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"Report."
"Our cyborg agents have been unable to come up with anything conclusive yet to tell us where the new medicines are being manufactured. We have been unable to procure a sample of the new medicines, but it is conclusively proven that they work. Neither of our agents however have anything to do with shipping or distribution, only taking and filling out new orders. That doesn't give them any reason that will pass muster to explore the computer network of Magical Minds, and its security is such that any attempt to get in will be found almost immediately. We could do it, but we would lose our agents for certain. Physically, they cannot access the holding areas for the potions, security of some sort keeps them and the other office workers away.
"What about getting one of our agents into Frost Shipping? Surely that way we could get something."
"I'll look into it Sir, but we do not already have agents in place."
"Do so, but be circumspect. Thanks to SHIELD we have lost several of our agents and more than a dozen holdings worldwide. We can ill afford to make another enemy, especially one of unknown ability. Infiltrate several more agents into the British government as well, we need to pursue that angle. We must secure these new medicines for AIM!"
OOOOOOO
The small Tuk-Tuk zoomed down the road, driven by a young looking man of Indian descent with such bland features and clothing he could disappear into the crowd of the smallest, most insular village with nary a ripple. Well he looked like a young man at present, and the Tuk-Tuk didn't really zoom so much as scoot. Behind him on the passenger's seat of the small, poorly designed and manufactured three-wheeler was an elderly woman, who could again fit easily into the crowd of any farming community. They were both so bland they barely even registered on the minds of the other people on the road.
Covered by the noise of the damn Tuk-Tuk and the surrounding traffic, the young man spoke to his companion without worrying about being overheard for the first time since they had left the luxury cruise liner that had deposited them Mumbai. "Are you certain you know where we're going?"
"I know where we need to be, how we get there is up to you." The old woman grumbled as they hit a rut in the road. "And I must say this mode of travel leaves much to be desired."
"Welcome to the life of a field agent, my dear. And some more information would be nice." The younger man muttered. If anyone was able to hear over all the other noise all around them, they would have wondered why he sounded strangely feminine.
Mystique and Irene had been moving through India for several weeks now, using public transportation when they could. But now they were deep into Naga-land, an area that had only in the past ten years seen a cessation of hostilities between tribes, and warring religions along with insurgents who wanted the region to become independent. It didn't have the infrastructure to allow many trains, or even paved roads, a fact Irene's back was presently lamenting. Though both travelers had enjoyed some of the local cuisine, farming was a large part of the economy around here, and the dishes were incredible.
"We will be facing a vampire of some kind, I cannot see how old or powerful. He has something in his possession, a book of darkest magic, or he will when he discovers it hidden in the statue he recently purchased." Irene frowned. " We must not allow him to discover it, or he will use it and damn himself and much of India, somewhat literally in his case."
"Great." Mystique grunted angrily, twisting the wheel so hard to avoid a large pothole in the dirt road they were on the Tuk-Tuk nearly fell onto its side. Behind her Irene squawked in horror, but Mystique righted them expertly, and the two lovers continued down the road. "Just great. I hate vampires. I don't suppose the man who will offer us a choice has disappeared has he?"
"I am afraid not. He will still find us before the wings of the owl do."
"Great…" Mystique muttered, repeating herself for a third time. The Tuk-Tuk carried on silently for a time after that.
OOOOOOO
Harry smiled slightly as he, Melody and Illyana walked around the gigantic room. Every single segment of the walls around was covered with different art works, which spread to several displays set into the floor. Emma had been correct, The Vatican museum was quite an amazing place, with all the different types of architecture, artwork, and extravagance that had been laid out over centuries of worship to the Christian god, but also to art itself.
Today had been the first day where Harry didn't have anything important to do. There was nothing going on that needed his attention on the business end. He and Steven were both stuck on a portion of the array they were working on, but Steven had volunteered to figure out the issue, and he had finished most of his smaller magical projects, though many of them didn't yet have an actual application, such as his new magic based spy devices, based off some of the toys Jean had collected from Selene's second cache.
So, Harry had decided to visit Rome with Emma, since she too was in a holding pattern with many of her own ongoing projects (read investigations) and had the day free of normal business. He wanted Emma to see what the telepath could glean from sampling the pope's feelings from a distance. That problem was one that was looming large in the future, and he wanted to know now if he had to plan for it.
