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"Cass?" Theo yelled as he stumbled and fell to a knee, feeling the weight of the armor for the first time. "Cass?" His partner had been having a ball smacking people around, talking about doing a more action oriented movie after this, then total silence. He tried not to panic, he'd been without Cass once before and he'd survived it, but would Cass? Fuck, he had to get him back online. What had happened?

He'd been happy to let Cass pilot the suit, and watched Tucker fight. The man was scary efficient, nothing like the sex obsessed clown he'd gotten to know, the guy had snapped at him and Cass for not taking the situation seriously enough. Tucker had complained at him not being serious.

Had he seen anything that told him how this had happened? He didn't think so. He cursed. He was too dependent on Cass to act as his memory, even after having to function without him before.

If he didn't know how it had happened, he needed to deal with the situation as it was, and figure it out afterward. He glanced around without moving. Tucker was on his side, a frozen statue, so it wasn't just Cass. An EMP that could reach through Cass' shielding? That was scary, he'd have to find a way to let Anderson know.

Theo's stomach dropped. Fuck, was Tucker's implant fried? If these bastards had killed his brother they were-- His hand was in a fist now.

He'd moved his hand.

He glanced around; had anyone noticed? They were looking at their injured, two were picking Tucker up, laughing.

Theo splayed his hand on the floor. If he could move his hand, this couldn't be an EMP. He breathed easier, Cass and Tucker were okay, in the long run. He'd address referring to Tucker as his brother after this, right now he needed to deal with these assholes.

He waited, he could move, but he had no idea how the armor would react. Other than walking around when he first wore it, Cass had handled it. He'd have to learn as he went. Two of them approached him. Laughing and talking in one of the Independent dialect Theo wasn't familiar with. There were too many of them for him to have learned them all.

He slowed his breathing, he had combat training, this was just like that. Now he wished he'd gotten more than the basic course. Regret later, Theo, fight now.

He put all his strength in the swing, raising his arm and striking the woman reaching for him in the stomach. There had been resistance, and then the arm moved. The woman flew halfway through the room before crashing down. Theo stared, remembering he was in the middle of a fight only when something struck him and pieces of a wooden chair rained around him; the blow barely registered.

Theo grinned evilly as he stood. The armor had weight, but nothing that kept him from moving. He turned to the stunned man holding the remnant of the chair and swatted him aside hard. He too flew away, crashing against the wall and not moving. He filed away the question of if he'd killed the man or not for after. Right not he needed to end this.

He ran at the men holding Tucker, feeling like he moved through water, one of the men noticed him--Theo expected they all did at this point, but that one was the only one that mattered-- and raised a gun. Theo couldn't duck, but it didn't matter, he didn't register if any of the shots hit him. He threw himself at the man. He impacted and kept going until colliding with the wall.

Theo chuckled, he didn't know his own strength in this situation.

The man crumpled to the ground, chest crushed, as Theo stood and looked around. People fired at him to no effect, and a woman pointed a device in his direction looking worried and doing something with it. The people around her screamed at her while shooting. It might not be what had incapacitated Tucker and Cass, but it was a target.

Theo ran at her, picking up speed, and decided against a direct collision at the last instant, extending his arm and turning to pass by her. The impact registered only as extra resistance. As her body bent around it and kept going once he stopped. Her device fell to the ground and since he had no idea how such a thing would work, he slammed his foot on top of it and hoped for the best.

"Cass?" he called, turning to look the room over. Tucker threw the other man away from him, grabbed a metal table and slammed it on three others, crushing it and them.

"I'm here." The armor moved on its own to catch the fist coming at him.

"Are you okay? I'm sorry, I know I said I wouldn't let you be cut off from me ever again, but I didn't see this one coming."

Cass chuckled. "I'm fine. I did panic at first, but all they did was cut our communications, which is impressive in and of itself, but I still had control, so I slowed my subjective time until you came back." Cass moved quickly and with precision, striking and stunning anyone within reach. "Any idea how they did it?"

"I crushed a device and you came back, so I expect that was it. No idea how, and unless we find a second one, I doubt there's enough left for you to study, the armor increased my strength a lot."

"Only think I had time to set as I lost connection to it and you."

"It was a life saver."

They stopped. He and Tucker were the only ones still standing. A lot of the people around Tucker were bent in unnatural angles.

