A note, my dear readers; all dialogue in italics is supposed to be in French. Savvy?

Also, the newest installment of LoEG has been released, titled the Black Dossier. Only in the US, sadly. Though you can order it through Amazon where it is going for 18 bucks. Once I get my copy you can expect a review. Cheers.


Three Days Later

Paris, France

"You…you don't need to drive so fast. I'm not in a hurry." Said Mona as she struggled with car sickness and held on to the upholstery for dear life in the backseat of taxi as it sped through narrow backstreets of Paris.

"Don't worry, miss. I'm a professional." Said the cabbie jovially, he was a man of his thirties with dark skin and black hair, apparently of Algerian extraction.

The taxi cab, which was clearly souped-up to an impressive degree, continued to zip across the city on it's way to a neighborhood in the more arcane part of the city, dodging numerous pedestrians, oncoming traffic and knocking a police officer with a speed-gun off his feet.

The hellish ride was finally over as the taxi screeched to a halt in front of a Turkish deli.

"We're here. That'll be fourteen euros, ma'am."

Mona fought nausea as she reached into her pocket to take out three fives and tossed it over, struggling to find the door and escape.

"Thanks for choosing me for your transport needs, ma'am. Please tell your friends about Daniel Marseille."

The cab sped away as sirens approached in the distance, Mona stood on the sidewalk hunched over, fighting the will to regurgitate and hovering over a drain.

She straightened up as she felt better and got a proper look around. It was an old, somewhat rustic neighborhood, the kind that seemed to be stuck in a time-bubble since the sixties. Prostitutes stood with bravado on the street corners, silently announcing that they were up for business.

"Don't look at me, Sister." Said a young blonde woman of the night as she puffed her cigarettes and scratched the top of her thigh, "I don't do that sort of thing. For that, go see Tania over on that corner."

"Uh. Thanks."

Mona walked into the deli, as Sands had instructed her yesterday before she had flown over. If Sands was correct, Priest would be waiting there; both would pick out a pre-specified item and purchase it. After that, their contact would rendezvous with them. Simple as that.

The owner was a man of fifties, olive skinned and dark haired, of an apparent Semitic extraction. He smiled warmly at her as she walked in, and then went back to reading the book in his hand.

She headed deeper into the deli, walking between the rows of canned foods and such. She picked up a can of cat food, and then heard a sound coming from an adjacent isle, so she headed to the end of the store and turned to see who it was.

"Mona." Said Priest as he saw her, he put the bottle in his hand back on the shelf and walked over to her.

"Hey, Priest."

"You look like shit. What happened?"

"Ugh. I got a cab ride from a NASCAR wannabe, apparently." Mona said, brushing her face.

"Huh. Well, welcome to Paris."

"Where have you been?"

"Here." Priest said as he continued looking through the shelves.

"Doing what?"

"There's this guy, sometime."

"He's a guy sometimes?"

"Sure. We meet once every while and catch up, tell a few tall tales and go chick-hunting."

"Where did you go?"

"Rhode Island."

"Who the hell goes to Rhode Island?"

"I have a grandmother there. I thought I owed her a visit."

"Checking up on your family; that's nice."

"Not really. She called the cops on me when I was in the bathroom. I barely got away without killing anyone."

"Ah. C'est la vie."

"Wait a minute, you're not going to do the same kind of thing you did in London. You're not going to talk with a French accent, are you?"

"That depends, can you speak French?"

"No. I can manage to understand how much I'm supposed to pay, or say I want to go to the louver of the little girls' room. I can even curse a little, but that's it."

"I guess not, then. Though, I can make no promises. What did Sands say you had to buy?"

"Pasta and Cat food. You?"

"Rosemary water and Salt. Pasta's right there, by the way."

"Thanks." Said Mona as she picked up a bag of dried pasta from a shelf where Priest pointed.

"I got the salt, where the hell's rosemary water when you need ... Ah, here we are." Priest said as he picked up a bottle of the water. The pair of them headed to the front where they placed their items on the counter. The owner looked at each of them and said aloud,

"Rosemary water, salt, cat food and pasta. You must work for the opposition."

"I take it you're our contact?" asked Priest.

"Yes."

