You cannot be serious.

Sunset grimaced at the deadpan tone of Sashssa’s voice. However, if they wanted to survive this battle, they needed to be able to anticipate Sonata’s moves as much as possible, and the best way of doing that without XCOM getting discovered… was to do it in a way that didn’t involve them directly at all.

“I’m dead serious," she finally said. “We need an advantage."

"If we’re discovered, that would be the end of us. We don’t have a giant spaceship to stay away from the Elders."

“Look, you won’t be discovered, there’s no chance in hell they’ll even consider the fact that you guys are still in the game—“

“Which is exactly why my answer is no," he interrupted. "Their ignorance of our existence is the greatest advantage we posses. What you ask endangers all of our lives. I will not have it."

"If any of my team members dies because you refused to help—“

"There is no need for that, Sunset, Annette spoke through another channel. "Sashssa is simply worried about their survival. He’s not very fond of you either."

“What did I ever do to him?"

“Not you… Sunny One almost killed him in a mission, but he managed to escape."

“Well… that’s great."

"It’s a good plan, Sunset. Let me talk to him."

“Be my guest."

Sunset sat in silence in the relative safety of the alley she was hiding in, her thoughts drifting into the life of her counterpart in this world.

Human Sunset Shimmer might be gone, and she might have run out of notes and visions to share with them all, but her legacy continued in many different ways. Sashssa being a good example. Or Annette, or Geist… how many more friends and enemies would she meet that knew her other self? That hated or missed her?

And that legacy now fell on her. As a leader, member of XCOM and spiritual successor. She needed to live up to a legend that had affected the whole world in one way or another. And not only that, but someone that probably had been her boss’s lover… and looked exactly like she did.

She hated to admit it but it sometimes really scared her, just how much of an influence she could be. How much leadership demanded. Even if from a very early stage in her life she had been groomed to become a leader of her people, and even with how much she had wished—and still did—to be just that… it was sobering.

Especially when leadership had her hiding with the knowledge that at any moment, an unseen enemy could blow up her head into bloody chunks.

Hmm.

Blood.

"Sunset."

Sunset’s head snapped up. “Yeah?"

I’ve talked to Sashssa and Vikass. They will proceed with your plan."

"Could you tell him that I’m not the Sunset that shot him?"

"He knows. But his species is very good at carrying grudges."

“Fantastic. I’ll keep that in mind."

"You should. He and Angel share common ancestors, after all."

“Central, sir," the Engineer spoke up, “we’re starting to receive a transmission."

Bradford smirked. “So that’s what she was planning when she asked us for a secure channel. Clever girl." He leaned forward on the rail as the globe transformed into a map of the area. “Let’s see where that monster is hiding."

Invisible and silent, the seekers floated high above the city, scanning, finding all living beings, big and small. They flew undetected over Jane and Fridge, who—much like Sunset—had taken cover behind the sturdiest cover they could find, and as away as possible from anything that might explode.

They flew over the building where Trojan had nested and now waited patiently for instruction, while Angel had coiled herself into a smaller target and scanned the area carefully, tasting the air with her flickering tongue.

The squid-like MECS passed the place where Elena waited, hidden in the shadows, and never caught sight of her.

Eventually, their scans detected the Hunter. Sonata waited with an impatient air about her, Darklance at the ready. Whatever the powers she had been granted by the Elders, she was blissfully unaware of the presence of the alien MECS high above her.

The pair of seekers stopped above the Chosen, then moved apart, covering a wider area in order to not lose sight of her, then transmitted her position to the Avenger and triangulated it back to the XCOM troops on the ground.

"Sunset," Braford called in, "Do you see her?"

“Yes, but now that we now know where she is…" Sunset muttered, “we need to figure out the best way to keep her distracted. We’re still a decent distance from her location, and she’s proven before to be deadly."

"Doesn’t help that this whole area has too many abandoned explosive containers," Jane added, "What’s the deal with that?"

"If I were to guess," Fridge spoke up, "I’d say that they were probably planted by ADVENT. Most likely they wanted to have them in case Julian’s MEC units started overpowering them, so they would start destroying large groups of them."

“So, crowd control, basically," Sunset summarized, “unfortunately that’s going to help her more than us, given her tendency to stick to the rooftops." She tapped her fingers on her knees.

"Come on XCOM, where are you hiding? Are you really that scared of little ol’ me?" Sonata’s voice taunted in the open channel.

Sunset bit her lower lip in annoyance. “Avenger, find me, Annette and Jane an alternate route to go around and get to the Hunter."

"You could get to her relatively quickly, Sunset," Bradford spoke up, "If you manage to climb up and move East, there should be no line of sight from the Hunter to your position from what we can see, but the first move would expose you immediately."

"Then we distract it," Elena pitched in. "We might not be too effective at our current distance, but Trojan and I can certainly snipe at the foul creature.

"We create the distraction and let you make your move while she’s focused on us," Trojan said, "Can’t say that as a sniper putting myself in the cross-hairs would be my ideal move, but we can’t do much about it… we have to close the distance somehow, and at least we have a fighting chance that you guys currently don’t."

“It sounds particularly dangerous," Sunset said.

"Hey," Fridge added, "tell me I didn’t join up with Menace on the day they wimp out."

"It’s your call, Captain," Annette said.

Sunset took a deep breath, eyes narrowing as she looked up into the sky. Today she intended to taste Chosen blood. “Let’s do it. Annette, I want you to go down the block the moment we know we have the Hunter’s attention where we want it. Jane, Fridge, you both stay ready to take Sonata down if she gets in range. Don’t get killed, people."

"Then I’ll take the first shot," Elena said, her voice betraying the anger she felt at seeing the Hunter.

“On my signal…" Sunset called in, standing up and moving down further into the alley, until she reached the end. She cracked her neck, then looked up. “Go!"