The day had dragged on while those who had been called arrived, the substantial wing of the hotel that had been put aside for them equally played host to the larger and more comfortable conference rooms, the large business table, complete with chairs more akin to living room furniture than the rigid nature of the board room, had been complemented with a hologrpahic projector at its centre, courtesy of Stark Industries.
Tony was standing, having releniquished the tempting offer of the largest chair, set at the head of the table, to be able to interact with the projector, and simply stroll around the room, he didn't particularly like remaining still. That and those who had arrived probably thought him unlikeable enough without him proclaiming himself their director.
Slide 1 presented a map of the Continental United States, as well as portions of Mexico and Cuba, detailing Fury's last known actions, a trace that was less accurate than Stark would have wanted, although probably far more so than Fury would have allowed, if he'd even known about it. That said, his course of action was rather clear, he'd been attempting to go to ground, although Stark would have hardly thought the government would have been able to pick him up so quickly if he hadn't also been attempting something counter to remaining hidden, Fury was a slippery bastard even at the worst of times, and this time he'd clearly had a reason to hide.
The private elevator leading up to the room hummed, as the first of them arrived.
Thor stepped forth from the open doors, his manner no-nonsense, mouth still set in a grim line. He did not favor strange voices entering uninvited into his mind, not even to direct him, but he would not quarrel with the necessity of instruction. He wore the beach garb still, shorts, t-shirt, flip-flops, hat, even if such disguises were likely moot by that point. He paused then when he spotted Tony Stark. He stared at Stark briefly. Then he cast a slow glance around the rest of the room, a glance that finally found its way back to the host.
“Stark,” greeted the god of thunder in a rumble that carried. “It is heartening to see that you live. Midgar would be greatly less amusing elsewise.”
Tony paused for a moment, the adjustment required to communicate with Thor after spending a while without speaking to the Asgardian, before responding;
"It's good you could make it Thor, trust me, I am equally thrilled I am still alive." He approached Thor, before making the questionable decision to shake his hand, despite the Asgardian's ability to limit his strength, the moment they clasped hands it almost felt like he'd forgotten to, and Tony didn't fancy being crippled before the mission had even began. When his hand remained intact however, it left him wondering if Thor was simply a fan of hearty handshakes, or if he'd deliberately given him a scare.
"Interesting...disguise, you have there."
Thor issued an eloquent grunt at the human’s reply. The Asgardian knew of few humans that lived their lives to the extent as Stark. Great indulgences, but right alongside great sacrifice. He shook the human’s hand with a respectful warrior’s grip, fortunately remembering a second before squeezing to be mindful of the fragile human bones. The strength of Stark was in the man’s mind, not body, but the mind was more than adequate to accomplish heroic feats.
Thor glanced down at himself.
“I thought it better to blend,” the god replied, missing Stark’s sarcasm. “Odin has not sanctioned my visit, and as thus, I wish to remain hidden until impractical.” The scrutiny caused Thor to inspect Stark’s own clothing, but there was nothing particular to comment upon there.
Instead the Asgardian gave the room another glance. “I trust you are gathering more than empty seats for this uprising,” he said. “I heard a sorceress of yours whisper in my mind as I arrived. I assume she is an ally?”
"Yes Thor, she is, although probably not if you keep calling her that." Stark answered with a smirk, although mentally noting the term for use later.
Thor regarded Stark’s smirk and decided to file that knowledge away. Thor knew a thing or three about angering a sorceress. Not the type of woman one wanted to spurn, but surely the woman in question could not be too disagreeable if she kept company with such as the Man of Iron.
“I will mind my tongue, then,” said the Asgardian.
With a shrug and a small smirk of his own, Thor moved past Stark to inspect the projection, absently searching for clues that told the purpose for the meeting. Probably of them all, Thor would know the least of the current happenings on this world, mostly those events Heimdall could easily discern from the watcher’s perch. Thor did not like that feeling, being the least informed, but he was patient enough to wait for the knowledge.
