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Donald had decided to head the assault on Sebastian because he felt that Shaw deserved a personal touch, he had indeed discovered that some of the corporate attacks on him came from Shaw's company. That, and the fact that he had much more faith in Skulltaker as a leader than any of the other cyborgs. He was Donald's primary kidnapper/assassin, a former Navy seal sniper who had been crippled in a battle with a mutant he had met on the opposing side on a mission to the Middle East. It had been almost ludicrously easy for Donald to recruit him, and he had been Donald's most loyal and most deadly 'Reaver' ever since.
His team for this mission was not as large as the one Donald was leading against Shaw and was very different in its composition. There were only seven cyber-dogs, and four Bruisers, but they were very different from the combat types that Pierce had taken against Shaw. All of them had some offensive weapons, but most of their weapons were designed to neutralize or capture their opponents instead. Pierce wanted Emma alive, he didn't think she was involved with the attacks on him but he had long harbored a growing hatred for her, as Emma well knew.
There was also another specialized soldier with Skulltaker, one who Donald called the Cracker, which had been the prototype to the work done on Pretty Boy. It wasn't in fact a cyborg at all but a robot, and very look much looked the part. It stood only half the size of a normal human, with six long arms which it kept folded together as if they were a single arm each ending with different tools. It had a very simple task, to take out the mechanized or computerized defenses of the mansion.
It also had an active camouflage system. One moment it was a small child running around near the back of Emma's mansion, the next Cracker was next to the outer wall and over it, camouflaged as part of that wall so well that it fooled even the cameras covering that area. Once there, it unlimbered its arms, connected one to the outside of the camera from behind and got to work.
Inside the mansion the security team was on heightened alert and the chief of security was in the command room. So he was there to watch as all of the cameras suddenly went down. "What, the, get them…."
He couldn't even finish the sentence before everything else began to shut off as well. Nearby the security team's programmer was trying rapidly to figure out what was going on and shaking his head. "I don't know how they did it, but I've got at least a hundred maybe more viruses in the system cutting into everything. I can't keep control of it."
"Can they turn those guns on us?" The chief asked bluntly.
"Maybe." the other man returned, not even looking up from his work as he tried to out-program a robot that had been deliberately created to beat him in this game. "The only way we could stop that is by cutting their power, none of the gun emplacements have their own internal power source; they're fed solely from the generator here in the mansion."
"Do it." The man ordered, and the tech gratefully moved his hand over from the keyboard to slam it down onto a large red button. Seconds later all the lights in the mansion went out, and the security leader nodded grimly. "Let's get in position."
Outside the mansion Skulltaker nodded his head, waving his hand in the air and signaling his team forward. None of them were intelligent, but all of them had been programmed to follow nonverbal cues. Instead of breaking through the wall separating Emma's mansion from the surrounding properties they went over it quickly and silently, then moved through her backyard towards the mansion.
They were watched from afar by the three snipers. Harry actually wasn't there, Emma had verbally torn into him when he attempted to come by himself, almost ordering him to head to Shaw's mansion so they knew how the battle there went, saying that she did not need Harry to personally come riding to her rescue, and that there were other things that Harry could do that the team could not. It was best to let the team handle the tasks they could.
So the three snipers watched as the attackers moved through the mansion's ground. As soon as they moved out of the garden they came under fire from Emma's security team who had moved to engage them along the terrace leading up from the backyard to the pool and sitting area there. The banister there was steel covered with marble, so it made for a very good defense against most conventional weaponry.
However, these were not conventional forces. The cyber-dogs and Bruisers let loose with their weaponry, blowing apart the banister in places, killing or knocking unconscious several of the security guards before more than a few seconds had passed in the firefight. Surprisingly though they lost one of the Bruisers to what appeared like a lucky shot from a security man who had caught the cyborg in the eye.
Or at least it seemed that way to everyone involved down there. The truth was that Coyote had seen his chance, and nailed the cyborg in the head with one of his rifle rounds.
"Nice shot," Vanguard murmured over the team frequency.
"Fair." Coyote said, shrugging mildly as he moved over from the position he had previously been in. "I wish we could go to rapid fire though, the lads down there don't have the weapons to really tangle with these lads."
"We have to keep our involvement to a minimum." Ghigau sent, her voice irritated. "We can't afford to leave any evidence of a third party helping Emma. Doesn't make it any easier." That caused both the other snipers to nod in unison.
Below the few survivors of the firefight fell back while their fellows in the mansion began to open fire from the first and second story windows. The men back in the mansion were more heavily armed, with several SAWS and other crew served weapons. With them they pinned down nearly all of the attackers for several minutes, though several more died under return fire, and more than one of the teams in the mansion died as well.
"Now?" Ghigau asked.
"Now." Vanguard replied. Both snipers lined up their shots quickly. Below, the Bruisers reeled under several hits from the heavy weapons in the mansion, then suddenly it seemed as if their armor gave way in different portions. One's head suddenly imploded, a round having entered its mouth. The other's chest exploded outward along one side as something gave way, and its power reactor blew.
That left only one Bruiser along with seven dogs and Skulltaker. And Skulltaker was the main problem. Several dozen yards back from the battle a long barreled normal looking sniper rifle stuck out from behind a tree for only a second and there was a "FIZZ!" of a laser joining the general bedlam.
Right below Vanguard a SAW team on the second floor went silent. "черт (damn)…"
Thanks to his actually having intelligence Skulltaker had been using fire and maneuver to close with the mansion, shooting at the targets that showed themselves with an accuracy all three snipers respected. But he was keeping his head down letting the lower-level cyborgs take the battle to the mansion's security team, and he moved away from the battle now around the edge of the mansion. "Hunter five, one and six follow me."
"Should we go after him?" Coyote asked.
