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xp_logsIn San Francisco, the team is briefed. The situation turns out to be even more complicated than they realized, and Nathan decides to call in some outside help, a decision that is also more complicated than it should be.
"Thanks for coming." Fred Duncan said as the X-Men entered the docks warehouse that had been converted into a command center. The FBI DAD looked tired, and there was something else in his eyes as he waved them to seats around a large trestle table. "The reason we kicked a request for help upstairs to Cooper is because we've got a bad one here."
Duncan had also been an agent long enough to make his assessment of a 'bad one' something to be taken very seriously. "Seventeen hours ago, a group of terrorists, under the leadership of a Chechen separatist named Saidullayev took close to fifty hostages and sealed off all access to the island of Alcatraz. His demands are typically mad; release of prisoners from Russian holding areas, a complete embargo on Russian goods and full recognition for a Chechen Free State, that sort of thing."
Duncan waved over two other men who'd just entered the room. One was dressed in the uniform of a United States Navy commander. The other wore a dark grey suit. Both men had uniform expressions of concern. "This is Commander Art Merrick, our Navy liaison, and this is David Langstrom, from the CIA. He'll be conducting the briefing."
"Thank you, Fred." David nodded and took a sip from a cup of coffee. "Ladies and gentlement, I'm going to turn you over to Commander Merrick in just a moment. I am the Assistant Deputy Director of Operations for the CIA. Saidullayev has been one of the Agency's concerns for close to a decade now. He is a mutant, a telekinetic of not inconsiderable power, and he is well trained. On taking the island, the HRT decided that it was outside of their capabilities, and the Joint Chiefs authorized the release of SEAL Team 2, Commander Merrick's men."
"Mission: Lockdown was launched seven hours ago. SEAL team 2 was to penetrate the prison through a system access shaft, enter in the old laundry, and fall on the citadel, where we believe most of the terrorists are located." Merrick's professionalism was firm, but the corners of his eyes and the thread of tension in his voice hinted at the emotions underneath. "The team was somehow spotted, and there was a confrontation. We, uh--" He paused for a second. "We believe there were no survivors."
"Agent Walsh, can you give us the communication playback now?" Another FBI agent walked over to a matte black sound system, and cued up the digital recording.
"Lockdown-6, this is SEAL team 2. We've reached the staging point." Over the comm, there was only the faintest rustle of movement from the SEALs that carried.
"Roger, Team 2. No indication of discovery from our position."
"Roger. Moving down the main access tunnel now."
"How long?" A new voice cut in, talking to the command comm.
"About twelve minutes to the access grate for the old laundry. From there, they have a straight route to the citadel where we think the weapon is set." Agent Fred Duncan's voice was distinctive and well known. "Team 2, any sign of the terrorists?"
"Negative. We have had no contact."
"Good." There was a metallic click, cutting the transmission back to just the command centre.
"Command, we have a problem." The voice was still professional; not worried or panicked, but strained. "There's been damage to the tunnel. It's blocked two hundred feet from the laundry grate."
"Roger that. Stand fast, Team 2. We'll find you another route." Click.
"Shit!"
"That whole underlevel is falling apart, Agent Duncan. We built that into the mission profile." A new voice, Langstrom.
"Is there a way around?"
The clatter of keys was very loud. "I think so. Captain?"
"Six?"
"Backtrack about sixty feet. There you'll find a ladder leading to an old vent port at the bottom of the citadel." More clatter. "One hundred and twenty feet south east from there is a stairwell. It leads to the junction outside of the laundry area."
"That's going to leave us out in the open, sir."
"Between the vent and the stairwell, yes. But there's been no consistent patrol activity in that area up until now." The sigh was clearly audible. "It's a risk, Captain, but the only other route is three times as long, and through multiple exposed areas."
"Understood, six. Team 2, move out." Click.
"We've breached the vents, command. Moving over to the stairwell now. Gomez," There was a shuffling sound of someone scurrying forward first. Against the soft slithering of the uniforms in motion, a sudden scrabble of sound burst over the comm..
"Cover! Cover!" A hissed command.
"Captain?"
"Nothing six. A couple of my men slipped on the open ground." There was a long hush. "No response. Continuing on to objective." Click.
"Agent Duncan ? We've got movement in the citadel."
"What?"
"Imaging shows… multiple squads sir. They're converging on—" "Six, we are taking fire! SEALs, weapons free! Weapons free!" An explosion of automatic fire filled the spaces of silence.
"Captain, what's going on?"
"We've been cut off, sir! Hostiles at the top of the stairwell and on the landing behind us! Ten, twelve hostiles! Rifle 1, covering fire on that landing!"
"Christ, the place is a goddamn firesack, and they just slammed the lid shut behind them." A new voice whispered in horror.
"Multiple types of automatic weapons fire. Grenades on the landing. Medic 1, get Demo 1 and Rifle 2 under cover!" Barnes' voice had gone into command mode, barking out orders as if he wasn't surrounded by flying rounds, trying to keep his teams' response disciplined.
"Rifle 2's dead. Motherfuck—"
"The fuck was that!"
"Stand fast, Rifle 1! Get me some fire on that damn stairwell! Six, we've got energy projectors. I repeat, energy projectors confirmed with the terrorist forces!"
"Grenade! Down! Everybody do—" An explosion tore over the speakers. "Team 2, come in! Team 2!"
After a long moment, filled with nothing but screams and weapon fire, the Captain coughed and came back on-line. "Lost the stairwell, Six. Two of the squad left. They're moving back to flush with us with grenades. Professionals, six."
"Captain, there's a culvert to the immediate west of that position. Form up and make for—"
"Negative, Six. Only Medic 1 can still walk. We're going to hold here as long as possible. There were no visible sensors or trips. Something passive, or they spotted us leaving the vent." The voice had gone emotionally dead; resigned to fate and trying to at least finish the job.
"Captain, get your squad out. The culvert—"
"Another mutie, Six. Oversized, carrying a recoilless rifle. Must have superstrength. Take the shot, Rifle 1."
"No effect, Cap'n. We're… Incomin—!" Click. The recording ended with surprising finality.
Nathan took a deep breath as the recording went to static immediately after the explosion. He hadn't been able to avoid visualizing the moment, imagining what it must have been like. After all, how many times had he been pinned down in similar situations? And it always happened so fast... "They gave you as much information as they could, I see," he said, his voice not quite impassive.
"They did their job." Langstrom's tone was conflicted. No one in the room could fail to be shaken by the sounds of a squad of elite warriors dying one by one over the radio, still radioing in information even though they knew there was no way out. At the same point, it also seemed like he was reluctant to be giving this briefing, as if he was left with no options but the most distasteful one he could consider.