"Theo, are you okay?"

"All good, you?"

"Pissed. What was that?"

"Some sort of jammer," Cass said, "preventing us from communicating with the armor, and anything else."

"So not targeted at us?" Tucker asked, walking through the bodies,

"Well, we were the targets, so--"

"I mean do you think it was built specifically to stop Orr armor tech? If these fuckers have managed that, we need to redesigned them from nanite to nanite."

"Ah, no. It was nothing more than a more powerful version of what's already in existence."

"Good. Now how do we kill that AI?"

"I don't know. I need to find a connection to search for it within the computers here. They don't broadcast."

"You do that." Tucker picked someone up from the floor. "I'm going to ask this one questions." He shook him, following Theo to the bank of computers at the far wall. The man came awake and fought against the grip, speaking in something Theo didn't understand.

"You understand that?" he asked Cass.

"Speak in a language I understand, you fucker," Tucker growled, shaking the man harder.

"It's a variation on the Itokian dialect," Cass said. "I could probably work out a translation, but I doubt there's anything useful in what he's saying. There, I can interface with that communication port using the armor."

"I hurt," the man said.

"I can end the pain real quick," Tucker replied. "One snap of the neck and it's over, got that?"

"It might have been a little too complex for him," Theo said as he place a finger on the port.

"Where is the AI?"

"It's not here," Cass said.

"Tuck, don't kill him!" Theo yelled as the other tiger wound back to strike the man. "Cass what do you mean?"

"This is where they worked on it, I see remnants, but whatever they ended up building was taken out. Probably to move it to where they will insert it in the world wide network, nothing here has a connection to anything else."

"Where is it!" Tucker yelled in the man's face. "If you don't fucking tell me I'm going to rip your balls out."

The man understood enough his nose dried out in fear, but it sent him babbling in that other language.

"Tuck, you're not going to get anything out of him this way," Theo said.

"And you think you can do better?" Tucker threw the man at Theo. Cass caught him and sat him on the floor.

"As a matter of fact, yes. Cass give me what I wore before entering the room, and you're going to want to work on translating his version of the dialect, in case he doesn't have enough fluency to tell me what we need to know."

"Are you okay?" Theo asked the man. "Do you understand me?" The man nodded, then looked atTucker who loomed behind Theo. "Tuck, go away. You're not helping."

"For all you know he's waiting to claw your throat out."

"Cass can react faster than he can, go away."

Grumbling Tucker left him alone with his prisoner.

"Alright, now, I need information. You made something here, I need to know where it is."

The man shook his head.

"Yeah, I get that. I'm the enemy, you can't tell me." Theo pointed over his shoulder in Tucker's direction. "Would you rather he question you?"

The man swallowed, his nose pad going dry again. "Too late, finished."

"We saw that. Where is it now?"

"With leader."

"If it's Paco," Tucker yelled, "I'm fucking killing him."

"Is your leader Paco?" Theo asked, hoping for a no, because if Paco was in charge, it meant Anderson had a hand in what was going on.

The man looked confused.

"He has no idea who Paco is, so that's a no on him being leader," Theo said. "Who is your leader?"

"Bech," the man said.

"That can't be right."

"You know the name?" Tucker asked, severely.

"The guy's a scientist, he can't be in charge here, what Independent would let a scientist run things, let along Anarchists? Who is Bech," Theo asked the man.

"Leader."

"What else?"

"Smart, strong."

"I saw his file, strong isn't a word that describes that man."

"Ruthless?" Tucker asked.

The man nodded, pointing at the armor.

"He'd have to be, if he took control here."

"But why? I get that he'd provide the tech if he has a vendetta against the corporation, or just SolGov, but why take over? The Anarchists want the same thing."

"Unless that's not what he wants," Cass offered.

"We can go and ask him," Tucker said. "Where is he?"

"Where's Bech," Theo asked the man.

"Control," he replied.

"Control room," Cass said, "two floors below. I'm reading a lot of electronics, communication systems, but useless with their jamming dome up. Enough monitoring within the local network I'm reluctant to slip in unless I have to. I'm reading six people."

"We know where we're going," Tucker said rubbing his hands.

"Thank you," Theo said to the man, placing his hand on his shoulder, and stunning him.