"Negative," Ghigau replied, making Vanguard cock an eyebrow in surprise. The last time he looked he had been given command of this mission, but… "Remember Sandman's still down there, I bet he can handle the cyborgs easily enough, the rest of the security team can't."
He and the dogs swiftly rounded the house instead of charging directly into the fire of the defenders, while Skulltaker was looking up at the roof. His system was telling him that some of the shots that had taken out his men were coming from up there, but none of his sensors could see anything. Not even infrared, thanks to Harry hitting the three snipers with the full package of his concealment spells: cooling, disillusion and Muffilatio charms on all of them.
Still, Skulltaker knew something was up there, so he was concentrating on figuring out what, even as the three dogs blasted their way into the mansion, ripping and tearing at the wall. He shook his head and entered the mansion after them, giving out orders. "Head up to the second floor, take the security team in the side while I find the primary target."
At that order the dogs had raced through what looked like a dining room towards the stairwell visible through the open doorway. Moments later however, they stepped onto what appeared at first like an indoor sand play area of some kind directly in front of the staircase leading up. That part at least had been correct from the plans of the mansion Pierce had downloaded for him, the sand however was a surprise, and very out of place…
Suddenly Skulltaker remembered a report Pierce's espionage team had passed on. About Frost wanting to rehabilitate… "Get Back!"
Before the cyber-dogs could respond to his command the sand came alive underneath them, grabbing the cyber-dogs with tendrils of sand that grabbed with astonishing strength. There was the shriek of twisted metal and the "Snap, pop and RIIIP!" of flesh and the cyber-dogs were all in pieces, flung here and there.
Skulltaker swiftly moved backwards, bringing up his rifle while Sandman coalesced out of the sand standing in front of the staircase leading up.
The other man shook his head while color appeared in the sand, giving the appearance of a plaid shirt and jeans. "You picked the wrong day to attack this mansion dude, even a day earlier would have been better. So sad." With that he raised his hand which elongated quickly, his fist becoming a mace, harder than granite.
Skulltaker dodged rapidly and one of his arms, composed of the same liquid metal as Donald and Pretty Boy changed into several dozen tentacles, all of them with sharp ends. He raked at the arms as they came near him while his rifle came up, blasting away at full auto now.
That rifle wasn't up to the ability of the rifles that Kitty and Jean had designed, but it was a decent enough laser. Sandman however simply faded in front of it, letting the blast pass through his body harmlessly, to cut into the stairwell. His arm became harder than granite, the blades of the tentacles simply pinging off it.
He grabbed Skulltaker's rifle with his other hand, which came up out of the wreckage and ruin of one of the Cyber-dog's to do so. Skulltaker tried to release his rifle, tried to transform that arm in the same manner as the other hand, but the sand was all over it, pulling him down and crushing the metal under its grip.
Skulltaker's eyes glowed, and laser beams shot out but even that couldn't stop Sandman from ripping his body apart. At the same time, he felt a mental intrusion, ripping and tearing at his mind, taking all the information it could, but then he felt nothing again.
As the cyborgs head separated from his body, joining the rest of the mangled wreckage around him Sandman stretched his arm tremendously up towards the top of the stairwell. He picked up a small transceiver, which ran on an internal battery, like all the other security men had been issued. "This is Sandman, I think we're done inside. How are you all doing outside?""
Up on the roof Nikolai turned to the other two snipers his head cocked to one side. "Well, that was rather anti-climactic. I wonder what Guardian found."
Emma nodded grimly where she was standing in her room with Jean as her security Chief issued an all clear. "Thank you chief. That bonus I mentioned, I'll triple it, I never expected an assault like this. Sandman, that goes for you too, you've already made me very happy that I got you out of jail."
Below Sandman smiled grimly thinking this job might well be his dream come true. Action like today, big checks, and no need to fight any costumed superheroes, yeah, he liked that idea.
"Inform me when you have the names of the dead, I'll also pay a year's wages to their next of kin if they have any, and for schooling for any children up to college level." Emma went on, shaking her head as she realized how many of her many men had died today.
Her security chief replied in the affirmative, sounding both angry yet pleased with her response. Angry that he had lost so many men and her thinking that money would make it better, but also pleased, because money really would help both his living men and the families of the dead.
After she finished talking to him, Emma nodded at Jean, then began to sift through the information Skulltaker had, which wasn't a lot, though some of it would be of use…
Emma paled suddenly as one memory of Skulltaker's came to the fore. She quickly raced out of her room with a surprised Jean following after her, heading down to where the servants had been ordered to remain in their rooms until the battle was over. She flung one door over and glared at the head butler. "Where's Cordelia and Angelica, and why the hell hasn't anyone noticed them missing?"
While the man babbled a response, his normal calm manner in abeyance with the sounds of battle still going on in the background, Emma castigated herself for not noticing her sister's absence then got a grip on herself. Time enough to beat myself up over it later, now I need to do something about it. With that thought, she telepathically reached out to the only one who might be able to help.
OOOOOOO
"Quite a lot." Harry replied to Nikolai repeating his question several hours later, as he looked around at the team where they all sat in the Room of Requirement on fluffy chairs, sofas and other comfortable furniture conjured just for this purpose. Emma wasn't there, having to deal with the fallout of the assault on her mansion, acting astonished, appalled and furious in turn with the police and the newsies. She had also, strangely enough, had to call Paris back, who had seen what happened on the news and had wanted to make certain her friend was all right. Emma was there in spirit however thanks to a telepathic link to Jean.
"First, is I can give us a bit of an update on the team makeup of the Hellions, and I'm not looking forward to discussing this with Scott." At everyone's odd looks he sighed. "It looks as if Alex was recruited to the Hellions. How that came to be I don't know, but he was there taking part in the battle."
Jean face-palmed, shaking her head. "Really? We warned him that something like that might happen, and he was still recruited?"
