He waited for at least five minutes, and while he heard the scuff of shoes at the head of the street, he also heard the scuff as they retreated. Damn it!

He held out hope that it was a fake and lingered a couple of minutes, but it wasn’t happening and he knew it. His impulse was to go after the guy, but that would blow his cover. So he waited a few more seconds, then headed down the street, casting a single glance over his shoulder before pulling out his cell and calling Marc. “What the hell happened?”

Marc sighed faintly. “Not sure. Either he spooked, or figured you weren’t worth the bother. He seemed to study the street for a moment and then bugged out. Don’t sweat it, we’ll get him next time.”

He grunted in reluctant acknowledgement. They’d better. He wanted answers, the sooner the better.

“Why don’t you go to the rendezvous point? We’ll meet you there soon. I got something for you.”

The rendezvous point was a dark little pub where no one seemed to speak English, which was ideal for their purposes, although Logan warned him that someone in their could be playing clueless just to eavesdrop on them. (He’d done that enough to suspect it in other people.) The fact that he said he had something for him pretty much meant that someone had come in after he left and talked to Hans, but Marc didn’t speak the language and had no idea what they talked about, so he was going to have to play interpreter.

Feeling the typical letdown of a wasted adrenaline surge, he went to the pub, which was all polished wood and pale lighting, and ordered a dunkelbier (a dark lager), and looked at the book he’d bought. It was a German science fiction novel. Well, why not?

He was starting the second chapter and beer by the time Marc and Sid came in, and people did stare at them, not only because Marc was his usual loud American self, but because they were the only non-whites in the whole place. That wasn’t true of Switzerland as a whole - it wasn’t quite as white as you’d think, or as it used to be - just this place at this moment in time. They still stayed to have a beer (not Sid, of course) before wandering back to their hotel like a bunch of tourists.

The recording Marc had made was very interesting. A man entered Naslund’s shop shortly after he left, and started questioning Hans about him. He asked Hans if he had asked “nosy” questions, if he had seemed “suspicious” in any way. Hans said no, and Logan couldn’t help but snort when Hans said he’d been a “nice young man”. After he told Marc that, he clapped his hands together. “Hot damn! He’s a shitty judge of character! We’ve hit the jackpot!”

He glowered at him. Logan was sitting at the head of the hotel bed, listening to the recording, while Marc sat on the end, awaiting instant translation. Sid sat at the small desk just beyond the bed, his posture so ramrod straight Logan’s back almost wanted to hurt in sympathy. “I’ll have you know I was runnin’ undercover missions while you were still in diapers,” he told Marc. That was true from what he’d gathered, he just couldn’t remember it. “If I want to seem like a nice young man, I can do it.”

“Then why don’t you seem that way in real life?” Marc challenged, grinning like he already knew the answer. He probably did.

“’Cause when you’re a nice young man, people don’t leave you the fuck alone. Can we get on with it?”

They did, although it was clear Marc would have rather teased him some more. Marc had taken a lot of photos of the shop and all the men he thought were watching the place (three in all, including the one that tailed him), and the photos of the back of the shop showed a door that must have led directly to the back room. It was only secured by an old fashioned key and bolt lock that would surely do for its basic purpose, but would be easy work for Marc. Of course, even if it was a super sophisticated lock, Marc could get through it with no problem, as he was an expert at getting in where he didn’t belong.