"Based on the information we got back from SEAL Team 2, and what our surveillance picked up, it's obvious that we are dealing with a mixed team of terrorists at Alcatraz. We've confirmed tight disciplined attack tactics, using both automatic weapons and mutant abilities. Unfortunately, this also fits the profile of their leader."
Kurt was pale and tight-lipped, looking slightly ill, and his hand clenched on the rosary looped around his other wrist. "Do we know exactly how many of them are in there?"
"How many and what kind of training they have?" Lorna added quietly, sitting back in her chair with her arms crossed over her chest, hands gripping her elbows. Her defensive posture could have been what they'd just heard or perhaps it was just Langstrom's attitude. Nothing like being treated like vermin while you were being asked for a favor. "Not to mention where on the island they are."
"We need better intel." Wolverine said around his lit cigar. "If they ripped through two squads of SEALs...." he mused, leaving the rest of his thought unsaid.
"This Saidullayev," Nathan said, getting back to specifics. "What more can you tell us about him? You said he was well-trained - I presume by that you mean in military applications of his TK?" "Is he a Chechen me?", you mean, Nathan.
"Ilyas Saidullayev. He's a Chechen by birth, but I think that's more of an excuse for his actions. Trained by the Russians originally, but got patriotic during the mid-nineties and became part of the separatist movement." Langstrom pulled out a file and dropped it on to the table. "Hell of a recruiter, too. He's pulled together a little team of mutants, all of whom are willing to do whatever he asks." He didn't bother to point out the parallels.
"The Agency has had an eye on him for ten years now. The GRU and the FSB have tried to take him all the way out on four seperate occassions, all of them unsuccessful. We nearly had a shot at this mutt in 2001, but our agent ended up compromised." Langstrom sighed. "And if that was the worst part of the story, it would just be bad news. Saidullayev contacted us thirty minutes after securing the island. He claims to have a low yield nuclear warhead, rigged to a portable SAM system. If his demands are not met, he'll detonate it in the center of the city."
And now we get to the heart of it. "Do we have proof?" Nathan asked, and watched as Fred Duncan leaned over his laptop, tapping away briefly before he turned the computer around so the rest of the table could see it. Nathan leaned forward, his eyes narrowing as he studied the footage of a hard-faced man in fatigues, delivering his demands in a flat voice and heavily accented English.
The camera swerved to show... "Damn it," he said as it swerved away from the launcher almost instantly. "Not enough time to let us ID what he's got. Although a launcher like that narrows it down a little."
"That plus records of what someone has given or sold him should give us a pretty accurate picture, right? I'm not sure it matters though." Lorna's hand flexed unconsciously, EM fields twined around her fingers. "We get close enough; we can stop them. I'm more worried about who we're up against, not what."
Kurt looked at her sideways, nodding, then turned back to Langstrom. "Is there any record of what kind of powers we will be facing?"
"Two energy projectors and some sort of superstrength mutant, as identified by the SEAL team. Saidullayev himself is a medium to high strength telekinetic, and he does have extensive training with his powers. There's no reason to assume the rest of his team does not." Langstrom scowled. "As for the nuke... based on the fact that we're looking at a portable launch system, our analysis is that we're looking at who ever fabricated the weapon must have based it off of our M84 warhead, the only thing small enough to be packed into a modified B61 rocket. "
Langstrom nodded, and Commander Merrick set down a heavy binder on the table, liberally sprinkled with coloured note tabs. "Folks, the USAF has sent along a field commission engineers profile, and they have an expert standing by to disarm the weapon. B61's and other launch systems normally use time and proximity fusing to detonate. While it's possible who ever built this used different triggers, the size limitaions make that unlikely. As long as the warhead casing is not compromised, disabling the launcher or the propellent end of the rocket should render it unusable." Merrick opened the binder, pointing to the complex blueprints. "The Russians came up with a way to short launch limited payload LAM's back in the 80s. The problem is that without an actual launching platform, like a box launcher on the side of a ship, the range and accuracy isn't much better than a normal Starstreak SAM system. That means we're either looking at a very low yield warhead, or their plan is to die with the weapon. Anything higher than the 50 kiloton range can't be fired far enough to escape from with a portable platform."
"I think we're overlooking something," Nathan said, and all the eyes around the table moved to him. "Before I go any further, though, a question... how did they get the launcher onto the island?" There was no answer, and he smiled very thinly. They hadn't mentioned a few key details, which made him think that perhaps they didn't have them. "Saidullayev's teams could have used Zodiacs, or something similar. But that launcher's big - heavy and awkward to transport, even given that they have a telekinetic right to hand. And they would have had to move very quickly to secure the island." Merrick and Langstrom exchanged a look, while Fred Duncan looked troubled. "Do we know how they themselves got onto the island?"
Duncan was the one who answered. "That's... not clear at this point. None of the security footage we received before they cut the feed was helpful on that score."
"So as far as we know, they appeared out of nowhere." Maybe he was being a little hard on them, given that he had the advantage of Kurt sitting right there reminding him of the possibility, but then again... Nathan opened the file, glancing at its meager contents, and then closed it again. "His team's a bit big for a suicide run, don't you think? Doesn't make sense. They've got to have an out. So what if they have a teleporter?"
Marie nodded, agreeing with Nate's implication. It made complete sense and made the situation even more troubling. There was no telling the range of their teleporter, but if it was someone like Clarice, the group would have no trouble engaging any size bomb and getting out of range. And who knew what other kind of mutants were involved? Going in with that many unknowns was going to add danger to an already unstable situation. Her expression grew even more grim. Locking her hands together tightly, she placed them in her lap. "There's no tellin' what else they have, is there?"
"There very often is not, in our work," Kurt chimed in, tone flat. "If it is so in this case, we must just make the best of what you have been able to give us."
"You have eight hours." Langstrom said flatly. "Saidullayev has shortened his deadline due to the SEAL team incursion. In eight hours, he will execute a hostage every five minutes until his demands are seen to. An hour after that, he will launch the nuclear device at the city. We can't allow that to happen."
Langstrom nodded to Commander Merrick. "The President has authorized the total destruction of Alcatraz in the event your rescue fails. The 57th Wing of B-2s from Nellis Airforce base will scramble, approaching the island from 30,000 feet using stealth. With a mixed drop of JSOW and GBU-28 munitions, they will completely saturate the island on a single pass, to ensure the destruction of the warhead. In the event this takes place, the prison facility of Alcatraz will be completely destroyed. There is no possibility of survivors."
