InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "in ur joornalz!"

When Seymour had gone on his little easter egg hunt, tracing arms from Russia through a few shell companies through Europe and eventually down to Africa, he hadn’t really expect that it would come to much. He’d figured a little dropped information here, leaked documents there, hacking on some server somewhere and boom, another potential shit creak exposed.

And it wasn’t because he was all about peace in the world, not really. It was about monitoring the dark agencies, the off the books places that might somehow trace back to Division, if there was such a thing in this world. But he was paranoid by nature, so he dug around.

Finding Stark tech made it just a little bit different.

He wasn’t overly thrilled about having to swing by in person to further discuss whatever but fine, he had the information and the back doors already in place, so it was likely about doing things in a timely manner, so he pulled himself out of his prefered pit of despair, aka Mario Kart, and took a trip to Stark’s building. He’d been by to see Caleb a time or two, so it wasn’t too big a deal. And weirdly, when he entered he was told Mr Stark was expecting him.

Eyeroll abound at the massive place, Birkhoff just let himself be led in the direction he was meant to go.

T’Challa for his part felt like this was almost familiar territory. Due to the dreams, teaming up with Tony and others was commonplace when solving big picture crises. He sat in the comfy leather chair in the break room, which doubled as an after hours (or as he assumed for Tony, any hours) wet bar. He'd been telling Stark about the last bits of his dreams about the Avengers when he heard Birkhoff approaching. His superb hearing picked up the man's steps a full twenty seconds before he appeared, and so stopped talking as a result, staring pensively at the door.

Tony knew that look. He and T’Challa had become good friends in this world. T’Challa had told him about all this Dream stuff that Tony hadn’t Dreamed yet… but that wasn’t uncommon. Natasha and Clint both knew a whole lot more about him in their Dreams than he knew about them. And Clint’s wife, too. The little lady. Tony was happy for his friend.

Both of the men in Tony’s office turned to watch as the younger man entered the room. Tony stood slowly, slipping his hands into his pockets. He gave a gentle huh as he observed. “I thought you’d be older.”

Birkhoff couldn’t avoid the eyebrow raise at that, because okay, he still dressed pretty much like a teenager -band shirts, jeans, the occasional hipster cardigan because fuck you they were comfortable and he got cold. But usually the scruff he made a point in keeping and the longer hair meant people didn’t do the ‘you’re pretty young’ thing. All in all, yes, he probably was younger than expected considering the stuff he’d done -hacking the NSA wasn’t really something most teenagers did, but some kids just liked to piss off daddy.

“Really? You’re older than I expected.” Lie, he knew who Tony Stark was, and what he looked like, and most of his career, “And… you have a friend?” Cue the paranoia kicking up a few gears once again.

T’Challa was generally a reserved man in terms of expression, but he afforded himself a small smile at the snarky retort. He cast Tony the slightest hint of an amused look before standing. “I am T’Challa Okonwko.” He pressed a hand to his chest in greeting, his Congo accent clearly audible. “I work for Mister Stark, and have extensive experience and history in dealing with African nations. He has brought me in on this situation to help.” He left out the superhero part for now; he wasn’t entirely sure it would even come into play here, as Wakanda didn’t exist in this world. But he’d pack his suit in case they were making any trips to Africa anyway.

Tony snorted. “No, I wasn’t.” Everyone knew who Tony Stark was, and how old he was. But the witty comeback was great. Tony appreciated a kid who could think on his feet like that. He nodded to T’Challa, and let the other man do the introductions. “Don’t worry, I’ve vetted him.” Tony insisted, throwing his figurative weight behind the Black Panther. “He’s going to be more of an asset than anything you or I could ever druge up, I guarantee it.”

Oh, that just really set Birkhoff’s mind at ease, really. Totally chill. He just had to roll his eyes and sigh, moving into the room and pulling his laptop case to the front, “Whatever,” because people were always who they said they were and all that, “Just call me Birkhoff.” Since weird name dude offered one at least, Seymour could return it.

