Freelancer's had a namesake to them. That being they were always capable of getting a job done quickly and efficiently. Some better than others but they usually didn't complete their mission unless something that they didn't plan for actually happened. Which in itself was pretty rare to happen, but it was near the downfall of the program that happened a lot more. Probably because of the leaks of information giving to the enemy by CT. Something that he could see and know why she had done something like that, but also something that he wouldn't have done himself. Did she die from her wounds? Maybe. He had never asked once the mission had been done and they weren't able to gather her armor either. He never asked questions unless they were needed to know of what was actually going on. He wasn't always in the know, and Washington had been perfectly fine with something like that. He knew that failing a mission wasn't just failing a mission. In some instances, it was life and death because if the Director didn't see someone that was useful to him or the program, he wouldn't be afraid to get rid of them. They were all expendable and there were always more nobodies that he could end up recruiting for the project.

That's what Washington had done when he no longer had anywhere else to go. Looking back part of him hoped that he had just returned home to sister and his mother after being court-martialled. Pretty sure that he could have found another job, but he could ever return to civilian life? Of course not. There was no way even now that he could possibly relax and not always think that he wasn't about to be attacked by someone. They were all light sleepers for a reason, and being born and fighting in a war that had started to years ago was going to create habits that were almost impossible to break. Before Carolina had arrived in the outpost, Washington had been working himself was all. He had his own schedule that he followed all of the time, although the past couple of days he wasn't following it as much as he would have liked. It wasn't healthy, but he was getting results from it. So far he had yet to run into a dead end, and his next course of action was probably going to figure out what the humans around here could know.

He needed something because they already knew that the Ascendants didn't have the correct technology to create the comms that they were going to need to contact those that could possibly help them. However, would that even be a smart idea? They were Freelancers and everyone would have known by then what Project Freelancer was doing with CT getting away with who knows what. Everyone would know about the atrocities of what hey had done to torture the Alpha AI, splitting it into segments. It was horrid and it was a horror that he constantly had to live out. Knowing the crimes of Project Freelancer, they were going to have to face for their crimes. They were criminals after all. They were responsible for a lot of destruction across different installations and galaxies. What would those that live here think about them when they realized how horrible they really were? Although they weren't entirely at fault, he knew, because they didn't know what they were doing. The Director had led them to be a lie, and because of that, they followed him without question. The Freelancer only knew that after the destruction of the ship, and after the AI that had been implanted in him nearly killed him and gave him all the memories that it had. it was painful, but now he knew the truth. He just didn't have anything he could do with it right now.

He had gotten a decent amount of rest since everything had almost gone to shit. He had a breakdown, but he had refused any questions that were asked toward him, brushing them off like they were nothing and re-directing the conversation somewhere else. He hated the way he was now, but he couldn't exactly change the way his brain worked now could he? Washington had gotten a decent amount of sleep, it still wasn't healthy about of sleep, but he was able to at least go on his morning run today and get something to eat. Now that he was thinking about it, he wasn't sure if Carolina had eaten anything since she had gotten here. Since the group had realized that he wasn't capable of stomaching raw meat, they had started cooking some meat and drying it out to make jerky. That was the staple of his diet, if he could eat fruit and stomach he would do just that. But from what he read in the textbooks that he had requested for about the different digestive tracts, it would probably make him sick. Something that he was wanting to avoid as he didn't need to have more variables happen to slow their progress on figuring out things.

The Freelancer set out looking for his teammate, wondering exactly where the leopard had gone. Leopards liked trees right? He wasn't sure but he was on the time during his patrol so he was going to patrol around the areas. Compared to everyone else, Washington didn't take off his helmet. Because of this, he wasn't capable of tracking down scents. An issue yes, but he hadn't run into a problem where it had actually caused anyone issues. He left the scent tracking or however the hell it worked to the civilians. He had brought a couple of things to eat with him not just because he was hungry but he knew that Carolina was bound to be. The Freelancer already had started chewing some of the jerkies in a bag he kept hidden in his chest plate when he heard the sound of splintering wood and the familiar voice. There she was. He didn't what he should have expected. He knew that she wasn't going to stop training. None of them were. Washington needed to start training himself as he still didn't know how to fight in his current body either. Blinking his eyes behind the visor of his helmet, he came across Carolina looking up at a tree that wasn't in the best of shape. Considering that there was wood in her fur, she probably fell here and there. At least that's what his initial look at her said to him. She was pushing herself too hard. Washington knew that if he said anything though, she would probably kick him across the forest. Which he was happy to avoid. It wasn't hard to hear Wash walking around as he didn't exactly make sure to keep himself silent. He had his armor, but Carolina did not, which had still confused him.