The card that Hans had given him with the shop’s number also had its business hours, so it was easy to formulate a plan of action. Logan would call Hans shortly before the shop’s closing and tell him that an emergency back home had him catching the red eye back to Berlin, but on his way to the airport, he wanted to swing by and buy the watch. Figuring that Hans just didn’t have that much business, he’d be willing to stay open a bit after hours for the transaction. So while Logan was buying the watch and keeping him busy in the front of the store, Marc would break into the back room and have a look around to see what he could find. Sid would be the floater outside, keeping an eye out for the guys watching the shop, and he was told to temporarily neutralize them if they seemed to be getting too close. (Because Sid only had two modes: temporary neutralization or insanely permanent neutralization. Logan could sympathize.) They’d all be wearing earpieces so they could hear wha! t was going on: Logan’s phrase that something was wrong was “Have you ever been to Berlin?”; Sid’s phrase was “It’s getting cold”; Marc would just curse if something was wrong. They’d all leave separately, assuming everything went according to plan, and rendezvous outside a pub couple of blocks away. If things went wrong, well, they’d have to kick some ass.

As back up plans went, it was very simple and basic, yet wildly effective.

The worst part was the waiting - that was always the worst part - but Marc killed a great deal of it by coercing them to go out and get some weather and city appropriate clothing, as another thing that he and Sid had in common was a lack of stuff; they traveled light, and Logan had to admit that even that had its own limitations. Still, Marc wanted to buy them the most outrageous stuff, and Logan wouldn’t stand for it, but Sid was too accustomed to obeying authority figures to stand up for himself against Marc’s sartorial assault. Marc saw the unspoken horror in his eyes and stopped, though. Not that he stopped bugging him - oh no, he just left Sid alone. He wasn’t a bully; he just picked on those who could defend themselves.

When they returned to the hotel, he had time for a beer in the bar before he had to call Hans, and their gamble was right: Hans didn’t get enough business that he could turn this down. He agreed to stay at the shop until he swung by, and said he’d have the watch ready for him. After that they waited some more, as they didn’t want to be too quick on the draw, and night was always a handy cover (as well as an advantage to Marc, as he saw in infrared).

Marc left first, then Sid, and then Logan caught a cab that took him straight to the shop. The night was clear, therefore even colder, and if it wasn’t for the lack of trees and rednecks he’d have thought he was in Northern Canada. The shop door was locked, a “closed” sign out, but the lights were on, making the windows glow a honeyed amber. He knocked, and out of the corner of his eye, he saw someone loitering in the shadows up the street. It was Sid, on watchdog duty.

Hans opened the door and let him in, the warmth of his store almost overwhelming after the crisp air outside, and once again he had to stifle the urge to sneeze. (Didn’t he ever dust?) They had a friendly, meaningless conversation about the weather, while he heard Marc say in his ear, “Going in.”

Hans had the watch ready for him, in an elegant box on a bed of cotton batting, and he pretended to examine it closely, noting details, buying time. He didn’t hear any noises in the back, so he figured Marc was doing a good job of silently creeping about.

It was all going really well - Hans must have been a lonely guy, as he was eager to talk - until Sid said quietly, “It’s getting cold.”

Uh oh.

“What’s wrong, kid?” he heard Marc ask quietly.

“I just found one of the guards from earlier,” he reported. “Dead. He’s been garroted. I didn’t do it.” He added that last bit needlessly, as everyone knew Sid wasn’t the garroting type.

Hans was looking at Logan funny, as he had seemed to zone out of the conversation. “Is something wrong?” Hans asked.

Logan didn’t smell blood on him, and kind of doubted if this doughy man, who appeared to have spindly arms, could have garroted anyone, especially those solidly built men Marc had captured on film. Somebody else was making a move here, somebody unrelated to those men outside.

Wow - what the hell did Hans have?

“I thought I heard something outside,” Logan told him, turning to glance out the window. He couldn’t actually see anything, it was too bright in here and too dark out there, but he thought he saw a flicker of movement, and Sid was suddenly saying, “Logan, there’s a man advancing on the shop. I won’t get to him in -”

The front window shattered, and a silver canister bounced across the floor, spewing out a stream of stinging, sour gas. Tear gas, the kind that hit Logan harder than most.

