Chapter 1
She stared at herself in the mirror, frowning slightly as she noted the dark circles under her eyes, the pale pallor of her skin and the general haggard look of her face. She idly wondered when she had last slept through the night without awakening to the sounds of terrified screams, seeing the deaths of her friends or the smell of charred human flesh. She shuddered remembering last night's dream, suddenly seeing Liu Kang's apparition before her eyes exactly like he was after Raiden had electrocuted him. He had died in their arms just before Shao Kahn had been defeated by the Elder Gods. Rubbing her eyes the vision faded leaving her looking at herself in the mirror again.
"Man up Sonya" She chided herself, "what would Jax say if he saw you like this." She smiled grimly no doubt Jax would have cracked a joke or threatened Johnny about something. "I wish you were here Jax we... I need you." Taking one last look at herself in the mirror, then checking her uniform, Sonya Blade straightened up then turned and walked towards the door directly behind her. She hesitated before opening the door, the others should have arrived by now, all three of them. Earth was defended by only three warriors, not including Sonya herself and she was not sure about the reliability of two of them but desperate times called for desperate measures.
She looked back around the small wash room wondering yet again when they could get better headquarters then opened the door and shut it behind her. She entered a small canteen that also functioned as an office. It contained a few cupboards, a sink and a small fridge which all lay against the opposite wall, an old wooden table was positioned against the right hand wall in front of a large cork board filled with notes and photographs of cases that the OWIA were currently working on.
Outer World Investigation Agency what a joke, she thought, after everything they had done and sacrificed this was all the government could come up with? Four overworked agents in a poky office in Alaska. If Jax had been here he would have called in favours owed, there would be more agents, available money for equipment, outside expertise and weapons, a much better headquarters in a more suitable location...but Jax was not here to do this. She was and unfortunately Sonya had never developed that easy going attitude that had gotten Jax all those friends in all the right places. The table had four unmatched chairs of which three were currently occupied.
Johnny Cage currently languished in one and except for a small scar running down from his lip to his chin he looked the same as he had during Shao Kahn's invasion. Currently he had his feet propped up on the table, he held a black coffee in his right hand and was busy reading the sports results from today's newspaper in his left hand. Judging from the snorting noises he was making the baseball scores were not what they should have been. Johnny had helped Sonya form the OWIA as he felt his movie career was not important any more. Sonya was glad of Johnny's presence though despite his attempts at flirting and joking with her, she knew he had her back and she had his.
To the left of him sat Cyrax, one of the Lin Kuei hybrid cyberninjas. He had been automated along with Sektor, Sub-Zero and other unknown members of the clan on the orders of their Grandmaster. The only reason Cyrax was with them was due to luck although Cyrax insisted it was fate. After Shao Kahn's defeat Sonya, Johnny and Raiden had returned to their temporary base to prepare the bodies of the others for their funerals, Raiden was going to take them to the Shaolin Temple for the monks to give them their final rites. Cyrax along with the mindless automatons that had accompanied him and Sektor were still in the room where they had fallen. Sektor was nowhere to be seen and had apparently given Cyrax up for dead or had no further use for him. Upon examination Sonya had found that Cyrax's access panel had been damaged, exposing the delicate circuits beneath his armour; no doubt caused in the battle against Nightwolf. Using the same technique she and Jax had used to override Sub-Zero's programming she had deactivated his slave protocols allowing his own consciousness to re-emerge. After the wailing and a long string of what she could only believe were oaths in Cyrax's mother tongue Tswana; at least according to Raiden, Cyrax had sworn loyalty to Raiden although Sonya suspected it was only so he could get revenge upon the Lin Kuei. Raiden had asked him to help Sonya and Johnny though at the time they had been at a loss at what to do. Cyrax was not wearing the faceguard of his helmet and some of the upper body armour, the skin of his face and arms looked abnormally pale due to the lack of sunlight and Sonya could see wiring protruding directly under his skin. He was flicking through an intelligence report in Russian. Apparently it was common for Lin Kuei assassins to be fluent in several languages besides their mother tongue because it made it easier to operate in a foreign country.
The last occupant at the table was a handsome Eurasian man who wore a crimson-red silk sash across his eyes, he was dressed simply in black trousers and a thick red sweater and he had a sheathed katana blade leaning against the wall to the side of him. He called himself Kenshi, what his real name was none of them knew although Sonya was used to that she doubted that Cyrax was the cyborg's real name anyway. Johnny had recruited Kenshi, he remembered watching him fight on behalf of Earth at Shao Kahn's tournament against a general of the Emperor's named Reiko. At the time Johnny said he had forgotten about Kenshi as he and Smoke had been in shock after being forced to watch the Lin Kuei bargain with the Emperor for Sub-Zero. Sonya had not seen that battle or Sub-Zero's capture as she had returned to Earth with Jax after he had lost his arms against Ermac. However she was intrigued by Kenshi's telekinetic powers and his heightened senses after the loss of his sight. Currently Kenshi appeared to be reading something in Braille what language it was in Sonya did not know. According to Cyrax Kenshi was a fluent French and Japanese speaker and his casual use of idioms in both languages suggested he grew up bilingual probably in Japan, as far as Sonya could tell he was pretty fluent in English as well although he used the British Received Pronunciation.
