Chapter 13
“The full weight of SHIELD and its resources, and we can’t find the richest man in the world?” Despite his best efforts at neutrality and calm, even through the video screen and the magic of telecommunications, Peggy could feel Coulson’s frustration. Not that she could blame him; it had been nearly a month since this particular bombshell had landed in SHIELD’s lap, and Peggy felt they were no further along than when they started. Weeks of work and a pile of dead ends left them with nothing more than the US military had...which was little more than nothing.
“It’s not nothing,” Romanoff murmured from her screen somewhere in a location Peggy didn’t recognize, but it looked like a seedy bedroom in some run-down part of the world. It was night wherever she was, and she was dressed down. Her long red hair was pulled up behind her head, making her appear impossibly young as she appeared to be scrolling through something on a screen. “Barton did find intel on the Ten Rings and their activities in Afghanistan, more than we had beforehand.”
That was a plus, one Peggy quickly jumped on. “Thanks to his work, we know that they have been supplied for years through back channels with all manner of weapons, including Stark Tech. Do you think they were starting to get greedy?”
“That or Stark might have been.” Romanoff lifted a pale shoulder in her night clothes, non-committal. “After all, it’s something we can’t rule out.”
Both Sharon and Cassandra Kam were huddled around her desk to be better seen on camera. They both glanced at each other, but it was Sharon who spoke up. “There were several large shipments that went out over the last few years to Afghanistan. I found the invoices in the system when I was poking around there, but when I asked about it everyone seemed to think they were part of a US military shipment authorized by the company.”
“Who signed off on them?” Coulson pressed quietly to Sharon, who gave Peggy half an apologetic smile.
“It would seem like it was Stark, but...honestly, it’s hard to say. He’s so hands-off with things that it could have been someone on his staff auto-signing for him. Hell, he could have been doing it without paying any attention, knowing him.”
“I do that all the time when I am not paying attention,” Cassandra offered, clearly trying to be helpful.
“What’s your take on it, Natasha?” Coulson flipped to her as she looked stoically thoughtful. Peggy had never seen anyone manage the smooth-faced, non-expression so completely as Natasha Romanoff.
“It’s possible. Stark doesn’t strike me as being a details kind of person. He likes leaving that to others. He could be aware of it and just not care, or he could be unaware of it and just not care. However, he is a man who makes his money off of conflict and war, and there is plenty enough of that in Afghanistan. The Ten Rings are just one of any number of insurgents, but they are one of the more powerful ones now that the Taliban has been undermined. My contacts had a lot to say and little real knowledge of them outside of the fact that they don’t think they are completely homegrown. He suspects they are somewhat privately funded from the outside by groups interested in seeing chaos in regions like Afghanistan with the hopes that the instability will help feed their particular interests. That’s why I mentioned Stark because he would be one of those types.”
Peggy tapped her pencil in irritation at that assessment, trying not to glare at the woman on the other side of the screen. It was hard to just dismiss what she had to say. She was right. It was an angle to consider and one they should talk about, but it also didn’t feel right, not in Peggy’s gut.
“Howard never really cared about the money,” she found herself blurting, tossing her pencil on the notepad in front of her. “All right, he cared a little, but it was more of the prestige of it all, the respect and access he got with it. At his heart, he cared far more about creating than he did about wealth and having the freedom to do what he wanted without being beholden to anyone. I can’t imagine he would allow his son to sell his technology knowingly to those who would use it to try and terrorize and enslave others, that stood against everything Howard fought for!”
“Tony Stark isn’t Howard,” Romanoff replied with her simple bluntness, cold but not overly so. Still, she might as well have kicked Peggy in the gut with one of her elegant maneuvers for all it hit her. “And US national policy stopped caring about who got hurt in their games of political maneuvering decades ago. If Stark is involved in some under-the-table dealing with the Ten Rings, perhaps it was all state-sanctioned, some backroom compromise between politicians. They got him to sell under the table, and it all went south on him. It’s hard to say.”
Peggy couldn’t believe that, but she couldn’t refute it either. “So have we abandoned the idea he was a victim of circumstance?” She directed that last question at Coulson with perhaps a bit more severity than she had intended. She could see the man cringe just a tad, visibly smarting under his cool demeanor, and felt a bit triumphant to see him blink in guilt at her.