But it didn’t stop him - he knew the agony would be a thousand times worse if he let it continue. Logan darted for the canister, eyes watering and stinging like someone was rubbing salt into them, his nasal passages burning like he was inhaling lava, and picked up the surprisingly hot canister, feeling a layer of skin burn away as he tossed it back out the window. A river of snot and tears seemed to be blinding him and choking him, but he was recovering even as he struggled to breathe. “What the hell is going on?” Hans exclaimed, the fear and anger in his voice quite genuine.

“Behind the counter!” Logan said, grabbing the man and shoving him in that direction. Logan remained where he was, in full view of the broken window. He was essentially inviting a shot, but to come after him they’d have to show themselves, which was the point. As soon as he saw them, this was done.

Sid said in his ear, “I’ve got the men on foot, but I don’t like the look of a car that just - ”

Gunshots rang out, muffled pops that were clearly guns with silencers on them (silencers lessened the noise, but didn’t make it go away), and Hans finally ducked behind the counter. Logan was tensed for bullets, but it didn’t happen, as he heard shouts and breaking glass, and what sounded like ricochets off metal - Sid got in the way? A good bet; bullets held no fear for him. This was followed by sudden acceleration and a screeching of tires on asphalt, as the men had no idea how to deal with this variable and decided that the best way to handle it was with a very hasty retreat.

“Kid, you okay?” Marc asked.

There was a distressingly long pause, but finally Sid, sounding a bit winded, replied, “I’m fine. They got away, but the immediate threat seems to be neutralized.”

Logan loved how he couched the terms: “immediate threat”. He was allowing the possibility that they could come back, but if they were organized or a big group, that was a good bet. They needed to get out of here and regroup before there was another attack that would definitely blow their cover.

Hans glanced warily over the counter, and asked, “You’re all right?”

Logan looked down at himself as if checking to make sure. “Yeah, I guess so.”

“How did you … you grabbed that … thing.” He was gesturing towards the window, and clearly meant the tear gas canister.

Logan shrugged, and wondered how he could explain getting a face full of tear gas and suddenly being all right. There really was no reason for it, was there? “I used to be in the army.” That made no sense at all - how could being in the army have ever prepared him for that? But he figured Hans would grudgingly accept it, mainly because he wanted to accept something. Hans stared at him warily, while Logan simply pulled out the cash for the watch and set it down on the countertop. “I thought Zurich was relatively crime free. I had no idea things got this bad.”

Hans straightened, blinking in obvious confusion. “Uh, um … this has never happened before. It’s very … startling.”

“It was.”

He dithered, hesitated, clearly not sure what to do. “I suppose I should call the police.”

Logan nodded. “It’d be a good idea.” He looked at his new antique pocket watch - which was set to the correct time - and said, “I suppose I could see if there’s a later flight I can catch …”

“No, no, please go catch your plane,” Hans said, almost a little too quickly. He must have suspected the connection to the item he was trying to sell under the counter, and wanted him out of there as soon as possible. “I’m very sorry about all this.”

“So am I,” Logan said. (In his ear, he heard Marc say, “All clear. Get your ass outta there, Logan.”) “Are you sure you’ll be okay? Do you want me to stay until the police arrive?”

Hans shook his head, and briefly attempted a brave smile that collapsed like a poorly made soufflé. “No, it’s all right. Thank you.”

Logan took his watch, and after pretending to be reluctant, left the shop, casting several nervous glances at the surrounding streets. Sid had dragged the bodies off to the side, but some left small, smeared trails of blood on the sidewalk. Broken glass glittered like ice, and spent shell casings littered the street like discarded cigarette butts. The dented gas canister was in the gutter on the other side of the street, looking like an oddly shaped beer can.

He ducked down the first side street, and nearly ran face first into Marc and Sid. “Bupkis,” Marc told him quietly. “The back room is a storage area full of boxes, and most of it is full of packing material and random crap, none of which looked expensive or likely. The gun oil you were smelling was coming from a shotgun mounted on a rack on the wall. It was well tended, but not recently used.”

“So this was pointless?”