"I think Alex was recruited immediately after he went home after that whole Magneto thing frankly." Harry said shaking his head. "I thought Xavier was keeping an eye on him, but I guess not. Or, possibly more disturbing whoever recruited him might have somehow bypassed Charles' watch of him."
Later on, when Harry passed onto Charles and Scott what had occurred he would learn that the former was indeed the case. Alex and Scott were still exchanging e-mails, but nothing in the e-mails had hinted at anything occurring that was out of the ordinary other than him getting a new girlfriend. Charles had assumed that the two brothers keeping in contact was enough, and had not been keeping a mental eye on him.
Harry would lambast him but not all that much, since Charles had other things going on closer to home. None of them were infallible after all.
Behind Harry, the image being projected from the pensieve changed to show the woman called Polaris. "Alex, or Havok his call sign seems to be, and this girl with green hair, were the heavy hitters of the group, at least at first."
He waited as the others watched a replay of the battle, before Amara spoke up disconsolately. "Magnetic powers, this Havok seems to have energy projection powers, and that might be Roberto Dacosta, the second flier to go down I mean. It looks as if he was recruited as well."
Jean and Emma were conversing as they watched, and it was Emma who came up with the suggestion. "Emma thinks that Empath's ability to mess with people's minds could allow him to make permanent changes over time, so it's possible that the three newcomers aren't working with Shaw willingly, not really." Jean relayed.
"It's a possibility I suppose. Do you think Robert would have joined this group if he was in his normal frame of mind Amara?"
"I didn't know him that well!" The neo-Roman girl protested. "I know he was serious about his current girlfriend and playing soccer, that's about it. Oh, and she might not have been a mutant, not certain, I only ever met him once and didn't meet her at all. We might want to look into that somehow, if Roberto did leave her behind, that would be a certain sign he wasn't in his right mind."
Betsy nodded. "I can do that. A telepath might be able to find something out that other people would miss. Do you know the girlfriend's name? Or where his family would be?" Magma shook her head at the first question, then nodded and gave an address in Rio De Janeiro for the second, and the conversation went on."
About an hour later the team had finished the analysis of the fight Harry had seen, and Harry was summing up their plans there. "Capture if possible subdue if necessary and kill only as a last resort for Havok, the woman called Polaris, and Sunspot when we face them in the future. Domino, Shaw, Catseye and Random, should all be put down with extreme prejudice, as well as any new recruits they gather before we face them since they no longer have Empath around to muck up people's minds.
"I'm still concerned about the fact we don't know Shaw's actual power. Yes, he looks durable, he's got some kind of healing factor and he's super strong, but is that it? If he was strong enough at the beginning of the fight to punch all the way through Pierce as he did here why didn't he?" Piotr mused.
Harry shrugged. "He seemed to get stronger as the fight goes continued, but why that is I don't know."
"I thought it was part of the super villain code that they had to monologue about their powers at some point in every fight." Dani complained, causing a chuckle to go around the table. "I think however, that we've done enough analyzing. We're just spinning our wheels right now.
"Let's leave it for now, and come back to it when we're actually planning to move against this group."
Harry scowled a little. He had wanted to remove Shaw right then and there, with his team exhausted and out in the open it would have been the perfect time. But he'd been forced to leave to save Cordelia from being kidnapped, an act that Emma was incredibly thankful for.
And Harry's desire to remove Shaw might have been risky as well in many ways. For one thing, Shaw would appear to die because of Pierce that way, and would be lauded as a whistleblower and a hero. For another, it would leave Shaw's other backers out there. There were at least three more mutants working with Shaw elsewhere in America, excluding Harry Leyland who hadn't taken part in the battle.
With Shaw out of the way, there was no telling what they would do, or how they would act. Leland wasn't nearly as dangerous as Shaw, but Emma only knew the codenames of the others, and had lost several spies to gain even that. Those codenames were Sage, Lord Imperial, and Wolfman.
And possibly worse, the loss of Shaw would place Buckman as the most powerful of the inner circle of the New York branch of the Hellfire Club. That would give him all the resources of the club without anyone to offset his influence, a bad thing considering the club had its own private army at the command of the inner circle, let alone the espionage side of things. Even if Harry joined immediately, he would still be seen as a junior partner after that.
After a moment Harry sighed, snapping mental fingers at lost opportunities. "Yes, it's a good idea I suppose. Storm, run the team through two exercises against what we saw from the Hellions going from what I saw, after that you lot can hit the sack. I, alas, have to go and tell Scott about his brother." Needless to say, that conversation was not pleasant.
OOOOOOO
"…Pierce Holdings will now be held by the federal government as the investigation continues, despite the man himself having disappeared. The manhunt is on for Mr. Pierce, but with no clues as to his whereabouts, the police are not optimistic about running him to ground. Again, if you have seen a man matching the picture on my left, please contact…"
"An interesting show, I wonder what hole Pierce ducked into…" Said a gruff voice from a man whose face seemed to be carved from granite at present. In one hand he held a glass of bourbon which he waved at the younger man who was standing by the window staring out over an army training camp, while the other stroked his short, gray beard. "Still, how far will this set us back? Pierce striking out like that was not in our calculations, you've lost your richest backer."
"I'm not thrilled about it of course general." The younger man said shaking his head. Thunderbolt Ross had not been seen in public for a while, which of course fit his new persona non grata, but that didn't mean he had simply disappeared, nor had Col. Stryker. "But I believe we can cope."
"Even with the government still insisting they won't give us the funding we need to finalize the projects?"
"Most of the government is saying that, portions of it of course are much more intelligent than others." Stryker turned back with a faint smile. "We'll get our money one way or another. From what I hear your new Hulk Busters are still being blocked thanks to Fury for now, but even with the decent PR they've been getting lately thanks to that alien Potter the mutant threat is still a hot button issue, especially with the violent flare ups there have been lately. Which means the Purifiers might well be authorized soon."