Thor glanced over his shoulder when he heard the elevator softly ding.
The elevator once again opened up showing a rather tired, wet and sandy looking Steve Rogers. As soon as the doors had slid open completely, he took the few steps out of the elevator and into the new conference room, nodding respectfully towards Tony first and then spotted Thor, also giving him a respectful nod of acknowledgement.
"Am I not late then?" He asked, remaining standing by the chair he would have considered sitting down in had it not been that he looked and smelt like the ocean.
"No, well, you've still beat most, and that's all that really matters." Stark returned to looking at the projected diagram, after nodding to the Captain, momentarily pausing to note how it very much looked like 'any other' Avengers meeting so far, hopefully with less internal conflict than their last few before the attack on New York.
"You can sit, Steve, the only person you'd insult would be the owner...and I'm fine with an odd smelling chair."
Steve looked from Tony to the chair aprehensively before just deciding to take a seat, resting his clasped hands together on the long table in front of all the chairs in the room. Well...if Stark owned the place, then he didn't mind so much getting the chair dirty.
"So...who are we still waiting on? Have you heard from Bruce? Hawkeye? Black Widow?"
The prince of Asgard moved to grip Steve Roger’s shoulder and clasp hands firmly, another warrior’s clasp just shy of bone-crushing. The towering blonde god tried not to loom over the seated man, and thusly simply chose to sit down beside. “Captain Rogers,” said Thor, rumbling a chuckle as he surveyed the fellow Avenger. “Could Stark not have leant one of his flying chariots for the journey?” the Asgardian jested lightly. “You look as if you swam here, my friend.”
Rogers’ question was also a silent one of Thor’s, of course. He glanced to Stark to hear the answer.
Steve looked up to Thor with a rather annoyed expression on his face, and simply stated...
"I did..."
"Not just 'us' this time, this registration issue is as much, if not more, a mutant issue than our own. Sorry I couldn't fully brief you both on the matter, but we'll be having a little help from some X-men on this one." And we need it remained unsaid, they'd conquered alien invaders together, but the US government? A whole different kind of villain in this scenario.
Jean Grey kept it simple: a grey cotton tank top too thin to do more than cover the tighter, form fitting, white tank top below it. She wore pale pink denim cutoffs that were short-short, instead of simply short, a new pair of white leather sandals on her feet, a pair of pink oversized sunglasses being removed from her face as she walked in chatting quietly with the tall blonde X-Man.
Calvin Rankin had not bothered to change, and likely would not. It was Calvin who walked in first, before Jean followed in his shadow. "Gents," Rankin's accent was light, almost too light to be recognized as Australian, unless a person were to focus on his words; the few he gave, anyway. Jean left a straw tote bag slip from her right shoulder and onto the ground, next to the chair in the middle of the table she picked just to the left of Calvin's.
Jean's attention flashed to the images projected, before it turned to the people in the room, her right hand tacking free falling strands of red hair behind her ear as her attentions were concentrated. She was hoping the Thunder God wouldn't bring up anything unexpected; like the Phoenix. Jean started with a little wave of her fingertips to Stark, before a full smile flashed a greeting to the other two.
"Fury's alive," She said straight to Stark, knowing the other two Avengers would focus in fast. "I don't know where. I can't locate him. That's...strange, because it means someone's gone through a lot of trouble to make him hard for a telepath to locate. But he is alive, and not under too much strain right now. If I had to guess, I'd say he's knocked out cold where ever he is."
It wasn't much, but at least she could tell them the man was alive.
"Ah, Thor, here's your 'sorceress,' see, stunning, even when she isn't using her mind powers," Stark smirked, ignoring his own advise as Jean walked in, nodding to Calvin, if only because he felt it a little too rude to ignore those who arrived, at least before he got into one of his many trains of thought.