“Not exactly. Look what the kid found on the garroted corpse.” Marc held out a laminated card towards him, and while it was dark, there was just enough ambient light from the streetlights that he could make out what was on it.

“Now I don’t exactly sprechen sie Deutsch, but even I’ve seen a couple of those words before,” Marc said, and there was an edge in his voice that Logan hadn’t caught before. He was nervous.

And as his eyes adjusted to the light levels, he could see why. The card identified the holder as Franz Abend, a member of German Intelligence. “Holy shit,” Logan gasped, looking at a corpse that was propped up against a building on their right. Correction: not a corpse. He didn’t smell dead, and he was pretty sure he saw the small movement of respiration. “This guy was an agent of the German government.”

“Shit,” Marc cursed, lifting up his goggles briefly to rub his eyes. “Why is the German government watching Hans Naslund? And who the fuck killed him? Do they realize they’re messing with government forces? That’s just asking to get put through a shredder.”

“Maybe we can ask him when he’s conscious,” Sid said, gesturing back at the man propped against the building.

“Who’s that?” Logan wondered, wiping the identity card clear of all their prints before flicking it off to the side. Sid probably didn’t have his prints registered with any governments, but Marc probably did, and Logan knew his prints didn’t officially exist anywhere, but unofficially existed, only to be accessed by very bad people he really didn’t want to deal with at the moment.

“He put the tear gas grenade through the window,” Sid said, as blandly as if reporting the weather. “He has a broken arm, dislocated shoulder, and possibly a concussion. I’m sorry, si - Logan, but I had to move fast to intercept him, and I may have hit with more force than intended.”

Oh good lord, was the kid actually asking forgiveness?! “This isn’t a class in the danger room, Sid, this is real life. Don’t apologize for defending an entire fucking street single handedly. And besides, I ain’t Captain Buzzkill. He may be in a half body cast for six months, but he’s still breathing, so A plus to you.”

Sid dipped his head, a gesture that was both acknowledging and embarrassed. He thought being with Angel and his crew had loosened him up a bit about the fighting thing, but that dealt with demons and the undead and whatnot; Sid must have categorized them differently.

Logan was startled to hear sirens rapidly approaching. Had Hans really called the cops? No, probably not; probably someone heard the gunshots and instantly reported them. Zurich wasn’t exactly the worst part of Compton - gunshots got noticed here, and people probably freaked.

Logan crouched in front of the injured man and lightly slapped his face, seeing if he could bring him around. When that didn’t work, he grabbed his obviously dislocated shoulder and squeezed. He started awake with an inarticulate shout of pain, but his eyelids barely stayed open, fluttering like broken wings. “What’s your name?” He asked first in German, then Swiss German.

Even in this low light, his pupils looked far too wide for his eyes, and what fell out of his rubbery, drool spattered lips were nonsense syllables, although Logan thought the accent was Swiss. His eyelids shut and he slumped farther down the wall, and Logan quickly frisked him, looking for some kind of identification. The guy was a pro: he carried a gun, but not a wallet. “We’re getting nothing from him,” he told the others, and then gestured that they should take the back way out of there. They did.

The kid was being modest - that guy definitely had a concussion, perhaps even a cracked skull. A hairline fracture at worst, but enough to make him incoherent until he got medical attention.

They stuck to the back streets and alleys until they were far enough from the shop and the police cars to feel safe venturing out, and since night had just fallen, they quickly found crowds of pedestrians to get lost in. They eventually found a cab, and had it take them back to the hotel.

Back in their room, Marc exclaimed, “How many others do you think are in on this?”

Logan looked at him curiously, crossing the room to shut the curtains almost out of reflex. He may not have remembered specific details of espionage, but he remembered random things, such as never leaving windows uncovered if you were near them. You didn’t make yourself an easy target ever, no matter how futile the gestures. “What d’ya mean?”