Jean and Ororo had bowed out, being too deep into their own projects, so he had instead brought Amara and Piotr due to understanding their artistic leanings. They were currently standing near a huge fresco of some kind going gaga over the artwork. Emma had been with them originally, but had moved to join Harry and the two girls when the discussion became too technical.
In contrast, Melody and Illyana had spent most of their time simply flitting from one random piece of art to another, making up stories about people they passed by or those in the different paintings. Neither of them were into the arts, so didn't much see the point. They had however enjoyed the Coliseum a lot, as had Harry. The crowds had been a problem for Melody at first, but Harry had solved it the same way that he had done when she joined him and Ororo on their date. Over this he had layered a few spells on all of them that had subtly directed the crowd to keep from bumping into them when at all possible. It had definitely helped his daughter, and Melody had loved her day out.
He frowned slightly, getting a feeling of being watched, something he had felt since he and the others had arrived in Rome. He knew someone was spying on them via magical means, some kind of familiar spell or something that allowed the user to watch them through some kind of medium, a conjured creature or something. It wasn't an ability he had run into personally before, but Steven's predecessor had, and his library had given Harry several ideas on how to deal with it.
Harry could keep their words from being overheard of course, but that hadn't stopped whoever was following them from doing so, which was what Harry wanted. He wanted them to continue to follow them until he got a feel for the magic being used, enough to trace it back to its source.
With that thought in mind he casually flicked his fingers lightly, casting a spell on Emma and himself to make it look as if they were having a normal conversation. "So, is this close enough for you to get a lock on the pope?"
Emma looked at him sharply for speaking like that in pubic, then when no one around them reacted, she shook her head, murmuring. "Never going to get used to that. And yes, I was able to find him easily enough." She sighed. "Benedict is a surprisingly open man on many issues I thought he would have been close-minded on, but he hasn't actually formulated his response on the mutant issue. He wants to wait at least another year, and let the council of cardinals come to an agreement."
She frowned taking his arm and leading him along in the wake of the two youngsters, who were now eagerly pointing toward the exit, eager to get back outside and see more of the city. "However, one thing is clear in his mind, he will not allow the church to split over this issue. What steps he might take or what he might be willing to do to make certain that doesn't happen is too unformed for me to get a good impression of. Benedict also knows about magic."
That startled Harry so much he stopped walking for a moment to stare at her. Emma smirked. "Oh yes, apparently the existence of magic is a closely kept secret, but the pope and at least some of the most senior cardinals know about it. In fact, he already has suspicions about your potions. Again however, he is wishful to take a wait and see attitude."
"I can work with that," Harry said, a small smile on his face after his initial start of surprise. "I can work with that very well, though I don't think I'll try the same trick I used to meet with William."
Emma blanched. "No, that would be bad. For one thing, the pope's older and in much less shape than Britain's king, and you might give him a heart attack, not exactly the best start to a conversation. And two, just no. Benedict is very much aware of his dignity as the pope. A formal visit is the only way to go there, and even that might not be the best way to go, possibly extending an overture toward him to come and visit you some point in the future to see the school or Magical Minds, might be a better idea."
"Ugh, I hate being formal," Harry whined, smirking at her a little before lifting the spell. Amara and Piotr joined them and he carried on speaking smoothly changing the subject. "Are you sure the food at this place you got us a reservation at tonight is worth getting dressed up for?"
The blonde rolled her eyes, inwardly impressed as she again took his arm, while across from her Melody did the same while Illyana found herself perched on her brother's broad shoulders. "I assure you Aroma comes highly recommended, not every restaurant is able to win a Michelin star."
"I suppose, but it will have to really try to beat the food we can get back home." Harry winked at Melody, causing her to giggle, holding onto his hand eagerly as they walked down the street.
Later Harry was suitably impressed with the level of cooking skill shown, but not the food. Nor was he the only one. Piotr too thought it was overdone bits of nothing, while Emma and Amara had a lot of fun. How much that had to do with the food and the ambiance, or how many heads the two of them were turning was debatable.
Emma was dressed to the nines, with a slinky white dress and the necklace Harry had created for her so many months ago. She was also covered by a modified Notice-me-Not spell that would keep anyone from connecting the 'blonde beauty' with Emma Frost. Amara wore a black and dark brown number of similar cut, and was reveling in Piotr's dumfounded look when he caught sight of her. The other diners noticing her was just a bonus.