“I mean, I literally don’t know why you couldn’t just get someone to do this for you,” booting up the laptop, resecuring all his settings on the new location and snagging some wifi outside of Stark Tower, because no he wasn’t letting anyone potentially slip into his system, Birkhoff kicked ShadowNet online. “You literally own an entire hacking division.”

T’Challa bristled slightly at the unprofessional response and dismissive attitude, though it showed only in a slight stiffening of his posture and a cold look that swept over his eyes. He glanced at Tony again before watching Birkhoff fire up the computer. “Do you now?” he said to Tony, curiosity in his voice. It actually surprised him he’d have a whole division - in the dreams Tony usually did it all himself or with the help of A.I. programs he’d built.

“If I told you, I’d have to kill you,” Tony teased back to T’Challa, then turned his attention to Birkhoff. His brain knew the kid was talented, and his gut claimed he was trustworthy. Tony’s gut had been wrong before, but he hoped he wasn’t in this case. “Show me whatcha got.” He added quickly, “you want a drink?”

“Anything that isn’t alcohol. I drove.” Because duh. “Preferably something with warning labels that denotes killing my liver with high levels of sugar.” Since Birkhoff literally lived on energy drinks that were going to kill him at some point, but he really didn’t care. If it kept him up through whatever system he was plowing through or got him through the latest gaming session, he didn’t care too much.

Fingers flying over the keypad, close to being nothing but randomly hitting keys, but with a sense of purpose, he had multiple boxes popping up on his screen, details of the companies he’d tracked and the shell organisations they ran and the blueprints of some outdated weapons tech that was clearly Stark Industries built but long since out of production. “Um…. I feel like I should point out that this isn’t strictly legal…” He’d paused before bringing up the security feed he’d hacked into and downloaded using some of the NSA’s tech, purely because he remembered where he was.

“I believe we were already under that impression, Mister Birkhoff.” T'Challa replied coolly, watching with rapt attention at every piece of information that sprang up on screen. “Tony...this is most disturbing. Old as they are, these weapons can dramatically shift the balance in whatever local war is occurring. Perhaps even aid in genocide.” He spoke from experience, a survivor of the Congo war. “Mister Birkhoff, have you been able to find the locations of the buyers?”

Tony stared at Birkhoff for a moment as if uncomprehending. What on Earth did that mean? Because he drove? What an absurd thing to say. But whatever. Scotch was Tony’s drink of choice, but there were a few energy drinks in the back of his mini fridge. Mostly for times like this when younger folk came to his office and requested them. Actually, there were a lot of different drinks in his mini fridge for that same reason.

“Mmm. Duly noted.” Tony nodded, speaking around the same time that T’Challa did. He reached for the can of... rocket fuel? Whatever it was, and offered it up to Birkhoff. “You’re absolutely right, T’Challa. We’re gonna have to put a stop to this… whatever it is.” The weapons were legally bought and sold from Tony’s company, but what happened to them after was a different story. And Tony hated that his name was all over them.

Okay, Birkhoff had to take a moment to stare at T’Challa because… “Can you please stop calling me Mister? I’m having some serious flashback moments that I don’t like.” Which wasn’t exactly true, because Birkhoff wasn’t his birth name and everyone in the dreams just called him Birkhoff, except for Percy and Amanda and that just led to a rabbit hole of issues.

“Anyway,” taking the can of energy juice, Birkhoff opened the whirlwind that was his research spiral, blueprints and schematics for the weapons he’d tracked accidentally, NSA security feeds popping into the corner and layering with images of white trucks and some heavily armed security guards at a depot in Johannesburg. “The main warehouse seems to be out of Johannesburg, it’s a shell company owned and traded by a Ukrainian company, which is a front for another dozen shell corporations before rerouting back to a South African company which trades with Russia. So it’s quite the connect the dots.” And had taken a day and a half of Birkhoff’s life connecting the companies and trade routes.

“These,” the weapons in question were definitely older production, but likely very deadly still, “were bought and traded years ago, by a company that seems legit, but were taken over about four years ago, warehouses were seized and they ended up with this group in Johannesburg. From digging and a few… Less than truthful emails and a phone call, they’re due for departure from here in one month. They’re due to be trucked to Bergville before they’re traded off with our Russian friends and then taken to Port St John for a fun little boat ride wherever they’re going to be stored until some poor bastard gets blown to smithereens.”