“If the German government’s watching Naslund, it’s likely others are, aren’t they? How likely is it that one government is going to trust another’s intelligence service, even if they are allies?”

That was a good point. No, that was a damn fantastic one. Logan sat on the end of the bed and wearily rubbed his own eyes as Sid turned on the nightstand lamp. His eyes had healed from the tear gas a long time ago, but they still felt a little dry. “If the Germans got this intelligence first, they could be hording it. All intelligence agencies are pretty nuts about having a monopoly on intell - knowledge is power and all that.”

“But they’re on Swiss soil. You tellin’ me the Swiss don’t know about this?”

Logan rubbed the back of his neck as he thought. Yeah, this was turning uglier by the second. "A coupla possibilities here. One, the Swiss know, and are allowing the Germans to run the op. Two, they're working with the Germans on this, equal but parallel operations. Three, the Swiss don't know at all; the Germans are working sub rosa."

"Which is worse?" Sid wondered. Unlike him and Marc, this wasn't effecting him, perhaps because he didn't realize the stakes. For one thing, if the people that attacked tonight were working for an alternate government, Sid had just assaulted their agents - he could be in a shitload of trouble.

"For us?" Marc replied, not so much sitting on the bed as collapsing on it. "The two of 'em working together. If the Germans are being covert, it works in our favor, 'cause the Swiss'll be pissed when they find out their neighbors are running an op in their country without telling them."

"If that's the case," Logan noted. "We don't know what's going on here." He sighed, as more ugly possibilities popped into his head. "We may not be the only freelancers."

Marc nodded, clearly having thought of that already. "Tear gas boy?"

"Maybe. Maybe not. A drive by sounds more amateurish than flooding a place with tear gas. How many gunmen were in the car, kid?"

"Two," Sid said, taking a seat at the desk across the room. "The driver may have had a gun, but didn't have time to pull it out."

"You made 'em freak?" Marc guessed.

"I stood in the way and they shot me. When it seemed to have no effect, they weren't happy."

Marc let out a small grunt of humor. "They probably thought you were Superman."

"Who?"

Marc waved his hand dismissively. "Never mind. Jeeze, we have got to enhance your education on Western culture."

"Bren tried to do that by taking me to the Halloween parade." Sid scowled in thought, his eyes distant as he seemed to gaze at his own thoughts. "It was ... unusual."

"Halloween parade?" Marc asked Logan.

Logan just knew Marc was going to love this. "The big do in West Hollywood?" Every year for what seemed like a very long time, the gay community of West Hollywood had a huge Halloween party that spilled out into the streets for the entire night, and brought out all sorts, from huge drag queens to gay biker gangs. It was essentially a gay bacchanalia, although in the last few years - according to Bren, at any rate - it had become "highly commercial" and "overloaded with straights looking for a freaky time".

Marc got it, and laughed, slapping his thigh. "Oh my god, kid, Bren dragged you there? That must have been an education."

Sid took that question far more seriously than it merited. "Some men do look remarkably like women. If it wasn't for the size of the Adam's apple, you'd never know."

This made Marc laugh harder, and Logan grimaced down at the carpet, trying not to laugh himself. Thanks to his friends, Sid had gotten an education that could best be called weird: alt rock concerts, demons, and transvestites. If Sid decided he wanted nothing to do with the Western Hemisphere, he supposed he would understand. "Back on topic," Logan said, as soon as he was sure he wouldn't laugh. "We could be involved in deep shit here. We didn't kill the German agent, but we were on the scene. If we're traced, things could get ugly fast."

Marc scratched his neck, which Logan identified as a nervous habit of his. "I know. I can tell Haun the deal's off ... but I am kinda curious what the hell this is all about."

"Curiosity killed the cat, Marc."

"I'm not some fucking pussy, I'm a Scorpion," Marc replied, flashing him a toothy smile. But it was forced bravado; he may have been curious, but he was still worried about it all. They were flirting with disaster.