Charming. It's a good thing we do our best work under pressure... In any case, they needed to be about it, Nathan thought. "Polaris, you need to review those schematics for the launcher," he said quietly, before anyone else could speak up. "Wolverine, Rogue, Nightcrawler... take a look at the blueprints of the island, identify some additional possible routes in." He rose. "I need to check in." And not just with the mansion.
---
Nathan settled back into the pilot's seat, slipping on a headset and leaning forward to open a direct link with the mansion. "Blackbird to base," he said quietly, relaxing just fractionally into the padded chair. It was difficult not to be more than usually tense, knowing that there was a committed fanatic with a nuclear weapon just across the bay. Deadline or no deadline, these situations were far from predictable. "This is Cable."
"Storm here," came the almost immediate response from Ororo. It was a bit sooner than she had expected to hear from any of the team, and she didn't know whether to consider that a good or bad thing. "Go ahead, Cable."
"Things are considerably more complicated here than we expected," Nathan said, and filled her in as succinctly as he could on the information they'd been provided at the briefing. "... so this is not an isolated maniac," he concluded heavily. "He's almost certainly got an out after all, and he's got a frightening amount of flexibility. And a damned near unassailable position for anything resembling conventional forces." He shifted in the chair, his mind running through options, weighing and discarding them swiftly. "I can't talk long - we need to work out our approach still, and that's going to take some planning, but I need you to patch me through to Snow Valley."
"Very well." Ably handling the comms, Ororo held him on the line while calling up the Snow Valley connection. She found herself tapping one foot almost impatiently, waiting for someone at the other organization to pick up. Time is of the essence, here.
"What?" Remy said sharply into the phone. In truth, he'd gotten used to Mark screening calls, and giving him warning of what was coming down the line. But the young man had worked a double shift at the club the night before, and they had given him the day off. Unfortunately, that meant Remy was stuck answering his own phone for once.
"Remy, it is Ororo. I have Nathan on the comms with me. There is a situation and he would like to coordinate with you, I believe. Do you have time?"
A situation. Remy sighed. It was going to be one of those days. "Patch him through." Remy waited for the telltale buzz on the line. "Salut, Nate. What did you get yourself into dis time?"
"And hello to you too," Nathan said dryly, before Ororo could answer. "How are you today, Remy? I'm sitting in San Francisco where we've got a telekinetic Chechen separatist with delusions of grandeur and a nuclear weapon occupying Alcatraz. I hope your day's been better than mine."
"Spilled coffee on my shirt. Guess dat doesn't really count." Remy sighed, leaning back in his chair. "Let's take dis one step at a time, neh? Telekinetic Chechen. You got a name wit' dat description?"
"Ilyas Saidullayev. Late thirties, Russian-trained originally, but hooked up with the guerillas back in 1995 after losing his family in Grozny during the bombing. Apparently he worked with Basayev for a number of years but had a falling out over some of Basayev's strategic choices. They don't have anything even approaching a good profile on him, which is not helpful," Nathan said sourly. He wasn't positive they had been given everything there was to have on Saidullayev. Maybe that was just him being suspicious-minded? "He's got other mutants with him. At least three, two of whom are energy projectors. We don't know how many people in total he's got on the island, but he's got it locked down pretty securely."
"Saidullayev? I know him. He's an asshole." Remy said, typing rapidly at his computer. "De Agency had a hit out on him go completely balls up in 2000. Dey dumped it over to me, but dey betrayed us before I even had a chance to build a field profile. Still, even wit' his powers, de X-Men should be able to get Lorna close enough to seize up de nuke before dey have a chance to trigger it."
"Oh, if only it were that simple. Problem one with that scenario is that we don't have sufficient details on the nuke," Nathan said grimly. "Best guesses only. Saidullayev used the security system to deliver his demands before he shut it down, and gave them about three seconds of footage of the launcher. Not enough to know exactly what we're dealing with. Lorna's back at the command post reviewing schematics of the most likely candidates, but depending on where it came from and how they've modified it, shutting it down could be tricky. If there was one thing I learned on all those ops chasing suitcase nukes in India and Pakistan, that was it."
"More to the point," he went on, "getting close fast is going to be a real issue. They've already sent in a SEAL team, but they got chewed up in the tunnels. As far as we can tell, Saidullayev set up some sort of makeshift passive security system. The SEALS wound up pinned down. No survivors." He didn't particularly need to go into further details.
"Obviously minimizing casualties is high on the list of priorities, along with disabling the weapon, if possible, and apprehending Saidullayev and his cohorts," Ororo said, the tip of her pen scratching across the pad as she quickly amended the list of details she was keeping. "We need to find any sort of way in that they would not know about… or at least something they are not expecting. I am sure we have all seen the layouts by now… so what are our options?"
"What kind of security system are we talking about?" Remy asked, pulling up the files he needed. "Got to be honest, Alcatraz is famous for being built up on top of itself. Even de Justice department doesn't have a completely accurate layout of dat island. Finding a discreet point of entry is going to be tricky; worse if dey got some half decent counter penetration measures in place."
"Give me a second," Nathan said, leaning forward to the console again. This was one of those times when one of their communicators' less-used capabilities came in very handy. "Ororo, I'm uploading the recording I made of the briefing - it includes what the SEALS managed to relay back to the command post before they got taken out. It's not much."
It was a measure of the quality of people on that team, he thought a bit bleakly, that they'd done their best to pass information back for whoever would follow them, even in the last minutes of their lives. We're going to do our best not to waste the chance you gave us, Nathan thought. I promise.
"The other problem," he went on, "is that we've got tour groups unaccounted for. They did not get off the island, and there's no sign of them standing on the shore waving for help, so the conclusion is that they're being held. That's roughly fifty potential hostages somewhere, and whatever this Langstrom person who was briefing us on Saidullayev might have implied about priorities, I'm not prepared to go in there having written them off as casualties."
"Hmm..." Remy sat and listened through the recordings, double checking their information with the rest of the documentation Nathan sent along. There was a long silence, broken only by the occasional sip of coffee from LeBeau as he went back and forth through the material. "Nate, just before dey crest over to dat stairwell, two of de SEALs stumble."
Nathan rewound his copy of the recording and listened. "Right. They did," he said slowly. That detail hadn't struck him as particularly relevant, given that there'd been no immediate response from Saidullayev's men. But then, it hadn't been too long after that that the response had come... "What are you thinking?"
"Hard ground, no rain for days so de earth isn't wet, and two highly trained SEAL members both stumble at de same damn time where dere's no reason dey wouldn't have sure footing." Remy covered his eyes with his hand and groaned. "De alarm system dat dey tripped isn't a what, Nate. It's a who. Dey've got a fucking Esper system on de island."