Stryker scoffed, spitting to one side. How anyone couldn't understand that he and the Fantastic Four were in cahoots here, working to put themselves in charge or something similar, he couldn't understand.
Ross smiled thinly then raised his glass of bourbon to the other man before taking a sip. After that he put it down resolutely and stood up. "In that case, I better go over the troops again."
OOOOOOO
Over the next two days while Emma tried to ride the fallout from Pierce's moment of madness, Harry and his group finished several small projects. The first arc reactor's parts were done, and the construction of it began. Several more asteroids had been hauled in from the Atiras group each of which was covered by a Fidelius, hollowed out and fused together into one huge station in preparation to be turned into holding farmland for his potions ingredients. On the outside it looked like, in Kitty's words, 'a gobstopper from that Willie Wonka movie'.
This was necessary though so Harry could use one of his last remaining hearthstone on it to power the arrays and various defense spells, such as the Fidelius he had already cast on them each in turn and then again when he fused the various asteroids together. Of course writing down the various runic arrays to enlarge the interiors would take far longer.
He and Kitty had just begun work on that together, with Harry instructing the girl on some more of the intricacies of combining different runic languages into a single array, when Harry was interrupted by a psychic call from Jean. "Harry, we've had a call from our contacts with the British government, it seems Balder is back with that treaty."
After giving some instructions to Kitty, Harry teleported down to Hogwarts, then from there to the same empty parking lot in London they had already used several times. From there he made his way to the conference building he had used previously.
Balder was there waiting by the checkout desk carrying what Harry guessed was the treaty. It was a large piece of parchment the size and width of Balder's forearm tied around at either end with velvet, upon which Harry could discern a few glittering runes of Norse design. Harry wondered idly how the heck Balder or whoever had gotten those to work on pieces of cloth rather than stone. Whenever he tried that kind of thing the item in question tended to burst into flame or disintegrate unless he figured out a way to ground them through use of another runic language, which was incredibly difficult on anything but stone.
The treaty was held in one of Balder's hands, and he was using the other to gesticulate some kind of story or other to the young receptionist, who was laughing at something he said, her cheeks a rosy blush. Balder was not dressed as he had been the last time that Harry had seen him, wearing instead what looked like a very good suit, and his good looks and sense of humor seemed to be doing its work on the young woman. I wonder if Mr. Harper had that suit specially made for him in case he returned…
Nearby said spymaster was leaning against the wall, ostensibly reading a newspaper but Harry could see that his eyes were watching Balder and the receptionist, a faint amused smile on his face. Not that he was alone in this, Harry thought it was rather amusing to watch Balder at work as well. Balder was supposed to be the God of diplomacy and light wasn't he? At least that's what little I've been able to find out said, that and his connection to the Prophecy of Ragnarok, his death is supposed to kick off the whole thing but he seems hale and hearty.
To say that Harry was still irritated about how little he had discovered about the Asgardians was to say that the ocean was wet. The missionaries had done too damn good a job, far too damn good a job in Harry's opinion, erasing, changing or destroying all sign of the original Asatru religion. What was left was an amalgamation of a few facts alongside several dozen not quite reputable myths, along with a whole lot of inferencing. It was so bad, Harry felt it must almost certainly have been deliberate but to what end and by whom he had no idea. But at least this part seems to have been accurate.
He slowly disengaged his Notice-Me-Not spell, nodding politely at Harper who nodded back before Harry coughed delicately. "I do so hate to take you away from your discussion Balder, but I unfortunately don't have enough time to wait for you to… finish."
Balder turned with smile on his face, grasping Harry's outstretched forearm while the receptionist suddenly gasped, realizing that the handsome giant of a man who had been flirting with her was meeting with the new business icon Harry Potter. For his part however Balder simply shook Harry's forearm firmly, saying "Indeed, I am due back soon as well, but when faced with a woman such startling beauty, I could not help myself."
The receptionist blushed again, then practically fell over herself getting the three men situated in one of the conference rooms. "And if you need anything, don't hesitate to ask."
Balder watched the young woman go then turned while Harry and the Mr. Harper did sweeps of the room, then nodded to one another before Harry turned back to Balder. "So has your king agreed to the nonaggression pact?"
"Indeed, and a very limited trade pact. Some form of a defense treaty will have to wait, but the gist of it is…" Balder went on, describing the various clauses in the treaties, what exactly the Asgardians were willing to trade to the humans, and in what quantity.
"And what would you be willing to take in trade for those items?" Harry said, interested in some of them himself. Various metals for example, he really wanted to see what he could do with some of the steel that the Asgardians produced. And there were certain runic arrays that worked well with gems as a main focus, but getting high-quality gems on the market especially of the size he was thinking of were simply too expensive for a project that Harry didn't actually have the time to pursue at this moment.
"I'm certain we could come up with some ideas." Balder murmured, and Harry rolled his eyes.
For the next hour or so the two men went back and forth, trying to decide on an equitable exchange rate. After all, both sides had things that the others side could not actually create and there was no set monetary equivalent to use as a reference. The Asgardians culture ran on barter and gold currency, actual gold coins. Harry wasn't about to let that stand, especially since Balder had looked up the value of gold, and well understood that any exchange rate there would be in his favor.
Eventually they moved away from using precious metals at all as an exchange rate, and slowly came to a series of guidelines. Foodstuffs would be sold to the Asgardians in on a 4 to 1 basis for items of clothing and fabrics, many of which were far stronger than the human equivalent. A cotton shift for example that could stop bullets would be a major draw. That ratio would go up astronomically for base metals and worked steel.
However, the balance of trade shifted the other way entirely when discussing electronics since Harry had gotten Balder to admit that TVs and other such items that the Asgardians were quite interested in could not be created in their culture, they just simply didn't have the basic knowledge to do it. For TVs, radios and the power to run them, it was a ratio of 2 to 1 in favor of the electronic devices. So for example one TV would be good for two Asgardian broadswords or the equivalent weight in metal.