He frowned somewhat at the mention of Fury though, especially the detail she provided, which pretty much confirmed the belief he'd been taken, rather than simply having so succesfully disappeared as to have dropped off Stark's own grid. He turned back to his map, showing the rarely revealed Stark ability to shift eyes from a beautiful woman in a crisis. The map projected into the air spun, as he began to make notes onto it, with various hand gestures that would have meant nothing to anyone but the device picking them up.
At the arrival of Jean Grey, Steve found himself bolting to stand from his chair, mostly out of respect for a woman entering the room. Like Thor, Steve wasn't naive to the fact that she was indeed beautiful, and suddenly he felt even worse about his current dress attire, regretting that he wasn't sporting the typical red white and blue uniform.
"Ma'am." Steve said tentatively sticking out his hand to shake her own hand. He had been briefly informed of Jean from Stark himself when he had reached out to Steve to arrange this meeting, but he had no idea that a woman with such reputation could also be so...beautiful.
Calvin found himself smirking, as he considered the sleezy way Stark addressed Jean Grey. Getting closer to Jean had been Calvin's main reason for coming, if for no other reason than to 'see what he could see.' And, to be certain, he had more reasons than his own curiosity alone. Many more. Did Stark really expect Jean to fall for what 'Iron-Man' called charm? That truly was amusing to Calvin. Steve Rogers looked content to sit and wait and stink, like a good soldier.
The 'God' felt to Calvin as thick headed as he looked. It was a thought that Calvin enjoyed, even if he did so privately, and smugly.
"Sorceress?" Jean asked with a small frown, her green eyes jumping up, leaping from Stark to Thor, lingering just a few moments on the blonde Thunder God before both look and frown were swept away with a furrowed brow and tiny trace of scowl, "I'm not a sorceress."
Calvin took the opportunity to slip from one side of his chair to the other, closer to Jean, whispering something to Jean even as he watched Thor with a self satisfied smile. A self satisfaction that turned into amusement, as he finished his whisper to Jean and leaned back straight into his chair again. The whisper even left Jean snickering, though faintly. "I don't put spells on people. Though if I did..."
Then she grinned, and stopped herself there. "Lord knows I've been called worse than 'sorceress.'" Jean even did a slow double take at the tall, blonde, and strapping human. "Hi, Captain." A greeting with a hint of a blush thrown in. Old fashioned, that one.
"Hilarious, you know, I knew a few people like you in High School. I think they clean my septic tank now." Stark didn't bother turning to face Calvin as he spoke, the bluetooth device in his ear picking up far more than just the words in this one room. It wasn't smart or grown up, but as the Captain and Thor had learned over similar meetings, Stark had a cold place in his heart for those who felt their powers entitled them to something more, even if in the case of the two Avengers, their actions had proven to Tony they were far from simply that.
"Sir, disturbance at current-level windows, Gamma-2, supporting defensive grid." JARVIS chimed from the central projector, prompting a response from Tony.
"Let him in, we've talked."
Steve found himself looking around the room, trying to locate the body that the voice belonged to. He had heard that voice once before...in his head...what did Tony call it? His robot butler?
Dissatesfied at not finding a strange looking robot in the room, Steve trained his eyes on the door instead where someone was supposed to be coming in soon. Gamma radiation? He adjusted himself in his seat a bit tentatively, wondering if a great big green guy was going to just rip down the doors instead of a scientist casually walking through.
With that, one of the windows, aimed away from the beach and into the Cuban jungle, slid open, a furry blue figure darting in, before he stood upright, placing a comical, if stereotypical, sombrero, atop his head.
"Took your time Stark...I feel my disguise may not have worked under inspection." Hank McCoy spoke with an element of humor, with a calm voice that was rarely raised in anything but interest or that same joking manner. The kind that gave you endless chances, but who you'd be terrified to break that last straw.
He 'padded' over to the meeting table, seemingly ignoring everyone around it, and focusing on the projection in a similar manner to Stark, although not being able to interact with it, without first prompting the billionaire. Soon the pair were engaged in a very indepth conversation with very high-brow terminology. What the room didn't hear, was the silent telepathic greeting, to the mind he knew would be waiting for one.