"People can be fooled, the same as electronics," Ororo murmured, more to herself than to the other two on the line. "And they can also be outsmarted." What she wouldn't give for just a little more information. "Knowing the trip point means that you will possibly be able to get in further before you are detected. Unless, of course, the point is random, or there are multiples. In which case you may only be walking into a larger trap."
Thanks, 'Ro, that's very helpful, was the first response that popped into mind. Nathan swallowed it, closing his eyes for a moment, and then answered. "We're in trouble," he said bluntly. "No one I've got with me precisely sucks when it comes to shielding their thoughts, but none of them can be 100% guaranteed to be undetectable. Especially with a telepath specializing in passive detection. And he or she will feel me coming no matter what I do."
"Oui, you going to get lit up like a heavily armed Christmas tree." Remy's voice was all business, talking fast as he highlighted the information. "An Esper is a security system, Stormy. It's basically like a big pair of headphones for a psychic; plugs dem into an ordinary perimeter system, and lets dem use dere powers to create overlapping zones of surveilliance. Mental radar was how it was described to me. Dey rare, because you need exactly de right range of abilities to use it, but once you have someone dat can, it's pretty much unbreakable."
He pulled up an old file from his Agency days and sent it over the e-mail to them both. "Here's some of de notes I made last time I ran across one. One of de side effects is dat sometimes it can create a sort of mental chaff as a side effect, so some people entering one of de zones experience a second of disorientation, or mental blankness. Dose three SEALs tripped because dey hit de edge of de zone. Poor batards were walking deadmen de second dey got on de island."
"And a psi with a powers mix this rare, requiring specific training, just happens to have hooked up with a Chechen guerilla? Who happens to have a ballistically-launched nuke? Goddamn it," Nathan burst out, real anger in his voice, "we don't have half the intel we need for this situation. I'm having fucking flashbacks here." Langstrom had reminded him strongly of some of the Mistra directors, which hadn't helped.
The anger guttered out as quickly as it had flared, and he took a deep breath, then went on. "All right. Clearly I am not going to start scanning people randomly on the assumption that they're holding back information. Neither am I taking the team in there to try and force our way through. We cannot tip them off, or the best-case scenario is that they'll teleport away with that nuke and try this again in Seattle."
His voice was as cold as it had been furious a moment before. "We can't go in until dark anyway. That gives us seven, eight hours. I hate to ask, Remy, but you have an advantage the rest of us don't have. It might let you get through and take down the psi running the perimeter. And yes, Ororo," he said before either of them could respond, "I know that it's not an ideal tactical situation either. But I think it's the best one available."
Obviously Ororo wasn't thrilled about this; obviously none of them were. Nathan was right, they didn't have nearly enough intel and the longer they waited, the worse the situation got. She wasn't surprised either that Remy had experience with this sort of thing, and it seemed his presence might give the team an edge in the situation, an edge they desperately needed. "Yes," she said quietly, hating to add one more friend to the roster of 'the team going up against a madman and a nuke'. "That is true. Well, Remy. What do you say?"
"Hang on a second, Nate. Oui, Remy has beaten de Esper system once. But only once, and half of dat was luck. No one else has fooled dat system before. Even if I go in, you're still looking at even odds dat dey pick me up before I can disable de passive sensors." Remy shook his head as he looked over the documents Dayspring had sent. "And, you're not going to believe dis, but dat's not even de biggest problem. Dis CIA liaison you working wit', Langstrom? He's de protage of Chester Whelan, de man dat created LOSTBOYS and a half dozen other deep black programs. It's likely dat he's de one dat tried to get me seeded into de mansion in de first place, as a failsafe against de mansion."
They knew a lot about Remy's history, especially the fact that he'd essentially been an assassin for the CIA for close to twenty years, but it was the first time they'd run up against actual people involved in the decisions to create Gambit. "If he even gets a breath dat I'm still associated wit' de X-Men, you can bet dey going to roll out a selectively edited version of my history to de White House, and Xavier's going to have a lot of questions to answer 'bout why he's got a documented terrorist and mass murder wanted all over de free world working on his team of heros."
"Look, Remy, I wouldn't have suggested it if I didn't have a way to get you onto the island without being noticed. It would be a strain on Kurt," Nathan said with the confidence of someone who'd watched Kurt through more DR scenarios and missions than he really cared to count, "but he could get you onto Alcatraz. They're going to have us on coms, yes, but I conveniently neglected to tell them about the telepathic switchboard. Thus we have a backup way of communicating once we're on the island. And as for your chances of getting through," Nathan went on bleakly, "if you've beaten it once, luck or not, you've still got a better shot than any of us. This bastard could potentially set the nuke and head out of there with his teleporter in seconds, once he decides to do it - do you think he's going to hesitate, if he sees us coming?"
Nathan shook his head, even though neither of the other two on the comlink could see the gesture. "A hundred things are going on at the same time, at the launch of an operation like this," he said. "And ninety-nine of those things can be diversions for the hundredth, if you play it the right way. How many times do you think I slipped things under the nose of one Mistra director or another doing just that? And hell, there were enough times they were sitting on the other end of the com, too. When it comes right down to it," he concluded more quietly, "it's about taking the best chance we have to avoid losing another West Coast city this year. But it's up to you. Just tell me yes or no now, so that if it's no I can head back to the command post and we can come up with an alternative."
"Merde." Remy said softly, but with razor sharp intensity. "I swear dat Tante put a fucking curse on me."
He got up from his chair and grabbed the trenchcoat slung over the back. "I'll be in San Francisco in five or six hours. Get your mission profile together wit' dat command centre, and have Kurt meet me at de airport. You lucky dat I have very fond memories of some parts of dat city and don't want to see dem or de rest of you go up in a nuclear explosion." Remy hung up the phone and walked out his office door. There were a few things he needed to pick up on the way to Emma's Lear.
"I would feel guilty," Nathan said to Ororo, hearing the tell-tale click followed by the noticeable lack-of-Remy, "but we need him. I honestly don't see any other remotely feasible option here." He was thinking tactically at this point, his mind racing through various scenarios. Even if bringing Remy in had the best possible results, things were still dicey. "I need to go back and start thinking about what we're going to do once we get topside on the island," he said, refocusing. "I wish I had a few more people with me."
And I wish that you did not have to be there at all, Ororo thought, a grim expression on her face. "Go make your plans, Nathan. I will be here if you need anything, though I think of us all you have the best chance of understanding what needs to be done. Do not hesitate to ask for whatever you need, be it from me or the people there." Except more people. That is one thing we are perilously short on.
