Assault (Red vs Blue)

20: Lock And Key

20: Lock And Key

Present Day: Crash Site Alpha (The planet Chorus)

The setup at Alpha had gone off without a hitch. Felix had to admit everything was going better than he'd expected. Granted, he knew Kimball would jump at the chance to try anything that might get the people of Chorus to pull ahead. The New Republic's general was a very driven woman — it was a quality Felix actually admired about her. However, having too much drive could end up being a weakness; which is exactly what it was for Kimball. Her need to be one step ahead ultimately put her and her troops further behind. It was a shame, really.

"Shouldn't take long now," Felix commented as he watched the carnage unfold below the ridge he was posted on. "Kimball just keeps digging herself a deeper and deeper hole. She's making this almost too easy."

"I wouldn't be so confident," Locus countered as he retrieved his sniper rifle from his back. "She still has the freelancers. We don't know what kind of resources they might be able to pull from."

"They're a disgraced military program with no allies left within the U.N.S.C. What resources do you think they could possibly have?" Felix asked, using his rifle to easily execute a Rebel soldier that started getting too close.

"You never know," the other mercenary answered curtly, taking out a Fed with an neatly placed sniper shot.

Felix snorted. "Yeah, well, anything they have, we can easily match and overpower. We have our own freelancers, remember? Speaking of which, shouldn't they have been here already? You know, at least the ones we were supposed to have here with us?"

Locus didn't look at him as he fired off another round. "Yes. But we're doing fine without them. Now stay focused."

"Yeah, yeah. Whatever. Let's tune in to what's going on out in the field, shall we?"

Felix switched to the open channel on his comms, only to immediately be bombarded with a complete clusterfuck of voices and conversations. Filtering through most of the insignificant ones, Felix was finally able to zero in on the one he'd been looking for. Kimball was talking with one of the freelancers — the one that was too nice for his own good. One of the stupid lieutenants was with them; the coward was panicking, wondering how they could've ended up caught in a trap. Felix wasn't interested in paying attention to that part of the conversation, though. He was more focused on the words being exchanged between the general and the freelancer.

"Wash and some of the others are in trouble," North Dakota was saying. "My sister's with him; I have to try and get over there. Think you can hold this position on your own?"

"I can try. But where the hell are they getting more men?!" Kimball demanded. She flinched visibly as Locus picked off the soldier standing beside her with his sniper.

At that, Felix decided to enter the conversation. He smirked to himself as he activated his mic. "C'mon now, Vanessa. You gotta give me a little more credit. After all, I was your right-hand man for years. Did you really think I wasn't counting on you trying this?"

"You fucking son of a bitch. You —" Kimball started to snap, but didn't get the chance to finish before the mercenary cut the transmission.

"Was taunting the general entirely necessary?" Locus questioned as he reloaded his sniper once again.

"Absolutely not. But I enjoyed it. It's like playing a game of cat and mouse — except the cat is always two steps ahead and the mouse never has the chance to try and escape. Only the mouse still thinks it stands a fighting chance. Just makes the game that much more entertaining."