York

"The whole universe is moving too fast, Wash. I think we're just trying to keep up."

- York

Freelancer Agent New York was an agent in the Special Operation's Project Freelancer who specialized in infiltration. York was the second best Freelancer agent at one time.

Project Freelancer
For a time, York was the second best Freelancer agent. In the episode 'Introductions', York (along with Agent Maine and Wyoming) fought in a training excercise against a new recruit to Project Freelancer, Agent Texas. During the fight, York repeatedly tried to coordinate his team's attacks but Maine and Wyoming ignored him and tried to fight on their own, which led to them being easily taken down. Tex bested York and his team in eight rounds of combat that included the use of melee weapons, hand-to-hand action and shootouts using guns charged with paralyzing paint.

However, in the ninth round Maine and Wyoming switched their guns' projectiles to live ammunition and attacked Tex with them, prompting York to try and help Tex, thought she repeatedly resists his aid and attacked him every time he attempted to help her. Tex eventually immobilizes Wyoming and Maine, but Maine breaks free and rams a column towards Tex but it hits York, stunning him. Tex fights and defeats Maine but he throws a grenade as a last ditch attempt to beat Tex but she dodges it and it lands next to York instead. As York struggles to get up, Tex fires rounds of the paralyzing paint at him in an effort to cover York from the grenade's explosion. York flies across the training room and the Freelancers watching come to his aid with medics. He is shown with multiple cracks in his visor and a hole above his left eye.

He later recovered enough to join the other Freelancers in their next mission, though his rank had fallen down to sixth. York is then seen inside the building. Carolina has him pick a lock for her. He notes its holographic and she asks if he can do it. He says yes. He does so but with an alarm going off. He asks if saying sorry counts in a jokingly manner to Carolina after the alarm. York alerts the team of an enemy patrol coming in and later helps them get a window washer lift to carry the package to the roof. Later he is told to shut down a bomb planted by Agent Texas. However he reveals it to be a transmitter. He asks a soldier to hold the Transmitter and runs away. Later when in freefall due to the building collapsing, thanks to a MAC round fired from the Mother of Invention, he asks Carolina why they didn't have a fallback plan. When he is about to hit the highway he lands in a Warthog driven by Agent Maine. York is later seen driving the Warthog. He gets the coordinates to Team B, however they go after Rhee Sebial who has the passcode.

Recovery One
He first appears in Out of Mind Part 3, trying to break into a small shop, as he is out of work. Tex hires him in a mission to find Omega, which he agrees to out of vengeance. Apparently Omega was responsible for damaging his left eye during an unspecified incident concerning Tex. York assists Tex by breaking into Wyoming's hideout, in which they both receive heavy fire upon entering. They are successful in eliminating his armed guards, but are unable to eliminate Wyoming himself. Tex had a clear shot at Wyoming, but her gun jammed, requiring York to cover for her. Moving in panic to cover Tex, York put himself in a position where he couldn't see Wyoming (due to the bad vision in his left eye) and was mortally wounded. His armor shut down once he died, sending out a Priority One Recovery Beacon, in which his AI is eventually retrieved by Agent Washington and his armor is "decommissioned".

Reconstruction
As revealed by Washington in Reconstruction Chapter 1, York's armor enhancement was not destroyed as may have been previously believed, but taken by Washington.

Abilities
In Introductions, York, along with agents Maine and Wyoming, displays considerable combat ability in his fight against Agent Texas. While unable to defeat Tex, he seemed to be the only one of the three to be able to block several of Tex's attacks, (Though Wyoming is able to injure her shoulder later on, he only managed to do so by using live rounds on the training floor, and thus 'cheated' in a sense) even managing to disarm her during one of the lockout paint rounds, though she was quick to nullify the achievement by swiftly defeating him. On the ranking board, it states that York is the second top Freelancer, which is another indication of his prowess in combat.

It is also stated in the mini series Out of Mind that York is an infiltration specialist, his first appearence being when Tex caught him trying to break into a store, and is later shown assisting Tex in inflitrating O'Malley's base.

Trivia

 * As revealed by Tex, each Freelancer was given a codename after one of the states of America. It is obvious that York is simply shorthand for his official codename, New York.
 * The fact that York, who'd been stealing for (presumably) years for himself to make ends meet has not gone by his Freelancer codename (much to the converse of Tex, who still operates in military operations). This is why York and Allison are names neither are used to hearing respectively.
 * The fact that agents Texas, Washington, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Carolina (singular because she was given 2 AIs representing both Carolinas.) go by the nicknames Tex, Wash, North, South, and Carolina respectively all support the possibility that York's codename was New York.
 * York's codename Foxtrot 12 is similar to the designation Sierra 117, an alternate designation for the Master Chief within the Halo games, as both are made up of a NATO phonetic letter followed by a numerical sequence. The use of the letter Foxtrot is due to York being a Freelancer and Sierra is due to the Master Chief being a Spartan.
 * York's healing unit is very effective as it allowed Washington to survive a direct shot to the back from Agent South Dakota.
 * In Out of Mind: Part IV, York sheds some light on how he lost his left eye by saying "Omega and Allison were always the best. Nobody could compete with them, not me, not Wyoming, not anybody. Trying to beat them when I should have given up is how I got hurt in the first place"
 * York is the first character in Red vs Blue to remove his helmet and reveal his face on screen.
 * According to Burnie Burns at Pax East, York was the link in the trailer to show that Red vs Blue Season 9 was not taking place in present time.
 * The extents and limitations of York's healing unit are unknown, leading many to question why he didn't use it to heal his eye or to save himself from Wyoming's fatal gunshot. As of episode 8 of Season 9 it has been noted that Freelancers are not permitted to and that it may in fact be hazardous for them to use their ability units and in light of his injury it likely healed into permanent scar tissue before this became viable.