Double release! This one was actually not in the original plan, but the story grew and last week I realized I had to break things up into smaller chapters for both pragmatic (release schedule) and story-driven reasons. Mostly for story reasons, look forward to another double release next week!
I'll also take this opportunity to thank everyone who's taken the time to review so far, namely RJay Fame, CowtionFish, CajunBear73, MrDrP, A Plump Hutt, anaadiffy, Gj agent and King in Yellow.
Last time on A Sitch Too Far:
"What's up, little buddy?" Ron said to Rufus as he crouched to have a better look inside, and found a folder blocking the drawer's movement.
"Hey, I got something!" Ron announced as he retrieved the crumpled-up collection of documents. As he inspected them further, the expression 'sick and wrong' seemed tame. "Uh oh…"
Chapter 17 - Land of Confusion
"What did you find, Ron?"
He was holding a folder containing a good fifty or so pages in Kim's guesstimation. Ron could not have read much of it.
"Uh, good news or bad news first?" He asked of her, after Kim joined him next to the dingy old filing cabinet, now with a raised eyebrow. "I found a file that might answer some questions…" He added.
"And what's the bad news?"
Ron closed the folder and showed Kim the label.
"Global Justice Personnel File; Director, B.," she read aloud. "'Uh oh' was right, this is so not a good sign."
"Call me paranoid, but this begins to explain some of the trouble we've had recently," Ron suggested.
"These guys either have more intel on us than we'd thought… Or…"
"Betty Director has been working for them?"
"I…" Kim hesitated, she wanted to choose her words carefully. "It's something we need to consider. Either way, I think we need a GJ field office. Wade, are you getting this?"
"Already on it, there's a field office in Strasbourg, I'll send you the address. It's also the headquarters for Western Europe…"
"Thanks, Wade," Kim replied. "I think we're done here, there really is nothing here, it looks like we just got lucky that they left this one behind."
"Makes you wonder what sorts of things they did remove," Wade mused.
"Probably a lot of files, I mean, why else have a filing cabinet?" Ron suggested as they walked out of the building.
The area seemed as empty as when they had arrived and Kim allowed herself to relax, if only for a bit, during the walk back to the car. Ron was again at the wheel, while Kim handled navigation duties. The large office building not far from the highway exit was relatively easy to find.
"Hi, we found a GJ personnel file in an abandoned factory and would like to speak to the ranking agent," Kim announced to the lone receptionist, showing him the file they had retrieved.
After an initial shock, he picked up his phone and pressed one of the myriad quick-dial buttons. "Hello, Agent Du? I have a lady and a gentleman here who wish to see you…"
"What the hell is Will Du doing here of all places?" Ron whispered to Kim. She shrugged in response, there was bound to be a good reason.
"Yes, I understand, but they have some documents… No, I think you really need to see this for yourself, Sir. Will do." The man hung up the phone and said, "Our acting station chief will see you in just a moment, if you'll follow me."
"Please and thank you," Kim said. They were led through a few corridors to a large office, where Will Du was sitting behind a desk.
"Thanks Robert, I'll take it from here," he announced, prompting the receptionist to leave the room. "So, just what is it that you people have found and why do you want to see… Wait a minute! Possible and Stoppable!? What the hell are you two doing here? And what is… Are you two supposed to be in disguise or something?"
"Nice to see you, too, Will," Ron said sarcastically.
"Seriously, why on Earth are you here? There's literally nothing going on in Europe, apart from some nazi troublemakers who somehow got their hands on the same goop Drakken was using."
"That's actually kinda why we're here," Ron offered.
Will Du's response was a cautious "Go on…"
The two teens took turns describing the sequence of events that had led them to that office, from the beginning of their undercover mission, while the Top Agent took notes.
"And that's when we decided to come here," Kim concluded, before placing the folder they had retrieved on the desk.
Will Du briefly examined it and took a deep breath. "You two really do have a knack for attracting trouble… I see two big problems in your story – I'm not saying you're lying, just that something is very wrong.
"So, first problem, Doctor Director has been on leave since the day before the casino raid, her mother had a nasty fall and cannot walk for at least a few more weeks, so she took time off to help her out.
"Second, there is no mole. Not in the traditional sense anyway. Naturally, we began an inquiry as soon as it became clear that Drakken was getting insider information. Since he was getting info from at least three different sources, we quickly concluded that something had been compromised – from there, we figured out that a recent shipment of phones had been tampered with by those nazi bastards and their firmware replaced with a malicious version that attacked our PBXes and implanted a malicious script that downloaded and executed a payload that snooped on all inter-site SIP calls and exfiltrated them in bulk, disguised with other traffic."
