He looked over his shoulder as the door closed, then resumed studying the scene outside the window. The other person who'd just come in spent some time moving a small device around the room, until he turned it off and put it back into his pocket, before taking a seat.

"We're clear."

"Good." He kept studying the view for a few moments longer, then turned and sat at his desk. "Proceed."

"We have so far been unable to get anyone into the DWU facility. A number of the usual assets point blank refused the job. I would suggest that they are probably the more intelligent ones."

He almost cracked a smile at that.

"The ones who did accept the job failed. One was intercepted, we think, by the ABB. Another was discovered by some dock workers while he was surveilling the facility from one of the currently abandoned warehouses in the area, beaten severely, and warned not to come back. To the best of my knowledge his cover as an ex-Merchant seeking revenge wasn't broken. There is nothing to link him to us."

"I see. Did these dock workers inform Hebert? Or the Family?"

"Not to my knowledge, no. As far as I can tell they just administered a very professional ass kicking and left it at that. Not unusual, we have records of similar events in the past affecting our assets, those of the gangs, and a couple of independents who fancied their chances. Those people may be a dock worker's association but at times they act more like one of the better intelligence agencies."

"Not entirely surprising considering their demographic makeup, I suppose," he commented mildly. "And how long they've been working on their own without backup. That would tend to imply a fairly significant level of ability purely to allow them to have survived so long in a place like Brockton Bay."

"I agree." His assistant nodded. "Moving on, the next asset tried a seaward infiltration. I have no idea why, we only learned about it later. Considering the abilities of the Family, that was unwise, but somewhat ironically they didn't catch him. A fisherman did."

"What happened?"

"The asset was beaten severely and warned extremely seriously that the next time he was seen, he'd be attached to some heavy objects and left on the mudflats at low tide. The fisherman was apparently incensed about the possibility of trouble around the Docks causing an interruption to the beer supply."

He stared at the other man, who checked his notes. "Beer?"

"So I learned. Beer. There is a very old tavern close to where the asset was captured, which is reputed to be a favorite haunt of Lung, and my information is that there are other individuals who frequent the place that are even worse."

"Worse than Lung?"

"I'm not sure I believe it either, but my informant was at pains to suggest that it was unwise in the extreme to interfere with the beer supply. I feel it's probably sensible to avoid the vicinity of the tavern for now."

Shaking his head and wondering, he finally replied, "Agreed. It's not part of the plan in any case, so why borrow trouble. Send the word to our assets to steer clear of that area."

"I have already done so, sir. Then we have the next asset, who had the idea to simply apply for a job at the DWU due to their current recruitment drive. That… didn't work."

With a faint sigh he made a motion to continue.

"The asset was interviewed by their head of security. As a result, he was beaten severely and warned not to return. At gunpoint."

"I am beginning to see a pattern forming..."

"Indeed. Three more assets, two of the ones we've used before and an independent we picked up a couple of months ago, tried the same approach but with modifications. One was caught by Hebert's main second level assistant, who goes by the name of Kurt. Expert in railway operations, as far as I know. He asked some questions which our asset failed to give convincing answers to, which led to..."

"Let me guess, a severe beating and a warning?"

"Yes. While being threatened with a very large oxyacetylene torch, apparently. He is disinclined to attempt another infiltration."

With a louder sigh, he asked, "How many more of these attempts ended in a severe beating?"

"Ah… all of them, sir. Except this one. Our man was cunning, he actually applied for a job he knew a lot about. Demolitions and reclamations, I believe. He was interviewed by Metis."

"And?"

"She smiled at him."

He raised an eyebrow inquisitively, causing his subordinate to expand on his explanation. "Apparently she smiled very slowly and in a manner that left the asset feeling, and this is a direct quote, 'Like something was licking my soul and working out how it would taste properly cooked.' A vivid if somewhat unusual concept. He added something about the smile being far too knowledgeable for his liking, and that there was nothing we could possibly pay him that would make him try again."

"But on the positive side he avoided a severe beating."

"Yes, although when he left, he was so unnerved by his meeting with her that he failed to notice a telephone pole that fell over and ran into it about a mile from the DWU facility. He's in Brockton General at the moment."

"Oh, for god's sake. How many people have tried so far?"

"Fifteen to date. All of them beaten unmercifully aside from one who may well wish he had been. At least none of the others have a broken pelvis."

