Sarah Connor is cursed to be ever vigilant (ever_vigilant) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2012-07-27 15:24:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, neena thurman (domino), zuko |
You've seen me in action.
Who: Zuko, Domino
What: Dom shows Zuko her hand, so to speak.
When: Thursday, 3pm
Where: A coffee shop
Ratings/Warnings: PG-13. I think there's a very brief mention of miscarriage in here, not sure. Also mentions of trafficking.
Status: Complete
The coffee shop was a small independantly owned and operated place set in the corner of a strip mall. It seemed to do well enough business, though most of the patrons were older, or quiet college students. At this time of day, it was practically empty aside from a few people in some booths on one side of the counter.
Dom liked this place for meeting people she didn't know very well. She'd met Nick Fury here, and Scott, too. She waved at one of the plainclothes guys who Fury had put here and there to watch for her safety as she headed inside. The guy didn't wave back, but Dom knew who he was. Honestly, in this case, she was glad for the potential backup.
A few minutes later, fresh cup of coffee in hand, Domino took the best defensible position in the place, and waited for 3pm to arrive. She felt weary and run down, but put her best face forward. This meeting was a risk, but she was getting to the point where she didn't really care.
There was a lot going on in Zuko's life. He'd had to cut several ties and bury some connections. It was time to lay low and lick wounds and hope when he lifted his head again his father hadn't cut him off. Or cut it off. He'd been weighing what he'd say or do when they met with Fury. The fire bending they couldn't hide. It was their criminal connections that needed to remain in the dark.
Obviously Domino had some sort of skin in this. Had that all been an attempt at a weapon sting? Somehow he didn't think so.
So he wanted answers, and wondered if this could prove advantageous.
He got out of his car and made his way to the coffee shop.
Domino'd sucked her coffee down so quickly that she actually found herself buying another one before taking her seat again. She noticed Zuko come in as she took her seat again, and waved her hand.
The contact lense was in, and she subtly scanned him with it while she waited for him to sit down. She'd expected some kind of unusual heat output or something to explain where the fire came from, but nothing came up as all that significant or different. Odd.
"Thanks for seeing me. I know you have priorities elsewhere right now."
He sat across from her after getting himself some tea, "This is probably part of those priorities. Right now I need to protect Mai." And Ty Lee. Even Azula.
He wondered what he was like in the Fire Nation, in that other world when he was this age. He was fifteen there. Fifteen and with more responsibility than any teen should have. All of them.
If he brought that up, Dom would tell him that he had too much responsibility even now. But he didn't, so instead she nodded, and spun her coffee cup in her hands.
"You've seen me in action. You have to know I'm not just some gun shop owner."
Ozai didn't suffer fools or weaklings.
"Obviously. That means you know more about me than I do about you, and that makes you more dangerous."
Ozai deserved a bullet in his brain, but that was sadly not Domino's call.
"I think it makes me of more potential use to you, actually. But that depends on a few things." Dom arched her brows at him, like what those few things depended on, also depended on his reaction to what she'd just said.
Or an Avatar to take him down.
Zuko sat back, sipping at his coffee as Neena talked, "Assuming this isn't a setup? Maybe."
If she could somehow get the heat off of them so the heat came off of the syndicate before Ozai decided they were too much trouble. There'd been rumors that he was seeing a woman younger than Azula.
"I have nothing to gain by setting you up. You protect my shop. And I've dressed enough of your people's wounds at this point for you to know I have no intention of hurting them. If I did, some events would have gone very differently."
Dom sipped her coffee and leaned back in her chair a bit, "Your nation is taking a lot of heat right now, and it has a lot of very interested parties watching it. Some of them want to tear it apart - some of them note the things it's getting itself involved in now, and have decided that keeping it contained is no longer an option. Me? All I know is what I see before me. A bright young man who wants to protect the people he loves and doesn't like some of the things that are going on right now."
That was the only reason he'd even come to this meeting. That she'd helped the way she had in the past. It made him willing to trust her.
"You're right. I'm not liking some of the things going on. I loathe them." He took another sip, "Moving against my f--the Fire Lord is next to impossible."
"It absolutely is." Dom nodded her head at that, "And not even I'm stupid enough to try. That's not the route I want to go, and not what I'm here to propose."
"The truth is," Dom added, after another long sip at her coffee, "I was sent here to offer you support. Your people have been around a long time. Business in general runs smoothly, and doesn't threaten the people I represent, at least until you guys decided to move across the county line. What I want to do is help you. I want to help you take care of the things going on that you don't approve of. There's some things I'd want in exchange. Intel, mostly. When things are getting out of hand."
It would be possible, but take more time, effort and money when they could just be contained and be a sort of tempering influence on the criminal element.
Zuko would be happy shutting down the sex trade entirely, though. He almost snarled, the tea in his cup boiling, "The trade in women has to stop."
