Chapter 5
The stately manor home of the Warrens family, in the countryside outside of their hometown of Swansea in Wales, was quiet as the sun began to set on a cool, autumn evening. Family matriarch Abigale was pacing back and forth in the lounge while her husband Rhys was sitting in his recliner and their son Michael, the younger Gwen’s father, watched his mother pace from the sofa.
“She can’t have gone all the way to America… could she?” Abigale asked. “Scott would have said something by now… she must have gone somewhere. That stupid child never listens to me. None of you ever listen to me. Why do I even bother talking?”
“Mum… at the rate you’re pacing, you’re going to find yourself in the wine cellar in an hour…” Michael said, choosing to ignore the fact she had just insulted his only kid.
The phone on the table began to ring.
“Hello” Rhys asked as he picked up before his wife could get it.
“Hey Granddad… It’s Scott.” The young man responded.
“Oh… Scott…” Rhys began to say before his wife yanked the handset out of his hand again.
“Scott, this is your Grandmother.” She said, “Have you heard from Gwen?”
“Yes” he replied
“Do you know where she is?”
“Yes.”
She stood there, waiting for a moment before she continued.
“Well?”
“Well, what?”
“Are you going to tell me where she is?”
“Nope… But I’m going to tell you where I am…
“RIGHT BEHIND YOU.” He yelled, causing her to jump in a fright.
He had snuck in behind her.
“How dare you, young man.” She snapped.
“Nana… give it up with the ‘How dare you’. You sound like a Karen.” Scott said, as he ended the call on his cell phone and slid it into his pocket.
“Where’s Gwen?” Abigale demanded from him.
“she’s safe. They’re all safe.”
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
“I know.” He said as he walked to the liquor cabinet and poured himself a drink. “I will fully answer your questions once you answer all of ours in a way that we find acceptable.”
“Put that down, young man.”
“Nana, I’m 32.” He said before downing the glass and pouring a second “Besides, takes, like, about eight of these to get me buzzed, might as well be water. Now… We want to know is what Alexander Tisch was doing in this house 24 hours ago? Huh? You know… He and his friends at Roxxon have been tied to some nasty, nasty things over the last few years... really decades when you think about it…”
“That’s none of your business.” Abigale said to him. “And who is this ‘We?”
“Actually, it is his business.” A voice sad from the doorway. She turned and saw a middle-aged man in a suit standing in the archway from the hall.
“And who are you?” She demanded of him
“SHIELD Deputy Director Phil Coulson… I’m your grandson’s boss. And the ‘We’ is SHIELD.” The older man said as he walked into the room and stood before them.
“I’ve heard of you, Mr. Coulson.” Rhys said, “I was under the impression you were dead.”
“I got better. Again.” Coulson told him “Mr. and Mrs. Warrens, I’m going to cut to the chase. We’ve long known that Roxxon has been up to some shady stuff over the years. They’ had dealings with so many different organized crime groups, we lost count somewhere in the mid-1980s. But we never had a paper trail… till recently. Late last year, a splinter faction of a hacker group called ‘Rising Tide’ got into Roxxon’s deepest, most secure servers and found some really, really interesting documents.
“I don’t know if you remember, but in 2009, one of their oil platforms, right off New Orleans, blew sky high… lot of issues came out of that. You know who was one of the executives who ran the project that caused that explosion? Alexander Tisch. Not long after, one of their oil tankers dumped millions of gallons of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico. Who blocked the plan to get the tanker replaced before that happened, knowing full well the risk? Alexander Tisch.
“On a more personal note, a Roxxon subsidiary, Asano Robotics, also supplied technology to a company called Cybertek, who were a front for Hydra, who used the technology to create an army of cyborg soldiers, some of whom were used against me and my people. Know who called for them to sign off on that deal? Alexander Tisch…”
“Mr. Coulson, is there a point to this?” Rhys asked.
“Mr. Warrens, the point is quite simple. Roxxon uses every trick in the book try to protect itself. They escaped prosecution for the oil spill because of that influence. We have never been able to get things to stick, until that data breach. Tisch is…”
“LORD Tisch is a hereditary peer of the realm” Abigale said, butting in. “He’s a member of the House of Lords and I will not have you speaking that way of him under my roof.”
“He’s a peer with an extremely suspect past…” Scott said.
“What are you digging at?” Rhys asked.
“Granddad… why was he here?” Scott asked. “These kinds of people, they’re going to know right away when we’re on their case and he could just as easily find out I’m your grandson. I’m not a repair tech working in a basement anymore. I’m a full-blown field agent. I have two different guns on me right now. I deal with people like him all the time. He could have been walking in to discuss a business proposition or he could have come here to KILL YOU. It’s super Sus and I don’t like it. So, why was he here?”
Rhys looked over at his wife.
“Tell them…” He said to her.
“No.” She said, stomping her feet.
“Mum… what’s going on?” Michael said “Tell us.”
“I…” She stuttered “I arranged for his son to marry Gwen.”