in my pocket, I heard the buzzer and rushed forward seeing buck making a hard push down one of the rows. I leaned to my left and fired off 6 rounds forcing him to take cover as I thought about it. There's two of them and one is being really obvious in that side, so she's over there. I worked my way all the way to the farthest right pillar and saw Caveira thinking she was being sneaky as I fired another round hitting her in the stomach as I spun to my right and fired another 7 rounds as buck was rounding the corner. He stumbled back as the rounds snapped past him causing me to pull my pistol and rush down the aisle, buck stepped around the corner and lifted his rifle firing a couple rounds causing me to stumble and tuck into cover. I leaned around and fired half my magazine into the corner of the pillar he was hiding at as I pulled my flare launcher from my belt. I pointed it at the pillar behind buck and fired.
       My signal of "what the fuck is that?" Caused me to rush buck as he squinted and looked around trying to figure out what I launched at him. I came around the corner and he let me know he had seen me arrive with a simple "fuck" as I fired 3 rounds from my mk22 and he quote unquote died. I heard Harry "Maverick, you're in" I looked up and saw my old friend Erik, I saw the indig modifications to his uniform and the American flag letting me know he was still running with CAG. I called up to him "Don't let me make you look bad" he replied with a small laugh "I'd never staff" I smirked this would be fun. I reloaded my rifle by pulling my magazine and flipping it putting the full mag in and clicking it in place. I replaced my pistol and looked at Gates as the buzzer was heard, I pushed forward aggressively. The last 2 rounds id been fairly passive so the sudden switch would probably throw buck and Caveira off. Maverick I wasn't so sure my trick would affect, just then Buck ran past me at a full sprint.
I pulled my car up and leaned to my left putting 3 rounds into his back, as I moved to my right slowly. I heard Harry "Be advised, wounding is in effect. If the wound is non-lethal your teammate can be revived" I heard a shoe scuff about 4 meters away on the other side of the pillar I was holding at. I leaned around the corner holding my mk22 at the high ready and saw Caveira, her eyes widened as I shot her in the thigh. I ran away and found a position I could watch caveira as Maverick appeared and grabbed her, I smirked and muttered "showtime" as I heard him ask "Where is he? Where'd he go?" Maverick dragged her around the edge of the pillar and stopped when he felt my pistol "Nevemind. Found him" as I pulled the trigger. I heard Harry "think that's enough, we've seen everything we need" I looked at Erik and asked "I thought I said don't let me make you look bad?" He replied chuckling "you have a habit of ignoring my attempts to stop that" I smiled "it's good to see you again" he nodded and replied "I see you're with The 6-4s now, I figured you would"
I looked up at Gates and replied "yeah, she gave me a good deal." He nodded and spoke "I wonder who you're gonna be bunked with." I replied "me too" as we walked back to Harry and the other operators. Harry spoke as I came to a stop infront of him "That was a very impressive display, i do worry about the use of human bait however" I looked at Erik and replied "fighting Erik in a head on fight is a coin flip, I needed to get him to a situation he wouldn't be able to defend himself." Harry nodded accepting the answer before speaking "Grace please stand" I saw a pretty cute Asian girl stand up. I heard Gates behind me "Be good, I don't need to hear anything about you starting fights." I replied "check" as Grace asked "sir? Why did you have me stand?" Harry spoke "I understand you have an empty bed in your room" she nodded nervously as Harry spoke "please bring your new roommate to the room and show him around"
I chuckled at her expression before she replied "fine, come on. Let's get this over with" I nodded and stepped forward before saying "Hey Buck" he looked at me in wonder as I said "sorry about the flare, I bet it hurt your eyes" he nodded and replied "after you're done getting settled come down to the team room, a couple of us are gonna be there and we want to know some things" I gave a thumbs up and followed Grace into the hallway. She spoke "I poked around your record, read a couple of the reports." I wasn't fazed by it as I asked "yeah? Find anything interesting?" She replied "besides your very clear moral code, not really. I tried to do some research into your record with The 6-4 but couldn't crack the database." I chuckled and replied "yeah, bear's a tech wiz, we've hired ethical hackers to test our protection and they couldn't crack it" she sighed and spoke "so why'd you bring that contract to Harry's attention?" I replied simply "you're on a CTU team, we only take contracts to kill the bad guys." She asked in return "who decided who's good and bad?" I replied simply "our morals, we side with whoever we think is in the right. I've seen what the White Masks do, they're definitely not the good guys" she commented "you're an interesting unit, I'll say that much at least"