The temperature readout on the tea cup flared up, and Dom reached a hand out, gently poking his arm, "Yes. It does. And you should know, I was there to see the operations in Thailand. I shut them down. I don't know who tipped us, but the connections were obvious. I'm not the only one who knows. If we don't do something soon, it's going to hurt your business in other sectors. Confidence will sink."
"I thought we might have a leak," Zuko said cautiously. "There's an old legend, about a helpful spirit."
He set the cup down before it burst into flame, "What do you suggest?"
He was so tired, so stressed, that he couldn't think. He could brain storm with Azula later but it would help if there were a few other ideas.
Dom tilted her head to the side, "First, your leak. If you despise the trading your people are currently involved in, then this leak is a friend, not an enemy. You want to find them and encourage them to keep on leaking, but only to Interpol or the CIA."
She held up a finger, "The FBI is great, but they're going to ask questions a lot more quickly, and they've already gotten their asses all up in your territory over this rescue."
He couldn't even focus on the important things. He had to deal with this before he could rest. Before he could grieve.
Swallowing a lump, he nodded his head. CIA and Interpol. Keep the FBI out of it entirely.
"I have a meeting with the FBI Saturday."
"Tell Director Fury to contact Neena Thurman about any questions he has, and thank him for his time." Dom sipped at her coffee. This case was her jurisdiction, and Fury would hopefully understand.
She needed to talk to the man again anyway. Dany hadn't gotten back to her, and Dom was certain the woman was in trouble. She wouldn't have been surprised if that was her next target.
Interesting. Zuko nodded his head. He was still going to show up, but he could now deflect any uncomfortable questions towards Neena. Sort of like pleading the fifth without pleading the fifth.
"I'll keep that in mind."
The tea was ruined, so he didn't bother finishing it, "Look, I know we might have screwed up, but patience isn't my strong suit, especially when certain people are involved."
Dom ran a hand up into her hair, and rubbed at her head with it. The migraine she was forming was starting to make little lights spark across her vision, but she pretended that she was just trying to think.
"You got a little stupid. A lot stupid. Situations like this are all kinds of complicated. There were hostages besides Mai and Kitty aboard. Mai herself has delicate handling instructions because of her status. You could have done more harm than good. But I'm not here to scold you. I know some people who would, but I'm not here for that. You gambled and it paid off. Everyone got home and only the bad guys died, so mission successful. You know how not to handle it next time," Dom shrugged a shoulder.
He probably should have tipped someone off about the destruction of the ship, but there'd been such an..urgency instilled in him, that he'd needed to act.
It didn't help that Azula goaded him into it, but that was something that Azula was an expert at. She knew were to push him.
"I think I can find where we can trim around the edges to get the syndicate back into a more managable state," Zuko offered. "I think Ozai has a lot of internal pressure to expand, and he's got great ambition."
"I think the issue is that the expansion currently isn't pushing away certain other criminal elements as subtly and smoothly as other expansions on his part have been. It looks like a power grab instead of something slow and controlled. That makes people nervous." Dom offered, while draining the rest of her coffee.
"Trimming the trafficking off will definitely help. We can approach this in baby steps. I'm pretty much tasked with helping you out with this for the duration, so I'm not going anywhere. And make no mistake," She eyed him with the most sincere look she could manage, "I want to help you. I want Mai to be safe. Your sister is a bit crazy, but a hell of a woman. You're handling this pretty damn well, considering."
Zuko snorted. She wouldn't have said that if she'd seen him when he'd gotten the news. He'd been a sniveling little child.
"Only a bit crazy? Frankly we've been pushed towards all this our whole lives. We never had the choice to be what we wanted to be. We never even were given other options. I have to work within the boundries. But I do try to stretch them from time to time."
"I was being diplomatic. But you should know that in a way, I understand that. Not precisely, but in a way. If you want out, I can help you with that, too. As a personal thing. But for now, I think you can do a lot of good staying put and trying to be the lesser of two evils." Dom frowned, because she honestly would prefer he was out of this completely. Him, his sister, his girlfriend, all of them.
It was what it was, and she got the job done. Most of the time. This time, she hoped he was willing to cooperate.
She checked the time on her watch - an unnecessary action, but one that implied she had another place to be, and blinked another set of sparks out of her eyes.
"You can come by the gun shop any time you want to talk this out, or ask to meet me here, or another neutral location. For now, why don't you sleep on it a bit? I'd only ask that this conversation and my identity stay with us."
Zuko smiled sadly. There were only two ways out for him and Azula. Their deaths, or their father's death. He knew that, without even needing to think about it. It was just something that was understood. If they weren't the Fire Lord's kids, it might have been different.
Ty Lee though. She wasn't integrated yet. She was an external thing. She could get out, by not coming in.
"The blue spirit asks the same," He replied, standing.
She got up, and held her hand out to shake his, firmly, "Understood. Thank you for hearing me out."
As a show of trust - trusting him with her back to him, for the most part - she gave him a mock salute, and waltzed her way out of the coffee shop first.
After shaking her hand, and accepting the salute, he tossed his cup in the trash, used the restroom, and then headed out himself. He had a lot to think about.