***
There really was a car waiting at the airport exit. Expensive, black, executive class, tinted to the point of opacity. Standing beside the driver's door was Petya in a black suit and black sunglasses. Petya Rasputin — the very sa Colossus from the comics. The Petya who had been in that first delegation, sent all the way to the Dragon Battle to fetch . The Petya who had spent the better part of ten years serving as my favorite training dummy in every advanced group session. My perfect sparring partner — the one who doesn't go down from the first hit. Who keeps learning, keeps pushing, keeps working through the assigned drill even when everyone else has already collapsed in exhaustion.
I actually stopped and stood there for a mont when I spotted and recognized him. You could, with a slight stretch, call the kid my Pupil. A slight stretch — but perhaps.
Feeling my evaluating gaze and noticing the thoughtful look on my face, Petya involuntarily flinched, and a light sweat broke out on his forehead. Understandable — he knew well. He knew that this particular thoughtful expression of mine ant so new exercise, test, challenge, strike, or technique was approaching, and that I wasn't yet confident he'd survive it.
I sighed. No — Petya wasn't right for the Dragon Battle. He was too calm for that. Too peaceable. There was no fire in him, no drive, none of that cheerful bubbling anger. They'd kill him there. Not in the Arena, but at night, from behind a shadow. He wouldn't be able to stay on guard every mont. He didn't like blood.
"Hello, Petya," I walked over and shook his hand.
"Hello, Sensei," this hulk of a man — who matched in both height and shoulder width — smiled a little shyly. All of them, every last one of the three hundred — no, two hundred and seventy-three — mbers of the First Generation, or rather the Zeroth Generation, of Soviet super-soldiers had always called Sensei. Officially, "Comrade Creed" or "Comrade Colonel" — that was only Natasha. And twenty-six more hadn't survived the ten years. They'd been killed.
Yes — a super-soldier can be killed. And every one of those n and won was a combat officer. The most battle-capable unit the Soviet state had. Constantly deployed, constantly on assignnts. Wherever it was hardest and hottest — that's where they were. Natasha was no exception.
Honestly, I still don't know how to feel about that. Nobody had asked if they wanted to beco soldiers. The experint had begun for them at the age of three. There had been no such thing as an inford choice. But I hadn't made that decision. I hadn't given that order. And if not for that folder I'd left behind, there would have been so "Red Room" or sothing like it regardless.
I got into the car. Back seat. Natasha settled in beside . Petya took his place at the wheel.
"Are you going to explain what's going on?" I asked Romanova. She had been promoted to Major, incidentally. Sa as Petya.
"You left Moscow so suddenly, Comrade Colonel. It threw our entire departnt into a panic. Then Miss Fury contacted us and inford us you were flying to Japan. Without prepared cover. We had to conduct ergency negotiations and coordination with the Japanese side to avoid a diplomatic incident. A KGB colonel is a significant figure," Natasha laid out the situation. "Ti was short — we had to work crudely, practically in the open."
"You shouldn't have gotten involved," I said, my mood darkening. "The scandal now is going to be bigger, wider, and louder."
"Why?" Natasha went tense.
"Because Logan and I flew here to conduct so very direct negotiations with the local yakuza. And we don't care about political consequences. Everyone's life would have been simpler if I'd stayed a private individual. I would have made it through passport control just fine without you."
"I don't doubt it for a second," Romanova replied. "But we have our orders. And we intervened. You are now in this country entirely officially. And you are a Colonel of State Security. Please keep that in mind."
"I cannot stand politics, intelligence work, or political gas," I muttered.
"That is not news, Viktor Ivanovich," Romanova said, and smiled — which surprised more than a little.
Checking into the hotel went smoothly. My personal effects and clothes were already waiting in the room. I suspected portals had been involved, since there wouldn't have been ti to ship them from Moscow by ordinary ans. Not that it was surprising — these people had always taken every assignnt with extre seriousness. That was why only twenty-six had been lost across the whole decade. Given their work and its intensity, that was a very, very small number.
By local ti it was still early morning. The working day was only just beginning. So I decided not to put things off.
I changed into a decent suit, packed a sports bag with a fresh gi, my hakama, belt, and sandals, and went downstairs. We got in the car, and Petya drove us to Hombu Dojo.
***
Eleven years had passed since I was last here. O-Sensei had still been alive then. It stirred mories. Brought on a nostalgic ache.
Even outside the hotel, two more cars carrying official representatives of the receiving party had attached themselves to ours, and small red flags had appeared on our hood. By the ti we pulled up to the building, we had beco a reasonably imposing delegation.
Kisshomaru Ueshiba ca out to receive us himself, with his senior students. And the look on his face when he recognized was sothing to see.
"Victor-san?" he asked, not quite believing yet, but already beginning to smile.
"Hello, Ueshiba-san," I smiled back. We bowed in the local fashion, then shook hands in the European one.