"These identity authentication protocols…"

"I know; they get a bit tedious. My name is Muhammad."

"I'm Priest. I take it you're part of the cell here in Paris?"

"That's not really of importance of your mission, is it?"

"I guess not."

"Umm, sorry," Mona said, "But all I understood was 'Je m'apelle Muhammad'."

"Ah." Priest said, "The imbecile tourist, gorgeous and stunning as she may be, does not speak the language. Bloody Americans, eh?"

"It is no trouble." Said Muhammad, "I can speak English little. My name is Moses Schmidt, people call me Muhammad."

"Oh, good." Said Mona, "And?"

"I am on your side." Said Muhammad as he stepped from behind his counter and took his keys out of his pocket, locked the door and turned the open sign.

"I was told by Monsieur Sands that you were searching for a man called Gideon. Non?"

"That's right."

"So, this is where he was last spotted?" asked Mona.

"This is where he was spotted being carried away by League Agents." Said Muhammad as he leaned back against the counter.

"That's it, then?" asked Priest, slightly wide-eyes and frustrated The League has MacGuffin? I let someone carve me a smile for nothing?"

"Huh? I'm…I'm afraid so. I think."

"Why didn't anyone tell us before we got here, then? Save us the trip or something."

"Perhaps not all hope is lost. Sands want's you to gather as much information as possible regarding his capture."

Mona sighed, "So what do you know?"

"Sands' men have come to the fact that Gideon MacGuffin had stayed in the Moulin Rouge Hotel for a time around six months ago. He paid using a bank account that they had linked to his Cayman island account. Perhaps just as Sands' men were able to find the connection, so was the League.

"I had did some searching, and found out from a concierge that I bribed that there was a unit of Interpol Agents came in to arrest MacGuffin, the story told to the guests and the management was that MacGuffin was an international war criminal. They convinced all parties to keep silent on the matter. The concierge also said that the 'Interpol squad' was a group of seven men; six looked like muscle, while the seventh was in charge."

"So, we bribe or break in and we pinch security's surveillance footage from the security cameras. Find out who the seventh guy was."

"That was six months ago; most 'otels would recycle their tapes by now. Besides, there's the chance that the League confiscated the tapes following the arrest."

"Alright, so this seventh man; did you get a proper description?"

"English, about a meter-seventy-two. Brown hair, big classes in a purple suit. Overall a very odd man."

"Not in London he won't be."


"Nice guy, huh?" mumbled Mona as she adjusted her messenger bag's strap, the bag was filled with her and Priest's equipment supplied by Muhammad, equipment such as two surpassed Berettas and several clips of ammo, two tazer guns, the standard laptop used for communicating with the Yellow Submarine and Sands' laptop as well as fake IDs and other items.

"Yeah, he's okay." Said Priest as he walked at her side in the minutes after sunset, "So, what are you thinking?"

"There's gotta be something in the hotel that might point us in the right direction. We should investigate the goings on during that day."

"They gotta keep records, right? Unlike constant video surveillance, bills and invoices don't take much memory so they probably hang on to them for much longer."

"Exactly," said Mona, "I have a plan. Do you have a pulse?"

"No. Why?"

"Can you fake one, then?"


London, England

"This has to be Harmony's best work." Said Mernae as she sat next to Mason in the Winchester Tavern, looking over copies of Bond's papers as Shaun the bartender brought over two pints of Guinness.

"Indeed. Lots of interesting thing here, Bond's travel itinerary is going to be very useful. There's also the most recent Red List, we had had only the bottom half of it."

"What's this, now?" asked Mernae as she raised one piece of paper, "It seems to be a request for an extension of a prisoner's detainment. This is one of the photographs taken lastly by Harmony, her work was rushed so it's a bit blurry, not to mention tat bottom is cut off."

"That's odd." Said Bond, "Where from?"

"Jabal Naffus, Qumar."

"Dear god, that about as bad a place to be held by the League as you can get."

"Why would Bond need to sign this?"

"Why indeed?"


Paris, France

Priest yelped and grabbed his chest with one hand and grabbing the rail of the stairs with the other, electing the stares of a few of the staff and the guests as he stood at the top of the flight of stairs leading between the first floor and the lobby.

"My…my chest…my arm… is …argh!"

