 Hello again! More XCOM 2. Good to know that you are central because I'm not giving you much of a choice. No offense, you've done an alright job so far. Right, I'm not going to make contact with them yet because I'm currently looking for supplies, scanning, really. That's going to be good. You have made considerable progress against the aliens over the past month, Commander. I hope that your ongoing efforts will only lead to further success. Ah, I see. So I had a supply drop, which means that we've got our monthly supply income and new stuff. A corporal and a doctor. Excellent. We'll conduct guerrilla operations to disrupt one of these efforts, but we'll have to choose carefully. We don't have the resources to intercede everywhere. That's interesting. Right. So, preparation to fold these dark vents before they can be enacted are already in the way. Counter operations will be available soon. Let's see. Advent rural checkpoints. Actually, I can't click on anything, can I? Right. UFOs hence the Avenger. If they keep imprisoning and torturing people, eventually someone's going to talk. Looks like Advent isn't content to just sit behind their city walls anymore. That's bad. That's very bad, actually. Commander, the resistance has a hidden cache of resources stashed outside of Advent's reach. But that means we'll have to fly over and scan the area if we want to recover this stuff for ourselves. Yet another one? Hmm... I believe that's more supplies than that is. So, let's make sure we get that one, then we get to the Overgrown checkpoint, and we take those as well. Of course, gaining intel will have to wait for now. Supplies? Fascinating. The mine shield is a powerful psionic artifact, rendering soldiers completely immune to any negative mental conditions, including panic, mind control, stuns and disorientation. That will actually be useful. I want to get down to doing that as soon as possible. Let's see, magnetic weapons, Advent Trooper autopsy. We can do that on the show. Or the faceless. Let's see what the faceless will tell me. I'm very curious to know more about these spy-specialistic aliens. They're commonly known as the faceless to our troops. The nebulous form of its physical structure, including the pliable, semi-solid outer layer, seems to be slowly degrading now that the creature has expired. There is also a pungent odor that only seems to grow stronger as time passes. A pungent odor? Lovely. Right. Advent has made steady progress in convincing the remaining civilian populace to migrate to their city centers with the propaganda campaign providing a constant stream of reminders as to the benefits of migration. They have maintained a steady influx of new converts. Unfortunately, most of these unwitting refugees have little idea what they are truly signing up for. I'm going to buy two of those because I honestly think that early on at least... Having never stepped foot in one of the city centers, I've never actually had one of these advent burgers I keep hearing rumors about. No one really seems to be asking the hard questions either. Like, when was the last time you even saw a cow? I'm going to risk it and take a mind shield with my two main characters. By the way, those two, after my friends, birthed them. And both of them look pretty damn awesome, don't they? I'm not sure if it's a good idea to take only one frag grenade with my Grenadier, but I can survive. Those grenades are radius and range. Excellent. We'll see if it works, if it doesn't, I can always switch around. I just want them both to be better protected from the effects of panic. Hello, Commander. Work is well underway, but it will be some time yet before my research is complete. What's happening soon? Only four days until the skull junk is finished. Time to get on with it then. Another 46 supplies. We have collected all of the resources. Nothing's happening so far. We have a priority message coming through. It looks like an encoded signal from the resistance. Hatching it through to your quarters now. Let's see. It would seem your recent activities have gotten Advent's attention. Our unwelcome guests are on the move. Advent has been diverting considerable resources and personnel to covert facilities across the globe. The exact details of these operations are highly classified. However, they do have one thing in common. I was wondering what that was. All their files, that we had previously uncovered to be but a part of this avatar project. Based on what we have uncovered so far, its true scope is far greater. This project is being directed from the very top of Advent. From a source I am still unable to determine. All attempts to uncover its identity have met with failure. It is time to take a more direct approach. Though we may not know the exact nature of this avatar project, we can still disrupt it. We must root out these hidden facilities with the help of local resistance cells. Disrupt our enemy's operations and in the process uncover the truth. Locate the source of this avatar project and then destroy it. Were the enemy to succeed in their efforts, I am certain it would mean the end for us all. I am confident you will take whatever measures necessary to eliminate this threat commander. We are tracking the alien's progress on this avatar project here. If they finish what they have started, it sounds like it will be the end for all of us. I am sure you will find the results to be as intriguing as I do commander. I have often wondered how the aliens could conceive of such a being. Is there another world out there filled with these shape-shifting creatures or are they merely another construct of alien genetic temporal? Mimic beacon, the Mimic beacon generates a holographic decoy to draw enemy attacks for one turn. It is deployed like a grenade trying to decide where the decoy will appear. On to the next important project. I think we should encrypt an alien data cache before... yeah, let's do that. The Skulljack is complete. Access to the alien communications network is highly restricted, requiring several complex biomedical augments before admittance can be granted. The Skulljack allows us to hack into the network by temporarily wrestling control of a being's augments. So any access gained is sure to be short-lived. Skull mining wasn't invasive enough. Tygan has conceived of a more thorough means of extracting information from other soldiers' chips. This Skullmining technique could lead to new intel gains from our enemies and could even grant access to hidden alien facilities for the purpose of sabotage. We can also upgrade our Skulljacks to significantly enhance the hacking ability of