Disclaimer: None of the League here are mine, and Eilidh and Fiona belong to themselves and their names are used here with their permission. The same applies for Sarah and Jeremy Nivern (Although Sarah's the only one of the two I like), Kate, and Gash.
Feedback: Much appreciated
Lady Moon3: It's a different Kate, to answer your first point. To answer the second, I simply forgot to clearly explain things in that chapter regarding Sarah and Gash's curiosity about Angelus in particular, but I've corrected things now. Thanks for pointing it out, by the way.
Oh, and in regards to your asking how Angelus died, I had him expelled from Angel's mind in my one-shot Angel story 'Precious Memories'. Check it out; it explains everything.
Sean Molloy-1: You'll have to wait and see on that front...
Velocity9: Glad you liked my casting, and thanks for the 'A'; I was worried I didn't have enough different characters in my League. By the way, where's your modern League story archived, if that's what you mean by you 'using the Doctor'- I wouldn't mind checking it out.
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen 2004
Watching the sight in front of them, Harry found himself briefly wishing that Ginny could be here with him to see this.
In front of him, spread out in all its glory, was the city of Paris, looking as incredible and beautiful as it had always appeared to him when he'd seen it in a film or on TV. The Eiffel Tower, Notre-Dame Cathedral, and, in the distance, the Arc De Triomphe...
It was incredible.
Of course, the view was slightly hampered by the large glass dome that now covered the top of the Nautilus's viewing tower. Harry didn't like it that much, but he knew it was necessary if they were going to pass through Paris relatively unnoticed.
While looking over the Nautilus's controls, which included the extra features that the Government had installed since it had originally been constructed by Captain Nemo, the Doctor and Fiona had discovered one of the Nautilus's more impressive new tricks, which consisted of turning it almost completely invisible unless one looked closely enough. Bond had recognized it as a trick that Q had once installed in a car he'd used on one of his previous missions; microscopic cameras attached all over the Nautilus projected the image they saw on the opposite side of the submarine onto the exterior, rendering it practically invisible.
The only drawback to the use of the cameras was that a glass dome had to cover the observation tower while it was in effect, otherwise anyone trying to get a bit of fresh air would be seen. Plus, it didn't make the Nautilus totally invisible; someone with sharp eyes could still see the submarine if they looked at it for long enough.
But right now, Harry wasn't interested in worrying about being spotted. He just watched the city drift past him on either side, smiling at the beautiful sight, and wishing Ginny could be here with him to see this...
"Everything OK?" someone said from behind him.
Looking back, Harry saw Gwen standing behind him, her arms folded in a slightly impatient-looking manner. Harry noted that she was wearing black gloves that came up to above her elbows, stylish black shoes, a pair of blood-red trousers and an identically coloured sleeveless top.
"Yeah, I'm fine; just a little homesick," he said, moving a little to allow her to lean on the railing as well.
She accepted the invitation and stood beside him, looking around her at the magnificent view.
Deciding to break the silence, Harry spoke again. "How long until we stop?"
"Not long now," Gwen replied. "Bond and the Doctor are just picking teams for this mission. All we really need to do is work out the Fantom's movements in this area when he recruited Sarah and Jeremy, and then we'll be taking things from there."
She then sighed a little as she stared out in front of her at the bustling city. "I still don't see why we couldn't just go to Mongolia and take this bastard out straight away."
"Because only an idiot would stop his enemy before he's worked out what the guy's trying to do," Harry said, looking Gwen in the eyes as he spoke. "All of us with prior experience in this kind of situation are agreed on that point; if you try and stop him before you know his plan, you could just make things worse. I mean, what if he's already made arrangements for other people to carry on with his plans in case he dies?"
Gwen nodded a little at that point, and then noticed something.
"We've stopped moving," she said, stepping back from the railing and turning to face the tower's door. "We'd better rejoin the others; we've got some searching to do."
Harry nodded at that point, and followed her down into the depths of the Nautilus.
Eventually, the League was gathered in the Nautilus's main hanger, six of them sitting inside two cars while the other three remained in the Nautilus. One car held Bond, Elektra and Clark, and the second had Angel, Fiona and Harry. The Doctor, Gwen and Eilidh had agreed to remain in the Nautilus and keep track of the others, and act as back-up in the event of the situation getting out of hand.