They were going to need to find it if it did travel with her like he believed it to be. One could easily hear the chewing that was going on inside of his helmet, which probably wasn't the best idea but he didn't care. He had done it before, although during that time he had been told that the helmet waste disposal was out of beta and actually worked. He wasn't sure if it was true or not, but his helmet didn't work the way it used to. The Freelancer stopped somewhat next to Carolina, keeping space between their bodies like he usually did when he interacted with anyone. He sat himself down and dug inside of his chest plate where he kept the back of jerky. The strips were large because they were from deer. Just be enough to satisfy big cats appetite after eating a couple of them. Although Washington was never fully satisfied when it came to eating. He got better with using his paws when it came to grabbing objects. Using his claws to pitch it in between his paw. The sounds of his chewing still heard although he wasn't exactly smacking because that would just be annoying. He had manners after all. After he managed to grab a piece of jerky, he turned toward Carolina and would aim to poke the leopard's cheek with it. The atmosphere he basically leaked was warmth and support. He knew what she was doing. He also knew why she was doing it. He understood. "Mm hungry?" Washington would ask with a full mouth, so his voice was slightly muffled. His visor definitely hid the grin that was spread across his face. It was not to have to hell at something or have an argument for once. He was stress-free right now and didn't have any voices in his head. "speech"

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Washington should be practicing. He knew that's what he should be doing. But with everything starting to pile up on itself, he never really had the chance to figure out HOW he was going to train. When it came to how he was going to train, usually F.I.L.S.S was going to tell him what he was going to do. In order to get into Project Freelancer, one needed to go through several steps to even be able to make it up to that point. One of those steps had been different tests that they had to be put through physically. Such as how good of a shot they were by shooting targets, reaction time, and endurance. There were, of course, other tests that were going on at the same time, but it was the type of tests that were really made to break someone if they weren't careful. Live rounds were used, and they were shot at to see how well they could act under stress with bullets that were flying toward them. Which seemed a little ridiculous to Washington just because of the factor that he was in the army and knew what it felt like to have bullets flying toward his face. But he wasn't used to being having human ammunition used against him. Although with his time in the military he knew how long it was going to take for someone to actually get shot.

That someone being himself. Washington remembered when he was bleeding on the training floor during his test, barely able to stand on his feet trying to figure out what he would do next. He wasn't going to give up. This was his second chance to make everything better, and the Director forced him to continue while he watched. Washington wouldn't have been surprised if there were those that had died in the process of their tests, as getting shot in a vital area would certainly kill someone. Maybe that had been why he was accepted so that all further records of him were basically wiped. If he were to die during this test no one would care and no one would know. Something that Washington didn't know at the time, but it made sense for the way they worked everything out. The Freelancer had managed to pass the test and was ranked accordingly by the statistics that F.I.L.S.S gave them. Washington was then given a training regimen after that until the rest of the spots for the Freelancers were filled. There were 49 of them after all, and he still wasn't quite sure what number he was if he got Washington. The training had mostly been on the areas that he hadn't been all that great at. Hand to hand combat. Bomb technician. And several other exercises.

Now, he wasn't the best at everything, but instead, he was decent at everything. That gave him an edge over others in that he was capable of learning several different fields and using them in battle efficiently. It was when he got his battle rifle though that he really shined. Having used the weapon basically since basic training, although the weapon wasn't numerous compared to the likes of an assault rifle that was more like a machine gun. A battle rifle took more resources to make and that meant they couldn't make an endless amount of them. Thinking about it now, Washington wasn't even sure where they got half of their ammunition from. Since they were a program that had been sponsored by the UNSC, he figured that they would have gotten it from them. But after all the information that was given to him by Project Freelancer, Washington wasn't so sure anymore. The Project had a lot of secrets after all. From there, he was given his own living space on the lower decks of the MOI where the rest of everyone was starting to settle in. The first Freelancer he had ever come into contact with would have been Agent Utah. Someone that had died during the project after using equipment in the field without an AI. AI's not having been introduced till later in the program. The guy seemed to be pretty interesting, but also not one for conversation.