"Thanks for coming." Fred Duncan said as the X-Men entered the docks warehouse that had been converted into a command center. The FBI DAD looked tired, and there was something else in his eyes as he waved them to seats around a large trestle table. "The reason we kicked a request for help upstairs to Cooper is because we've got a bad one here."
Duncan had also been an agent long enough to make his assessment of a 'bad one' something to be taken very seriously. "Seventeen hours ago, a group of terrorists, under the leadership of a Chechen separatist named Saidullayev took close to fifty hostages and sealed off all access to the island of Alcatraz. His demands are typically mad; release of prisoners from Russian holding areas, a complete embargo on Russian goods and full recognition for a Chechen Free State, that sort of thing."
Duncan waved over two other men who'd just entered the room. One was dressed in the uniform of a United States Navy commander. The other wore a dark grey suit. Both men had uniform expressions of concern. "This is Commander Art Merrick, our Navy liaison, and this is David Langstrom, from the CIA. He'll be conducting the briefing."
"Thank you, Fred." David nodded and took a sip from a cup of coffee. "Ladies and gentlement, I'm going to turn you over to Commander Merrick in just a moment. I am the Assistant Deputy Director of Operations for the CIA. Saidullayev has been one of the Agency's concerns for close to a decade now. He is a mutant, a telekinetic of not inconsiderable power, and he is well trained. On taking the island, the HRT decided that it was outside of their capabilities, and the Joint Chiefs authorized the release of SEAL Team 2, Commander Merrick's men."
"Mission: Lockdown was launched seven hours ago. SEAL team 2 was to penetrate the prison through a system access shaft, enter in the old laundry, and fall on the citadel, where we believe most of the terrorists are located." Merrick's professionalism was firm, but the corners of his eyes and the thread of tension in his voice hinted at the emotions underneath. "The team was somehow spotted, and there was a confrontation. We, uh--" He paused for a second. "We believe there were no survivors."
"Agent Walsh, can you give us the communication playback now?" Another FBI agent walked over to a matte black sound system, and cued up the digital recording.
"Lockdown-6, this is SEAL team 2. We've reached the staging point." Over the comm, there was only the faintest rustle of movement from the SEALs that carried.
"Roger, Team 2. No indication of discovery from our position."
"Roger. Moving down the main access tunnel now."
"How long?" A new voice cut in, talking to the command comm.
"About twelve minutes to the access grate for the old laundry. From there, they have a straight route to the citadel where we think the weapon is set." Agent Fred Duncan's voice was distinctive and well known. "Team 2, any sign of the terrorists?"
"Negative. We have had no contact."
"Good." There was a metallic click, cutting the transmission back to just the command centre.
"Command, we have a problem." The voice was still professional; not worried or panicked, but strained. "There's been damage to the tunnel. It's blocked two hundred feet from the laundry grate."
"Roger that. Stand fast, Team 2. We'll find you another route." Click.
"Shit!"
"That whole underlevel is falling apart, Agent Duncan. We built that into the mission profile." A new voice, Langstrom.
"Is there a way around?"
The clatter of keys was very loud. "I think so. Captain?"
"Six?"
"Backtrack about sixty feet. There you'll find a ladder leading to an old vent port at the bottom of the citadel." More clatter. "One hundred and twenty feet south east from there is a stairwell. It leads to the junction outside of the laundry area."
"That's going to leave us out in the open, sir."
"Between the vent and the stairwell, yes. But there's been no consistent patrol activity in that area up until now." The sigh was clearly audible. "It's a risk, Captain, but the only other route is three times as long, and through multiple exposed areas."
"Understood, six. Team 2, move out." Click.
"We've breached the vents, command. Moving over to the stairwell now. Gomez," There was a shuffling sound of someone scurrying forward first. Against the soft slithering of the uniforms in motion, a sudden scrabble of sound burst over the comm..
"Cover! Cover!" A hissed command.
"Captain?"
"Nothing six. A couple of my men slipped on the open ground." There was a long hush. "No response. Continuing on to objective." Click.
"Agent Duncan ? We've got movement in the citadel."
"What?"
"Imaging shows… multiple squads sir. They're converging on—" "Six, we are taking fire! SEALs, weapons free! Weapons free!" An explosion of automatic fire filled the spaces of silence.
"Captain, what's going on?"
"We've been cut off, sir! Hostiles at the top of the stairwell and on the landing behind us! Ten, twelve hostiles! Rifle 1, covering fire on that landing!"
"Christ, the place is a goddamn firesack, and they just slammed the lid shut behind them." A new voice whispered in horror.
"Multiple types of automatic weapons fire. Grenades on the landing. Medic 1, get Demo 1 and Rifle 2 under cover!" Barnes' voice had gone into command mode, barking out orders as if he wasn't surrounded by flying rounds, trying to keep his teams' response disciplined.
"Rifle 2's dead. Motherfuck—"
"The fuck was that!"
"Stand fast, Rifle 1! Get me some fire on that damn stairwell! Six, we've got energy projectors. I repeat, energy projectors confirmed with the terrorist forces!"
"Grenade! Down! Everybody do—" An explosion tore over the speakers. "Team 2, come in! Team 2!"
After a long moment, filled with nothing but screams and weapon fire, the Captain coughed and came back on-line. "Lost the stairwell, Six. Two of the squad left. They're moving back to flush with us with grenades. Professionals, six."
"Captain, there's a culvert to the immediate west of that position. Form up and make for—"
"Negative, Six. Only Medic 1 can still walk. We're going to hold here as long as possible. There were no visible sensors or trips. Something passive, or they spotted us leaving the vent." The voice had gone emotionally dead; resigned to fate and trying to at least finish the job.
"Captain, get your squad out. The culvert—"
"Another mutie, Six. Oversized, carrying a recoilless rifle. Must have superstrength. Take the shot, Rifle 1."
"No effect, Cap'n. We're… Incomin—!" Click. The recording ended with surprising finality.
Nathan took a deep breath as the recording went to static immediately after the explosion. He hadn't been able to avoid visualizing the moment, imagining what it must have been like. After all, how many times had he been pinned down in similar situations? And it always happened so fast... "They gave you as much information as they could, I see," he said, his voice not quite impassive.
"They did their job." Langstrom's tone was conflicted. No one in the room could fail to be shaken by the sounds of a squad of elite warriors dying one by one over the radio, still radioing in information even though they knew there was no way out. At the same point, it also seemed like he was reluctant to be giving this briefing, as if he was left with no options but the most distasteful one he could consider.