Each car was the top of its line in both design and speed, and the Doctor had even worked in a couple of extras should the need arise, although Q had laid the groundwork for the cars to have those extras installed. One of the more interesting extras was a video-phone that allowed the driver of each car to talk with the drivers of the other cars, which came in especially useful now, when Bond was issuing his orders to the rest of the League.
"Right then," he said, as the two-way link between the cars was established. "You all know our current objectives; find anything we can about Sarah and Jeremy's movements while they were in this city, and see if we can find any information about anything else Im Ho Tep, or the Fantom, or whatever his real name is, got up to while he was recruiting them. If anything goes wrong, you should attempt to engage the enemy away from the eyes of the public, and also take the bodies away until we can get rid of them in a place where we can be sure there won't be any witnesses." He stopped talking, sat back, and looked at Angel with an inquiring gaze in his eyes. "Any questions?"
"Just one," Elektra put in, raising one inquiring hand so that it could be seen in the rear-view mirror. "Where exactly are we going to be looking for this information, if you don't mind me asking?"
"Easy enough," Bond replied. "Angel and I have contacts in this city's darker underworld, as we do in some other cities around the globe. The three of us will direct their cars to places that our informants frequently inhabit, and then see if any of them can give us information on the Fantom's activities. No matter how good he is, he can't operate in a city like this without attracting attention."
"Right then," Gwen said, leaning forward to look at the screen herself. "You guys get going; you're to rendezvous back here in an hour."
"Agreed," Bond replied, as he used a remote control device to open the Nautilus's doors. As the League's cars started to drive out of the submarine, and Bond shut the door with the remote operator, he whispered to himself nine words that had often been said by the original League's leader, Tom Sawyer.
"The League is set.... And the game is on."
He could only hope they would win it.
Too much was at stake for them not to win this battle.
"Wow..." Clark commented, as he looked around himself while Bond drove the car through Paris. The magnificent city was one that Clark had never expected to see at this stage in his life, and now that he was here, he found it almost impossible to accept that it was genuinely happening.
"Yeah, it's great, I know," Elektra said, looking over at her alien teammate with a slight smile on her face. For all his powers, even though he could have raced around the city and looked at it all in a matter of minutes, he was sitting in a car, moving through it at normal speed, and looking at everything around him with the wide-eyed wonder of a small child, even though he had nearly finished his life as a teenager...
It reminded her of her first visit to Paris when she was younger. She'd only been about eight at the time, and her mother was still alive. Her father had mostly taken her there so that she could start he studies with her new sensei, but her parents had still managed to find the time to take her around the city to see the sights.
She smiled a little at the memory of those old days. She wasn't even old enough for her age to be measured in two figures, and she already knew just to look so innocently cute that her parents would not only take her up the Eiffel Tower, or go for a boat trip along the Seine. How had she learned how to be that manipulative?
Simple.
She'd been a child.
"We're here," Bond commented, as he parked the car.
Looking out of the window at the building they'd arrived at, Elektra and Clark noted that it looked like both on of the most welcoming of places and one of the least welcoming.
At first glance it was in perfect condition, and looked like anyone who wanted to could just walk in, but when you looked at it again, certain things in some places- a spot of graffiti here, some red patches behind the dustbins, and other such details- led you to get a bit nervous about going in.
Elektra looked over at Bond, a slightly quizzical expression on her face.
"You contact lives here?" she asked.
Bond shrugged at her.
"His house may not look like much, but he's reliable, and not as dangerous as some criminals I know," Bond replied, as the three of them walked up to the door and Bond knocked. "I only ever use him for information when I feel that this mission is too big for my official sources, so he should see us."
"What do you mean by 'too big for your official sources'?" Clark asked, curious.
"I mean that I don't want to attract attention from my opponents by using my Government contacts," Bond explained. "If I just use my criminal contacts, then it doesn't attract as much attention."
Just then, the door opened in front of the three League members, to reveal the form of a large, muscular man with a bald head and tattoos all over his arms.
"James!" he said, smiling at Bond as he looked at the agent.
"Hello, bruiser," Bond replied, patting the taller man on the shoulder. "How's the wife?"
"Oh, better than she has been," the man replied. "At least she isn't pregnant again; three is more than enough, in my opinion."
"Yes, children can be tiresome at times," Bond replied. "Anyway, we're here to speak to Mr Caldwell. Can we come in?"
"We?" the man asked, looking at Clark and Elektra suspiciously. "You know how Mr Caldwell is about visitors."
