Agent X

Abandoned places and surprise reveals

They dashed up the stairs in single file, guns out and ready for any surprise attacks. X kept stopping at regular intervals and corners and peeking out of them carefully, making sure that everyone was engaged upstairs.
The procession finally made its way to the ground floor of the parking lot. X stopped at the entrance and had a quick look at the number of people present in the place.

To his surprise, there seemed like a reasonably high number of operatives surrounding Shell, Snow, and her half of the commandos. In fact, they were more than the commandos X had under his command.

He made a quick assessment of the numbers and signaled for the commandos behind him to surround as many people as possible from behind.

He held up his hands and made a series of numbers, an indication of the intervals at which the commandos should surround them. A quick look at them reinforced the statement and they all nodded solemnly in understanding. He also whispered a quick code word to them; time is up, one that'll signify that they needed to overpower everyone in their vicinity when he said it.

Agent X looked ahead again and gave a single nod and raised his hand in a gesture, asking them to move forward now. He then stepped aside as the men glided past him, silent as mice, and took their positions carefully. He waited until they were properly settled and ready, and then prepared to make his grand entrance.

'Everybody! Agent X is here!' He exclaimed loudly and stepped out of his hiding place with his arms spread wide open. Heh, looks like all that time spent among drama queens paid off after all!

At once all eyes in the room were focused on him, and he thought he saw Shell slap her forehead out of the corner of her eye. Oh well, that couldn't be helped now.

His entrance was so startling that no one stopped him from walking right up to Shell in the middle of their circle. Only when he got into a defensive position with his gun did they remember that Agent X and his comrades were still the enemies. They all straightened up and held out their guns as well.

'Well, this has been a really lovely encounter and all, but I'm afraid we have other things to catch up with, so we'll just be off.' X intoned cheekily. Everybody, including Shell and her team, stared at him in shock, because none of them expected Agent X to come up so dramatically and blatantly throw out such movie-like dialogues. Where was he going with this?

'What? Didn't you guys get me? Our time is up now.'

Shell raised her eyebrows at his weird way of expressing the last few words. Then it clicked to her as she took in the rest of the team positioned around them. Ah, it must be a codeword.

But then something outright confusing happened. A few of the operatives from ACE turned around in unison and shot at the commandos hiding behind them in one cold, precise strike.

Everything was very confusing to SHADE's operatives, who looked around in horror as they realized that no one else was coming to their rescue now. Only one question was in everyone's mind. How did they know that our operatives were hiding behind them?

Then X took one last look at Shell and her team before stepping away from them and joining the circle ACE had created around them. Their circle expanded comfortably to include him in their midst as he stood right in front of Shell, but this time with his gun pointed at her.

X looked at Shell straight in the eyes. He knew her well by now, and easily anticipated the outburst of words that were overflowing within her and threatening to spill all over.