Part 3

Brenna reached into her bag to pull out her panel as she headed out of comm. She raised her head just in time to realize she was about to walk right into Xavier. She made an abrupt detour but faltered for just an instant, only to find Xavier's hand already there to steady her. Catching his eye, Brenna smiled her apologies and thanks, then continued on her way. Walking at her normal brisk pace, this time looking where she is going, she consciously slowed her breathing and heart rate back to normal. "What is wrong with me?" she thought. "I haven't been this affected by a pretty face and a nice ass since I was 18."

Putting that lovely but distracting though out of her mind, Brenna continued on to her destination. Curling up on the bean bag chair that somehow had survived a recent sweep by housekeeping, she opened the mission parameters for which she was to develop a profile. Using the information she had, she developed a rough plan and identified places where she needed additional data. It looked pretty straightforward which made her go back and check of anomalies. There would be no way for subtle degrees of assessment if the tasks were easy. She didn't see any obvious anomalies so she decided to pursue her original plan and let her concern stew for a bit and return to it later. Checking her time she headed to data retrieval to get the intel she needed to firm up her plan. As she was filling in the details on her mission profile from the Intel she retrieved, it clicked what was wrong. She opened one of the profiles Michael had done that she had downloaded on to her panel yesterday. Yes. That was it. One little locations anomaly can throw the whole mission. She adjusted her profile to incorporate the solution Michael had used.

Checking her time once again, Brenna then finished her profile by detailing the characteristics of the operatives who should make up the teams. Wishing should could run it thorough a simulator and further refine it, but knowing she was almost out of time and the computers were being heavily utilized as it was, she just docked her panel and submitted her profile to systems. She breathed a sigh of relief when she received the successful completion confirmation message on her panel.

Next she headed to systems where she discovered there was still a queue to get into the weapons simulator or on to the training computers. She put her name on the list for the weapons sim and asked to be paged in the workout area when she was on deck. During her brief conversation with the tech running the simulator, she spotted Avillion who gave her thumbs down regarding her performance on that task. Brenna knew however that Avillion tended to underestimate herself so decided to wait and see.

On her way to the workout area, Brenna nodded greetings to several CL operatives. Curlly barely caught herself from speaking in time with a hand over her mouth, which caused Brenna to click her tongue at her disapprovingly. MG hurried by obviously in the middle of something. DragonLady, looking tired but pleased, headed for systems coming out of the computer training area. Upon reaching her destination, Brenna was disconcerted to find that the only workout room with open space was currently occupied only by Xavier. Knowing she needed to gather her focus for the upcoming task, Brenna shook off her unease and took a place on the floor at the far end of the room. She went through a series of warm-up stretches and then several yoga exercises, eventually forgetting Xavier was even in the room as she worked towards increasingly difficult postures. Soon her panel beeped and it was time to go do her weapons simulation. She gathered her stuff up and got up only to find Xavier also on his way out, he held the door to the workout room open for her. She gave him a puzzled look and headed for systems to check in.

The weapons sim was intense. And while she was sure she didn't score the highest of any operative doing it, Brenna felt she held her own. It was a draining yet satisfying experience. She headed off to the showers to get a quick break between activities and re-focus her thoughts.

It was getting to be late in the day, so by the time she arrived in training Brenna didn't have any trouble getting a computer. The tech running this area swiped her panel and assigned her to a terminal. Brenna made her way to the assigned location only to find herself seated next to Xavier. "What is it with this guy?" she thought. "Is he stalking me?" That thought made her smile to herself, but as she sat down he caught her eye and smiled at her. Remembering suddenly that she wasn't here to play, Brenna activated her computer training sim and got down to the business of completing this now very long day. This task was both the hardest and the most straightforward of the tasks. The objectives and obstacles were completely unambiguous but the obstacles just kept increasing in difficulty until you ran out of time. Brenna only accomplished 8 of the 18 objectives but, knowing there was a reason she didn't work in systems, tried not to let it bother her.

Part 4

Brenna headed for her quarters to get cleaned up and changed for dinner. That had to be one of the strangest parts of this whole event. It ended with a formal dress awards banquet. Ever since his relationship with Northstar had gotten serious, Operations had been a lot more receptive to the advantages of positive team building in Section but this was a stretch even for Northstar's amazing powers of persuasion. Pulling on her opera length black satin gloves, Brenna headed for the room where the banquet was being held. Walking in the door, the first thing that struck her was the noise. The enforced silence of the day had left her unprepared for the volume that accompanied normal chatter. Looking around, she quickly spotted the rest of the fearsome foursome looking spectacular in their eveningwear. Brenna mused to herself, "When does Curlly find all that time for shopping? I don’t think I have ever seen that dress before." As she walked toward them she noticed Curlly gesturing wildly to one of the servers. When she reached them, she discovered that Curlly was trying to get some him to bring her of the cheesecake that was for dessert. Luckily the servers were all very well trained and even Curlly's most menacing glare had no effect. Laughing, Brenna punched Curlly lightly on the arm, "Give the kid a break. You'll get cheesecake soon enough." The server tossed Brenna a thankful glance and quickly hurried off when Curlly turned to Brenna to whine playfully, "But I want it now."

Shaking her head, Brenna headed off the rest of that conversation by saying, "What's up with the name cards on the table? Do we have assigned seating or something?"

Avillion said, "Yeah and it looks like we're all at different tables. At least I am sitting with Jack though."

Curlly commented, "Wonder where Sinjn and I are sitting?"

Brenna asked, "He's going to be here? I'm so excited I finally get to meet him. Ever since I joined CLHQ seems every time he's around I am out on a mission or vice versa."