"Jean, I'll have to get used to seeing you again. But for now, still the most extreme pleasure." He was always one for dramatics, even when 'thinking.'
There was no need for Stark to point out the ‘sorceress.’ Thor already had eyes upon her the moment she entered. Of course she was beautiful, and of course she had much flesh on display. Both were valid reasons for any man to stare. But Thor had lived most of his existence around beautiful women. Not that he was immune to particular charms, but it was the aura around this particular woman that drew his scrutiny rather than the length of long, well-shaped legs.
Well, to be fair, maybe it was both.
Thor narrowed his arctic eyes slightly, his jaw tightening. Trying to work out his alarm as the others blathered to one another. There was something to this one, something not of this world, some flicker of cosmic. Something both familiar and foreign, known but unknown, yet Thor could not place the sensation or memory. That did not necessarily mean that she was an enemy, but instinct told Thor she was dangerous. Very dangerous. Yet a glance around revealed none of the others were wary in her presence. Perhaps Thor’s own senses were mistaken. Even so, Thor nearly regretted leaving Mjolnir in the sands at the bottom of the Gulf.
The god stood slowly, hands on the table, and addressed the woman, somehow achieving a “regal” bearing despite board shirts and a tacky souvenir t-shirt. The swell of muscles in his arms were tight, veins standing with tension.
“I am Thor Odinson, Prince of Asgard, God of Storms, and Avenger of Earth,” he said low and slow. “Companion of Stark and Captain Rogers. Be you sorceress or not, I would know your name and your intentions here, woman.” Calvin and Stark remained all but ignored, as well as the entrance of a … blue furry troll? No, Thor did a small double-take on Hank before refocusing his glare to the red-head. The troll could wait until the woman had answered.
"Not sorceress," Jean's smile found her pink glossed, shiny, lips...despite the urge that followed the God's demand. "Or 'woman.' Doctor Jean Abigail Grey. Aliases include 'Marvel Girl', and more recently, 'Phoenix'." Jean knew even before Thor was done speaking what he was really after. And it wasn't anything close to what to what Calvin Rankin or Tony Stark were after.
No, all Thor wanted was to make the connection between his intuition, and reality. A connection Jean served up to him by including her second alias; that of the cosmic entity personified: the Phoenix. Because what a girl wanted more than anything was to be stared down by a God like Thor for nothing about her other than that cosmic sensation she gave him.
For once in her life, Jean Grey wished she'd given the God a sensation closer to what she gave Stark, instead of the that of the cosmic variety. "Let's just call me Jean, even in the field," Her words were simple enough, even if the look her green eyes gave the God suggested something more to her meaning. "If that's okay with you, 'man'?"
Thor stared at Jean Grey a long moment, arctic eyes hard. He'd managed not to erupt at mention of Phoenix, but only barely. Surely the nomenclature was purely coincidental. Surely the woman had not named herself after a legendary being for any reason other than homage to the fables that Midgardians told of such. But Thor could not deny what he had sensed. Nor could he decide how much of a threat it would be... or if it was even a threat at all. Time would tell, he supposed. All he knew presently was that this woman was one he would keep a close eye upon.
"As you wish... Jean," he said, obviously grudging. Slowly, he sat back down, convincing his body by degrees to release the tension that often preceded great violence. Friends, he reminded himself. He was here among friends.
Thor was not the only member of a unique bloodline to arrive at Cuban meeting. Barely outside the hotel, an arcane circle materialized before emitting a woman in tight-fitting black leather besides Scott Summers, the controversial former leader of the X-Men, also garbed in black leather, and something of a winner in a genetic lottery in which his entire family was made up of powerful mutants, the kind that authority should recognize as formidable.
But Scott was gentle enough in general. He stepped up to he door with his most trustworthy companion at his side, Illyana Rasputin, ironically the most gothic and intimidating woman he knew.
