Background music suggestion: Led Zeppelin: Immigrant Song

Chapter 10: The Warm Up

We come from the land of the ice and snow
From the midnight sun
Where the hot springs flow

-Led Zeppelin: Immigrant Song

...

"I'd prefer we'd have some chain of command here," Gudrun said.
They had one of their daily meetings in the living room. It was a week till the mission.
"And I've noticed the three of you avoid this subject."
She gave Ian, Jo and Erik each a glance.
"Malin is right. Someone has to lead," Orfeus said, walking next to her.
"Okay...It's Ian," Erik said.
Ian's eyes immediately shot to Erik's.
"Yes, I say it's Ian too," Jo nodded.
"I mean...If it's okay with you."
Ian honestly didn't know what to say. This had come out of nowhere. He had had no intention of being the leader of this pack, or Agent squad, whatever one wished to call it. His gut reaction was very much to dissociate. It felt almost the same had someone told the PFY he had suddenly become the BOFH.
"He seems a bit shocked," Mitsuko said smiling.
"He'll come out of it," Erik said rising from his chair.
"Can I just think about it for awhile?" Ian asked.
"Sure," there was an unanimous answer.
"I'll tell you tonight," he said almost absentmindedly and left the room, Jo following him.

They were soon walking in the forest. Luckily that day wasn't burning hot.

"It might as well be you or Erik."
"No," Jo said shaking her head.
She stopped and Ian too.
"Erik is basically his own leader. Yes, he will follow when needed but he certainly doesn't want to lead. And as for me, it's the same when you asked me to become the guitarist/vocalist. I'm just not cut out for it. I'm a guitarist. You know that. And besides, at MoGaCon you practically led us during most of that mission. Especially the end of it. I don't know if you noticed it but you did."
"So you really think I can do this?"
Jo nodded.
"And...you promise to be my first officer?"
"You know that."
She smiled now.
"Although I think that term is only used with ships and planes."
"I knew that, wing man."

...

Four days later

Cosmo exited the office building in Oslo, feeling drained. He touched his hair once again. It still felt weird. Jo had cut it the previous night and in the morning she had helped him to turn into its present spiky appearance.

"I remember the first time I went undercover with Ian...It was this horrible metal festival," Jo had said applying the hair gel.
Cosmo guessed she was trying to cheer him up.
"He chose the name Crucifier and I was Ravenna...I mean, we had some other names but I've forgotten those already."

That day Cosmo would be Jakov Turau.

In the office Cosmo had met an elderly woman. She shook his hand but didn't introduce herself. The woman was wearing a grey business suit and lots of bling.

"Have you liked living in Oslo?" the woman had asked in the most polite tone when they were sitting in her office.
"Yes. The summer has been nice."
"Oslo is so nice in the summer."
After some tedious small talk, he had signed the contract. They had also taken blood tests and made sure his Belarusian was fluent. Of course this had been no problem since it was his mother tongue.
"The language was the most specific request. As you understand we cannot have the client disappointed."
"Of course."
A younger woman had entered the room and brought in some papers. They were obviously the results of his tests. The elderly woman carefully read through them. It felt like an endless amount of time.
"Everything seems to be in order."
She put the paper to a folder, giving Cosmo a sheet of paper.
"Here are the specifics. What to wear et cetera. And the rendezvous point."
She said this giving him her best, yet so obviously fake, smile.
"If this goes well, we would certainly like to continue working with you. I've heard good things of your work back in Minsk."
"Great," Cosmo said conjuring his own smile.

They had found a way to get someone inside. And it had been Helena's suggestion again. The other agents had barely blinked their eyes when she had suggested it but Cosmo was clearly upset.

'ICANREQUESTAPROSTITUTE'

'WITHSPECIFICS'

Cosmo had been angry when he had realized what the fourth word would be. So this was her life. Requesting prostitutes. With specifics. Of course he shouldn't have been surprised. It was a cult life. And why the fuck should he care, he thought.

The Agents had told Helena they would consider her suggestion and answer as soon as possible. And also consider who they would possibly send. In the end they had decided to take the risk. The person who would take this role had to be a hacker because the task would mean infiltrating the security system.

Later that night Helena had played "Mind if I Cut in?" and the songs had begun scrolling.
First Cosmo wanted to shut the computer but he didn't do it after all.

'CANUDOIT'

He knew what she meant. Songs continued scrolling.

'PLEASE'

An hour passed, songs scrolled.

'OTHERSIDONTKNOW'

Fuck.
He knew he would volunteer.

Cosmo sighed and put two songs in the playlist, spelling his message.

'OK'

At least he would be an elite prostitute unlike those sad women his father had brought home.

...

It was raining as the chopper flew through the majestic mountain landscape with the six Agents on board. Cosmo would go to the rendezvous point at a local nightclub the following day. Ian was piloting the helicopter. The sky was probably as dark as it could get, covered in heavy clouds. The night would still refuse to fall in the north. They landed a half day's' hike from the complex. Hermann Grieg had provided the gear. Apparently this was considered an emergency and he had still promised to help in one.