"I do pity you peons, truly I do, if you cannot understand what fine cuisine really is." Emma said a laugh in her voice. Despite the reason behind their visit, this trip to Rome definitely beat out the three times she had been here before.
The company makes all the difference. This has been a lot of fun, even with the others here spoiling my wish to have a romantic day out. Amara is a surprisingly interesting conversationalist, and Piotr actually has a mind behind that farm boy exterior. He and Harry were quite amusing when they made fun of that group of irritating tourists, and his discussion about the difference between period pieces was good enough to make that one tour guide notice. The two little girls are okay I suppose, and Harry is quite good with them. Emma didn't really like children. Oh, she saw the reason for them, but she didn't like being around them.
"I know what I like my dear. The food's nice, the view is great, the ambience etc., it just is a little overpriced for the portions, and overdone for my tastes."
"Barbarian." Emma scoffed. Melody and Illyana both raised a hand, asking if they could go with her. Emma scowled, but nodded, leaving Harry behind to talk quietly to Amara and Piotr about what they had seen today. Mid-conversation Harry frowned, and Piotr cocked an eyebrow at his friend/teacher/team leader. "What's wrong tovarishch?"
"Hmm… nothing major, just… Remember that feeling I told you about, half of its gone now…" Harry trailed off, trying to find where one of his watchers had gone. He had discovered that there were two of them after he sat down, being able to concentrate enough to localize the magical feeling in the air. One of them was definitely connected to a small cat, though Harry sincerely doubted it really was a cat, which was perched on a nearby window ledge, well within sight of their table on the balcony of the restaurant.
The other though, that one was tougher to localize, and it had disappeared a second ago. Or so Harry thought, until he felt it return, just as Emma and the children did… That made Harry's eyes narrow dangerously, and he focused his magical senses harder on finding the second watcher. When Emma stopped to talk to a waiter, the two children continued on toward Harry, and he realized then who the targets of the second watcher were.
Rage, pure primal fury ripping away his conscious thoughts, his plan to follow the magical lines gone now, burned away by the rage that someone would dare to spy on his daughter. Harry's control snapped, his magic rippling around him, it was all he could do to stop it from affecting the physical plane around him. He bore down on his control, knowing he couldn't lose it entirely, not here, not with so many people around.
Swiftly Harry cast a spell, making everyone around him not able to notice anything unusual, a powerful spell he would have to cancel after, since it badly impaired the crowd's ability to think clearly, let alone react in an emergency. With that done he grimly reached out with his own magic to grasp the imp that was suddenly visible high up in one corner of the room, and the cat. Both of the targets of his ire noticed his anger and the spells he cast, but couldn't get away from Harry's senses.
Harry would later wish he had tried to make a verbal threat or something, but at the time his self-control was hanging by a bare thread, and he could only form a single word before his magic lashed out, slamming into their very beings and through the connection between the two creatures to their masters. "BEGONE!" With that word reality shifted and the two familiars simply ceased to exist.
Watching the two creatures disappear without even the chance to howl in pain, Harry slowly calmed down. Melody touched his hand, her wide eyes staring up at him in concern. "Father, your songs suddenly went all angry and disjointed, are you alright?"
Emma had immediately noticed what had happened, the suddenly blank, unseeing eyes of the people Harry's overpowered spell had effected was obvious. Even she felt it, though Harry hadn't included her or the others in the spell, the power of it had nearly made that attempt to exclude them fail. "What was that about?"
"Sending a message." Harry growled, then forced a smile on his face, cursing himself inwardly at not keeping control enough to follow the spells connecting his watchers to their creatures, but the idea of someone magical being interested in either his daughter or apprentice had so infuriated him he had almost lost it entirely. "I'll tell you about it later. I'm fine Melody, truly."
Emma smirked a little, reaching down between them to grab Harry's hand drawing it across to lay on her thigh, leaving it there before her hand went to his own thigh. "I think you need to get your mind off whatever just happened before you bust a blood vessel. I think there are some clubs around here, and I haven't been dancing since I first met Jean."