However Balder could not make agreements to trade gems, items of power, or magical knowledge. "Those we have to wait until we see how well these agreements work. How exactly will we make the exchange?" Balder asked, moving past that point rapidly. He had been given strict orders on what to do here, stricter than normal frankly. He was after all the most diplomatic of the Æsir, so Odin-father normally gave him his head, and expected him to make the best of it.
This time however Odin had instead given Balder extremely set instructions to follow which had actually made Balder a little angry at the time, though not enough to make waves. After all, Odin was a long term thinker. That one eye of his saw more than any other save perhaps his wife. It was why he was King, why he had ruled for so long and so well, through good times and bad, and Balder would not gain say that.
What Balder did not know was that Odin was counting on the trade agreements to be too small seemingly to gather any attention from… any other eyes. But Odin knew that oaks grew from small seeds, and even small cracks in a dam could cause the whole façade to crumble over time. Especially if someone was ready, poised with a hammer to help the weight of the water along.
Harry looked over at Jack Harper who smiled back blandly and said simply, "I believe my government will be more than willing to set up a warehouse on guarded property for these trades. Of course we will also have to take a certain amount of remuneration, say 10%?"
"10% of the worked goods except for the metals." Harry said with a nod. "No magical items or knowledge once we get to that point until I okay them." If I ever do, which is highly unlikely.
The spymaster rubbed his forehead, wishing that the Iron Lady was here to do this. But then again, given how leery Mrs. Thatcher was of Harry, perhaps that would have been counterproductive. "10% of the worked goods, 2 out of every 10 for the metals. For example if you get 10 swords, we get two."
"Just for setting up a place to have the trades occur? I don't think so." Harry laughed. He was all for the British government making some money off this agreement, after all it was happening on their land, and he wasn't about to let any Asgardians into Hogwarts, no matter how much he liked Balder, nor did he want his meetings with them out in the open as they would be if they happened at Magical Minds regardless of any attempt to hide them.
After all, he really didn't care about the jewelry, clothing or anything of that nature, but he definitely didn't want anyone else to get their hands on Asgardian steel. He said that aloud, and then went on firmly, "And I'm not budging on it. I'll create my own area for the trade before I let that happen. I'd be willing to go up to twelve percent on the worked goods though."
"And how would you supply the goods on your, or should I say humanity's end?" the spymaster riposted.
After that however he went on in a more conciliatory tone. "I do not believe that my government at this time would be interested in the steel save for a sword for Captain Britain, and a small holdout knife for the Crown Prince. There have been… threats in that direction considering his outspoken views on certain terrorist groups and the UN's position on them, and other parties are leery of another powerful, popular king following William. Having a knife of that caliber might be an aid in the future. Would that be agreeable?"
Harry nodded. Considering that the British were in fact going to be providing a lot of the luxury goods that Harry would then resell to the Asgardians that made a good deal of sense. He was merely their go-between for that, as well as selling directly from his own resources. "I'll agree to that, and if William or you want me to, I could whip up some armor for the Crown Prince or other security for the royals when they are away from Buckingham palace, though it would have to wait for a time, I have so much on my plate right now it isn't even funny."
"Welcome to the life of a public servant Mr. Potter." Jack replied dryly.
So the initial trade agreement was agreed to. Balder unrolled the parchment, and then began to write down in simple easy script the agreed rate of exchange as well as the rest of it. This was formally witnessed by both Jack and Harry then Harry used a Duplication spell on the parchment, which flared red for a moment before fading to reveal that the spell had worked and created two other duplicates.
At the spymaster's bemused look Harry shook his head. "It only works on paper and other simple items, I couldn't duplicate a gun or something of that nature if that's your wondering. What was that red flash?"
"The parchment is tied into another parchment back in Asgard." Balder replied. "My king will know that you cast a spell on it, but so long as the agreement I return with matches the agreement shown on that parchment, he will understand your need to have your own copies. I will keep one copy, my king will keep another, your government Sir." He said bowing his head to the spymaster. "Will keep a third, and you will keep the fourth Harry. That way none of us can change anything, without all us knowing that it has been done."
Harry smiled at the precaution, though he wondered internally how Odin had figured out a way to create a magical connection across dimensions like that. Perhaps the God of Wisdom is more than a title he thought to himself, before he went down the row of parchments, signing his name, before touching his name with a finger, hitting it with a small spell to make it unchangeable. "I presume our names will appear on your king's copy as well?"
"Yes." Balder replied with a nod of his head. Once everyone signed, Harper moved over to a decanter of brandy that he had brought along, which had by this point chilled nicely. "A toast gentlemen, to new horizons, and new friends."
The other two men echoed the toast, clicking their glasses together, and sipping ritually though Balder simply threw his back. "That," he said shaking his head, "Is good stuff. Doesn't have much of a kick to it, but I love the flavor. You might wish to add that to the list of goods my people would be willing to trade for."
"Will you handle all such transactions?" Harry asked sipping at his own brandy.
"I will, if we can set up a place for trade this trip I will return in a week's time with a first batch, then we will barter for that within the outline of the exchange rate we have already set."
Harry nodded, making a mental note to make certain that he remembered to gather some goods for the Asgardians.
By the time they finished for the day, they had decided on an army depot to house the trading station, and Harry had also subtly questioned Balder on his people, coming away with many more questions than answers alas. Still, he decided to set that aside for now to concentrate on his own projects for now.
OOOOOOO
The next day was Wednesday, and in the morning Harry was once again up in space working on the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. Melody and Illyana had convinced him to use that name the moment they heard about the project, and Jean and Ororo had both agreed it was most appropriate. By lunch time, he and Kitty had written out on the hearthstone a full third of the arrays Harry wanted to place on them, all of the enlargement arrays and two of the defensive. Harry would handle the time displacement arrays himself, but this would let the house-elves start to plant now. After that fully half of his total house elf force was devoted to farming, but he still had more than enough to handle any of the other little projects and keep up with work in Hogwarts.