"Uh… In case Kim didn't understand what you said, could you repeat that in English, please?"
Kim gave Ron a displeased look, but did not protest further.
"Ugh, amateurs…" Agent Du said as he massaged his forehead in frustration. "Our phones were hacked."
"See, that was so much simpler to say! Try leading with that next time," Ron suggested, much to the agent's displeasure.
Kim tried to keep him on track, "Ron, head in the game… We have bigger problems."
"Indeed you do," Will Du agreed, "just how sure are you that you spoke with Doctor Director?"
"Unless someone's perfected the technology to somehow clone a human, pretty sure," Ron stated.
"Not a hologram?"
"She ate with us at Bueno Nacho," Kim replied. "TI was there, they'll back us up."
"Miss Possible, the only thing I dislike more than working with amateurs is working with self-titled professionals who might as well be amateurs. I'll take your word over theirs."
"Harsh, but fair," Ron commented.
"Okay, so any other loose threads…" Will Du mumbled as he went over his notes. "Your fake IDs, can I see them?"
Both Kim and Ron produced their fake passports and driver's licenses and placed them on the desk.
"Okay, wow," the agent said. "These are good, I'm not a documents expert, but these would have fooled me. Any day of the week."
"Doctor Director mentioned you produced these in-house," Kim offered.
Will Du pushed back forcefully, "What? Global Justice is not in the business of producing fake documents of any sort."
Kim and Ron exchanged glances, they both agreed that their sitch was going from bad to worse.
Agent Du took a deep breath, then pressed a few buttons on his phone. "Investigations," a female voice announced over the speakerphone.
"Hi, Francesca? Will Du. Is François back from lunch yet?"
"He is, I'll transfer –"
"No, I need him to come over to my office. Can you relay that message?"
"Will do."
"Thanks," Agent Du said to conclude the call, before he lifted the headset briefly and put it back down. "Here's the deal, you two are not in trouble, I don't like to work with you, but that's a far cry from you two being criminals. That said, I think it's a bad idea for you to be roaming around on this… This operation of yours. You don't know what's going on, we don't know what's going on, and I've had more surprises today than I'd like to have in a month. Agree with me so far?"
Both teens nodded.
"I can't force you to do this – at least not without drawing unwanted attention to what's going on and causing half a dozen diplomatic incidents – but here's the deal: We have a flight to Middleton leaving sometime around 22:00, I'd be much happier if you were on board. Given what's going on, I'll definitely be flying back, too."
Kim hesitated for a moment, "I… I mean, we don't really have any leads at the moment, anyway. Right, Ron?"
"Yeah, the factory was the last credible thing we had. I guess we still haven't looked at the file we got in Vienna…"
"File?" Will Du asked.
"On the russian nazi guy from Munich," Ron replied, "we did go to Vienna just to get it and had a guy tailing us all the way to Basel airport. We have it on CD, if you're interested."
"Interested? Yes, but we need to take precautions." He again pressed a button on his phone.
"IT," a male voice answered.
"Hi Manuel, Will Du here. I need an airgapped laptop with a CD drive, ASAP."
"Will do. Give me five minutes."
Kim and Ron exchanged another glance. They were not imagining things, that was the third time.
"While we wait, let's see if we can narrow down our problem somewhat," Agent Du said unfazed. He navigated around on the phone, then hovered his finger over a button. "I need you two to be extra quiet for this one."
The two teens did as instructed and Agent Du placed the call. Doctor Director's voice was heard.
"Agent Du, to what do I owe this pleasure?"
"Madam Director, just checking that everything is peachy."
"My mother's doing better, an apple a day and all that."
"Madam Director, it's about Team Possible. Have you spoken to them recently?"
"Not for about a month, is everything okay?"
"Yes, as far as I know, just a minor accounting thing, an insurance company filed a claim about some wrecked cars or something? Anyway, I spoke to them, and they told me they knew nothing about it, but the insurance rep insisted that he had your signature."
"Sounds like that wacky scheme of Dementor's from last year to claim damages for materials stolen at Drakken's behest."
"Yeah, I thought so too. I'll tell them to produce the documents or shut up, sorry to bother you and best wishes to your mother."
"Not a problem, Agent Du. Talk to you soon."
Will Du pressed a button on his phone with a very dissatisfied look on his face.