Music from the street below caused them all to peer over the side of the balcony to see a large group of street performers had set up shop nearby. Six women dressed in knee length frilly skirts and tight blouses were dancing around, with random people from the crowd joining in. To one side was a small band playing a Greek dancing song. "Ask and you shall receive my dear."
Illyana and Melody both clapped their hands in delight while Harry signaled the waiter for their bill. Piotr looked resigned while Emma looked amused but game. Amara however was shaking her head. "You know those are Roma right? They could be a band of thieves, there were a few of them near the Coliseum."
"Oh, but they were nice." Melody interjected, swaying her head gently to the many different songs that had taken up residence in her mind right now. "It wasn't anything personal, they just needed the money, like Aladdin and the bread."
"Well with that ringing endorsement we have nothing to fear." Harry laughed, shaking his head, though he wondered how Melody had been able to discern that through the filtering spell he had put on her. Still it wasn't the first time.
"Besides, Emma and I are the only ones who have money on us at present, and…" Harry waved his hands in series of small scale, somewhat complex spells on his wallet and Emma's purse. "Those who steal from a wizard will get more than they bargained for."
With that the six of them left the restaurant to join the small party occurring in the street. There were indeed several teens working the crowd, filching pockets. Emma took a moment to find out that they were stealing more because it was fun than because they needed the money, unlike the ones near the city.
While Piotr and Amara were dancing with the two youngsters, Emma put her arms around Harry's waist, drawing him in to a grinding sort of dance with her. "You know this doesn't match the music at all right?" Harry said with a smirk, though he still ground back, causing a gasp from her and several parents to turn their children away from the sight. "I've been told that sort of matters for some reason."
"Hmmpf, well if you had listened to me and sent the children back to the castle we could have gone to an actual club. So you're damn well going to put up with it Harry Potter."
"Putting up with things has never been my forte, escalation now…" Harry smirked, then leaned in quickly kissing her hard on the lips. His tongue darted in between Emma's surprised lips, seeking out her tongue and wrestling with it in her mouth as they continued to grind their bodies against one another. Eventually he pulled back, ignoring the amused chuckles and scandalized muttering of the crowd around them.
Emma opened her eyes slowly, gasping a little for air as she stared at Harry through lust-filled eyes. "Mmmm… damn are you certain I can't convince you to send the children back and find a hotel somewhere so I can have my wicked way with you?"
"I don't think so, besides Jean would be very annoyed with you for jumping ahead like that." Harry replied dryly. Emma laughed, and they went back to dancing, occasionally sharing kisses, but for the most part just having fun.
Later that evening the six of them left Rome, teleporting back to the castle without further incident. Later that evening, at the same time that Harry was explaining what had happened to Jean and Ororo, the thieves who had worked the crowd were going through their ill-gotten gains. When they came to the wallet Harry had allowed them to steal off him however, not only did they find it empty, but when they opened it, the wallet exploded in sparkles, filling their hideout with smoke. When the smoke dissipated, all of the thieves were covered head to in sparkles, the kind used in art projects the world over, oh, and super glue as well. Pain was momentary, humiliation lasted far longer, in Harry's opinion.
When Harry shared his memories (literally via the pensieve) with his three ladies of what he had sensed in the restaurant, they were all concerned about it, and determined that for a while at least they would err on the side of caution, and not allow either Illyana or Melody out from under the wards without at least one of the heavy hitters with them.
Harry also said he would prepare a set of protective enchantments for both girls. That was all they could do now, not having any idea how to hunt the watcher down. It was irritating, but just this once they would have to simply wait on the defense.
OOOOOOO
At the same time that Harry had lashed out with his magic, elsewhere on Earth a woman of indeterminate age yet great physical beauty reared back in shock. She had pale white skin, dark green eyes, which seemed to shimmer like water in the light of several candles set around the room, and straight dark magenta colored hair falling straight down her shoulders. At present she wore a sheer black nightgown, open down the front to reveal, though no one was there to see, much of her chest and stomach.
After a moment she recovered from her shock, shaking her head. I cut my connection at just the right time. My familiar is simply gone as if it never existed, and with it the magic that had bound us together. If my consciousness was still connected to it… She shuddered, turning away. One thing is clear, the destroyer of my phylactery has only grown stronger since. Curse it, I might need to… look for allies.