At the same time, the first twenty robots Doom had sent Harry had quickly been cleared of any surprises by Jean and Reed then been put to work on the Fidelius covered asteroids. Half of them worked on the interior of the Hanging Gardens, putting in a permanent air recycling system. The other half began work on what Harry was calling 'The Forge', which would be a factory set into another Fidelius protected asteroid he and Jean had dragged from the Atiras like the others. The Forge would create things down the road for their orbital industry, anything from armor equal to that they had looked at on the Hellion to power junctions to weapons, which would be far better than the ones they had found on the ship for various reasons, including magical ones. It would be slow work, months in fact, but it would get there eventually.
After lunch however, Harry, Jean and Ororo met up with Reed Richards, Susan and Dr. Doom. They had scheduled this time to listen to a presentation by the psychologist/sociologist Reed had brought in to question the prisoners.
Andrew Lefton was a rather portly man, who looked like the poster child for the absent-minded professor. But his eyes behind his wireframe glasses were quite sharp, and whatever his thoughts about being a peacenik when it came to humanity this did not extend to aliens. Nor did he seem to have any illusions or preconceived notions in that direction either, which Harry supposed was natural enough coming from someone that Reed had personally vouched for.
After they all sat down in the same room they had used to talk to Doom previously on the Hellion, Andrew began quickly. "The problem with many warlike cultures is that they don't work long term. I will explain. A despotism or military junta, a government controlled by the military, does not allow free speech or free will in its citizens for the most part, and the rights of that citizenship is sharply curtailed in order to allow the government to retain control. In humans, there has never been a military-as government that has allowed with within its culture places for art, self-expression, and science."
"Indeed, most warlike cultures do not allow for change at all, especially in terms of a person's position in society beyond a certain amount. The Spartans are of course the prime example of this, but there are others. But the Spartans are the ones that I think of, because in many ways the Kree are like them yet in other ways they are so very different. I probably do not have to say this, but their thought processes are fundamentally alien. How much of that is the fact that they have been raised in a military culture, and how much of that is simple lack of empathy I do not know."
"What do you mean?" Asked Dr. Doom, his voice sepulchral from inside his mask, while next to him his mother continued to sip slightly from a fire whiskey Harry had supplied.
Andrew flinched a little at the sight of the supervillain. He knew there was some sort of agreement there, but he didn't really like to be reminded of it. Still, he answered readily enough. "Every person I've talked to among the blue-skinned Kree I would term as a functioning sociopath where other races are concerned." Everyone's eyebrows went up like that, and he shook his head. "The definition of sociopath is a person who cannot, not does not, but cannot understand cannot empathize with another person's emotions or desires, cannot see another person's point of view regardless of anything else. If you are not Kree and I need to emphasize this, if you are not Kree, you are worthless to these people. Even their client races are looked down upon and scorned. I would need a much larger study sample to tell you whether or not that is true across the board, but I'm getting the distinct impression that it is. A lack of caring of other race's right to exist at all is built into their culture. Even the Spartans had more care for their enemies than these people do."
There is a moment of silence people digest that. Then Harry murmured, "So basically when they talk about war, they're talking about total war, as in utter destruction of the enemy."
"They wouldn't even understand why you are considering any other kind of war. The destruction of the civilian population is simply good sense to these people. I asked questions like that, questions about orbital bombardment and other things of that nature, and what I found out horrified me." Andrew replied, shaking his head. "Let me get back to my main point. I had fully expected to find that there was some kind of break between the civilian and the military in this culture, that the military was on top because it had the guns as is so often the case with humans. But it isn't, the military is on top because that's how the Kree think. That is a tremendous distinction!"
"And one will have to take in mind." Reed nodded, wincing at the implications.
"What about the pale skinned ones? Do their impressions differ?" Ororo asked, wondering about Una, who was doing a simply wonderful job as the school nurse.
"A few of them could pass for humans in terms of thought processes." Andrew nodded. "Una is the best example of this. I've talked to her on the phone a few times and she certainly fits the normal human mold. Mar'vell is getting there slowly, but he's been heavily indoctrinated. All of them have to a certain extent, they've been convinced that their place is below that of the blue skinned ones, but they were fighting it before they were captured."
"Do you think they would be safe to be released into the general population?" Reed asked.
His friend hesitated but nodded. "Eventually I believe so. Seven of them or so could be released now, but I believe that doing so would have a negative effect on the remainder. Let them stay together for now, and then release them into a closed society as a group. Not an open one, and open one would overwhelm them all, and I'm uncertain what many of them would do if they were so overwhelmed."
"I'll ask formally Dr.." said Harry turning to Doom. "Would you be willing to take these people into your country and watch them? Needless to say you would be free to pump them further for information so long as out and out torture wasn't used and you shared anything you learned about their species or space warfare."
"I will agree to that." Doom said with a nod. "Have you found anything about their industrial capacity?" he said turning back to Lefton.
Harry nodded and asked the same thing. "Have you learned any specifics at all that we can use?"
Andrew shrugged. "Not a lot. Some things that the people themselves didn't know, things that 'everyone knows', though they were not willing to answer specifics about the military. It should come as no surprise that their star systems are heavily organized, and of course it has to do with the military. If a system can produce a dozen ships of ships battlecruiser and above they are called primary systems. If they cannot, they are called secondary. There are tertiary systems as well, but those are supply systems with resource heavy planets which cannot support life but which sends a steady supply of material to primary systems.
"Moreover, almost their entire industry is run by robotics. They don't have a base worker class. That was hard to get out, they didn't understand the term."
"Are you talking about not having any kind of civilian sector at all, or not any civilian influence in the industrial sector?" Jean asked.