The breadcrumbs weren’t exactly easy to trace, but they weren’t impossible when it came to someone like Birkhoff who was like a dog with a bone.

T'Challa barely raised an eyebrow at Birkhoff's brusque request, though he was rankled a little at it. But he gave the younger man a single nod and watched with rapt attention as the screens popped up. Absorbing as much visual information as he could while the hacker talked, he started formulating a plan in his mind. Being part of a superhero team plus his dream genius bleeding over allowed T'Challa to process information and figure out a battle plan much faster than the average intelligence outfit might.

“There is no time to waste. There are many neighboring countries with warlords that would pay handsomely for those.” T'Challa paused a moment, mulling over the most realistic scenarios. “They could make it to the Congo, or worse the Sudan...Tony, are you thinking what I am?”

“Well, we want to make sure that some poor bastard doesn’t get blown to smithereens.” Tony said, leaning over to get a good look at all the information on the computer screen. He was fast, taking it all in. No one would ever say that Tony Stark couldn’t put two and two together, no matter how fast the numbers were being thrown at him.

Tony stood and pulled his glasses down off his face. He pinched the bridge of his nose for a moment, thinking. “I’m thinking we have to take a trip.” He wasn’t really a superhero in this life. This was a bit above and beyond. But they were capable. And they were willing. He glanced over at T’Challa, trying to confirm what the other man was thinking.

Birkhoff just watched the pair of them, getting their ‘hero’ groove on, it wasn’t really his thing, he did the information getting, not bursting in with the whole ‘save the day’ routine. “Okay, if you must,” it actually felt a little like working with Niki and Michael, “I’m gonna point out that they move in a week. So that might be the best time to go in, right as they’re shipping out because the security will be split between the compound and the transport.” If there was something that Birkhoff knew it was windows of opportunity.

“It’ll give me the time to hack into their database and get you more info, screw up their security measures too.” And why the hell was he volunteering for this shit?

The look T’Challa shared with his friend was indeed confirmation that they would have to play superhero in a foreign country. In the back of his mind his dream memories made his spine shiver as the exact reason his father had died as well as a delegation of Wakandans was because of superheroes fighting with reckless abandon in places they knew nothing about. But T’Challa knew something about South Africa, he had made numerous trips there for various humanitarian and political reasons. So there was that consolation, at least.

“Then we shall make plans to leave in a week.” he said with absolute certainty. “Thank you...Birkhoff, for bringing this information to us. You are helping to save many lives.”

Tony nodded. The plan seemed to be coming together beautifully. Actually, he was a little surprised. This felt normal. How was it this shit felt normal? “Let me know if there’s anything I can do to assist your… hacking.” Tony didn’t really consider what he did with computers to be ‘hacking’ per se. But he knew that’s what it was. And he was good at it. And Tony could see so much potential in Birkhoff. He was glad to have someone with such talent on his side.

“So, we’ll reconvene in a few days? After all the preparations are finished?” Tony asked, glancing from one to the other.

Birkhoff just nodded his head, working out what he’d need to do, sort of letting the comment about saving lives wash over, because honestly, he got involved in far too much like this, but never like this. Usually he just passed information to the appropriate people. “I should be good, my Linux system it pretty much built for this.” And with the skills he’d built here and the ones he’d slowly managed to adapt from the dreams, this was Birkhoff’s wheel house.

“So… Yeah, talk to you guys later?” And that was Birkhoff’s way of attempting to beat a hasty retreat.

“Yes,” T'Challa replied to Tony's question. He nodded to Birkhoff wordlessly, sensing the man wanted desperately to leave.

Tony nodded. “Thanks, Birkhoff. I appreciate your help.” He reached forward a hand to shake the other man’s. And, of course, it was true. Tony’s gratitude was genuine. With the handshake he was releasing the younger hacker to head back to his own business. “I’ll be in touch.”