"These missions will be the most dangerous you have ever been on. Each of you will be going immediately on separate missions. Max, you'll most likely going to be bedridden for a few days. You can thank the Demigod Project for that because you should be dead. Amazingly your body has already started to heal the injuries that you sustained. The shoulder will be stiff but back to one hundred percent in a few days. Now boys, to understand your missions you need to understand a bit of how I am able to do what I do. After these missions my resources will be significantly limited. I am preparing for it however and I am expanding my team. There are a few other operatives who work for me, however they will never meet me and I prefer that it stays that way. These others are... less reputable than yourselves."
Bernard looked around at the three other men. "Less reputable than a vengeful ex-Imperial hitman fighting for a different team, a crazed explosives expert, a SWAT officer turned grifter, and my personal favorite insane ex Republican spec ops officer with a hero complex. "
"I like that. Grifter," Wakefield said, smiling.
"I'm not insane," Steel said squeezing the IV bag until it was empty.
Bernard stared for a moment. "Says the man who jumped down a ladder after a team of six Imperial Assassins to save some girl you've never met, no offense Anne."
"None taken."
"Noted. But I have more fun than you do." Steel said ripping the IV out of his arm. "Besides, out of the two of us who is carrying enough explosives on him to blow the planet up, not because he needs to but because it would be pretty?" he asked pointing the IV at Bernard absentmindedly while reaching for some gauze.
"Well I don't have them all on me now." he admitted, moving Steel's hand away from his face.
"Left pocket."
"It couldn't blow up the planet..." Bernard said sheepishly. He turned back to Anne "Anyways my point is, if we're the best you could find what hope could we possibly have?"
"All the hope in the world."
"You mean universe?"
"Let's not get ahead of ourselves."
"Great."
"Anyhoo, I need you boys to go on missions for me. Each one of these will obviously fall into your skill set but they are individual missions. The reason these must be individual is because they are time sensitive. I need my network to be destroyed."
"What? Why?" Steel asked leaping out of the bed and realizing he was attached to monitors by the crashing sounds behind him.
"Must you always be so impatient?" she exclaimed angrily.
"Yes? I don't really know how to answer that question," he said ripping off the electrodes.
She rolled her eyes and proceeded to answer his question. "The reason my network must be disassembled is because they have been bought out by the empire. I found their goal is for power while mine is for freedom. They once fought with the Republic against the Empire but now they believe their cause to be lost and have found it to be more profitable to turn on me."
"Is that why there were Imperial forces outside your damn door?" Nash asked. "We were told we were meeting, hell if you hadn't told us we weren't coming back we'd have walked in empty handed. We weren't expecting the Imperial Army!"
"Tyler, I told you what you needed to hear to get the job done. You all lived, I see no problem with what happened."
"Steel lost three liters of blood on your goddamn carpet!"
"Why does everyone care so much about the fucking carpet?" Steel yelled sitting back down on the bed ripping the LEDs attached to his chest.
"This is the kind of shit that I'm talking about, Anne, Steel almost died fighting people we weren't expecting."
"And I'm sorry about that but-"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Steel interrupted, "I did not almost die."
"Max, there are three liters of blood out of your body that say otherwise. Tyler, I am trying to explain why you didn't know about those men. It is because for the first time I didn't know about them.
The men that are a part of my network have betrayed me and sent men to kill me. The assassins, as you know, are not only the most dangerous men in the Empire's control, but they are also the best at getting information out of people. Hence the reason this planet was not just destroyed... Amy would have killed me before they could try." Anne shuddered at the thought of the entire situation as though this were the first time she realized how close to a horrible death she had been. "I want these men dead as soon as you can do it."
With that Amy handed her three files, which she gave to Nash, Wakefield, and Bernard.
"What, no mission for me?" Steel asked. "From my understanding I was kind of the lynch pin in this entire thing."
"Somewhat, but at the moment you went and got yourself pretty badly injured and I need you here."
"There has to be something I can do."
"Make sure that no more assassins come after me."
"Really? Bodyguard?"
"No, not really, now that I think about it Amy's got that covered. I guess you'll have to lie around until you're back to full strength."
"I'm fine," Steel said becoming extremely irritated "And I'm not just saying that. I legitimately can say, now that I have some of my memory back that I have done more than what you're asking with worse."
"And you may not remember these parts but most of those missions you went and got even more hurt and almost failed the missions."
"I'm sorry Anne, but this is bullshit. I finally feel like myself again and you have me sidelined," Steel said rising to his feet shakily.
"One reason you can't go," she said holding one finger out,"is this." With the one finger she pushed an extremely dizzy Steel onto the bed, which was an impressive feat considering the significant size difference between the super soldier and computer genius.
"You suffered multiple concussions, lost most of your blood, and had a knife the size of your hand driven in until it hit bone."
"Steel, she's right we're going to need you a lot more in the future. Just rest up, maybe try actually sleeping. Which as far as I know in the past few days the only times you've been unconscious are when you either lose blood or severe head trauma," Nash said, clapping his hand on Steel's back as the man got back into the hospital bed."
"And let's get that IV back into you shall we?" Anne said getting a new needle ready and putting it in the crook of Steel's arm before he could react.
"Sure why not. Do I ever have any say in medical procedures happening to me?"
"No."
"Well, at least there's the honesty. What's in this IV, I already feel dizzy."
"A tranquilizer so you'll stay in the damn bed. And nutrients, obviously. We can't have you starving to death while you heal."
"Of course-," and with that Steel was out cold.
"Well gentlemen you best be going. There is a network to disassemble and there are probably more teams after me than the ones we encountered today. If you need anything your armor is already linked into my communications network I only ask that you do not refer to me by my name out in the open."
"Yes ma'am. Where is our first mission?" Nash asked.
"Earth."