With one final gut-wrenching groan Priest grabbed his chest with both hands, staggering forward before his knees buckled and he fell, tumbling down the stairs.

Priest landed at the bottom after rolling down twenty-five steps, hitting his head several times on the way.

"My god!" cried a woman of middle-age in an evening dress as the rasping man landed at her feet, "He's …He's having a stroke! Help!"

Several of the hotel's staff rushed over, as did some of the guests. They all stood in a circle looking in horror and fascination at Priest as foamed, rasped and trembled. Exchanging looks of helplessness and disbelief, each muttering something or another.

"You look live you've seen a ghost. Do you know him, Mister Langdon?"

"Looks like epilepsy."

"Someone should get security!"

"Make way. I might be able to help him."

A young woman of her twenties kneeled down and grabbed Priest's wrist.

"Good god! I've only ever seen a temperature like this on a corpse! He barely has a pulse. Someone get a medic, quick!"


Mona casually waltzed into the security office second after three of the men in it ran out in a hurry to inspect the commotion in the lobby. Only one was left there, he immediately took notice of her and stood up.

"Wait a minute, miss. This is a restricted area. You can't come in here. What's that in your hand?"

Mona raised her hand and pulled the trigger on the tazer-gun she held, ejecting a pin dragging a wire that plunged into the man's chest and conducted hundreds of volts of electricity that promptly knocked him out.

She placed the tazzer gun back in her shoulder bag and sat at the main consol, pulling out an external-hard drive and connecting it to the server before going to work.


"He's getting better!"

"So I see."

"George!" cried Mona as she ran to where Priest lay on the ground, pretending to recover from a seizure he never had, "They told me somebody was having an attack! I just prayed it wasn't you!"

"I'm alright." Said Priest, faking exhaustion, "I…I think I had a seizure, but … I'm so glad I didn't die without seeing you one last time, Lisa."

"Will you be alright, Monsieur? Can you walk?" asked one of the guests as he helped Priest up.

"Yes, I'm… I'm okay."

"Oh, George. Did you forget to take your pills again?"

"I'm sorry, Lisa."

"Oh, enough of that." Said Mona, "We need to get you to a hospital."

"Do you need any help?" asked the guest.

"No, sir. It's fine, it's happened before. We jest need to get him to a hospital fast."

"Head for Our Lady of Sorrows, tell them that you're friends of Police Chief Cloesau."

"Thank you, Sir." Said Mona as she grabbed Priest by the shoulders and they made their way to the door as the crowd dispersed and each returned to his buiness.

"We're wasting our time with all this world-traversing spy bullshit." Said Priest as the two of them kept up the act, "We should be goddamn actors."

"Yeah. That 'It's good that I didn't die before seeing you' bit was hammy, though."

"Yeah, I thought so too."


"Shit…" cursed Priest as he unbuttoned his jacket, then ripped the pins connected to the tazer gun out of his flesh, then waited for a few second for his pulse to completely stop, "I'm beginning to hate this gig. Found anything?"

Mona sat at the passenger seat with a laptop in her lap as the two sat in a parked car in a dark alley a block away from the Moulin Rouge.

"Almost." said Mona as she banged away at the keyboard, "Got it."

"Whenever you're ready."

It took Mona a minute to find what she was after. And she did, she said,

"This is MacGuffin's bill."

"Yeah, I see it. Cognac, crab, masseuse, dry cleaning, crab again. I don't get it."

"The dry cleaning thing is registered the afternoon of the day he was arrested. Muhammad said he was arrested at lunchtime."

"I don't get it."

"The dry cleaning was to remove a stain from a jacket; a purple velvet jacket to be precise. And then it was sent to London. The dry cleaning bill is charged to MacGuffin."

"Okay, I get it. The seventh man has his jacket stained while making the arrest, the hotel manager offers to get it cleaned and sent to the man's place in London. I assume there's an address?"

"Yeah. It's in soho. The guy's initials are A.D.P."

"So we know who arrested MacGuffin. Time to call sands."


Surely you know who the fuck ADP is, do you not?

R&R.

Next Chapter: Priest and Mona return to London, but not everything is as easy as it seems. Priest and Mona confront a man of mystery in the final day of their hunt for Gideon MacGuffin.