While Thor, the mighty thunderer he was, had been grumbling about the so-called 'Sorceress' that was Jean Grey, he as entirely oblivious to the former hellion queen that had just teleported onto the beach. They recieved a few curious glares from the locals, but nothing that necessitated a top on their part. After all,Tony Stark had invited Summers to his 'beach party', and Magick was just his escort and chauffeur. When fighting intergalactic conquerors and omega level mutants, teleporting is usually more practical than, say, The Blackbird.
So, stepping up to the hotel doors, Magick looked at Scott, as if her eyes were communicating a hint of doubt in the wisdom in this course. But Scott just smiled at her and chuckled a bit before adjusting his hair a bit.
"This can't possibly go that wrong. And if it does, just pull us out," he said as he began to pry the double doors apart. "Actually," he reconsidered, "just stay by the entrance." Then, peeling the doors apart, Scott stepped inside the Cuban lobby and looked around. It was peaceful enough in appearance.
So he made his way around the space before spotting an elevator along the edge of the wall. He smiled at the worker at the front desk, who responded by nervously smiling back and breathing uneasily.
Typical, Scott mused, offset by the fact that the man kept staring at his signature visor. Without asking permission from anyone, he strolled over to the elevator and pressed a button, stepping inside before riding it up several floors to a conference room.
As soon as the doors spread, he took a glance at the people gathered within, spotting a blonde, muscular behemoth, the billionaire playboy that was Stark, Captain America, and then.. Jean Grey? 'Was this real?' he wondered to himself before cautiously stepping into the room, ready to call Illyana in an instant.
"Jean?!?"
Jean didn't even look; too busy keeping herself from another brush with a blush. She just kept that forced smile upon her glossed lips, even as she stood from her chair and walked towards the entrance of the conference, shooting a look behind her to the group at the table. "We'll be right out in the hall for a few minutes." Jean assumed the mutant man would follow her into the hall as she walked past him.
Steve blinked awkwardly, looking between Jean and the man who had just entered the room, exclaiming his surprise over the presense of the woman. He cleared his throat and took a couple steps back before sitting back down in his seat, averting his eyes from the situation that had just become somewhat awkward for everyone in the room.
Luckily for her, Summers did, letting her close the doors to the conference room as he walked out. The hall was the same, no matter the hotel; a short fiber, freshly vacuumed carpet in a hall where the biggest features was the art framed on the walls, and the elevators 'dinging' away softly. Only then did Jean stop and look at Scott Summers.
"Hi, Scott. Hadn't seen you much the last week at the Mansion. How are you?"
"I.." He didn't know what to say. He didn't know if he should've screamed or cried. "J-J-J-J-Jean.. is that you?"
A lone tear streamed down below his right eye. After mourning her death years ago, he'd thought that he'd simply run out of tears. But he was wrong, he discovered. It's not every day that a revolutionary realizes that his dreams aren't all dead.
Jean's voice dropped to a whisper. The kind of whisper that only carried with it secret tones and words best kept between two well acquainted souls like Scott and Jean; her green eyes wide and raw and watchful. For any sign. "I don't know how. I woke up where I died, in what remains of Genosha. A man I quickly realized was a weakened Magneto was the first to find me. A day later he helped me get home to the Mansion. That's the day the Mansion got Stark's message. So I decided to come out and help."
That was, though abridged, exactly how it had happened. "I don't know how's or why's apart from that, I'm sorry."
She said, not for the first time, apologizing for returning from the dead.
Swallowing the pain in his throat, he smiled a little bit, like the sun rising in the dawn. His lip spread to the side of his face as he thought of what he could say to her. What can you possibly say when someone you love returns from the dead? Only the truth, he realized as he looked into her moist eyes.
Slowly, but steadily, he recalled the last few years of his life, "I left the X-Men. I quit when you and Xavier were gone. Without you, there was reason for me to stay. I always wanted to change the world, so I did. I became my own man, started my own team, and chose a different life where I've touched more Iives than I ever did on our old X-Men team. I-I've changed the world, even saved it a few times. But it's always killed me that you died. Don't apologize to me, Jean. I'm sorry I wasn't there for you all those years ago."