“No, but we do have to consider every possibility, and the other hasn’t gotten us very far unless you found something that could point us in a better direction.”
Peggy wished they had. “Sadly, no. His closest contacts seem above board. Sharon’s investigation turned up little behind the scenes there.”
“I wouldn’t say it turned up little,” Sharon clarified with a bit of an eye roll. “Stark has his enemies, even in his organization. He’s got several who think they are smarter than they are and under-appreciated, but none of them have the access or the knowledge to have sold him out.”
“What about his personal contacts?” Coulson cut in.
Here, Peggy nodded toward Cassandra, who gulped and gathered her files and her wits to address Coulson. “Tony Stark has a list of people a mile long who could potentially want him dead.”
She pulled her tablet towards her, tapping onto the glass and transmitting it to the large screen, sharing it through SHIELD’s satellite data network, a concept that made sense to Peggy but still amazed her. “These are just the ones I assume he pissed off. I’ve not gotten into his father’s contacts or his maternal grandfather’s contacts, both of whom ran in some pretty interesting circles.”
“I can imagine,” Coulson murmured. “Who are the most likely people who would want to see Stark removed from the picture?”
“I got Justin Hammer on the list, of course.” She pulled up a photograph of a thin man who might have been handsome if he didn’t remind Peggy vaguely of a weasel. “He is Stark's main rival. Up until ten years ago, he was an unknown weapons engineer subcontracting for another company, but somehow got the ear of General Thaddeus Ross. Ross gave him a shot, mostly because Ross is known to love having big weapons at hand and doesn’t like having to put up with others messing around with them, like Stark. He helped get Hammer several lucrative contracts with the Army, but the big money ones were always out of reach because the US military-at-large was tied mostly to Stark.”
“And this Hammer would want the competition removed.” Peggy considered him, reading the man’s information quickly. “Is he the type who would stoop to espionage, kidnapping, and potential murder to get ahead?”
It was Natasha on her end who answered. “Hammer absolutely would. He’s a worm and not as bright as he thinks he is, but he’s opportunistic.”
Peggy was only surprised the operative knew who Hammer was. She shouldn’t have been. But Cassandra shocked her even more by challenging Romanoff’s assessment. “I agree, he’s not above kissing up to power when he can get to it, and maybe he’s ruthless enough to do it, but I don’t know. Honestly, I think he’s pretty content with picking up Tony Stark’s table scraps, hoping that he makes a misstep and that he can pounce on the opportunity. I saw his shares skyrocketed on the news of Stark’s disappearance.”
“I bet they did.” Sharon snorted and regarded the man in his pale gray suit with mild disgust. “Has he even made a public statement filled with kind platitudes and crocodile tears?”
“Yes on the platitudes, no on the tears. It was a very ‘thoughts and prayers’ kind of press release, hoping that Tony has a safe and quick return.”
“I bet,” Peggy sniffed, already deciding she didn’t like the man. “Right, who else?”
The image of a beautiful woman floated on screen, so gorgeously dressed she made Peggy feel slightly shabby. “Rumiko Fujikawa, one of the first women to handle a family-run company in Japan. She’s smart, capable, and Stark’s ex.”
“And a notorious party girl, from what I understand. Stark’s perfect woman,” Romanoff called, apparently knowing exactly who she was.
Coulson cut to the chase. “And what does that have to do with his disappearance?”
Cassandra liked this theory, judging from the glitter in her dark eyes. “The word on the street was that early on in Stark’s reign at his company, the two of them hooked up. He was young and inexperienced with Stark Industries, and at the time, Fujikawa's father was interested in seeing if he could manage a hostile takeover and use Rumiko as bait. She’s known to be...well, a bit of a dark and dangerous lover in the bedroom and played on Stark’s willingness to give anything a go. At first, it seemed like Stark was all in until it turned out he had flipped the tables on the pair and had taken their company outright himself. He gave it back to Rumiko, on the condition she beg for it.”
Peggy eyed the fierce-looking woman in the photograph. “How did he make her beg?”
Cassandra flushed at this. “I’ve heard rumors.”
For the first time Peggy heard Romanoff snort on the other end of the line, something like respect flickering across her otherwise placid expression. “Nice!”
Even Sharon looked amused. Peggy, however, could feel her cheeks burn as she cleared her throat. “I don’t need to know. Is any of it true?”
