Jacopo entered the sterilized white room and looked around, taking in the blank white walls, his gaze roaming over the thick power lines and their convergence: a set of automatic double doors leading...everywhere, he supposed. Beyond those doors was a time machine, the first and only one of its kind, able to transport up to four passengers to any point in history. Jacopo stared at it, wondering what monstrously complex mechanism allowed it to accomplish such a feat, until his partner Xerxes entered, jolting Jacopo out of his reverie. The two of them were here to retrieve a long-lost remnant of nature, a long-extinct species of plant from which, it was said, near-miraculous drugs could be synthesized. Jacopo and Xerxes each placed their hand on a panel on a wall, doors sliding silently open to reveal the latest in tactical armor: the Hydra-class integrated armor system, named so for its ability to connect the various members of a team through their central nervous systems, allowing them to transmit thoughts and ideas directly to one another.

Each man stepped forward, his armor opening to reveal the intricate interior, which was lined with neural sensors and connectors. Jacopo entered his, stepping backward into it and suppressing a grin as the Hydra armor enveloped him, the neural interface feeling as natural as bare skin. Jacopo waited for the machine to finish, grimacing at the slight pinch of the armor piercing his spine to interface with his brain, the powerful machinery inside the armor plating tuning itself so that he could move it as an extension of himself. The display smoothly turned on, even sharper than his own vision, and he felt the signal that his partner's armor had done the same: they were ready.
Jacopo and Xerxes stepped out of the armory pods, each man grabbing a sidearm on his way out. Jacopo also took a Harpy-class plasma rifle, while Xerxes grabbed his favorite, a long-range Gorgon-class sniper rifle. They nodded once to each other, each knowing the other was grinning boyishly behind the cold, expressionless visor, and stepped towards the time machine. It scanned their armor status, cross-referencing with the deployment schedule, and hummed quietly as it calibrated itself. Jacopo's mouth twisted into a slight frown, and he said,
"I've been wondering: how come no one's ever here with us to make sure the machine is running right? I mean, what if it sends us way too far into the past, or into the heart of a star?"
Xerxes shrugged, replying, "I think it's something to do with the radiation the thing emits when it's turned on. Our suits are designed to handle just about anything, but a technician's outfit wouldn't be. Or maybe they just do it before we get here; I don't know."
Jacopo nodded, and the machine finished calibrating, the doors opening with the pneumatic hiss of escaping air. They stepped inside, and the doors closed again, the machine humming as it smoothly transported them through time itself. After a few minutes, it opened again, revealing a vastly different world. None of the soaring spires or gleaming towers present in their own city rose above them; only gargantuan trees and their canopies. Instead of the bustle of cars flying above, only the sounds of nature could be heard. The two men stepped out, and off they went. A real-time map of their immediate area appeared on their displays, showing them where they were and the possible locations of what they were looking for, as well as a picture: a seed, bullet-shaped, colored a vibrant red, and the royal-blue fruit it was found in. They jogged along, scanning their surroundings without worry for the future, since any changes made to the past had already happened, their effects already felt. Indeed, it would be a crime against nature, not to mention impossible, to abstain from this undertaking; the future dictated that they must.
The first indication that something was wrong was the silence. All sounds had, at some point, ceased completely, and the air itself seemed poised for something to happen, for any event at all to break the dreadful silence that seemed louder than any noise on Earth. The men chatted mentally as they jogged along, too intent on that and their mission to notice that anything was amiss. Then, out of the foliage, came the screech of engines as a drop-ship flew out of the canopy, plasma turrets locked onto the two partners.
Jacopo noticed it first, diving into the dense jungle and drawing his plasma repeater. Xerxes, receiving Jacopo's sense of alarm and seeing what was wrong, dove into the jungle in the other direction, taking and aiming his long-range rifle at the drop-ship. Before he could fire, it unleashed a barrage of plasma bolts into both portions of jungle, forcing the two men to move out of the way. Then came the drones. Four Stalker-class hunter-killer drones dropped silently from the ship, which then flew away, having sprung its trap. The drones moved with stealth through the primordial shrubbery, hunting Jacopo and Xerxes as the men fled through the jungle.
After an hour had passed, Jacopo slowed his run, hiding and readying himself to destroy the Stalkers. He backtracked, keeping his repeater up, until a Stalker dropped from the canopy, shooting its own plasma repeater. Jacopo rolled and came up shooting, the ionized gas bolts blasting the Stalker's front into a ruined, molten mess. It staggered once, twice, and collapsed with finality. Jacopo quickly destroyed the other Stalker, then went after his friend.
Xerxes crouched under cover, taking his sidearm out. His rifle would not avail him here; not with these mechanical predators on the loose. He walked low, stalking the Stalkers, and spotted one up in a tree. Damn, but they liked to climb trees. He aimed at it...and yelped as the other Stalker leapt onto him, monofilament blades extended at his neck, chest, whatever it could reach and make bleed. It emitted a sound almost like a growl, and Xerxes kicked it off of him, shooting it with his sidearm until it dodged nimbly, leaping onto him again and knocking him down. Its blades destroyed and its systems near failure from damage, it latched onto him in a crushing embrace, its powerful arms and legs squeezing the life out of Xerxes and his armor. In his final moments, the soldier looked to the side, the fruit he had sought less than a foot from his face. He reached for it, grabbing it and holding as he breathed his last.
The damaged Stalker finished its work on the meatbag it had been sent to kill, the massive drain on its systems putting it into a catatonic state. A kilometer away, Jacopo stopped, gasping as he felt his friend die. He clenched his jaw, reloading his repeater and activating all weapons systems on his armor, switching it from stealth to assault mode. It whirred, several plates moving aside or popping up to reveal missile pods and an automatic, rotating turret. He would make these drones pay. Jacopo ran in the direction of Xerxes's last known location, quickly reaching his friend's corpse and the Stalker, clenched like a grotesque spider around it. He shot it in the head once, ensuring its destruction, and looked around for the other one.
The last Stalker crouched on a branch, its systems processing how best to destroy the second meatbag. It extended its blades, preparing to leap...and screeched as Jacopo ran and tackled the tree it was in, shaking the entire trunk. The Stalker fought to keep its balance, but Jacopo rammed it again, shaking it loose. It dropped, twisting to avoid taking too much damage, and landed lightly on its feet. It chittered, trying to unnerve the meatbag, and wove left and right like a snake about to strike. Finally, it struck, the meatbag punching it and sending it flying backward. The Stalker struck a tree and stuck, climbing up the trunk and leaping off to strike at the meatbag. Jacopo narrowed his eyes, his turret shooting at the Stalker as he jumped to meet it, intercepting it and landing with it under him. He held its wrists, and planted his foot on its chest, a primal yell escaping him as he ripped its arms off at the shoulders. He kept yelling as he pummeled it, his yells devolving into curses and his curses into sobs as he reduced the assassin drone to a mound of ruined metal plates and wires. Jacopo stood after a while, going to Xerxes's body and sobbing anew as he saw the fruit clenched in his friend's hand. Whispering a quick thanks to his fallen comrade, he took the fruit and departed, not having the heart to carry his friend's corpse back to base. He entered the time machine, and it took him back. Jacopo fell to his knees as he left it, sobbing quietly as he held the fruit in his hands. He tore into it, taking out the seed and looking up to see a uniformed man looking calmly down at him.
"Congratulations, agent," the man said crisply. "You passed."