His assistant checked his notes. "Five by the DWU directly, one indirectly by Metis terrifying him, one by a slightly drunk fisherman, one by a small group of ABB members, one by a Parahuman with a pack of dogs, one by an angry barkeep when he found the man trying to steal a car outside his place of business, two by random members of the public for no apparent reason, one by an off-duty PRT trooper who apparently had a very bad day at work and didn't like the way he was being looked at, one by Cricket who was passing and just did it for fun as far as I can tell, and one by an enraged Girl Scout."

"Girl Scout?" he echoed incredulously.

"Yes. About fourteen, and I would imagine from the description of the damage, going for her black belt in karate badge or something. The asset wouldn't say what started the fight, but it apparently didn't last all that long. She stole his wallet as well, which was just adding insult to injury." The other man flipped over the page and shook his head. "Quite a lot of injury."

"Good lord. What was a Girl Scout even doing in the docks?"

"I believe she was selling cookies to the patrons of that tavern I mentioned earlier. It appears to be something of a local social gathering place."

"Bizarre. Only in Brockton Bay."

"Yes, sir. A number of different approaches have been taken, all failed. Applying for jobs, climbing the fence, the seaborne approach, smuggling themselves in on delivery vehicles… None got further than the outer offices of the administration block, nowhere near the BBFO office. The one who was intercepted by Rachel Lindt barely escaped with his life. Once she'd finished beating him, she let the dogs out."

There was silence for a while as he digested the report. Eventually, he asked, "Do we have any deniable assets left?"

"One or two, but we're scraping the bottom of the barrel. I could attempt to contact Faultline if you wish…?"

"No. We've heard she and her people visited the Family recently. We can't risk them telling the lizards. It's entirely possible that they're now allied with the Family, based on past actions we've observed."

Spinning his chair, he looked out the window again as he thought, his assistant waiting patiently behind him. "This is more than a little irritating. What will it take to achieve our goals?"

"I can't help but suggest that it may not be possible to achieve them, sir," the quiet response came. "When it was just Saurial, the problem was difficult but not beyond the realms of feasibility. Raptaur complicated things, Kaiju threw the entire situation into turmoil, and every new arrival makes the whole thing more and more complex. Perhaps we should step back, or even abandon our plans?" The other man's voice was somewhat tentative, but held a level of concern he couldn't just dismiss.

"We must also bear in mind that the Family are gaining allies, respect, and public approval at a somewhat worrying rate. That is also having a knock-on effect on the city administration, for example causing Mayor Christner's popularity to skyrocket. He's currently the best liked Mayor for over eighty years, and that doesn't seem likely to change except upwards. And it's even managed to raise the profile of the local PRT a noticeable amount due to their close relationship with the Family."

"True, true," he mused. "All that influence, and all they do with it is wander around repairing infrastructure. That shows them for what they are, of course. Any normal person in that position would take more advantage of it."

"We don't really know what their motives are, sir. There may be some deep planning involved."

"Possibly. If so, it's very long range." He turned his chair back to face the other man. "I still think it's just evidence that they, while powerful, are not intelligent enough to really take advantage of the openings they've left in the status quo. We can work with that, but I agree it will need a change of approach."

After some more thought, he nodded decisively. "We'll drop the infiltration for now, as it's clearly not working. Work on recruiting some more informants, hire some new specialists in through the normal cutouts, the usual. Concentrate on information warfare and intelligence assets this time. If we can't get someone inside, perhaps we can find an opening through subtler means."

His assistant made some quick shorthand notes, nodding a little. "Make certain that there is no link to us. This is far too important to risk exposure for, and those animals are cunning whatever else they are. The DWU is much too good at this as well, so we definitely need to be careful."

"Of course, sir." The other man looked up from his notes. "On another front, there are hints that a number of agencies are attempting the same process via a number of methods, for reasons I do not yet know. What should I do about it?"

"Who?"

"The usual ones, and a few oddities, such as the Coast Guard for some bizarre reason. There seems to be quite a lot of interest in either the DWU, the Family, or both from a number of parts of the government. I'm not entirely convinced that most of them are aware of the others either. Although considering how fragmentary inter-agency cooperation is that's not completely surprising."

"Odd." He shook his head. "Monitor the situation and make sure our people don't interfere or get spotted. It's not impossible that the CIA or someone will fuck things up again and that could give us an opening. It's happened before."

"That's true, yes. I'll make sure we stay out of the way. Will that be all?"

"For now, yes. Let me know immediately if anything changes, but for now we'll wait and watch. When we have the right resources in place we can try again."

"Sir."

The other man stood, nodded to him, then left. When the door clicked shut, he turned back to watching the city outside the window and planning what the future would be like.