"Agent Hill," I straightened up and saluted, "What are you doing here?" I asked with a calm smile.

"I think we both know what's going on here Cadet Adams," Hill said cooly.

"I...don't understand?" I played dumb.

"Please escort her to my office. I'll deal with her later," she ordered her agents. "And I'll be taking this back from you."

"STOP! We need that information!" I argued.

"I'm sure you only want it to spread false rumors around," she said cynically.

"No, I'm only looking for answers. We all are!" I tried to explain.

"You know what? I don't need to listen to this! You'll have to explain everything later anyway."

"What? Who are you taking me to?" I asked worriedly.

"Don't worry, we're going to take excellent  care of you and your friends," Agent Hill tried to tell me. Her agents took me away and now, I had to work on my cover story. Was I going to tell her the truth or half the truth? Does she really need to know my motives or can I just come up with an alibi? Should I try to gain some sympathy or be honest? My mind was going a mile a minute and I couldn't sort my thoughts!

"I guess I'll have to wing it and hope for the best," I thought to myself as the agents started to slow their pace. I knew trying to fight S.H.I.E.L.D. after getting caught was pointless, so I decided to cooperate.

"Oh goodie! You're ok!" Katie sighed with relief as she hugged me.

"Did you try to run?" Vidia asked. I shook my head.

"I know they caught us, but why are we all  here? Shouldn't they be interrogating us separately?" Max asked confused.

"Maybe they want  us to try to protect each other," Alice suggested.

"No, something bigger is going on here," I said. Right on que, Agent Hill walked in.

"There are agents searching all of your quarters right now. Is there anything they should know before we start asking questions?" she asked. We exchanged nervous glances, but refused to talk. "Ok then, you're going to have to wait a really long time before we can start the interrogation." She noted as she briskly turned on her heel and walked off.

It felt like we had waited for hours before anybody came back for us. Agent Hill had a large stack of files and wore a blank expression as she accepted the water bottles that Skye brought. Commander Howlett followed Skye in with a fuming, annoyed look on his face. "Is he coming to?" Howlett asked monotonly.

"Of course he is, he wouldn't miss something as alarming as this little situation," Agent Hill answered matter-of-factly. Howlett shifted nervously as he avoided making eye contact with anyone. A few more minutes went by and everyone was startled when we heard the door open. An important, but rather intimidating, tall, black man with an eyepatch came in and everyone stood to attention. He raised his hand to stop us from saluting.

"If everyone can sit down and stay calm, that would makes things a lot easier," he said. We shakily did as we were told and waited in awkward silence as he skimmed through the files Agent Hill handed him.

"Well, what do we have here?" he asked in an interested tone., comfortably sitting back in his chair. I looked to Howlett for help, but he stared hardly at the files. He seemed tense, but what could possibly make him so nervous?

"With all due respect sir, it was during dinner when this went down and I was off duty at the time. I had absolutely no control over this," Commander Howlett pointed out like a scared little boy.

"I understand that, Commander Howlett. I to got my dinner interrupted with, what do you call yourselves? V.M.A.S.K.?" the man remarked irritatedly as he looked up from the files. We slowly nodded our heads, afraid of what might happen if we didn't. The silence was unbearable and I knew that he was probably doing it on purpose to make us feel uncomfortable.

"Sir, if you don't mind me asking, what happened to your eye?" Katie asked gently. Vidia elbowed her. "What? I was just asking, it's not like I was trying to be rude or anything."

"Do you not  know who this is?" Vidia quietly asked Katie and to Vidia's horror, Katie shook her head.

"I can see that not many of you have seen my face. I'm Director Fury," he introduced himself. We all gasped and shared scared glances with each other. "The answer to your question is something that I'd rather not talk about, but I will tell you that I got it in my younger years when I was out in the field." Director Fury closed the files and handed them back to Agent Hill. He sat back in his chair and intertwined his fingers. "What are  we going to do with all of you?" he asked us. "You're a fine group of Cadets that are top in all of your Divisions and were able to come together, to what? Break the rules to steal a file that could, in the wrong hands, completely ruin everything?"

"I'm sorry sir," Katie said as she started crying, "I am so, so  very sorry! Please forgive me!"

"Sorry? Sorry is what we'll be when we get kicked out," Max retorted.

"Yeah, if my family didn't hate me before, they sure will when I go back as a failed war hero," Vidia said.

"I want a job line up for when I go back, that's all I'm asking," Max begged.

"If you get kicked out, do you get to keep your ranking achievement pins?" Alice asked hopefully. I looked at my friends, completely disgusted with their reactions.

"How can you guys be so willing to go back home? After everything we've accomplished, it shouldn't be that easy to give it up," I told them.

"I take it you're their leader?" Director Fury asked.

"I sure am and I'm not as easy to persuade," I informed him.

"She's a little stubborn, but I assure you, I can handle this," Commander Howlett tried to step in.

"No Commander, let me  handle this," I argued.

"You've never dealt with someone who has as high of an authority as Director Fury and you have no idea what the rules are. I do this everyday and can help you get through this before you say something that you'll regret," Howlett explained.

"That won't be necessary Commander Howlett, please continue," Director Fury encouraged.

"Unlike my friends, I'm not sorry because if you were to ask any of the Cadets, you would find that we've noticed the secrecy going on around here. When we tried to ask about the truth of what's really been going on on the battlefield, but all we got was that we don't need to worry about. Just because we're the lowest ranking officers, doesn't mean we have to be treated like children. Because we couldn't get straight answers from anyone, we decided to take matters into our own hands. We did some searching and prepared for what we thought we needed to. Then we took action, even if it meant breaking a few rules."

"Ha, a few rules," Agent Hill laughed.

"When we finally got the file that would tell us everything we needed to know, Agent Hill came and stole it back from us, so tell me Director, how does it feel to know that your greatest Cadets broke the rules because of your  decision to keep everything hidden?" I finished.

"Adams!" Howlett growled, "that  was uncalled for!"

"And what do you think you'd  be going home to, Cadet Adams?" Director Fury asked.

"A loving family who appreciates me no matter what decisions I make. As long as my Daddy knows that I was doing it for the right reasons, he'll say good job for not being afraid to stand up for everyone else," I answered. Director Fury thought about this for quite some.

"I really hate it when this happens," he commented with a sigh, "but the five of you leave me no choice." We braced ourselves for the scolding. "You broke the rules, stole a bunch of gadgets, hurt our valued Commanding Officers, and  you managed to get your hands on the most important file we have here on the base without getting caught until now. I should be furious with the five of you! However, we need agents to be more like you guys willing to do whatever it takes to get what you want," Director Fury explained.

"A-Agents sir?" Max asked.

"Why not? We're always looking for inspiring, bright, new Agents that work well together," he said.

"Are you offering us a chance to skip the rest of our training to move up?" Alice asked.

"The choice is entirely up to each of you individually," Fury added.

"Give us a moment to decide," Katie said as we formed a huddle.

"Are we gonna do this as a team?" Vidia asked. We talked it out and came to a final decision.

"We'll work for you with one exception," I announced.

"And what might that be?" Agent Hill asked.

"We want to keep our group name, V.M.A.S.K."

"Consider it done," Director Fury smiled, "Commander Howlett, I'll have their new schedules delivered to you by tomorrow morning for our future Agents."

"Your going to hand them new positions that easily?"Howlett asked.

"No, the five of you are going to have to prove to me that you're capable of completing missions within our guidelines," Fury explained, "None of you are to say a word to anyone about this, otherwise, I will  send you home." With that, we left feeling 100 pounds lighter. Once we were a decent distance from the Director's office, we let out all of our excitement.