“Who knows? What is known is that the two of them do not get along now. She tried to actively block his access to Japanese markets but ultimately was unsuccessful. In any case, she denies everything about the story now, for obvious reasons, but there has been more than one attempt by corporate spies attached to her to get inside Stark’s inner circle.”
It didn’t feel right, but Peggy considered it. “Would she be ruthless enough to hire a hit on him?”
“It's salacious enough I sort of want it to be true, but I'm not buying this one. Frankly, it’s nearly two decades ago and I think she’s mostly moved on. Besides, given the amount of coverage of this, if it were tied to her we’d have heard by now, and that’s not press she wants.”
“And nothing is coming out of Japan here,” Romanoff chimed in. “China, sure, but Japan has to step carefully in Asian markets. I don’t think Fujikawa would want the sort of bad press that would come out being associated with terrorists.”
“Fair enough,” Peggy looked to Cassandra. “Which leaves us with who else?”
Cassandra threw up her hands as a handful of other photographs flickered to life. “Not much of anywhere. Stark has a lot of corporate enemies who wouldn’t mourn if he disappeared in the wilds of Afghanistan, like Nelson Jones of Roxxon. He’s got an angry and powerful ex or two, though honestly, the fact you got dumped by Tony Stark is almost a badge of pride out there. I think they would sooner write tell-alls and make money off the profits. If there is anyone at Stark Industries who could be bribed into it, Sharon is more likely to find it. Most of his high-end friends are so tight with him I doubt they could be bought.”
Sharon brought up the obvious point. “None of them have a good reason to demand it or the inside knowledge to make it happen. And even if they did, what sort of connections do they have to make it happen?”
“So this leaves us right where we began.” Coulson’s sigh echoed even through the office space in New York. Peggy wasn’t far behind him, honestly. Weeks of research and interviews and she felt they were getting nowhere. “Who haven’t we spoken to?”
“Stane,” Peggy replied in mild frustration at the recalcitrant COO of Stark Industries. “He’s been conveniently unavailable the last few weeks, I presume putting out fires and trying to handle the company in Stark’s absence.”
“Though it should be noted that he normally handles the company even in Stark’s presence,” Sharon blithely pointed out. “He’s rather politely avoided us on the whole.”
“Does Stane know about Howard’s connection to SHIELD,” Peggy directed this to Coulson, unclear on who did and didn’t know about Howard’s whole other secret life.
“Howard kept that secret from almost everyone I know of. Even if Stane knows of it, it’s likely he thinks that Howard was a consultant.”
“You would think he would want Stark found if anything else to keep the stock prices up,” Cassandra offered, frowning. “Does he know about the investigation we are running?”
“You’d assume he would get the idea if SHIELD is calling to meet with him,” Romanoff replied, looking thoughtful. “Stane, he had his own company once, right, before coming over to SI?”
Sharon pulled up the answer, already deep into files on her computer. “Yeah, a satellite technology company back in the early days of telecommunications. He’s a CalTech grad and got in on the ground level of that with some lucrative ties to NASA, but he has a background in computers and engineering. That’s how Stark found him. He bought out his whole company for the price of an executive vice presidency and a large chunk of SI stock.”
“Bet that made him a wealthy man,” Peggy mused, considering. “Sharon, where does Stane live?”
“Between LA and New York, mostly, depends on what he’s up to. SI’s main headquarters are in Los Angeles, but their board and most of their front-facing offices are here in New York in Stark Tower.”
“Does he have an office there?”
Her niece blinked. “Yeah, I’d assume so.”
Peggy glanced at the screen with Coulson and Romanoff. “I think I need to go pay him a visit.”
Romanoff arched an eyebrow in mild surprise. Coulson looked downright delighted. “You are going to just waltz in there?”
“Why not?” Peggy had done more outrageous things before in her life. “After all, if he’s not willing to come and see us, I feel that the least we can do is go and see him.”
A ghost of a smile haunted Romanoff’s otherwise stern expression. “I was wondering when you’d finally get around to doing that.”
Peggy did not comment as she looked at Coulson. “You have a problem with me seeing if he will talk.”
Coulson held his hands out wide, clearly eager to see what happened. “Keep me posted?”
“If I’m not arrested first,” Peggy called cheerfully, turning to the other two. “Who would like to come and with me on a bit of a shakedown?”
Neither had to be asked twice.