logicunlocked | AU Summary

Agent Texas awakens with no memory of her creation. As far as she is concerned she is Allison, a soldier, who has been recruited into an elite program called Project Freelancer. She doesn’t realize she’s a copy of the memories of the older man who greets her upon her awakening.

Soon after this, the Freelancers who have been trained for active duty are transferred to the frigate Mother of Invention. The first mission is to Earth, a stealth mission meant to acquire some intelligence that would lead the Project to a particular asset that will come to be known as the Sarcophagus. Though typically reckless and impulsive, Agent South decides to follow her brother's suggestion that she set her motion trackers. The stealth objective is met handily and the Charon Corporation has no idea of the breach in their security.

Not long after this, Agent Texas is introduced to her fellow agents. The Director of the Project does this by choosing three volunteers to fight her—York, Wyoming, and Maine. During Agent Texas's introductory match, Agent York is upset at the infraction by his fellow-agents, Maine and Wyoming, who have brought live ammunition into the training room. Rather than participate further, he goes to the exit bay door and calls for FILSS to end the match. Though his request is not heeded, he is nowhere near when a grenade is lobbed by Agent Maine. He escapes the match unscathed.

Because of the successful retrieval of data at the oil platform, the Sarcophagus mission was also a success. Agent York successfully gains access to the facility and the Freelancers make their way to the roof undetected. Extraction was a success and when team B when after the briefcase, Charon's goons were still scrambling to respond. Therefore, the briefcase retrieval was also a success.

Soon after this, AI assignments begin. Carolina defers receiving Sigma, who is assigned to Agent Maine. All other assignments proceed as intended, York being partnered with Delta in the process. Eventually, as more and more assignments take place, Carolina chooses to accept an AI assignment instead of continuing to defer. In fact, she requests two AIs for the advantage since the AIs seem to be growing weaker in each generation. Because of the earlier successes in the Project this happens quite late—by now ten AIs have already been assigned, including Eta’s assignment to Florida and Iota’s to Connecticut. Unfortunately, one of Carolina’s fragments, Kappa, is apathetic and dispassionate, and its emotional bleed-over causes Carolina to wonder what the purpose is in continuing to persevere in fighting and in success. It all begins to feel meaningless, especially as she becomes overwhelmed with the futility of attempting to win a match against Agent Texas.

Not long after this, Tex is convinced by her AI Omega that acquiring the Alpha is key to their dominating at fighting and getting the credit for winning the Covenant war. Tex kidnaps the Director, resulting in his being forced to explain her and Church's origin and status as AIs. In the aftermath, Omega is pulled and put in storage. The Alpha AI, who has now been left only with the Director’s childhood and early adult memories, is implanted in his own android body and left alone at a simulation base, believing himself to be a Blue soldier.

Now that the first phase of the Director's experiments has become a success, the Freelancers begin taking on missions against Covenant targets, alone or in pairs. York is assigned to partnership with Tex. Over time, they build a strong friendship and call one another best friends. Tex also begins training with the Director and he trains her in AI defense tactics. She is able to hack into computer systems and mess with surveillance equipment, all very useful skills for someone partnered with an infiltration expert. York, for his part, becomes proficient at infiltrating Covenant security systems.

[Please note there is mention of suicide in the following section.]

Agent Washington is next on the implantation list and is assigned the Epsilon AI. Wash's breakdown with Epsilon leads to his disappearance from the Project. The agents are not told what happened to him. The Director asks for Tex's help in convincing the broken Epsilon to reform himself. He attempt is successful and Epsilon is reimplanted in Agent Alabama. The stable and strong-minded agent is assumed to be able to help Epsilon stablize. But even support from Tex is not enough and Alabama slowly breaks down in a prolonged repeat of what happened to Wash. Eventually Alabama attempts suicide. York retrieves Alabama's journals after breaking into his room, and in reading them, Tex realizes Epsilon is Memory. The Project secretly decides to hasten Alabama's death when they learn this, without Tex's knowledge.

Eventually Carolina's descent into depression also leads to her becoming unfit for ervice. Like Wash, she’s quietly whisked away, and the agents are never told anything about her fate. Though York had assumed that Wash had been sent home, he’s now forced to wonder if Wash and Carolina met a more disastrous fate.

None of this takes place in a vacuum. Connecticut, who has always been a bit of a skeptic, has been unable to keep her discomfort with what she’s observed to herself and begins to confide in Agent Maine. In the meantime, Maine’s Sigma and York’s AI Delta have been discussing the fact that their nature as fragments leaves them feeling incomplete, only helped in that by being with their implant partners. Tex has confided her concerns about what happened to Alabama to York, and the return of Omega, who has returned to Tex after locating a radio signal from storage, only increases her anger about the situation. Between all the secret discussions Tex eventually formulates a plan to take over the Project.

The plan is not a success. Agent Texas, being an AI, is easily shut down via voice command from the Director. The Director is also able to call his loyal agents Wyoming and Florida to fight off the other intruders and the co-conspirators are apprehended. All of the agents’ AIs are removed. York is sent to solitary confinement and is awaiting interrogation in the morning.