"No civilian influence in the industrial apparatus. Everything it of course is owned by the government especially orbital construction. However, there are true civilian sectors such as clothing, theater and other things of that nature. They are all looked down on of course, but even the blue skinned ones understand the necessity of having them. But robots are taking on more and more tasks, allowing the Kree to increase their military manpower to a far higher degree than any human society could handle."
"Interesting, but it doesn't actually help us. Still, continue Doctor." Harry mused.
Andrew nodded and went on. He described the everyday life of the Kree, both pale-skinned and blue. There was no nobility, the government and military were run via seniority and largely based on meritocracy, another sharp deviation from any real militant culture among humanity that Andrew made certain to point out. He described the training the soldiers went through, the fact they were all from different planets, and that they were trained on randomly selected training stations. He mentioned the indoctrination among the blue-skinned Kree that began when they were young, the segregation that existed between the pure and non-pure Kree.
Eventually, Andrew got back onto the topic of government. "Factionalism is almost entirely unknown, but there are two factions among the Kree. You all know that the Supreme Intelligence is a computer correct? It is not in fact, it is a… a cyborg entity I suppose you could call it, made up of hundreds of thousands of the minds of the most intelligent brightest and greatest Kree. There's even a ceremony for a brain to be inducted into it, and it is seen as a high honor. A few of the ones I talked to had seen one such broadcast several years ago."
"But while the Supreme Intelligence is supposed to control all aspects of the society, it has advisors who are not part of its matrix to handle a lot of its duties. They are headed by a man called Ronan the Accuser, who is apparently the highest authority in their judicial system. Needless to say he is a pureblood Kree, and he is extremely well thought of by the military, apparently having come up its ranks before making the jump over to his current job."
Andrew paused, then went on. "This is just supposition without much evidence, but I think reading between the lines of what the prisoners said about him, he might be more individualistic than most Kree. It is well known, all of them agreed on this, that Ronan doesn't like the fact that the Supreme Intelligence controls so much of Kree life. He puts it in terms of military necessity, saying that the Supreme Intelligence isn't able to react to shocks and surprises, which are natural aspects of warfare. However, there are rumors that he means to supplant the Supreme Intelligence in some manner, which might tie into why Mar'vell was accused of treason, though how is beyond me."
For some reason Doom and Harry exchanged a glance at that and Harry leaned forward. "How would such a move be seen by the normal Kree soldiery, or is the 'sample size' we have at present to small for you to answer that?"
"I'm afraid it is if you want a definitive answer. I got some positive thoughts on that subject, some negative. All couched as I said before in terms of military necessity."
"Pity," Harry said leaning back. At everyone's looks he shrugged. "If one or the other was more amenable to leaving Earth the hell alone, we could make a deal with that one and work against the other."
"For someone who doesn't like politics are remarkably shrewd about them." Susan murmured, laughing quietly.
"That's not politics that simple strategy. Of course so is remembering 'the enemy of my enemy is my enemy's enemy, no more no less'. We would still have to be on guard against betrayal later on, but the upheaval caused from such infighting could be useful."
Reed winced a little at the cold analytical tone Harry was using, but couldn't really fault it. Earth was such a very vulnerable egg after all, humanity didn't even have a basket to protect it yet. He snorted as his minded mangled that metaphor, but it was true enough.
"Battles between the Kree and the Skrull come in three different varieties." Andrew went on, moving to another topic. "One is what we would term commerce raiding, small actions, quick in and out. Apparently the Skrull do the same thing to the Kree, but merchant vessels on both sides are armed, so the battles are often much tougher than you would think."
Harry and the others nodded, having learned about those kinds of battles already.
"The second type is what I would call limited engagement. Small fleets looking for maneuver room, always trying to attack the other side from a position of strength. This kind of warfare goes on all the time on the border between the two races, nearly all of the crew members I talked to served on ships that took part in them. The goals of such are to take one system or other and deny it to the enemy in any way possible."
"Then there is a third kind, which I would call main offensives. The Fleets involved in these number in the thousands and they spread out over multiple systems. And this is not me trying to sound startled her or worried. One of the Kree I interviewed was the equivalent of a private first class on a battlecruiser that served in what they called the fifth assault fleet. When I asked him what an assault fleet was, he looked at be me askance, as if he thought I was making fun of him or something, it was simply something everyone knows.
"These fleets are constructed around 40 Doombringers or Planet Crushers, 400 dreadnoughts, over 1000 battleships and even more battlecruisers and upwards of four thousand frigates of the size of the Hellion."
Harry rubbed at his forehead. "Those are not pleasant numbers Dr., I'm not about to blame the messenger but damn…"
"I'm afraid that's all I can tell you about their order of battle, these people weren't high ranking officers if they were officers at all, and the blue skinned ones still refuse to give us any straight information about their militaries. They talked a bit about their culture, though I'm still wondering why."
"Because they think that their culture is just as superior as the rest," Jean replied with a shake of her head. "They think that the more they talk about their Empire, the size and strength of it, they'll wear down our morale, and we'll simply surrender."
All the humans around the table blinked at that then shrugged and moved on. "Were you able to find out the answer to the question I posed to you before you began Dr.?" Harry asked.
"The question about what they do to with their ships that are damaged or obsolete? They do have a few junk systems, systems where obsolete ships are left before being destroyed for their parts later on, but they are few and far between. I was able to find the location of one, or at least its name."
Harry smiled faintly. "What was its name?"
"It translates to Dead Man's Row."
All the others at the table were now looking at Harry and he smiled faintly. "I had a new acquaintance of ours, who is a remarkable programmer, look at the information from the engine room's computers that was still intact and there was in fact some astrological data there. We actually can figure out where that is."
"And what will you do with that information Mr. Potter?" asked Dr. Doom, though his tone seemed to indicate that he already knew.