A small grin slowly appeared on Brenna's face, "I don't think sitting at different tables is acceptable. Girls, lets show some of that lauded initiative." Scanning the room she continued, "Looks like there is no one arrived from table 8 yet. Gather up your name cards and switch them with ones from table 8. Quickly, but covertly, before anyone from table 8 can arrive and catch on."

Nodding their agreement, each member of the fearsome foursome and their companions started mingling with the operatives around them. Of course, they were actually heading for table 8 to get the name cards to replace their own at the other tables but a group movement would have looked suspicious. Brenna completed her own switch quickly, seeing as she was originally seated at table 7. She then headed to the bar to get a fuzzy navel. After getting her drink, Brenna headed back towards her table scanning the room with her eyes as she went. She noticed all the other operatives were scanning the room as well. Subtly, quadrant by quadrant, just like they had all been trained to do. It made her giggle. Even in the heart of section everyone was still vigilant.

Checking the progress of the "mission" Brenna located Ayrelia with her eyes just in time to see Ayrelia put three name cards onto their table. Two together presumably for her and Drake and then another into the empty seat next to Brenna. "That's strange," Brenna thought, "I wonder who else needed a seat. Probably…hopefully another CLer." Narrowing her eyes Brenna mused, "She wouldn't." Ayrelia, feeling Brenna's eyes on her looked up and smiled brightly. Brenna sighed softly to herself, "She would." However before Brenna had time to casually make her way to table 8 to confirm her suspicions Operations asked everyone to please make their way to their seats so dinner could be served.

Brenna arrived at the table just as Xavier did. He held her chair for her and then seated himself in the place next to her that was marked with his name card. Brenna looked over at Ayrelia and smiled a little too brightly, "Going to be around later?"

Ayrelia replied, "Nope, sorry. Drake has already made plans for me."

"Oh that’s too bad," Brenna replied sweetly, "Guess I’ll catch up with you tomorrow. Perhaps we can work out together."

Curlly, who was sitting across from Xavier, watched this exchange with interest but decided to head it off. "Brenna this is Sinjn," she said pointing at her companion.

Brenna smiled warmly and held out her hand to the man across from her. "I’m so glad to finally meet you. I’ve heard so much about you, but knowing Curlly I am not sure how much of it is true."

Sinjn returned her smile and shook her hand, "Likewise," he said.

Brenna grinned, but was saved from having to come up with a witty comment by the arrival of their salads.

After the servers withdrew, Curlly held out her hand to Xavier and said, "Hi, I’m Curlly."

"My name is Xavier," he answered shaking her hand.

Sinjn held out his hand to Xavier and said, "I’m Sinjn Tyler."

Xavier shook hands with Sinjn, and responded, "Pleased to meet you."

Brenna also held out her hand and said, "And I’m Brenna."

Xavier took her hand and gently kissed to top of it saying, "I’m pleased to finally meet you as well."

Brenna colored slightly and, quickly taking her hand back, said, "We did seem to keep bumping into each other today."

Curlly kicked Brenna under the table earning herself a quick glare. Turning back to Xavier, Brenna continued, "This is Avillion," indicating the woman seated on the far side of Sinjn, "and that’s Jack," pointing to the man seated next to Avillion. Indicating next the woman seated directly across from Jack, Brenna continued, "That’s Ayrelia." Inclining her head towards the man seated between herself and Ayrelia, finished, "and this is Drake."

Xavier nodded to each of member of the table as Brenna introduced them. Avillion spoke up, "Pleased to meet you Xavier. You’re new aren’t you?"

Xavier replied, " I just arrived yesterday."

"Xavier was on a deep cover mission for Section 8 when it was destroyed. He has been reassigned to Section 1," Drake filled in.

Xavier looked at Drake coolly but didn’t say anything.

Noting it was quickly becoming time for a subject change, Curlly says, "I love your accent, Xavier. Are you from Spain?"

Xavier focused his attention on Curlly, "No," he replied, "I’ve spent a lot of time in South America."

Before anyone else could question Xavier further, the lights dimmed and the sound system announced, "Now the moment you all have been waiting for, our very own Section One Show of Talent." With that all four walls lit up and various video clips of the day’s contest flashed across the screens. The whole thing was done in the style of a music video with various music highlighting various parts of the day’s activities. The video surveillance tech guys had outdone themselves. Since it is not very interesting to watch a person sitting at computer or jacked into a virtual reality simulator, they had used computer animation to fill in the virtual opponents. The icons for the virtual opponents they came up with for the computer simulation were hysterical. There was even a scene of Curlly getting eaten by Pac-Man. You could hear the gasps and exclamations of operatives coming from various places around the room as they spotted themselves in the images that were flashing by.

The Show of Talent continued for the rest of the meal. It was a very powerfully done video. It clearly highlighted both the effort required and the skill of the operatives who had taken part in the day’s contest.

The lights came back up just as the servers were clearing the tables for dessert. As the cheesecake was served, Operations came up to the podium and said, "Good work today people. Today was the final assessment of a training program we instituted about three years ago with the establishment of CLHQ. Though there were some who felt these unorthodox methods would surely fail, today we proved them wrong. While as a group the results of today’s contest support the viability of our training program, ironically the operative who took top honors today is not a graduate of our program. This operative is new to Section One, arriving here only yesterday. Xavier Montero." A surprised gasp went up from Table 8 where Xavier sat stoically. "Welcome to Section One, Xavier," Operations continued. "While everyone did quite well, today’s exercise had the added bonus of pointing areas of weakness. Your team leaders have details of your individual performances, see them tomorrow for your follow up assignments."