So Washington had left him alone. It had been between his time and during his endurance test that he was given his armor. The armor wasn't made to specifications of his body, except maybe the helmet, as the undersuits that they wore contoured to their so that the armor would just have to sit on top of it. He was given rules of what he was allowed to do with the armor and what would happen if he tried to take anything that belonged to the Project as his own. He now understood that those rules had been absolute, especially after what happened to CT when she tried to take her armor with and give it to the insurrectionists. The more missions he went on, the more that the Director and Counselor saw his potential and bumped him up the ranks. Until he reached the top 8 Freelancers in the entirety of the program. By this point, he knew most of the Freelancers that were on the MOI of who they were. He didn't interact with all of them, but he had least talked to all of them at least. He had been nervous about being ranked so high, nervous to talk to those that were considered the best of the best. This wasn't the UNSC after all and he considered the other Freelancers that he worked with to be his friends. They cared about one another, even if they had a weird way of showing it.

Washington first spotted Carolina during her time in the training room as he made his way toward a debriefing that he was due for. He recognized the armor from her file, and she was working on holographic targets. That was all he saw of her for a while until they were finally made to go on a mission with one another. Washington immediately following her lead because of her experience and it seemed like she knew what she was doing. He had gone to respect and trust her judgment. Was a friend the right word to call her? Probably not. They had never gotten that close from what he could remember. She was his teammate, and they were the only ones at the moment. They needed to be there for one another, even if it felt strange. They needed one another. At the mention of her not being hungry, Washington would raise a nonexistent brow inside of his helmet. He knew that wasn't true. He had been with her almost constantly and hadn't seen her try to eat anything. Hearing her stomach growl though let a small chuckle escape from his jaws, although it was light and not intended to offend her. At the mention of eating in his helmet, the smilodon shrugged his armored shoulders. Before the sound of his swallowing the food that had been in his mouth was actually heard. He had to admit though, hearing the leopard laugh was almost a new breath of fresh air. He had never liked it when tensions had run high during the end of Project Freelancer. He wanted so badly for everything to go back to the way they were.

"Hey, it's efficient rather than sitting to eat something." Washington made the excuse pretty quickly. Although he wanted to just see if he was capable of eating inside of his helmet with his new face. Looking down at the rest of the bag of the jerky, he pushed the rest of it toward Carolina. He had just brought them along as a snack and for her. "Besides, I already ate before coming here." He definitely wasn't lying this time on how much he was eating. Which Carolina didn't even know that he had nearly starved, something he was going to keep away from the fellow Freelancer. A grin spread across the smilodon's face as she at least seemed to enjoy it. Was there any seasoning on it? Probably not. He doubted that any of the civilians had something like spices in the first place. "I don't know what to call them either. Its been than anything raw that's for sure though." Washington agreed with Carolina on that. He didn't want to eat anything raw. The thought disgusted him that he was stopping to the level of what he was now. An animal. Hearing movement behind them though, Washington looked over his shoulder to look at Bastille.

He would be lying if he said that after recent events that he hadn't lost respect for the commanding officer. Which may had been evident that Washington didn't stand up onto his paws to try and greet the male like he usually did. He knew Carolina better than the commanding officer, and he was going to stick by her side even if it seemed like a drastic change from nowhere for him to suddenly start following orders. He's been following them since he had arrived here. Washington didn't say anything about what Bastille asked, because it wasn't addressed to him anyway. His gaze looked at the corner of his visor to look at Carolina's reaction. She wasn't going to start threatening him. That was good. Washington would simply shuffle his paws as Carolina explained her training. He, of course, could be Carolina's sparring partner, although he doubted he would be able to offer much in his current condition. "speech"