"Oh no, don't have her stop apologizing now. Not when she's actually doing it correctly for once." A silky voice came from down the hall. Coming out of the shadowed entry way from the lounge, as she had apparently taken the stairs, Neena came forward. Her eyes narrowed a bit at Jean but her attention stayed on Scott. Still though, she continued to walk forward until she was practically standing in between the couple, a part of her heart going out to Scott as she realized that he had let a few tears slide for this woman.
"She's not worth it Scott. The Jean Grey you knew before the Government put their noses up our asses is still dead, and will always be dead." A light smile fluttered across her black lips as she looked back over to Jean and winked before pushing past Scott to enter the room of men.
It was a ping-pong of tones. Jovial and teasing, with the loud smack coming from Jean's hand against Domino's backside and the grin to accompany it. "Welcome back, Dom."
And then, her eyes returned to Scott Summers, and the jovial and teasing was gone. Extinguished, leaving only a muted sense of seriousness between Jean and Scott Summers. "I know. We'll get together and talk after Stark's glorified PowerPoint show, okay? In the meantime let's get in there. They've got just as much put into this fight as we do, especially since it's their leader missing in action right now."
Something, she thought, Scott and she could relate to. "Okay?"
Once the black & white woman left the hallway, Scott halfway considered vaporizing her, except that he knew it was wrong. Ever since he could remember he'd struggled with the same base desire. As one of he planet's most powerful inhabitants alive it had only made sense that he had some sort of superiority over the less powerful, after all, evolution had crafted him. But it was his unprivileged upbringing that gave him self-control and a conscience to plague him over every misdeed.
But for Jean, and Jean alone, he'd hold back a little longer. Caging his curiosity, he agreed, saying, "Okay."
Jean walked into the room first, pushing the door open for Scott to follow: "Hey, nerds," she said to Hank and Stark, "We nearing ready to fire this laser light show up?"
"Lasers?" Steve found himself ducking his head instinctively.
"My Kingdom for a laser pointer." Just because teasing Cap would be, she thought, that amusing.
"I've got nothing more than lasers." Stepping inside the room, Scott made his visor glow as he looked at the former war hero, who nearly fell out of his seat when he realized that Scott's visor was glowing red. "And they're a lot less fun than you'd think."
"Sorry, no lasers." Stark replied, nearly at a half-whisper, before clapping his hands, the holographic projection warping into a straight line of light, before disappearing into the projector beneath it.
"McCoy here was simply helping me work on a theory for a new arc generator." Not entirely, although that had come up, not before both of them had confirmed how unlikely it would be to track Fury, without inside, or drastic outside, help. The face that Tony wore when he turned to regard the fully assembled group was one of grim determination, rather than his usual humor.
"I won't waste time on listing their past grievances, but this government has taken a great man, and one of our only hopes at shutting the whole system down without a full scale civil war. I had hoped bringing in the world most powerful, surviving, telepath, and another genius rather more used to governmental oppression, might have given us more of a location, but it hasn't." He paused, perching on the edge of the table, they had all gathered at one end, so he remained facing them all, beyond Beast who remained somewhat behind him.
"Only one person will know where they've taken him, one who isn't on their side. A woman who's used to far more terrifying governments than this, so far, and who never trusts the men in charge. Which technically means she's never trusted me, but anyone who does is many degrees dumber than they think. Natasha went into hiding before they took Fury, I've only got a fix on her because she's revealed herself, she's on her way..."
"And once she gets here, the government will have its casus belli." Beast interrupted, the latin phrase seemlessly woven into his sentence, as if no more normal a wording could have been chosen, "The US, under the new lifting of the embargo, will have grounds to extrodite us all for harboring a traitor, and, well, the Cuban government isn't particularly fond of a lot of us anyway." Beast's eyes fell on Stark, although, it was hardly like he was the only offender in the room, at least the 'death warrant' on the billionaire wasn't public, Natasha on the other hand, once that was done, they'd lose a significant chunk of the public support on that alone, Russians were never particularly popular in the States, let alone those which refused orders.
