Old Man of the Mountain: It Always Seems Worse

[x-dominion.livejournal.com]

Christian Kane uncovers exactly what Farouk has gotten himself into, and a tense meeting at Snow Valley outlines the risks involved.



The Snow Valley conference room had seen its fair share of strange meetings, between devising plans to thwart a hurricane, stop the potential destabilization of the globe, and rescue God. At this point, nothing said inside of those walls could ever be taken as too strange or too ridiculous to be real. It was a small group arrayed around the table, and for Garrison Kane, his first time there. He looked over the group for a moment, giving Morgan a smile, and sizing up Betsy Braddock and Jake Gavin. Gavin he pushed out of his mind for a moment. It was about being a professional right now, and focused on Braddock.

She was composed, projecting the kind of easy competence that he'd seen from Wisdom and his father. Achingly beautiful, exotic with her purple eyes and matching hair, there was also a dark vein of menace that pulsed under the surface of her composure, of violence that could be unleashed to devastating effect at any time. She was a telepath, Kane remembered from the Zemo incident, and a woman that his father had judged to be an effective operator. That deserved respect.

"So, Madripoor." Kane said finally. "My dad passed along a name or two to talk to once in country, but he was a little rushed as to why I'm going in the first place."

"For those of you unaware, our good professor Farouk has found himself in a spot of trouble." Her hands clasped together as her mind went over the details of the Op and began the debrief. "He has managed to make some enemies that have placed him in the sights of one, D. Ken Neramani. A man who has the will and the means to make anyone disappear. Garrison's father has been ever so helpful in keeping one of our own safe." Betsy leaned forward and regarded the younger Kane and then Jake. "This is an overseas excursion. We are, with Garrison's help as our "facilitator", to find a missing Indian diplomat in Madripoor. Since we are to meet the professor and Mr. Kane in Madripoor, we will be assisting both men in their search. Both Christian and Farouk believe that the diplomat has vital information that will need to find its' way to safe shores, preferably ours." Betsy regarded Jake as she spoke, this wasn't a safe mission and wanted to be absolutely clear as she relayed that information. "There is little doubt that we are not the only ones looking for this man. I expect great resistance if half the trouble Farouk has found himself into is true." Her eyes stopped on Kane as she asked. "Mr. Kane, could you please share the names your father entrusted to you?"

"Got it." Kane said, taking in the details his father had uncovered and passed along directly to Snow Valley. Farouk had managed to piss off the Prime Minister of India. He was certainly moving up in the world in regards to his class of enemies. "There's an ex-SHIELD agent in Madripoor, name of Tim Dugan. Apparently, everyone called him 'Dum-Dum', which I'm just hoping is a bullet reference, and not an explanation of his critical ability. He's tight with Fury, but I guess he's also a little past his best before date. They promoted him out of the field, but he decided he didn't want to jockey a desk to end out his career, retired, and moved out to the island. According to Dad, he's got the place wired, and thanks to some kind of work with STRIKE a decade ago, still has a 'working' relationship with my old man. If this diplomat is lying low in Madripoor, he's supposed to be the best start to finding him."

"What are the odds he's going to play nice without ulterior motives?" Everyone had their secret ambitions, Morgan knew. The odds that his secret ambitions weren't in conflict with their objective was something she'd like to know ahead of time. "Who's the other one? Braddock said 'names,' plural. Unless Dugan's got multiple personalities there's at least one more contact we're looking for when we hit ground, yeah?"

"The others are officials in Madripoor's Customs agency, and a couple of less savory elements for access to weapons and false identifications to extract the guy if we find him." Kane replied. They were useful but interchangable contacts, there to help them get the reasources they needed without having to waste time with developing their own local names.

"As for Dugan, Dad says he can be trusted, and my father is awfully hard to shark. Personally, I think we can assume he'll play straight with us, unless something really changes in the circumstances involved."

Jake had been surreptitiously trying to figure out which of Kane's arms had been ripped off; for a pair of one-armed men, the two of them were remarkably hale and healthy. At Betsy's look, however, he'd reined in his curiosity for the moment, frowning as the details of the job emerged. "Classic needle in a haystack," he muttered, "except this haystack's an island with four million people on it. Great." He glanced back at Betsy. "Besides Neramani's goons, do we know of anyone else who may be looking for this diplomat?"

"No," Betsy answered. "But we cannot assume that this man has gone to ground without reason to do so. Which means that we do have others to contend with and we'll run into them soon enough."

"So, we're heading into a potentially hostile environment, with the resources of the second most populous nation on the planet against us, and we don't have the first clue where to find this guy." Kane rubbed his eyes tiredly. "If I didn't know better, I'd think Farouk did this on purpose. I guess we'd better start packing."