"We saved his life, didn't we?" Sid asked, almost apropos of nothing.

"What?" Logan asked.

"Naslund. The attack tonight was meant for him, wasn't it?"

And Sid had just made a good point that should have been instantly obvious. Yes, the attack wasn't meant for them, they were just there when it happened. And good thing for Naslund, although he'd never know that. "It must have been. Although the man who gassed him probably meant to take him alive."

"Maybe the shooters were the back up plan," Marc suggested. "Things went tits up, they cleaned the area. No witnesses. They just weren't counting on Mr. Healing Factor and the Bulletproof Kid."

"I'm really not a kid," Sid pointed out, but so mildly it was almost a question.

Logan felt like his brains were going to start leaking out his ears. Rather than have any answers, they just had more questions, and a slippery slope that looked steeper the farther they worked their way down. He shook his head and ran his hands through his hair, wondering if he could shove all the questions back in and not care about them. "We need to get while the getting's good. I hate to say it, but we're in way over our heads."

Marc nudged him lightly with his elbow. "Since when are you the cut and run type?"

"Since someone started garroting intelligence agents, that's when. No good is coming of this."

"But some already has," Sid said. "We saved Naslund's life, yes?"

Oh goddamn it.He got up, and said, "I need a beer. I'll be down in the bar."

"I'll join ya once I catch a shower," Marc said. "I smell like dust. And hey, maybe you wanna change your shirt or something, bud - you smell like tear gas."

He was right. Logan had gotten strangely accustomed to the smell. He could probably rub tear gas directly in his eyes now and wouldn't be effected by it - sometimes his healing factor did have its uses.

So after changing into clothes that wouldn't be rated a toxic event, he went downstairs to the hotel bar, which oddly enough replicated the interior of a British pub, with lots of dark wood and dim lighting, even a dartboard that had never really been used. He sat at the end of the bar, far from everyone (and the entrance), and had the blond, blue eyed bartender - another excellent example of Swiss masculinity - keep setting him up with the strongest beers they had. The bar wasn't very crowded, not yet anyways, and the relative peace was kind of nice. Soft classic rock music played in the background, and Logan knew he was deliberately distracting himself by wondering why no band had ever covered "No Sugar Tonight".

He was trying to imagine what would happen if he told Marc he was taking Sid and going - could he even do that to Marc, even if it was ostensibly for his own good? - when a lean, dark haired, blandly handsome man in a reasonably classy off the rack suit came in and took the leather stool right next to his. He ordered a Scotch on the rocks and looked like a normal businessman relaxing after a hard day at work ... only Logan could smell the gun oil on him. A quick glance confirmed the bulge of a shoulder holster.

He noticed Logan glaring at him, and waited for the bartender to walk away before saying quietly, "Don't worry, Wolverine, I'm not going to cause trouble. I’m only here to talk.”

Oh shit. He knew who he was. Government? The short, neatly swept back hair made him think so.

He put his fist on the man's thigh, keeping his arm under the bar so the bartender couldn't see, and muttered, “I have a claw right over your femoral artery. Call your dogs off, or you're the first to go."

The man swallowed hard; Logan watched his Adam's apple bob up and down as he glanced at his leg, then pretended to swirl his drink around in his glass. Nervous sweat beaded on his forehead, and he could tell from the way his hazel eyes were looking inward that he was calculating his chances of getting out of this. He slipped a hand casually off his drink, and he knew the man was considering grabbing his arm, pulling it off.

As if. “Do ya really think you're faster than me, bub?" And as he said that, he gave him a wicked, unfriendly little smile, and the stink of fear rose off him, sharp and sad. “Now, start talking, or I start stabbing."

Actually, he wasn't inclined to start stabbing in the bar if he didn‘t have to, but there was no way the guy knew that, and his reputation was bad enough that he was sure the guy believed him.

Besides, if the guy did press his luck, he'd be lucky to be getting home with one leg.