any soldier carrying one. Right, well, time to get it to work soon enough. View targets. Let's see how the hidden resistance computer. A scientist's reward. And it comes to the dark event. We are doing it! No way am I letting these... Equip the Skulljack then. And I'm nice as well. Take the medikit, medikit. Why is it even written as a medikit? Never mind. Right then, time to get down to it. You see, Sergeant Virgil Firewall and Sergeant Vladimir Firewall make for quite an impressive pair. Let's see how it goes. There's a hacker working for the resistance discovered of vulnerability in the ADVENT network and trying to pull some of their data from a terminal in this area. Unfortunately, the aliens were quick to eliminate the operative. But as far as we can tell, the data is critical to the alien's latest operation. We're moving in to recover what we can. Eliminate all enemy contacts and secure the area. Access the network before they have time to lock down the connection. Just enough and easy enough. Well, the easy part depends entirely on how many times I... Right, we only have eight turns until we get to the computer. That's all fairly good. And what's this? Never seen one of those so far. I've gotten to be very close all of a sudden. What are you, mate? I might as well take a shot. Missed? Really? Oh, shh. This is going to make things severely more difficult. So that's what those are. Another instant bouncer. Not large to you like you are made of butter. Too easy. I got a scope and PCS conditioning. I don't know what the abbreviation stands for, but I know that it will give me plus one HP, which is always nice. The effective soldier will gain a slight boost in survival availability on the battlefield with the basic conditioning sim. Good. I'm sure the doctor will want to see this. Absolutely. Sorry, mate. Oops. If you miss that, I'm going to kill him. A critical shot, not enough to get him. No problem, though. Well, I should hope there's no friendly fire. Pretty much, buddy. That's how these things go. At least around here. I think I can safely assume that there are no aliens here. Not here. Not about here. Still no aliens. Let's see if I can get any of you. I'm putting too many of my eggs in the same basket, but it is what it is. Too far away. So that might be a problem. But hey. See? Useful. The poor alien must be very surprised right now. I'm very confused. At least she's got the medkit. And this did not take as long as I was afraid it would. 2-3 points of damage. As opposed to 65%. Let's try and get the alien. Angie is not herself today. Last time she was killing aliens, let them ride. This time, however. No different mistakes. And this is the only person... That's what you get for trying to hurt my friend. I mean, it's a bargain. Goodbye. I will die. Whenever they point their guns at the cosmos, I get really quite worried. Alright, I'll go. Like, very much so. I'm going to just make a quick save for Basterity's sake. And then I'm going to do something completely insane. No need to ask twice. And go up there. Let me guess. Aliens. 7 and 55. I need the advent officer alive. I need to put my skulljack inside of him. And yes, that's probably dirty talk. Hopefully. A virgin will be able to hack inside the bloody computer from the door. Oh, it was blue his head off. Unpleasant. At least it would have been. Maybe not. How the hell did you miss? Quite possibly one of the worst shops ever. Die now. Thank you, Angie. Target neutralized. Time to go. Please work. We've dedicated our systems to processing the new data, but we will need to work fast. It is only a matter of time before they detect our intrusion. Excellent. Oh, I even unlocked a small cache of intel. Aliens, surprising indeed. And he's dead. Oh, he's not dead. Is he dead? Scary. That appears to be the codec responsible for safeguarding the alien data storage. We have to neutralize it if we intend to recover the data. Understood. Weapons hot. We've got our target. First I'm going to hack this. Then I'm going to hope that the evil alien does not murder Vasie. Guess who does. Research done on the current tech reduced by 50%. Whoa, that's awesome. Affirm successful acquisition of the ad-bent files. Eliminate any remaining hostiles in the area. I suppose I could, but not. She's not a robot, as we shared. Maybe some aid protocol for Vasie might help in saving her life. Oh, that's good. Scares me. He'll probably shoot with some suppressing fire. Excellent. This is going to be one hell of a game changer for Vasie. That is awful. I need to get out of there. Can I shoot it? I can try. 39%. Not awful. Not surprising. Still have to try. I don't want to slash it with my blade, but shooting it with a shotgun. Now this could... What? Ah, alright. Clone. Seriously? Now there are two? Anything like this. The Codex is projecting multiple copies of itself into our dimension. On my way. This horrifies me in many different ways. It only has two HP. Actually, I should be able to kill it with my combat protocol. That is as surprising as it is joyful. That was the thing of great beauty. You don't get that anyway. Every day. Or any day. I suppose. I didn't see that. I need to reload my weapon. I could use... Go on. Yeah, sure. And I got an achievement out of it. Now I do what the achievement is. Of course. Hey! That went better than expected. That is it. The soldier is wounded. Too awesome. Good. Seems I made a good call by changing my HQ's thingy. Now I can get feeling. Not good. Because I am really quite fond of Virgil. Firewall. That was it. Doesn't surprise me. She likes to stab people with her blade. And when she doesn't do that, she shoots them with a shotgun. It's really quite difficult to survive. Both of them are gravely wounded. Damn it. Hey! Now corporals as well. No, actually, they are going to be sergeants. Let's see. Dead Eye. Take shot with a small aim. Penalty for a significant damage boost. Or fire your pistol at target. This tank does not cost an action. Down. Both of those are good. But I am going to take the dead eye. Awesome. And as I might as well take Shadow Step. Oh, that's amazing. The soldier does not trigger Overwatch or Reaction Fire. That is so useful. Right. Vladimir is still the biggest badass of them all. I mean, look at her. She is smoking her smoke. Or is that a Cuban? It's probably a Cuban. She has a monocle. She's got a big ass gun. And a grenade launcher. A grenade. A bunch of tattoos. Her gun has smiley faces on it. It's amazing, really. That is one of my best friends right there in 20 years. It's what she's going to become. And she's stone cold and vass is fatal. I love those names.