"I know," Bond replied. "Don't worry; they can be trusted."
The man nodded. "That's good enough for me," he said, as he turned around and walked back into the house, followed closely by the League members, two of which were itching with curiosity.
"What's the deal with this Caldwell character you mentioned?" Clark asked his leader out of the corner of his mouth. "Why all the secrecy?"
"He's wanted by the police for a major casino heist he pulled off in Vegas while he was a member of a gang of thieves a couple of years ago," Bond replied. "I found him a while back, but, to be perfectly frank, he and his group are a lot nicer than the person they stole the money from, so I agreed to turn a blind eye at his presence here so long as he keeps me informed about various criminal activities in this area."
"And he agreed?" Elektra asked.
"He did," Bond replied. "I only told his location to certain individuals that I can trust not to expose him. I'm sure that you two can do the same."
Clark and Elektra nodded just as the man in front of them opened a door on their left and waved them in.
The room in question was a large lounge, looking like it had been furnished by the crème de la crème of decorators. The sofas, the chairs, and the tables were all in peak condition, and the entertainment system was state- of-the-art, with all the latest features in the art of electronics.
Watching the entertainment system in question was a handsome, dark-eyed, rather preppy-appearing young man who might have been mistaken for a law student if it weren't for his rather casual outfit of jeans, a linen jacket and a striped long-sleeved t-shirt.
He looked up as the League entered the room, and smiled at Bond.
"James!" he said, getting up from the sofa to shake the agent's hand. "Good to see you. And your friends are?" he asked looking at Clark and Elektra.
"This is Clark Kent and Elektra Natchios, Linus," Bond smiled, as his new friends shook Linus's hand. "They're associates of mine in a new branch of the Government; they can be trusted."
"I guessed that," Liuns smiled, as he waved the tall man out and indicated a couple of the sofas in the room. "Well, take a seat; what brings you to me?"
"We're looking for information on a criminal who was in the area recently," Bond explained, as the three of them sat down in Linus's chairs. "He called himself 'the Fantom', and was here recruiting a couple of elite assassins. We were wondering if you knew anything about him?"
Linus stopped smiling, and his face became more serious. "Yeah, I've heard a little bit about him," he said, looking a bit nervous now. "He's talented, I'll tell you that; he's only been around for a few months, and he's already established a reputation for himself that makes the Kingpin's look pathetic." Elektra flinched at the mention of the man who had arranged her father's murder, but nobody else noticed as they continued to listen to Linus. "I don't know much about him, save for a couple of pieces of information. They may not be all that important..."
"Tell us; right now, everything's important," Clark asked, looking over at the former thief.
"OK," Linus said. "Firstly, anyone who joins his group is in there for life; the only way out of there is to either die in action or commit suicide. Secondly, according to rumours I've heard, he has a bank account in Zurich, under the name of 'Hawley Griffin'."
Bond stiffened in horror at that statement. "Griffin?" he said, slightly shaken.
"Yeah, that's right..." Linus said, as he looked over at the spy. "Something wrong?"
"No... no, nothing major," Bond replied, as he got up from the seat. "Thanks for the information, Linus. We'll be going now."
"What was that all about?" Elektra asked, as the three League members drove away from Linus's house.
"This whole situation is starting to get out of hand," Bond replied. "That name Linus gave us was the name of another man who was connected to the original League; Hawley Griffin, the original Invisible Man."
"What?" Clark asked, looking over at Bond. "Wasn't he a member of the original League? Why would our opponent name himself after one of the League?"
"No, their invisible man was a thief called Rodney Skinner who stole the work of the original," Bond replied. "It would appear that our foe has a certain fixation with naming himself after people who, if they didn't actually battle the first League, at least were around at the same time as them."
Elektra groaned. "So where does that leave us?" she asked. "We've still got almost nothing to go on."
"On the contrary, we are a bit further on than we were," Bond pointed out. "We know that Im Ho Tep, as we shall call our foe until further notice, has a bank account in Zurich. If we can find that account, and find out where he's getting his money from, we might be able to work out his motives for these murders."
Clark nodded. "Good point," he said. "So, where to now?"
"Back to the Nautilus," Bond said. "The Doctor can prepare the League- mobile while we wait for the others, if they haven't returned yet."
Elektra smiled. "Let's go," she said, smiling at her teammates.