"Where have you been all these years, Victor-san?" he asked with genuine warmth. It's a good feeling, being t with real gladness. Your own lips spread into a smile without asking permission. "You vanished back in '69 and then — nothing. Not a word."
"Teaching Soviet children Kung Fu," I admitted.
"Kung Fu?" he said, puzzled. "But why not Aikido? You have sixth dan with the right to teach. My father gave you that permission — you rember?"
"I rember," I said, slipping off my shoes at the entrance to the dojo. "But I don't consider it my place. I understand the true path of Ai-Ki too poorly. I don't have the enlightennt O-Sensei carried."
"A pity," Kisshomaru said, visibly disappointed. "Father would have been glad to see you carrying his art forward."
"You know, Ueshiba-san—" I stopped and stood still, struck by a thought that had just arrived. "Perhaps it was Heaven itself that directed here today. Or the will of O-Sensei, watching us from above. I didn't plan to be here. It all happened by chance."
"Oh?" Kisshomaru smiled. "Then share this insight that has been opened to you."
"My na is Viktor Ivanovich Creed. And at this mont, I am the Head of the Martial Arts Federation of the Soviet Union. My visit is official. And I have the authority…"
"Oh?" His eyes widened. "You've risen high, Victor-san. And what authority is that?"
"The broadest kind," I smiled. "Today, after training, you and I will discuss the possibility of opening, within the Soviet Union's Martial Arts Federation, an Aikido Aikikai Federation of its own. I'm confident there will be no obstacles from the authorities. And you will be able to send instructors and senior students to the Union officially. And in return, receive groups of students from there."
"Oh! Teaching Ai-Ki to Soviet supers?" He lit up. "That is extraordinary. And so strange. Do you think it could work?"
"Ueshiba-san, I am the Union's authorized representative in Japan. It will work." I turned. "Natasha?"
Romanova was at my side, as always.
"I'll send a ssage to leadership through diplomatic channels right now," she said with a nod. "A decision will be reached in the shortest possible ti."
"Leave Petya with ," I asked her. "I want to show him the wonder of Ai-Ki. I'm certain it will suit him better than anything else."
"Understood, Comrade Colonel," she said, stepped aside for Rasputin, and then moved away quickly to transmit the ssage as soon as possible.
***
The day passed magnificently. It turned out I had missed the atmosphere of Aikido practice deeply — the openness of it, the absence of conflict, of aggression and rivalry that reigned here. The technique itself I had practiced constantly over the past ten years, using and teaching it in sessions with the advanced groups. But I had never isolated it as its own art. Had never explained the aning of the Path of Ai-Ki, because I had never considered myself worthy or pure enough for that.
So the body rembered. The body had not forgotten. And the joy of movent and interaction was undimd by clumsy errors.
At lunch — I stayed in Hombu Dojo for lunch, as Kisshomaru simply wouldn't release — Natasha arrived with confirmation of my authority to conclude agreents with the Japanese Governnt in the field of developing cooperation on the developnt of Martial Arts.
My initiative had been approved "at the highest level" in the Union, with a green light given practically on the spot. I had the right to conclude any agreents touching on the relevant subject matter.
This significantly altered my plans. It forced to extend my visit by at least a week, though originally I had intended to conclude everything in a single day. But man proposes…
***
In the morning, a different car ca for . With a different driver. And from a different entrance of the hotel. And I was no longer Viktor Creed — I was Viktor Lehnsherr. The cover for my arrival and presence in Japan had been constructed by a different organization entirely, speaking through Nicole's voice.
The car was even more luxurious than yesterday's. Not executive class — premium class. And it comfortably held all of us: Logan, , Nicole, Cap, and Erik. The driver was separated from us by an opaque partition, so I had no idea who it was and didn't think to ask. Probably so SHIELD operative.
In this car, we pulled up to the office building of Yoshida Group. We stepped out — all of us looking formidably polished, in expensive suits and dark glasses. Distinguished. It was almost enough to make your jaw ache.
At the entrance they made an attempt to stop us, but a pair of glances over the rims of our lowered sunglasses — mine and Erik's — sohow drained the security staff of that particular ambition and awoke in them thoughts about the value of life and the transience of all earthly things.
Elevator. Ride up. A door to an office. Or a conference room — I wasn't entirely certain of the purpose of the space our distinguished little company proceeded to walk into.
And wouldn't you know it — all three of the people we were interested in were in the room at once. Nicole's doing, without a doubt. Either she'd gotten a tip about this precise eting, or — equally likely — she had engineered the eting herself, dropping a word here, feeding information there, to one person and another. She had a talent for that.
Shingen Yoshida, Mariko Yoshida, Hideki Kurohagi, so woman of Slavic appearance, and a sizable cluster of security. Part of it, I gathered, belonged to Shingen, part to Kurohagi. Though in truth they all had more or less the sa face, those security n, as though stamped out on the sa press.
