Project FREELANCER had been off its game recently. They kept making plans for meetings and training ops, and then canceling them at the last second. Alternatively, they were also running such things and starting them at the last second. This was causing most Freelancers to be on alert, ready to spring into duty any second, which lead to hardly anyone actually getting some downtime.

It should be noted that 'most Freelancers' apparently did not include Agent Maine, who was currently busy drinking until he puked.

"This will come back to really bite you, you know," Sigma said as Maine cracked open another bottle of beer.

"Bah!" the blonde waved a hand in the air, dismissing the idea. "Bullshit, you see how 'well' they're doing keeping track of things. I'll be sleeping all day tomorrow."

"…Wanna bet?"

"…wat?" Maine paused, turning and looking at the red avatar on his nightstand.

"Let's make a bet on it, see what happens," the AI said, grinning.

"All right! Fine!" Maine said, pointing at him. "Yer on," he took another sip of beer.

"What's the wager?"

"Oh, I have an idea or two…"

Approximately six hours later and Agent Maine was standing on a crate in front of the briefing room, holding his pounding head in his hands as he waited for the other Freelancers to show up for the goddamn meeting he'd been so sure they weren't gonna have.

Oh, he was also wearing a pinky fuzzy dress over his armor, such was the wager:

His dignity.

Well, not his dignity, dignity of course; he'd lost that ages ago in the bottom of a garbage can outside a club. This was his oh-so-manly, badass dignity. His man-card, so to speak.

"What the hell is he doing?" South exclaimed, coming to a stop a few feet away as Maine muttered to himself.

"I don't know, but somehow I have the strong urge to prepare to record whatever is coming," North said as York and Wash rounded the corner.

Wash munched on his breakfast-to-go, a stale bagel and a glass of orange juice. He looked like shit, having not slept properly in the last three days. The odd spectacle in front of him got Epsilon to calm down and stop screaming inside head though, so that was nice.

"Is Maine finally coming out of the closet?" he asked, swallowing some bagel.

"From where, Narnia?" York interjected.*

"Mm, yeah, good point."

As the rest of the group gathered, Maine cleared his throat and unwillingly pulled his head from his hands.

"I, Agent Maine, would hereby like to state that despite my outer shell of total masculinity and badassery, on the inside I am nothing but a big girl," he choked out. "On the inside I am really a pansy and if not for my amazing AI partner, Sigma, I wouldn't he half as useful as I am to Project FREELANCER.

"All of my womanizing and drinking is really just me over compensating for the obvious."

Washington leaned on York's shoulder, cracking up as Maine took a pause. York raised an eyebrow. "I give up, what the hell is he doing?"

Delta's avatar shined next to him, casting a green glow on everyone near. "Sigma and Maine made a bet on whether or not we would have this meeting today. Maine lost." he explained.

"Oh," York mumbled.

Maine re-started his speech again. "It should be noted, that along with the aforementioned over-compensation, Agent Washington and I have secretly been gay lovers for years."

"Haha- what?" Wash snapped his head up, glaring at Maine. A pair of women he'd been eyeing the past week gave him odd glances. He pointed at York; "he's Agent Washington."

"In conclusion, I'd like everyone to know I am merely a fake, and do not deserve self respect of any kind. Oh, also, I heart pink lace. That is all." With that, Maine hopped off the crate and proceeded to rip the dress to shreds. His face was flushed as he stormed into the conference room whilst trying to ignore the laughter and hushed whispers.

"I'm going to kill you," he growled. He felt Sigma's barely-controlled amusment in the back of his mind as he took his seat and began plotting revenge.

A/N: *If you get that, yay. If not, think about what he's saying. Narnia...?