"Based on the information we got back from SEAL Team 2, and what our surveillance picked up, it's obvious that we are dealing with a mixed team of terrorists at Alcatraz. We've confirmed tight disciplined attack tactics, using both automatic weapons and mutant abilities. Unfortunately, this also fits the profile of their leader."
Kurt was pale and tight-lipped, looking slightly ill, and his hand clenched on the rosary looped around his other wrist. "Do we know exactly how many of them are in there?"
"How many and what kind of training they have?" Lorna added quietly, sitting back in her chair with her arms crossed over her chest, hands gripping her elbows. Her defensive posture could have been what they'd just heard or perhaps it was just Langstrom's attitude. Nothing like being treated like vermin while you were being asked for a favor. "Not to mention where on the island they are."
"We need better intel." Wolverine said around his lit cigar. "If they ripped through two squads of SEALs...." he mused, leaving the rest of his thought unsaid.
"This Saidullayev," Nathan said, getting back to specifics. "What more can you tell us about him? You said he was well-trained - I presume by that you mean in military applications of his TK?" "Is he a Chechen me?", you mean, Nathan.
"Ilyas Saidullayev. He's a Chechen by birth, but I think that's more of an excuse for his actions. Trained by the Russians originally, but got patriotic during the mid-nineties and became part of the separatist movement." Langstrom pulled out a file and dropped it on to the table. "Hell of a recruiter, too. He's pulled together a little team of mutants, all of whom are willing to do whatever he asks." He didn't bother to point out the parallels.
"The Agency has had an eye on him for ten years now. The GRU and the FSB have tried to take him all the way out on four seperate occassions, all of them unsuccessful. We nearly had a shot at this mutt in 2001, but our agent ended up compromised." Langstrom sighed. "And if that was the worst part of the story, it would just be bad news. Saidullayev contacted us thirty minutes after securing the island. He claims to have a low yield nuclear warhead, rigged to a portable SAM system. If his demands are not met, he'll detonate it in the center of the city."
And now we get to the heart of it. "Do we have proof?" Nathan asked, and watched as Fred Duncan leaned over his laptop, tapping away briefly before he turned the computer around so the rest of the table could see it. Nathan leaned forward, his eyes narrowing as he studied the footage of a hard-faced man in fatigues, delivering his demands in a flat voice and heavily accented English.
The camera swerved to show... "Damn it," he said as it swerved away from the launcher almost instantly. "Not enough time to let us ID what he's got. Although a launcher like that narrows it down a little."
"That plus records of what someone has given or sold him should give us a pretty accurate picture, right? I'm not sure it matters though." Lorna's hand flexed unconsciously, EM fields twined around her fingers. "We get close enough; we can stop them. I'm more worried about who we're up against, not what."
Kurt looked at her sideways, nodding, then turned back to Langstrom. "Is there any record of what kind of powers we will be facing?"
"Two energy projectors and some sort of superstrength mutant, as identified by the SEAL team. Saidullayev himself is a medium to high strength telekinetic, and he does have extensive training with his powers. There's no reason to assume the rest of his team does not." Langstrom scowled. "As for the nuke... based on the fact that we're looking at a portable launch system, our analysis is that we're looking at who ever fabricated the weapon must have based it off of our M84 warhead, the only thing small enough to be packed into a modified B61 rocket. "
Langstrom nodded, and Commander Merrick set down a heavy binder on the table, liberally sprinkled with coloured note tabs. "Folks, the USAF has sent along a field commission engineers profile, and they have an expert standing by to disarm the weapon. B61's and other launch systems normally use time and proximity fusing to detonate. While it's possible who ever built this used different triggers, the size limitaions make that unlikely. As long as the warhead casing is not compromised, disabling the launcher or the propellent end of the rocket should render it unusable." Merrick opened the binder, pointing to the complex blueprints. "The Russians came up with a way to short launch limited payload LAM's back in the 80s. The problem is that without an actual launching platform, like a box launcher on the side of a ship, the range and accuracy isn't much better than a normal Starstreak SAM system. That means we're either looking at a very low yield warhead, or their plan is to die with the weapon. Anything higher than the 50 kiloton range can't be fired far enough to escape from with a portable platform."
"I think we're overlooking something," Nathan said, and all the eyes around the table moved to him. "Before I go any further, though, a question... how did they get the launcher onto the island?" There was no answer, and he smiled very thinly. They hadn't mentioned a few key details, which made him think that perhaps they didn't have them. "Saidullayev's teams could have used Zodiacs, or something similar. But that launcher's big - heavy and awkward to transport, even given that they have a telekinetic right to hand. And they would have had to move very quickly to secure the island." Merrick and Langstrom exchanged a look, while Fred Duncan looked troubled. "Do we know how they themselves got onto the island?"
Duncan was the one who answered. "That's... not clear at this point. None of the security footage we received before they cut the feed was helpful on that score."
"So as far as we know, they appeared out of nowhere." Maybe he was being a little hard on them, given that he had the advantage of Kurt sitting right there reminding him of the possibility, but then again... Nathan opened the file, glancing at its meager contents, and then closed it again. "His team's a bit big for a suicide run, don't you think? Doesn't make sense. They've got to have an out. So what if they have a teleporter?"
Marie nodded, agreeing with Nate's implication. It made complete sense and made the situation even more troubling. There was no telling the range of their teleporter, but if it was someone like Clarice, the group would have no trouble engaging any size bomb and getting out of range. And who knew what other kind of mutants were involved? Going in with that many unknowns was going to add danger to an already unstable situation. Her expression grew even more grim. Locking her hands together tightly, she placed them in her lap. "There's no tellin' what else they have, is there?"
"There very often is not, in our work," Kurt chimed in, tone flat. "If it is so in this case, we must just make the best of what you have been able to give us."
"You have eight hours." Langstrom said flatly. "Saidullayev has shortened his deadline due to the SEAL team incursion. In eight hours, he will execute a hostage every five minutes until his demands are seen to. An hour after that, he will launch the nuclear device at the city. We can't allow that to happen."
Langstrom nodded to Commander Merrick. "The President has authorized the total destruction of Alcatraz in the event your rescue fails. The 57th Wing of B-2s from Nellis Airforce base will scramble, approaching the island from 30,000 feet using stealth. With a mixed drop of JSOW and GBU-28 munitions, they will completely saturate the island on a single pass, to ensure the destruction of the warhead. In the event this takes place, the prison facility of Alcatraz will be completely destroyed. There is no possibility of survivors."