"I think it represents an opportunity, especially along with another little project I've been thinking of handing him." Harry went on looking back at doctor Lefton. "This was informative, not as much as I would've liked, but as much as we can at this point. Needless to say please keep the information that we have taken alien prisoners to yourself, we might wish to call you in the future, but for now unless you have anything more to share we can adjourn."
It was several hours later, and Harry, Jean and Ororo were meeting with Emma back in Hogwarts discussing Harry's plan, which Emma was against. Not because she didn't think it wouldn't work, it sounded plausible at least, so long as they could pull off the acting necessary, and with a telepath along even that wasn't exactly a hurdle.
No, it was the idea of Harry leading the operation himself. "You cannot be absent for that long. We have your introduction to the New York branch coming up this weekend, then we have the second interview next week, and you know my feelings about the whole Sentinel Project coming to a head soon! You have no idea how long this job would last!"
Jean had a screen in front of her, looking at the astronomical data as well as calculating the speed of the Hellion. She frowned thoughtfully. "Emma's right, this isn't exactly a short jaunt. I think 2 1/2 weeks out, then a month or so back, and that's assuming we don't run into trouble. We surely won't want to lead anyone searching for us directly back to Earth after all."
"How ready is the Hellion for action?" Ororo asked.
"Reed was able to reconstruct most of the programming for the weapons, as well as the shields and environment controls, though the original control programs were gone, so we had to create them from scratch. It's missing a few external weapons we took apart to reverse engineer, and the interior is still messed up from our taking it, but for the most part the ship is good to go. I wouldn't want to send it into any kind of battle, not without a full crew, but for something like this we might get away with it."
"And Douglas can really write up this slave program?" Ororo asked.
"He and Hisako yes," Harry said with a nod. "I asked him that several days ago, and he's already shown me a preliminary program.
Both teens were of course being paid for their programming work, since Douglas' ability with languages did transfer over to computer languages, any computer language. He was a master programmer within moments of studying a new one, and had reconstructed all the astrogational data the engineering computers had saved on them, even more so than Reed or Doctor Doom had been able to.
It had astonished both teens that Harry was willing to pay for them for this service, but saw it as simply a way to keep them happy and tying them more securely to his faction, nor was he exactly being foolish about it. They both received weekly stipends, which they could use on one of the bi-weekly shopping trips the teens were let out on, but for the most part that money was going into a savings account for both of them, sort of like Paige's. It would only come available when they were 18.
"How many ships are you thinking of us taking?" Jean asked looking at Harry.
"As many as we can get, we'll worry about crewing them once we have them, right now we just need a mobile defense force. It'll be at least two maybe even three months before the industrial sector I'm working on begins to come online, and equally long for what we can do for the Ravenspires to be finished which isn't as much as I'd hoped to be honest." Harry replied.
Jean shrugged. "Sorry Harry, but there is a wealth of difference between creating a combat suit or even a fighter jet, and creating even a rudimentary spaceship or space station., That kind of large scale design is simply too intricate, with far too many damn problems, for you and I to do it."
"Exactly, so we need to figure out some other way of getting a visible defense force."
"Visible?" Emma's one eyebrow raised in query at the use of that particular word.
"Those ships would serve as decoys to draw fire away from Earth if the Kree send in ships with the intent on bombarding humanity back into the stone age." Harry replied grimly. "And if they're concentrating on the ships they might not see us coming. Which doesn't even consider the fact that my spells flummoxed the Kree sensors completely, something I am damn well going to take advantage of. Use a few ships to draw them away from the others being hidden under cloak, then take them out, either with the team or through the other ship's weapons."
"That makes sense but you still can't leave now Harry." Emma replied. "You're a public figure now, if you disappear like that this closely after your first interview it's going to look very suspicious. Especially considering everything else that has been going on in America."
"You're not suggesting that someone would think that I was in cahoots with Pierce are you?" Harry scoffed.
"No, but they might assume that you were hiding the same sort of thing that he was but haven't been found out. The American government in particular is eagerly looking for ways to force the British to force you to divulge the secrets of your medicines, to ensure a free and equal competition rather than the monopoly you have."
After a moment, Harry sighed. "I don't like the idea of sending anyone else out so we'll table…"
"No we won't." Jean said shaking his head. "You're right Harry, we need to figure out a way to keep any opposing force from simply coming in and bombarding the planet from multiple angles. We couldn't handle that kind of thing, this plan could give us at least the decoys we need to keep that from happening. I'll lead the team we send on this."
Harry locked eyes with Ororo for a moment, who nodded, and he looked back at Jean, emerald staring into jade for a moment, then he nodded reluctantly. "I'm not happy, but I can't deny the need for this mission." And I'm not about to say that I don't trust you enough to get it done. "But if you're in charge Jean, you get to choose the force."
"Myself, Una and a few other Kree prisoners, those who have shown the most hate and disdain for their old society I'll ask doctor Lefton about the number of prisoners he thinks would be willing to work with us. Nikolai, Paige, Dani. I'll take Douglas too if he agrees, his computation skills will help, as will his ability to read body language if we have to communicate with anyone."
Harry winced. "I don't like the idea of having him out in the field. Despite his skills with languages of all kinds, he has about the same sense of self-preservation as a lemming." Douglas had of course been given some training in hand to hand as all the teens were even those not on the team, and took to it precisely like a rock took to swimming. He was also a horrible shot, and didn't like the idea of hurting anyone.
"Do you think the fantastic four would be willing to send Reed along?" Jean asked.
"Read and Susan possibly, they were the ones most interested in space exploration before their mission." Harry murmured, irritated at himself for having to fight the instinct to want to do this himself. Why the hell had he been training Jean and the others in leadership all along if it wasn't for times like this if he couldn't trust them to handle it without him?
Jean nodded, and the conversation continued from there were as they went into particulars of the mission.