Kim ventured a guess, "Bad news?"
"Very bad, we exchanged a challenge and countersign, I'm confident that was Doctor Director. You'll have noticed she said she hasn't talked to you for 'about a month'…"
"We sat with her at Bueno Nacho just over a week ago," Kim insisted. "Might she be keeping our mission a secret? It was supposed to be off the books."
"Peachy is the challenge we agreed upon for 'shit has hit the fan', if you'll pardon the expression." He sighed audibly, then continued, "We'll just have to sort this all out in Middleton."
There was a knock on the door. "Come in," Will Du said and a man walked in with a laptop.
"Agent Du, I was walking by IT and they had me bring you this laptop. What else can I do for you?"
"Thanks, François. I need you to have a look at these documents…" Will Du said as he handed them over.
"Two American passports, machine readable, otherwise unremarkable… And two driver's licenses, Colorado, USA. Also unremarkable."
"Well, they're forged," Agent Du replied.
"Wow, I never would have guessed. Of course, I haven't inspected them in detail, but these are good."
"I was hoping you'd find something I hadn't… I can't hand them over to your lab, these two need them at least until tonight, but see if you can find any reports of such high-quality fakes being tied to arms trafficking and/or neo-nazi groups."
"Will do. Anything else?"
"That's all, thanks…" The man left Will Du's office. "So, let's have a look at your neo-nazi," he said as he placed the CD in the laptop's optical drive. "Woah, does he really have these tattoos?"
"Oh yeah," Ron confirmed.
"Oh, it gets better," the agent continued, "'unusual affinity for Wagner'. Gotta love nazis and their total lack of subtlety when it comes to symbols. Known associates… Putin's chef is in the mix? God, these assholes just won't rest until Moscow is one giant cesspit of deplorables… But I'm still not sure what the connection is."
"If we knew that, we might not be here, to be honest," Kim answered.
"Alright, tell you what: Be at the airport, ready to go, at 21:00. In the meantime, keep a low profile. Go do touristy things or something, I'm going to start working on getting to the bottom of all this."
"Will do," Ron said, much to Kim's dissatisfaction – not because she disagreed, but because she was struggling not to laugh out loud at Ron's joke.
"Wait a minute," the agent said.
Did Ron get caught?
"How are you two paying for all this?"
"Uhm, I don't want to say 'GJ slush fund-backed credit cards'," Ron offered, "but I guess I just did…"
For the first time, Will Du was stunned beyond words, he just sat there, mouth agape.
"Dude, it's just what we were told!"
"That's… That's not what…" He took a deep breath, then continued, "I think it's safe to say that's at least part of your 'being followed' problem."
"You think someone is tracking our expenses and narrowing down our travels?" Kim asked.
"It's a distinct possibility. Do you have cash?"
"A couple hundred Euro between us. Maybe a thousand," she replied, deliberately understating somewhat.
"Ok, good, that'll easily be enough for the rest of the day." Agent Du again dialed someone.
"Yello," a man answered.
"Pawel, it's Will Du. I need to you to investigate a pair of credit cards, maximum priority – but before you do, drive into Germany and buy some fast food, make it look like the cards are on their way elsewhere."
"Do I need an escort for this…?"
"No, we just need to throw someone off a tail."
"Ok, will do."
Agent Du hung up the call and said, "You'll have figured out that I need you to surrender the credit cards…"
Kim and Ron looked at each other and agreed to do so. Whatever was going on, cash was going to be a lot less traceable.
"I'd let you stay here with us, but I imagine you're not in the mood to be cooped up in an office for the rest of the day."
"Fair assessment," Ron answered.
"You remember the way out?"
"Yeah, thanks, man," Ron said.
"Watch your backs," Agent Du recommended as they got up.
"Will do," Ron replied with an astonishing level of self-control. More than Kim could muster. They made it outside just before she burst into laughter. "Oh my god, Ron, I am so going to kill you!"
"Sorry, KP, that one was too good to miss out on."
"Oh, Ron, I needed that laugh… Just what mess did we get ourselves into?"
With over six hours to kill, the two teens agreed to start by going for a walk around the neighborhood, which looked nice enough for a well-spent afternoon. It also gave them an opportunity to talk to Wade, for a combination of tourist advice and (more importantly) a discussion of what was going on.
"Admittedly, the credit cards looked kinda dodgy when I looked into them, they're not obviously backed by any bank accounts, but I figured the whole 'slush fund' thing was a reasonable enough explanation," Wade explained.