Charming. It's a good thing we do our best work under pressure... In any case, they needed to be about it, Nathan thought. "Polaris, you need to review those schematics for the launcher," he said quietly, before anyone else could speak up. "Wolverine, Rogue, Nightcrawler... take a look at the blueprints of the island, identify some additional possible routes in." He rose. "I need to check in." And not just with the mansion.
---
Nathan settled back into the pilot's seat, slipping on a headset and leaning forward to open a direct link with the mansion. "Blackbird to base," he said quietly, relaxing just fractionally into the padded chair. It was difficult not to be more than usually tense, knowing that there was a committed fanatic with a nuclear weapon just across the bay. Deadline or no deadline, these situations were far from predictable. "This is Cable."
"Storm here," came the almost immediate response from Ororo. It was a bit sooner than she had expected to hear from any of the team, and she didn't know whether to consider that a good or bad thing. "Go ahead, Cable."
"Things are considerably more complicated here than we expected," Nathan said, and filled her in as succinctly as he could on the information they'd been provided at the briefing. "... so this is not an isolated maniac," he concluded heavily. "He's almost certainly got an out after all, and he's got a frightening amount of flexibility. And a damned near unassailable position for anything resembling conventional forces." He shifted in the chair, his mind running through options, weighing and discarding them swiftly. "I can't talk long - we need to work out our approach still, and that's going to take some planning, but I need you to patch me through to Snow Valley."
"Very well." Ably handling the comms, Ororo held him on the line while calling up the Snow Valley connection. She found herself tapping one foot almost impatiently, waiting for someone at the other organization to pick up. Time is of the essence, here.
"What?" Remy said sharply into the phone. In truth, he'd gotten used to Mark screening calls, and giving him warning of what was coming down the line. But the young man had worked a double shift at the club the night before, and they had given him the day off. Unfortunately, that meant Remy was stuck answering his own phone for once.
"Remy, it is Ororo. I have Nathan on the comms with me. There is a situation and he would like to coordinate with you, I believe. Do you have time?"
A situation. Remy sighed. It was going to be one of those days. "Patch him through." Remy waited for the telltale buzz on the line. "Salut, Nate. What did you get yourself into dis time?"
"And hello to you too," Nathan said dryly, before Ororo could answer. "How are you today, Remy? I'm sitting in San Francisco where we've got a telekinetic Chechen separatist with delusions of grandeur and a nuclear weapon occupying Alcatraz. I hope your day's been better than mine."
"Spilled coffee on my shirt. Guess dat doesn't really count." Remy sighed, leaning back in his chair. "Let's take dis one step at a time, neh? Telekinetic Chechen. You got a name wit' dat description?"
"Ilyas Saidullayev. Late thirties, Russian-trained originally, but hooked up with the guerillas back in 1995 after losing his family in Grozny during the bombing. Apparently he worked with Basayev for a number of years but had a falling out over some of Basayev's strategic choices. They don't have anything even approaching a good profile on him, which is not helpful," Nathan said sourly. He wasn't positive they had been given everything there was to have on Saidullayev. Maybe that was just him being suspicious-minded? "He's got other mutants with him. At least three, two of whom are energy projectors. We don't know how many people in total he's got on the island, but he's got it locked down pretty securely."
"Saidullayev? I know him. He's an asshole." Remy said, typing rapidly at his computer. "De Agency had a hit out on him go completely balls up in 2000. Dey dumped it over to me, but dey betrayed us before I even had a chance to build a field profile. Still, even wit' his powers, de X-Men should be able to get Lorna close enough to seize up de nuke before dey have a chance to trigger it."
"Oh, if only it were that simple. Problem one with that scenario is that we don't have sufficient details on the nuke," Nathan said grimly. "Best guesses only. Saidullayev used the security system to deliver his demands before he shut it down, and gave them about three seconds of footage of the launcher. Not enough to know exactly what we're dealing with. Lorna's back at the command post reviewing schematics of the most likely candidates, but depending on where it came from and how they've modified it, shutting it down could be tricky. If there was one thing I learned on all those ops chasing suitcase nukes in India and Pakistan, that was it."
"More to the point," he went on, "getting close fast is going to be a real issue. They've already sent in a SEAL team, but they got chewed up in the tunnels. As far as we can tell, Saidullayev set up some sort of makeshift passive security system. The SEALS wound up pinned down. No survivors." He didn't particularly need to go into further details.
"Obviously minimizing casualties is high on the list of priorities, along with disabling the weapon, if possible, and apprehending Saidullayev and his cohorts," Ororo said, the tip of her pen scratching across the pad as she quickly amended the list of details she was keeping. "We need to find any sort of way in that they would not know about… or at least something they are not expecting. I am sure we have all seen the layouts by now… so what are our options?"
"What kind of security system are we talking about?" Remy asked, pulling up the files he needed. "Got to be honest, Alcatraz is famous for being built up on top of itself. Even de Justice department doesn't have a completely accurate layout of dat island. Finding a discreet point of entry is going to be tricky; worse if dey got some half decent counter penetration measures in place."
"Give me a second," Nathan said, leaning forward to the console again. This was one of those times when one of their communicators' less-used capabilities came in very handy. "Ororo, I'm uploading the recording I made of the briefing - it includes what the SEALS managed to relay back to the command post before they got taken out. It's not much."
It was a measure of the quality of people on that team, he thought a bit bleakly, that they'd done their best to pass information back for whoever would follow them, even in the last minutes of their lives. We're going to do our best not to waste the chance you gave us, Nathan thought. I promise.
"The other problem," he went on, "is that we've got tour groups unaccounted for. They did not get off the island, and there's no sign of them standing on the shore waving for help, so the conclusion is that they're being held. That's roughly fifty potential hostages somewhere, and whatever this Langstrom person who was briefing us on Saidullayev might have implied about priorities, I'm not prepared to go in there having written them off as casualties."
"Hmm..." Remy sat and listened through the recordings, double checking their information with the rest of the documentation Nathan sent along. There was a long silence, broken only by the occasional sip of coffee from LeBeau as he went back and forth through the material. "Nate, just before dey crest over to dat stairwell, two of de SEALs stumble."
Nathan rewound his copy of the recording and listened. "Right. They did," he said slowly. That detail hadn't struck him as particularly relevant, given that there'd been no immediate response from Saidullayev's men. But then, it hadn't been too long after that that the response had come... "What are you thinking?"
"Hard ground, no rain for days so de earth isn't wet, and two highly trained SEAL members both stumble at de same damn time where dere's no reason dey wouldn't have sure footing." Remy covered his eyes with his hand and groaned. "De alarm system dat dey tripped isn't a what, Nate. It's a who. Dey've got a fucking Esper system on de island."