"O-hayo, Yoshida-san," I was the first to greet him, with a respectful but shallow bow, after we'd entered the room.
"Lehnsherr?" he said, more rough than polite, in response to the greeting. "I was told you were looking for a eting."
"That's right," I smiled. For so reason, none of my companions showed any eagerness to enter the conversation. I was left to carry the whole thing myself. Bastards. They knew perfectly well I wasn't gifted when it ca to talking. It didn't co naturally to .
"And what do you want?" Shingen asked, a little rougher still, as we moved closer to them — the office was not a small one.
"You have the goods, we have the buyer," I smiled.
"'Goods?' 'Buyer?'" He frowned. "What are you talking about?"
"We've co for your daughter," I said, letting the smile ease back a little. "To ask for her hand. For my friend." I glanced back. "Jas?" Logan stepped forward from behind the rest of us. The girl — who had been standing with her eyes lowered to the floor — startled as though drenched with cold water, and pressed both hands to her mouth. Her eyes flew wide open with astonishnt.
"Get out," Shingen said, making a gesture as if brushing away a fly. "Mariko is already spoken for."
I had genuinely tried to be polite. I had witnesses to prove it. But he simply didn't want things to go smoothly. That was on him, surely. Wasn't it?
"Which language do you prefer to speak?" I said, letting the smile go out entirely, and stepped closer. "The language of Force, or the language of Money?"
"And if Force?" Shingen took a step forward and placed his hand on his sword. He was dressed in traditional Japanese samurai garb, though as far as I understood it, he had no actual connection to the samurai tradition. He was bald as a knee, with thick, bristling black eyebrows — an imposing, striking figure of a man.
Without a word, I stepped forward. Not toward Yoshida, though — toward Kurohagi. Under the wide-eyed stares of everyone in the room, I grabbed him with one hand by the groin and the other by the throat, and threw him bodily through the window, shattering the large panoramic pane of glass behind Shingen with his body.
Nobody had ti to blink before the unhappy Hideki's screaming was already fading in the direction of the pavent below. Then ca a distant thud, the sound of broken glass, and the wail of so car alarm belonging to a vehicle that had apparently been unlucky enough to et a body that had gathered considerable speed on the way down. What did anyone expect? Sixteenth floor. Yoshida Group had a tall office building.
Though the reason nobody — the assembled security, Shingen himself — had managed to blink was also this: in front of every single pair of eyes in the room, a thick tal needle now hung suspended, ready to enter the skull behind it at the first movent anyone made. Well — I wasn't going to be the only one having fun. Erik had decided to participate as well.
anwhile, I produced a handkerchief from my pocket and carefully wiped my hands with it, walking unhurriedly toward the now-frozen Yoshida.
"Mariko is free again," I said, and shrugged, stating the obvious.
"And if Money?" Shingen asked — considerably less bold than he had been at the start of this conversation, his gaze fixed on the needles hanging an inch from his eyes.
"Erik," I said, with a small twitch of my jaw. He understood, and the needles drifted back a couple of ters, giving everyone room to breathe, to swallow what had been stuck in their throats. They couldn't quite manage to relax, though — the needles were still hanging there in the air, unsettling and inescapable.
"In the language of Money: my brother and I hold a controlling stake in Stark Industries. Heard of it?"
"I have," Yoshida said, and his interest imdiately sharpened. "Very much so — transnational corporation, monopoly in IT and technology."
"Stark Industries can enter into a partnership agreent with Yoshida Group, expanding its business in Japan through you. Does that interest you?"
"Yes," Shingen said, settling into a kind of calm. "And the groom himself?"
"The groom is broke," I said, making no attempt to soften it. Logan set his jaw but didn't object — because, when it ca down to it, it was true. He had nothing to his na except the fine Harley sitting in Xavier's garage. No ho, no bank accounts. Just a gym teacher's salary from Xavier. "But he's our friend. Is a partnership with Stark Industries sufficient as a bride price?"
"I'd say so," Shingen considered, and agreed.
"And you can put your new son-in-law to work afterward. He has a heavy hand. That kind of man has a place in Kuzuryu."
"We'll see," Yoshida said, sizing up Logan with an appraising look. "What about the agreent?"
"Erik — call Howard. Tell him to fly out here. Will you supervise and make sure they reach terms?" I turned to my brother. He gave a crooked smile and nodded, and the needles vanished back into his clothing.
"Steve?" I turned to Cap. He was grim and dark. But he said nothing.
"And what about Hideki? And the police?" Nicole asked.
"What about Hideki?" I looked around at everyone present. "He jumped on his own, didn't he? Wasn't that how it happened?" And sohow, under my gaze, no one in the room volunteered an alternative version of events.
"Excellent," I said, with a nod. "You can handle the rest yourselves. I'm going back to the dojo."
***
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