Carol attempted to enter the conference room as quietly as possible. She held her breath and opened the door so slow it barely made noise. She was late and she knew it. After the lounge, she found jeans and a t-shirt in the hotel gift shop before she headed to her room and ripped into the mini-bar. The booze made her sleepy and she nodded off, sleeping through her alarm.
Holding her breath, Carol slowly tip-toed across the carpet towards an open chair. She started to sit down in it before it loudly creaked, annoucning her presence to everyone else.
"Shit...," she whispered under her breath as all eyes turned on her. "Hey everyone... I've been here the whole time, just quietly listening. I've been folllowing everything. So, yeah, that whole thing with Russia is like crazy, right? Vodka, Yakov Smirnoff, uhh... Communist Russia, you bite dog..."
Carol rubbed her flushed face and looked down at her lap.
"Sorry about that. Hey, Cap, Thor, other super friends... I'll just be shutting up now."
Stark sighed after an elongated silent pause, "Never work with children, animals or Avengers." He allowed Danvers to wither for a moment longer, although there was a significant lack of seriousness to his glare, something a veteren would probably have little difficulty in bearing.
His attention was dragged away from Danvers as the projector on the table crackled to life, although remaining simply a beam of light, visibly shifting from side-to-side as a familar voice sounded through the device.
"This is agent Romanov, recorded message. Sorry Tony, won't be able to make your little get together, the heat's too strong on us Fury sympathisers, can't let them get away with this, not again." Despite being a recording, it fully drew the billionaire's attention, suconciously mouthing responses, although he managed to avoid blurting them out. The agent was more than a friend and fellow avenger, even before then she'd saved his life a number of times, he didn't want her dying because of what she was telling them.
"I couldn't get a complete fix on Fury, but SHIELD have recently moved two top security prisoners, beyond any clearance level I even knew existed. One has remained in the States, still being transported onboard SHIELD's mobile headquarters, the other's been moved to the UK, SHIELD's top security facility on the Devon moors. I don't have any more information as to which one is Fury, but I can't imagine they'd use this level of clearance for anyone not useful for fighting back. That's all I have time for, they'll have already traced me."
The message cut out immediately, no cliche gunfire in the background or violent shouts, Natasha was too smart to let them get that close, instead it left the room in silence for the moment, Stark's hands pressed to the surface of the table, as his mind raced through the problem at hand.
It was Hank that spoke first, the calm of his voice resorting to a usual habit of his; "The miserable have no other medicine but only hope." The quote drew Stark's eye, a slight frown crossing his features, although he seemed disinclined to comment on it, and again it was Hank who continued.
"So, it would seem we must divide, and wage war on two nations, let us hope we do not drag the rest of the human world into it."
"I've worked with SHIELD in UK," Carol said while staring at her lap. "For only about six months last year, I acted as a SHIELD liaison with MI13, it's like the British version of SHIELD. I'm not an expert about all the facilities and infastructure they have there, but I know where to start looking, and I might have some friendly contacts on the other side of the Atlantic who may be willing to help."
It was a good idea; splitting up. Even if Jean didn't like the idea, it still remained a good idea. "Okay. Meet up here tomorrow at 7am for splitting up and shoving off? Give everybody one night to blow steam and come back tomorrow focused and ready?"
"For with long travel I am stiff and weary.Get thee away." Hank smile slightly at Jean's reaction, before turning his head to regard Tony, who gave little more than a terse nod, turning back to watch the hovering stream of light that arose from the middle of the table, remaining still even as the rest of those assembled filed out. Hank remained until they were gone, giving a last few words for Stark, before leaving himself;
"Unwind Stark, you do it well from what I hear. She can save herself, worry about the ones who cannot in her place."