Sonya approached the table and sat down, Johnny dropped his paper on the table and flashed a grin at her and winked as he removed his feet from off the table. Sonya shook her head mildly amused at his antics and then turned to Cyrax, "Is there anything interesting in that report on the Black Dragon?"
"Depends on your point of view according to the Moscow authorities there has been no new activity at any of the Black Dragon's known haunts. There seems to be an increase in the number of deaths attributed to drug deals gone wrong among suspected affiliates of the Black Dragon. But what seems strange is the lack of movement of money, weapons and narcotics by other parts of the organisation." Cyrax sighed, "we have removed only a few mid level people in the organisation it should not have disrupted them as much."
"Perhaps those people were more important than we thought?" Johnny interrupted.
Sonya shook her head "Intelligence from Ankara suggested that cell was not in direct communications with Jarek or anyone below him."
Kenshi stopped reading and tilted his head in Cyrax's direction "These deaths among narcotic dealers puzzles you Cyrax."
"Yes I'm not sure why but there seems to be a pattern. Almost as if someone was making them look like drug deals gone wrong" Cyrax drummed his fingers on the table, "It reminds me of an assignment Smoke and Tundra had completed in Ukraine. That one had to look like a disagreement between rival gangs and required a significant number of deaths."
Johnny rolled his eyes "The phrase you are looking for is probably turf war." He sipped from his coffee, "perhaps a rival gang are picking off Black Dragon members since Kano isn't around."
Sonya snorted "I hope not because we know nothing about a cartel large enough to take on the Black Dragon even the Mafia leave the Black Dragon alone." Sonya rubbed her temples feeling the start of another headache, "is there any leads on Jarek in that report Cyrax?"
Cyrax flipped a few pages through the report "One a car was stolen in St Petersburg three days ago. The surviving witness gave a description matching Jarek's profile."
Kenshi interrupted "Surviving witness there were more?"
Cyrax nodded and responded unperturbed "The other three occupants were killed at point blank range with a .44 Special gun, two men and one woman, all members of the same family." Johnny and Sonya winced and Kenshi opened his mouth in a silent O. Cyrax continued "the car was found a day ago in Tartu which is a city in Estonia not far from the border. The Russian authorities tracked the car using the blue tooth data of a mobile phone dropped inside the car by one of the victims."
Kenshi sighed "That sounds as if it is our best lead so far. If it is Jarek I wonder why he had to flee from Russia so suddenly."
Sonya closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose "who cares, Cyrax I want you to go to Moscow and gather what intelligence you can on these drug dealer deaths. If it's worrying you I think we should investigate." Sonya looked at Cyrax and narrowed her eyes he was looking at Johnny for confirmation of her orders. It still irked her that Cyrax would not follow any order she gave without checking with Johnny or Kenshi first. Smoke had been the same and from what he had told her there was no place for women in the Lin Kuei. It had come as a shock to her that the Lin Kuei thought women were only good for breeding and had little use for them outside of that.
Johnny caught her gaze and flashed a smile at Cyrax "Good idea Sonya I'll go with Cyrax and keep him company on the plane, we can watch Ninja Mime together it's just came out on Blue Ray." Cyrax rolled his eyes as Sonya and Kenshi chuckled, Cyrax had complained bitterly to them about the eight bucks he had wasted seeing that film in the cinema with Sub-Zero and Sektor before the tournament.
"Sonya do you wish for me to accompany you to Tartu or would you prefer I remain here and handle reports?" Kenshi asked. Sonya detected a slight note of frustration in his voice despite his abilities and fighting prowess the others still found it hard to not view his blindness as a disability. Despite Sonya's desire to chase after Jarek she had to attempt to trust Kenshi at some point.
She shook her head. "No I'll remain here and study the reports, it's about time I started doing that more regularly instead of chasing after Jarek. You can go to Estonia instead and see what you can find out." The look of surprise on the others faces made Sonya smile, she could still surprise people. "Besides I am your superior and I should be delegating more of the leg work among the three of you instead of doing it all myself."
Johnny stood and drained the rest of his coffee "Well if that's all settled I better pack a few things while Cyrax sorts out the flight. I may bring my earlier film The Gist of my Fist in case we get bored." The look Cyrax gave the back of Johnny's head as he followed him out of the room suggested that Johnny may meet the same end as the main villain in Ninja Mime before they reached the airport.