OOOOOOO
This was another place entirely, one that was decidedly not on Earth, or even in the same dimension. This was a Hell Dimension, much like Mephisto's, though without that beings… flare. That didn't mean it was pleasant, it was simply much more like the normal image of hell seen in so many paintings without his additions. But much like Mephisto, the lord of this particular hell had a castle, and a throne, in which he was sitting now.
The magician known as Belasco sighed faintly as he watched on of his minions screaming in agony as it literally dissolved in front of his eyes, the very fabric of its being erasing. Whatever had happened to its paired imp had reverberated along their link, and the greater demon was now dying, no worse than dying, simply ceasing to be a horrible thought. "So, it appears as if my chosen apprentice has found a most powerful guardian, one who is both powerful and vigilant. One that is also paired with the Life-giver's avatar, I recognized him from my servant N'astirh's description of that debacle."
"I, I will need to think on this further." He stood up then, ignoring the still screaming demon as he walked out, thinking hard, weighing possibilities and odds in his head, not liking any of the conclusions he was reaching, unwilling to give up the prize, yet terrified of what he had just seen.
OOOOOOO
Two days after his visit to Rome, Harry sat with Reed next to him in the observation deck, gazing out into space as they sipped at a few semi-alcoholic drinks. All right, they were incredibly alcoholic, but they were also small, thus would not be able to impair their mental functions. The two men had just finished discussing Betsy, who Reed had medically cleared to return to Britain with her brother that morning.
She was fine physically better than fine actually she was at the peak of physical condition. She seemed alright mentally, which was possibly due to her telepathic powers given the fact she had thrown off Mojo's mental dominance several times, not letting it build up. Her mechanical eyes however did indeed have several malware programs in them. One was designed to make them explode if a signal on a certain frequency was received, while the other was to send video out to a station in Mojoworld. Needless to say Reed had removed both.
Ororo had already heard from her. Betsy told her friend she had been called in immediately upon her return by the UK government on some job. Apparently Emma Steed was still comatose, and they wanted a telepath's aid in breaking her out of it, or determining if she was never going to break out of it at all. This was why her company was still in legal limbo, as Emma put it.
First, the government couldn't find anything indicating Ms. Steed's company had anything to do with Selene's activities. Her money, yes, but not the company's assets. Yet on the other hand, Steed was the only survivor of the Inner Circle, so they wanted to prosecute her. Yet in her current state, having lost her mind to Selene's mental domination, not only was she mentally unfit to stand trial, but she was an object of sympathy. So Betsy had been called in to see what she could do.
Now however, the two men were simply enjoying a moment of quiet contemplation. "I don't think I'll ever get tired of this view." Reed said slowly, setting down his glass on a small table set between the two of them, his eyes locked on the image of space before them.
The older man smiled faintly when his eyes caught movement on the monitor set into one wall, the wall still retaining its transparency despite the computer screen stuck on it, which showed an image from the interior of the asteroid. At present it showed the jungle, where his son Franklin was playing with young Paige, Dani, and Melody, some kind of hide and seek game, with Melody and Franklin working as a team to stay away from the teens.
Piotr and Ben were somewhere else installing some of Reed's equipment in his lab, the first of many such deliveries. Jean, Susan and Ororo were elsewhere, talking about something or other that Reed didn't want to think about, putting the heading of any fully female conversation under the heading 'troublesome' in his mind. Paige and Dani come along today having heard about Harry's space borne projects from Piotr and Nikolai. Harry had struggled with the decision but in the end he had decided to trust all the teens and read them all into it the secret. Amara however had opted out, feeling uneasy about being so far from terra firma. Johnny and Wyatt were not there either, having a day out at the race track near the Baxter Building.
However, Harry had yet to bring up any of the other younger children to the asteroid. He might have to do it eventually, but for right now he felt it was something special for Melody and Franklin.
The site of his son around with a happy grin on his face made Reed's smile widen, but he turned back to Harry when the wizard spoke. "True, it really is majestic isn't it? You say you're ready to install the next round of sensors?"
"I have them up and running yes, some final tests still need to be done, and I'm more than a little worried about the computational needs, but other than that…" Reed shrugged.
