xp_logs | Mission Flesh Mechanic: Round Table

X-Force arrives in Russia, and ends up stuck dealing with Remy.

Sheremetyevo Airport was rumoured to be run by the mob, which could be true considering the efficiency of the former Soviet hub. Twenty years ago, the entire Eastern Bloc filtered through the terminal, and since the fall of Communism in that state, it was even larger and more well used. Russia had found capitalism in a big way, and the Western countries wasted no time connecting themselves to the opportunities.

Frost Industries had ties in Russia, so getting all the necessary authorizations as a cover for the visit had been simple. Remy's voice on the phone had been very serious; the game voice as they called it, and he had underlined the need for secrecy above all. As they deplaned from the Lear to the tarmac, a uniformed woman with long red hair topped by a service cap met them. Introducing herself as Natasha Romanova, she ushered them and their things to a pair of white vans at the edge of the runway. From there, they drove in silence into the city. Any questions were met with a polite but firm assurance that they'd get answers soon.

The vans pulled up in front of a non-descript building near the Vodootvodnyj Canal. Non-descript wasn't hard in Moscow. Over seventy years of communist rule had made for a city built for extreme functionality, not beauty, and gorgeous old buildings from the time of the Tsars were packed in between square concrete office buildings, brute and cold. The building had Ovcinnikovskij carved over the entrance, in both cyrillic and latin lettering, but that was the only ornament. Romanov led them through the lobby, past a pair of uniformed guards, and up two flights of stairs. Finally, she opened a door and deposited them into a large meeting room, where Remy, Betsy and
another man sat talking amiably in Russian.

"It's good to see you all made it here safely and mostly intacted." Betsy said, breaking from her conversation with Vazhin.

"And the gang's all here," Amanda said, dumping her bag with a sigh of relief. She hadn't gotten a lot of scope on the whole threat, so she'd had to bring a few more books than she'd wanted to and they were heavy. "Anyone got any food? 'M starving." And she was - something about Moscow's energy made her feel like she could eat an entire bakery.

Wordlessly, Wanda handed over a chocolate chip muffin she'd hidden in her satchel. With the right amount of packing, she probably could have fit a midget in there. But after seeing the effects on Jennie of not eating, she really wasn't taking any chances. "That should keep you until we're done," she teased, sinking into a seat. She gave everyone already in the room a small smile.

"If not, I have cookies from the airplane, and some of that terrible snack mix with too many pretzels." Marie-Ange said, patting her own shoulder bag. It never hurt to be prepared, and she'd heard stories about bad Russian food. "And several bottles of water..." She said. "I was warned about the water."

"This country has water?" Mark asked, dropping comfortable into a chair next to Betsy. "I thought the rivers ran with vodka. This news disappoints me."

"I bet it does," Betsy said, affectionately rubbing the top of Mark's head, mussing up his hair. "I hope that's not the only reason you've decided to take this trip."

"Ta, Boss Lady." Amanda grabbed the muffin. "And the vodka'd certainly explain the Pillock," she murmured to Marie-Ange with a grin as they too took their seats. The muffin was hastily unwrapped and she began stuffing pieces in her mouth. "And I'll probably take you up on that snack mix. This place is hungry."

Remy looked at his team and tried not to sigh. Most of them were European by birth, but coming in as a group, they were just so... American. {{Alexi Nikolay'ch, they are much more competent then they sound.}} he said in Russian, and Vazhin shook his head with a smile.

{{I am sure that any team you and Yelizaveta has put together is. They remind me of my brother's children, which is perhaps why I never had any." Vazhin said wryly, earning a laugh from both Betsy and LeBeau.

"Sit down. 'manda, dere's time for food later." Remy waved his people towards the chairs. "This is Colonal Alexi Vazhin, one of de higher ranking officers in de GRU. Dat's de equilivent to de NSA in de States. He's basically de man in charge of de mutant question here in Russia, and he needs our help."

Doug quietly observed the conversation with interest, biting back a chuckle at Amanda's pressing need for a snack. Still subdued and feeling drawn out from the airport, he was inclined to simply watch and learn for now. Anything he picked up on might very well be valuable later. Needing their help or not, he wasn't going to trust this Colonel Vazhin right out of meeting him the first time, and certainly not simply on Remy's say-so.

Amanda resisted the urge to pull a face at Remy, reminding herself they were on a job now. Instead, she subsided, slouching back in her chair and eating her muffin. Her Russian was still pretty basic, covering introductions and directions, but she'd picked up the amused tone. So not the impression she wanted to be making. "What kind of help?" she asked, raising an eyebrow at Remy but keeping her tone respectful.

"The discrete kind, Miss Sefton." Vazhin said in perfect English. "A week ago, a salvage and communications company's headquarters in Novosibirsk was attacked by an unknown mutant; characterized as grotesquely overbuilt. He was shot seventeen times by local police before dying. During his rampage, he killed the entire engineering staff of the company, the president, and nine other civilians. The man was identified as a railroad worker on the TransRussian frieght line, who had gone missing three days before the incident."

Vazhin gestured to the stacks of files in the middle of the table. "Two days ago, another company was attacked, this one in Arcangel on the coast. It was a power reseller, involved in green systems. Same characteristics on the mutant, same levels of damage. This one, a fifty-three year old woman from the Chernyakhoskoye region." He sighed and rubbed his eyes. "Neither were ever identified as mutants, and neither had any associations with each other. There is no reason
either of them should have been in these cities, much less attacking people."