"Didn't you mention you'd spoken with GJ the other day?" Ron inquired.
"I did, but not with Doctor Director. You remember Agent Roberts from the Drakken raid? Come to think of it, he was a little bit surprised when I asked him if Utkin was on their radar, I figured it was normal, but perhaps he was more surprised than he let on."
"Can you confirm the story about Doctor Director's mother?" Kim asked.
"Already have, and it checks out, hospital records, food deliveries… By the way, you're coming up on the European Parliament on your right."
"Wait a minute, Wade," Ron interjected, "Bernard pointed out the European Parliament building in Brussels, what's up?"
"I don't know, but I can look it up for you…"
"Never mind, Wade, probably just a misunderstanding," Kim suggested.
"Yeah," Ron continued, "it's not like they have some crazy scheme where they regularly move all of parliament around between two cities."
"That would be a ferocious waste of taxpayer money," Kim added. "Nice building, though. Anyway, back on topic, it's still possible that Betty Director isn't lying to us and just keeping GJ in the dark. Will Du's phone hack story makes a lot of sense, too. I'm hoping it's all just a big misunderstanding."
"Yeah… Well, call me if you need anything, guys, I'm going to give TI an update…"
"See you, Wade."
"Later, man…"
Kim and Ron were again on their own, so to say. The walk was pleasant enough, but the specter of uncertainty around their (now completed?) mission still loomed.
"Hey, KP…" Ron said apropos of nothing, "Did we win?"
"What?"
"Our mission, did we succeed, did we fail? If it was the phones, was this all just a waste of time? Scratch that, we're together, so it's never a waste of time."
"Aww, that's so sweet. Honestly? I don't know, I'm not sure anyone knows at this point. But it's been a pretty fun honeymoon…" Kim said between giggles.
"'Never be normal', am I right? You know, this place is kinda romantic…"
"Not sure there's all that much to do, though."
"My thoughts precisely…"
The two teens found themselves walking along in each other's arms, neither of them quite sure how they'd ended up in that position, but they also did not feel the need to do anything about it. Maybe it was the endorphins from another mission being over, but in a weird way, it was just another day in their lives.
"Oh, look, another 5-Series like the one we rented," Ron pointed out. "They're still super new, they're not even out in the states yet…"
"It's a nice car," Kim agreed, "though I'm not sure I'm ready to daily drive a soccer mom car."
"That's the beauty of rentals," Ron said as they approached the car, "enjoy it for a few days, who cares after that… Oh, this one has a brown interior, that actually looks really cool."
Kim was expecting Ron to comment further, but he was suddenly silent. She didn't need to guess what was going on.
She and Ron let go of each other and broke in opposite directions, narrowly avoiding being hit by taser bolts. A group of five goons had somehow gotten in place behind them, but lost the element of surprise a moment too soon. They were dressed in street clothes and would have blended in if they were not ganging up on Team Possible.
Ron began to run away, doing what he always did best, and drew three of the five to chase him.
"You amateurs should know better than to send two guys after me," Kim taunted the remaining assailants as she worked on her tactic. They just smiled, as if they had the situation under control. Whatever their plan was, they had not counted on Kim somersaulting above their heads and kicking both their necks, forcing them to the ground. After landing, she took a few seconds to bind them together with the plastic zip tie handcuffs they carried, then she ran after the second group, which was chasing Ron.
His distraction had worked perfectly, Kim was more than capable of dealing with a pair of goons, and the other three had little hope of catching up to his mad running away skills. He'd led them around the block, so Kim should be just about ready to ambush the second group. Ron turned into an alleyway and found his way forward blocked.
His pursuers couldn't believe their luck, as evidenced by their faces – Ron had run into a blind alley, and now they were going to easily subdue him. Of course, they had not counted on Kim showing up behind them and knocking the three of them to the ground in one swoop. Though one tried to get back up, Ron kneed him and forced him to the ground while his focus was on Kim. The two teens tied down their assailants and quickly searched them for anything relevant. None carried any ID, though one had a concealed pistol. Kim found the magazine release, pressed it, and put the full magazine in her pocket, leaving the (hopefully) empty pistol behind.
"Let's roll, Ron."
"I'm with you, KP!"
F in the chat for us European taxpayers who are still putting up with the French vanity project that is having the European Parliament move around between Brussels and Strasbourg twice a month. Apparently, the cost of this was estimated at over 100 million Euro per year a decade ago.