"We'll wait to install them then," Harry said shaking his head. "I think I've come up with a solution for the computational needs, but it will take a while before we see anything." He told Reed what had occurred between him and Tony, ending with Tony's offer of help and Harry's asking for an AI core.
Read nodded emphatically when Harry asked him if he would be willing to check out the programming on it. "Most definitely, I am not going to question Tony about his programming of Jarvis, but Jarvis is a personal AI, it was made merely to interact with Tony and facilitate his work it doesn't control his entire company only his house. That doesn't even mention the fact that Tony is used to being the center of things, and rather nosy too."
Behind his glass Harry smirked. "I think Tony's getting better, and I actually think he's doing very good work as Ironman, but that doesn't change the fact that he's a grandstander, and used to being the one in charge. I don't want any kind of bugs or shadow programs that bite us in the ass later." That he trusted Reed not to add his own was not said, the two men were friends and allies, and trusted one another to a degree that reminded Harry somewhat of him and Blaise for some reason.
Blaise had never been a combatant except on very rare occasions, but he was a firm ally of Harry's, funneling information and cash when necessary to Harry's efforts. Harry hoped he was happy back in his old dimension, having finally married his childhood fiancée and moved back to Italy before the battle of Hogsmeade. Reed was sort of the same, not quite on the same team with Harry, but certainly on the same side, and someone Harry trusted and was trusted and turned by. After all you did not ask a person you did not trust to train your child as Reed had Harry.
"I had a thought about a scanner myself actually." Harry went on. "I was wondering if you could prove or disprove it?" Read made a go-ahead gesture, still staring out into space. Harry went on. "You said that your defenses against magical teleportation had to do you do with sensing and redirecting the bow shock of the teleportee as it were through the air? I've read that planets and even solar systems create similar bow shocks when moving through space, and I would imagine it's true for any astral body. But would it be true that you could detect something similar moving through hyperspace?"
"It would be yes." Reed nodded. "However the power consumption needed to run that kind of the system even on a small scale would be monstrous." He paused calculated his mind, going over figures and information faster in his head then an entire team of normal scientists could've done with computers in front of them. I'd estimate you'd need the output of an entire city's worth of generators to cover barely twenty miles or so of space."
Harry frowned a little. "Damn, I thought it was a good idea."
"It might be, if we can solve the power problem. Again though, we'd need to use satellites to mount the scanners themselves, and some kind of way to beam in the power to those satellites or the satellites with their own inner power sources. Perhaps rather than having it on all the time, which would be as I said power intensive, you could pulse them out at different times during the day like sonar. It wouldn't be perfect, but it would work."
Reed went on thoughtfully. "I can see if I can finagle that technology a bit more. Make it more economic power-wise, and possibly enlarge it or shrink it, but it would take a while."
"Something to think about anyway." Harry shrugged, and the two leaders of their respective teams went back to gazing out at the stars quietly.
That calm did not last. Moments after they had finished talking a warning tone sounded throughout the asteroid. "Warning, high-energy pulse detected, gravitic anomaly detected, light wave distortion sensor activated." Harry sat bolt upright and raced over to a set of controls, slapping his hand down on it and quickly punching in the code to show the sensor's readouts on the large screen which had previously been showing Melody and Franklin. That view disappeared, and Harry and Reed looked at the sensors had picked up.
A ship had jumped out of hyperspace at the far edge of their scanning equipment. While the team assembled around them Harry and Reed waited for the ping from the light refraction array to get back to them. Twenty minutes later they watched as the ship appeared on the screen. It was largish, possibly a half a mile from one end to another and half that across at its widest point judging from the LRA. It seemed to consist of differing sized block shaped areas, with the smallest at the front, facing down toward the Earth. Weapons or anything else could not be discerned by this system, but it could detect what looked like engines at the back, and several small blisters on its surface.
"Somehow I don't think they're friendly." Harry muttered shaking his head as the 'real-time' (actually several minutes old) video of the LRA showed something small being shot out from under the front of the ship heading towards the Earth far below. "What are the odds that we would be up here at precisely the right time to spot a ship coming out of hyperspace? Attack of the spandex dilemma indeed."
Reed cocked an eyebrow while around them the other adults on the asteroid gathered. "Spandex dilemma?"
"Oh it's something Nightcrawler came up with a while back. The moment you put on a skintight suit and call yourself a hero your luck is changed for good or bad. You'll always be right where you need to either cause a crisis or prevent one."