Reaching over, Wanda picked up one of the folders and started to flip through it, glancing over the information in a first quick read. "How far away is Archangel from Chernyakhoskoye?" she asked. "I am not familiar with that part of Russia."

"Over two thousand kilometres." Vazhin said, tapping a map. "Chernyakhoskoye is in what is now Kazakhstan, but it's part of about nine thousand square kilometres that Russia still leases. Mostly the Baykonur space launch facilities, but also Stepnogorsk and some other research facilities down there. Which is why this falls into my control. Stepnogorsk was our major facility for esoteric weaponeering since the 1960s. If these mutants are some how tied to that, the
fallout will be tremendous. Kazakhstan could pull our leases, which means the loss of tens of billions in infastructure and forty five years of state secrets. Unfortunately, corruption in the FSB and the SVR means that to use those agencies would almost certainly see that information out of sale."

"Esoteric how?" Amanda asked, the word seizing her attention. After their encounters with elements in the British government researching magic, it was worth questioning.

"Experimental programs to utilize new technologies into our security forces. Bioweapons, cybernetics, psychic phenomenom, mutants; we had scientists trying to weaponize them all for the state. Many of those experiments would be extremely embarassing to my country if they became public knowledge, much like your American Weapon programs." Vazhin was a smooth operator, indicating not only the depth of his own intelligence, but also justifying the actions of her predecessors with an American parallel. Remy almost grinned.

"Neither myself or Officer Romanov have turned up anything to link these attacks to any of those programs, but we are concerned that if they continue, they will fuel further interest in the programs, connected or not. My country is still a fragile balance, and the last thing our internal stability needs is to tear up old scars to find the wounds that were inflicted." Vazhin shrugged. "However, a group of unknowns with the right training can make inquiries without the normal channels getting wind of it. If this is a new mutant terrorist group, or some attack on us, we need you to determine that, so we can act decisively to counter the threat. If this is some holdover from the Soviet era that's resurfaced, we need to shut it down quickly and quietly. Yelizaveta tells us you are the people to be trusted to make these things happen."

"So we split up and check out Novosibirsk and that other place I'm not even going to try to pronounce?" suggested Mark. He shrugged when eyes turned on him. "Stop looking at me like that. I'm still new to this kicking ass and taking names secretly thing."

Marie-Ange laughed quietly, and leaned over towards Mark. "If I know Remy, he is already preparing a mental list of eighty things for all of us to do, most of which will be boring, or involve talking to goverment officals and hoping they do not ask for identification."

"Or going through dusty old magic books." Amanda met Wanda's eyeroll and grinned. "Time for another brain storming session, huh, Boss Lady?"

Wanda laughed and nodded. "Just give us a place to set up and we're good. Somewhere with lots of wallspace to stick things up."

"Betsy has you guys setup here. Talk to Romanov before you leave about access to the archives. She can arrange it." LeBeau said, eyes sweeping over the rest of the table. "You all hired for a reason. How do we proceed?"

Sarah spoke up from somewhere in the back of the group. "Well, since I doubt the pen is mightier than my fist in this situation, I'm volunteering to be muscle for whoever needs it most." She stuffed her hands in her pockets, and looked around at each of them. "That's for you all to decide."

"Doug, you fancy playing a little Sudoku with a map and the info about these places?" Mark asked. "I'd volunteer for the reconnaisance part, but . . ." He coughed. "Onay Ussiansray orfay emay, anksthay," he finished softly in Pig Latin.

Wanda shot Mark an amused smile and then nodded at Amanda. "I think this calls for pots of coffee and tea to be set up," she mused. "I fear it'll take some serious research to dig down to the bottom of this one."

Doug nodded at Wanda and Mark. "Research, research, research. It's what I do best. Connect the dots and put the puzzle pieces together." He very purposefully spoke in English. Maybe it was the whole super-spy nature of this project, but he felt like keeping his talent for languages up his sleeve for the time being. You never knew what you might overhear when people underestimated you. Of course, he wouldn't have put it past Remy to brief Vazhin about the talents of the team, but that was neither here nor there.

Marie-Ange covered her face with a hand, frowning, and raised the other. "I think that puts me on the talk to people and be charming and well spoken and well dressed duty, yes?" She would've been
happier leaving it to someone else, but better her than Sarah. Sarah's grasp of tact took extended vacations to tropical countries -often-.

"Unless you'd prefer to take the bodies," Sofia answered smoothly, finally looking up from her seat where she'd been flipping through a Russian magazine. "I've got Sarah. The rest of you don't have possibly super strength zombies to deal with. Or very naughty vodka to take in for questioning later."

"Right, as if either would be a horrible fate, considering." Betsy said, sitting back in her seat, smirking at Sophia as she swiveled in her chair. "I think we've settled on our roles in this little endeavor. If there are no other questions or objections, I believe it's time to adjourn our meeting and perhaps let our friends refresh themselves before starting in on their respective jobs." She turned to Remy, raising her eyebrow to him before regarding the group. "All right then. Hop to it. We've got loads to cover before this is all over."

"Before you go, one other thing. We working on high security. Dat means you all, outside of dis office, you use you code names. I know dat you hate dem all, and I have specifically selected ones dat you like even less." Remy tossed a range of files over the table, smiling vaguely. "De Russian Federation is about as corrupt as you can imagine. Anyone uses dere real names, outside of dis office, and you just subtracted yourself from de pension plan. Go, let's make dis work."