"People can be fooled, the same as electronics," Ororo murmured, more to herself than to the other two on the line. "And they can also be outsmarted." What she wouldn't give for just a little more information. "Knowing the trip point means that you will possibly be able to get in further before you are detected. Unless, of course, the point is random, or there are multiples. In which case you may only be walking into a larger trap."
Thanks, 'Ro, that's very helpful, was the first response that popped into mind. Nathan swallowed it, closing his eyes for a moment, and then answered. "We're in trouble," he said bluntly. "No one I've got with me precisely sucks when it comes to shielding their thoughts, but none of them can be 100% guaranteed to be undetectable. Especially with a telepath specializing in passive detection. And he or she will feel me coming no matter what I do."
"Oui, you going to get lit up like a heavily armed Christmas tree." Remy's voice was all business, talking fast as he highlighted the information. "An Esper is a security system, Stormy. It's basically like a big pair of headphones for a psychic; plugs dem into an ordinary perimeter system, and lets dem use dere powers to create overlapping zones of surveilliance. Mental radar was how it was described to me. Dey rare, because you need exactly de right range of abilities to use it, but once you have someone dat can, it's pretty much unbreakable."
He pulled up an old file from his Agency days and sent it over the e-mail to them both. "Here's some of de notes I made last time I ran across one. One of de side effects is dat sometimes it can create a sort of mental chaff as a side effect, so some people entering one of de zones experience a second of disorientation, or mental blankness. Dose three SEALs tripped because dey hit de edge of de zone. Poor batards were walking deadmen de second dey got on de island."
"And a psi with a powers mix this rare, requiring specific training, just happens to have hooked up with a Chechen guerilla? Who happens to have a ballistically-launched nuke? Goddamn it," Nathan burst out, real anger in his voice, "we don't have half the intel we need for this situation. I'm having fucking flashbacks here." Langstrom had reminded him strongly of some of the Mistra directors, which hadn't helped.
The anger guttered out as quickly as it had flared, and he took a deep breath, then went on. "All right. Clearly I am not going to start scanning people randomly on the assumption that they're holding back information. Neither am I taking the team in there to try and force our way through. We cannot tip them off, or the best-case scenario is that they'll teleport away with that nuke and try this again in Seattle."
His voice was as cold as it had been furious a moment before. "We can't go in until dark anyway. That gives us seven, eight hours. I hate to ask, Remy, but you have an advantage the rest of us don't have. It might let you get through and take down the psi running the perimeter. And yes, Ororo," he said before either of them could respond, "I know that it's not an ideal tactical situation either. But I think it's the best one available."
Obviously Ororo wasn't thrilled about this; obviously none of them were. Nathan was right, they didn't have nearly enough intel and the longer they waited, the worse the situation got. She wasn't surprised either that Remy had experience with this sort of thing, and it seemed his presence might give the team an edge in the situation, an edge they desperately needed. "Yes," she said quietly, hating to add one more friend to the roster of 'the team going up against a madman and a nuke'. "That is true. Well, Remy. What do you say?"
"Hang on a second, Nate. Oui, Remy has beaten de Esper system once. But only once, and half of dat was luck. No one else has fooled dat system before. Even if I go in, you're still looking at even odds dat dey pick me up before I can disable de passive sensors." Remy shook his head as he looked over the documents Dayspring had sent. "And, you're not going to believe dis, but dat's not even de biggest problem. Dis CIA liaison you working wit', Langstrom? He's de protage of Chester Whelan, de man dat created LOSTBOYS and a half dozen other deep black programs. It's likely dat he's de one dat tried to get me seeded into de mansion in de first place, as a failsafe against de mansion."
They knew a lot about Remy's history, especially the fact that he'd essentially been an assassin for the CIA for close to twenty years, but it was the first time they'd run up against actual people involved in the decisions to create Gambit. "If he even gets a breath dat I'm still associated wit' de X-Men, you can bet dey going to roll out a selectively edited version of my history to de White House, and Xavier's going to have a lot of questions to answer 'bout why he's got a documented terrorist and mass murder wanted all over de free world working on his team of heros."
"Look, Remy, I wouldn't have suggested it if I didn't have a way to get you onto the island without being noticed. It would be a strain on Kurt," Nathan said with the confidence of someone who'd watched Kurt through more DR scenarios and missions than he really cared to count, "but he could get you onto Alcatraz. They're going to have us on coms, yes, but I conveniently neglected to tell them about the telepathic switchboard. Thus we have a backup way of communicating once we're on the island. And as for your chances of getting through," Nathan went on bleakly, "if you've beaten it once, luck or not, you've still got a better shot than any of us. This bastard could potentially set the nuke and head out of there with his teleporter in seconds, once he decides to do it - do you think he's going to hesitate, if he sees us coming?"
Nathan shook his head, even though neither of the other two on the comlink could see the gesture. "A hundred things are going on at the same time, at the launch of an operation like this," he said. "And ninety-nine of those things can be diversions for the hundredth, if you play it the right way. How many times do you think I slipped things under the nose of one Mistra director or another doing just that? And hell, there were enough times they were sitting on the other end of the com, too. When it comes right down to it," he concluded more quietly, "it's about taking the best chance we have to avoid losing another West Coast city this year. But it's up to you. Just tell me yes or no now, so that if it's no I can head back to the command post and we can come up with an alternative."
"Merde." Remy said softly, but with razor sharp intensity. "I swear dat Tante put a fucking curse on me."
He got up from his chair and grabbed the trenchcoat slung over the back. "I'll be in San Francisco in five or six hours. Get your mission profile together wit' dat command centre, and have Kurt meet me at de airport. You lucky dat I have very fond memories of some parts of dat city and don't want to see dem or de rest of you go up in a nuclear explosion." Remy hung up the phone and walked out his office door. There were a few things he needed to pick up on the way to Emma's Lear.
"I would feel guilty," Nathan said to Ororo, hearing the tell-tale click followed by the noticeable lack-of-Remy, "but we need him. I honestly don't see any other remotely feasible option here." He was thinking tactically at this point, his mind racing through various scenarios. Even if bringing Remy in had the best possible results, things were still dicey. "I need to go back and start thinking about what we're going to do once we get topside on the island," he said, refocusing. "I wish I had a few more people with me."
And I wish that you did not have to be there at all, Ororo thought, a grim expression on her face. "Go make your plans, Nathan. I will be here if you need anything, though I think of us all you have the best chance of understanding what needs to be done. Do not hesitate to ask for whatever you need, be it from me or the people there." Except more people. That is one thing we are perilously short on.
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