"I had noticed something similar during our own time as adventurers I suppose, though I haven't thought it had anything to do with our uniform. Could be an interesting experiment to see if our luck did indeed change if we wear baggier suits." Reed laughed.
"Will NASA pick that up?" Harry asked, gesturing to the video.
"Even NASA won't miss something like that if one of their telescopes are pointed in the right direction." Reed said caustically. He had absolutely no respect for NASA whatsoever. The National Air and Space Administration was more a bureaucracy based more on keeping itself going these days than an organization actually devoted to space travel. They still were arguing about putting another space station up in orbit, and had ignored all the evidence of alien life forms that had been developed in the course of the Fantastic Four's career thus far because it argued against much of their own data. That 'head in the sand' attitude infuriated Reed.
Worse was the fact that they were still the biggest and best in the game on Earth, though thanks to Harry that was going to change dramatically. The two men had plans for the future, oh yes.
Right now however Reed enlarged the image of the thing that had been shot out of the ship frowning. "That… looks familiar... I think it might be a Kree Sentry android. We dealt with one of them about a year ago I believe. They are heavily armored and armed robotic troubleshooters/scouts for the Kree Empire."
"What would it be here for?" Jean asked from behind him, while the others, minus Dani who was changing into her combat gear, muttered.
"I don't know, but I think we need to take action in the event. I don't think even SHIELD has anything that could really stand up to one of those things, even if they were in the right place at the right time, without it causing a lot of damage to the surrounding area."
Harry nodded looking around at the others. Ben was frowning angrily, clenching and unclenching his rocky hands. "The Kree!" He spat out shaking his head. "Fascist bastards. If you're not Kree you're not nothing in their world, I'd hoped we'd seen the last those assholes."
"I think I need to reread your mission logs, I knew you'd run into a race called the Kree, but I didn't know your opinions about them." Harry shook his head. "However now is not the time think about that. Two teams," he said looking around at them all earnestly, taking command with the ease of long practice. "One to go after the Kree Sentry, we can't allow it to roam free down there, and we can't trust SHIELD to be able to get to it before it can do a lot of damage or carry out whatever its mission is. The other team will board and take that ship. It has entered Earth airspace without permission or declaration of intent, so I'm calling it either an act of aggression or piracy, and as such, we are fully justified in taking them out."
"Oh Harry." Jean laughed smiling widely as she saw the ship, eager to start taking it apart. "You take me to the most lovely places." Everyone laughed at that, even Reed was amused and interested. If the ship had simply stayed in orbit doing nothing however he probably would have argued against attacking it. But the moment that the ship shot out the Sentry towards Earth, without radioing its intent or doing anything to show that it respected human sovereignty of their planet, it became an attacker, and therefore fair game.
"I wish I could contact that wayward brother of mine." Susan grunted irritably. "Of all the times for him to forget his communicator, we could use the extra firepower."
"We'll have to make do without him or the others, there's no time to find them and get them here. Reed, I might need you on the ship to deal with any technical things we run into, same with Jean, so that's you two, me, Susan for scouting, Paige as strongman, and Ororo for additional firepower. Thing, Colossus, Valkyrie, Paige, you'll head down to deal with the Kree Sentry." Harry looked over at Reed. "Do those things have any kind of self-destruct device?"
Read shook his head. "No, or at least I doubt it. I examined the one we dealt with before, and it didn't seem to have any such capacity."
"Take it down hard then. I don't think we'll be able to learn anything from it that we can't learn from their ship, and going by where it's going to land, there's going to be too many civilians nearby for me to want you to faffle about."
Ben nodded grimly but Piotr spoke up. "If we need to start fighting where there are any civilians about we might need to split some of us off to help get them away from the combat area."
All the older adults looked at the younger man in surprise and respect for that idea, then both Reed and Harry nodded emphatically. "Good idea." they said as one, then looked at one another and chuckled.
Dani nodded too, laying a hand on the large Russian's shoulder.
"I will go with the ground force." Ororo said firmly, also looking at Piotr in approval. "My magics can help keep the civilians safe, allowing the rest of you to hammer the invader unimpeded."
Harry nodded, then said simply, "Let's go." Before turning to lead the way to the hangar.