In the evening they set up a simple camp. They would continue approaching the complex the following day and wait till the nightfall.
"I hate mosquitoes. I just deeply, deeply hate them," Orfeus complained.

Also, it began to rain.

...

Cosmo had arrived at the club and was directed to a private lounge. He was apparently the only guy. Besides him there were five young women. A limousine had taken them to a helicopter where they were actually blindfolded.

He was startled awake as the blindfold was taken off. He couldn't believe he had actually fallen asleep. They were helped out of the helicopter and Cosmo looked around holding his breath. The location was...spectacular. He couldn't take his eyes off the mountains that were partly covered in mist. It had rained and the sky looked so grey it would probably rain more soon. The group was escorted through a pathway that lead through a spruce forest.

Finallly they arrived at the complex. It consisted of several smaller buildings that were located on quite a steep slope, connected with wooden stairs, pathways and decks. Cosmo also knew there were vast underground parts. The architecture was very modern and mostly wooden. The blasting music filled the air. It resembled metal, Cosmo wasn't sure of the genre though. There was an odd distortion, adding an otherworldly beat on top of it. Anyway, it was obvious the party had begun.

"This way. She's waiting for you," a tall man in a black suit said as Cosmo was guided to another direction as the rest of the group. He followed the man to the wooden steps towards a separate small building on the edge of the complex. Climbing the steps Cosmo couldn't help thinking that had he not been an undercover Agent on a mission, he would have been soon probably fucking Helena for money. Fuck. This was just against all his ideals. Now he found himself in even a sourer mood.

Finally they reached the wooden deck in front of a smoke tinted glass door. The man pressed a button in the console inserted in the wall next to it.
"Han er her."
There was a silence and then a voice.
"Greit...Han kan komme inn."
There was click. The door had obviously been opened. The man gestured him to enter and left back down the stairs.

Cosmo entered. The space was loft like, long, and dark. Following the foyer there was a kitchen and dining area, in the middle a sofa and large flat screen tv. At the other end of the room there was a bed, a small desk opposite to it. The wall at the back was obviously made of glass panels but it had been darkened.

A door next to him opened. Cosmo could see it led to the bathroom.
It was her.
"Hello Helena," Cosmo said realizing he had sounded most robotic. He was still in a very bad mood.
Helena was wearing a turquoise party dress of some flowing material. Seeing her this way annoyed him even more for some reason. But soon Cosmo realized she was just staring at him and she looked somehow...odd.
"Good to see you," she finally said.
"It is," Cosmo replied trying to sound neutral now.
Perhaps she had expected more but it was just beyond him at that moment. There was another awkward silence. He had to break it.
"I should start...Do you have the laptop and the headset?"
She just nodded, still looking strange, pointing at the laptop on the desk at the other end of the room.
"Cosmo…" she said quietly before he left.
"Yes?"
She knit her brow.
"I took these...pills...to calm myself. I was afraid I wouldn't be able to function...but I think I took too many. I hadn't taken them for such a long time…"
She closed her eyes and shook her head.
Fuck, Cosmo thought. He understood the strangeness now. This wasn't part of the plan.
"I feel so tired..."
He looked at the time. It was 20:16. There would still be hours till the others would arrive.
"Try to sleep."
It was the only thing he could think of. Helena nodded and took her high heels off. Then she slowly walked to the bed at the other end of the room and threw herself on it. Cosmo sighed and followed her to that part of the room, to the desk. Then he sat by the computer, beginning his work.

After a while he glanced towards the bed. Helena was definitely sleeping. He immediately turned to look away. He wouldn't look at her. Looking at her sleeping...That would have been just wrong.

"Agents, can you hear me?" Cosmo finally said to the headset.
He had set up the communications link and felt relief as one by one the agents confirmed.

...

It was 22:16 now. Cosmo had been following the other Agents' progress.

Also, he had glanced at Helena occasionally. She was still sleeping. Cosmo thought there probably was a service that would provide sleeping elite prostitutes for the clients to look at; people who would look exquisitely beautiful when sleeping, never drooling on the pillow. Beautiful dreamers, that's what they could be called. After realizing this was one extremely tired thought, he decided to rest for a moment as there was a long night ahead of him.

He headed for the sofa, keeping the wireless headset on. The others would arrive around 1 AM.

...

At the complex they would divide into two teams. Ian and Jo would go to Loke Magnusson's rooms and try to raid his computer. Erik, Gudrun and Mitsuko would go to lower labs where they knew Bargala was kept. Orfeus would stay at some distance and coordinate the others again. It was time for them to part their ways.
Orfeus approached Gudrun as she was checking her gear once more.
"Take care, Malin."
She was startled but clearly not annoyed.
"You too, Ernesto."
She frowned now.
"I hope..."
She sighed.
"What do you hope?"
"That if we'll get back, we could…"
She seemed to actually be lost for words.
"Listen to more dubstep?" he finished her sentence.
"Yes," she said quietly, finally looking at him.
Then she embraced him quickly and left.

...