After suiting and gearing up, Luc jogged up into the dropship, ready to kick some more arse. Now that he had some time to get better acquainted with the ParaCom armoury, he looked a few details different than before. Just like last time, he kept a rocket launcher over his shoulder for tough spots, but his primary was a ParaCom issue railgun. Testing the thing out on the range backed up Packston's review and Luc was well and truly sold. On Luc's harness was an HE grenade, just like last time.

Luc sat opposite where Angus was sitting as he inspected his own equipment. It was the same setup as Anya's when she headed out on the last mission. Angus wasn't looking too enthused. Luc double checked his holo-targeting module before he noticed Angus' face. "Hey Angus, getting nerves? You'll be fine, the people on this team are tight."

"I'm surprised your still chirpy as ever right now, Luc," Angus said, leaning forward in his seat and looking up at Luc.

Luc raised an eyebrow, "What do you mean? These things bleed and die. Well, some of them bleed, but they all die. It's nothing-"

"Luc? Luc! Shut up," Angus snapped his fingers loudly between them, then pointed his gloved hands around to the other seats, "Look, what's wrong with this picture? Don't tell me you haven't heard."

Luc was incredulous at this point. He looked around until his eyes found the Asian FNG with the sniper rifle. "What? We have a new guy? So what?"

"Try again."

It hit Luc like a cinder-block from the sky. He brought his hand to the side of his head and opened his mouth in realisation. "Ooooh, Anya's not here yet. Man, I was wondering why it was so quiet. Wait, she's always early, I never get to the party before her, what's up with her?"

"Fuck me, she didn't tell you, didn't she?" Angus said while shifting in frustration in his seat, "She went under the knife this morning, Luc. She volunteered for the WREC program. They're removing her limbs as we speak."

Luc stared back at Angus in utter disbelief. He didn't know whether he should be angry, confused, worried, surprised, or anything, really. All he could manage was three words in a slow and low voice. "What...the...fuck...?" He looked away and onto the floor of the dropshop, holding a hand over his mouth, "What the fucking fuck!? Why the hell did she do that?!"

"I said everythin' I could to try and convince her otherwise, but she's got the idea in her mind. She won't turn back 'till she's either in one of them suits or straight brown bread." Angus looked down, "You know how stubborn she gets."

Luc held one hand forward, pointing to Angus aggressively. "No, no, this cannot happen. She can't just-"

"It's happening, Luc. She's beyond the point o' no return." Angus was not at all fazed by Luc's protests. He spoke with authority enough to talk him down, "She'll be in recovery for the next few days."

"Fuck, this cannot be happening. Fuck, fuck, fuck..." Luc gave up and buried his head in his hands. Up until now, Anya had been annoying, but she was always clear-minded, sensible, not to mention strong enough to take care of herself without Luc interfering, but now she had made a decision that Luc could hardly justify under any circumstances. Why was she acting so rash all of a sudden? Luc realised that, for the first time, he was actually worried for his sister. The one time that something like this could happen, and he couldn't stop it. [i]Why the hell didn't you tell me, Sis?[/i]

Angus, knowing a futile situation when he saw one, left Luc to calm down during the flight and decided to engage with the new guy. He looked over to him without any particular expression and addressed him. Whoever dyed their hair that silver colour had to have an attitude. "Oi, you're Mashiro, right? The rookie? This your first mission on the team? You killed paranormals before?"