A ten square foot room, government issue grey. A single steel table, two steel chairs. Fluorescent bulbs humming, flickering ever so slightly. Hidden in the walls, a Faraday cage. Not that there was anywhere to hid a bug to begin with. SUPER briefing rooms were truly a treat. On the table a cardboard box lay open. The top of the neatly set aside lid bore the words "TOP SECRET" in red ink. A document folder lay in front of that, open. In one of the two chairs, eyes intently scanning the pages, a man. His posture was as stiff, his suit immaculate, his face betrayed nothing of the thoughts behind it. Brown eyes flicked quickly over words and photos. He seemed almost robotic.

Wick flipped a page in the dossier. His previous assignment was complete, his part in the operation over. Unless it made the news, it was unlikely he would ever learn how it ended. That was simply the way of things. He received the information he needed to know to do his job, and no more. He did not even know who was to take over for the next step. Possibly it would remain internal, more likely it would be handed over to a special forces unit, or the x-men. It still boggled him that such a band of disgusting devil-spawn freaks had somehow fooled their world and their government into giving them official clearance and jurisdiction. They did not even receive training in any official capacity, but were trusted to recruit and train for themselves. At least military contractors and mercenaries functioned on foreign soil. To think such a group would be allowed to operate on home soil. Especially mutants...

The agent drew his mind back to the folder in his hands. He was to receive a new assignment. He was to be briefed by agent Sang. He read on. Every page was marked in red ink "Top Secret" and Wick could see why. Former SUPER asset escapes with experimental SUPER serum that can regress people to an earlier age.Even in the old days, this would have been a high priority mission. Now? New management would want this dealt with, and they would want to make sure SUPER was never attached to it. That certainly explained why it was going to him.

He flipped another page. Known affected victims. Wick would need to look into each of them more too, find the pattern, predict the next attack. More than one X-man. He simply could not escape them. Leashless attack dogs that should already have been put down. His superiors obviously did not think so however. That was the trouble of the brave new world he found himself in. He pulled his mind back to his task and flipped the page again. Notes on the attacks, photos from the scenes, witness statements. Those would likely be useless, as ever.

The door handle rattled as somebody touched it. Wick looked up and over, expression as cool as ever, and stood.

Sabine was “benefitting” from Kristoph’s promotion, if you could call the mandatory custody of several major organizational responsibilities a benefit. As a senior agent and a trusted asset of her former partner, Sabine went from being a subtle sneak in a crowd to the woman responsible for aspects of personnel management and public relations. Well, putting out fires; there were probably other parts of public relations she was thankfully not doing; all the parts that were not flammable, she guessed.

This also put her in the awkward position of managing people with similar seniority and experience, not all of whom were keen on being managed. This was especially true of the agents who thrived in the less savory AV era. It was hard not to feel Agent Wick was one of the ones thriving.

The man was skilled; one of the most reliable field agents they had, which Sabine did not say lightly since she also contended for that praise before this pseudo-promotion. He was also part of the oldest of old guard, and given the issues she was managing with Noel, Michael, and Kent, that still made her nervous.

Nervousness was not an excuse to do her job poorly, and Agent Tristin Wick was an asset. He had proven incredibly loyal over the years to SUPER, and she could not inherently start treating that as a bad thing or a warning label. If anything, the current job of tracking down the age-altering chemical terrorist fit his skillset and would be a good way to test his ability to follow the new modus operandi.

Taking one last moment to focus herself, Sabine opened the door to a briefing room. The place was drab, which was fitting. As a social mirror, she dictated her energy to reflect who she was meeting with and Tristin was a no-frills man. Direct, efficient, and to a degree, robotic. For that reason, her smile was brief. ”Thank you for making time for this briefing, Agent Wick. I’d hope you’ve taken the time waiting for me to peruse the dossier?”

Sang, Sabine. One of the few people with more SUPER tenure than Wick. One of the few people Wick truly respected professionally. Her brief smile was met with an equally brief inclination of the head. It remained an interesting introspective moment to interact with the woman. A mirror held up to his own persona. Wick had wondered on more than a few occasions who exactly lay beneath the constant masks. Face unchanged, Agent Wick sat once more and turned back to his reading.

"Of course, to both counts. I predict needing thirty minutes to finish, however I have read enough to be briefed." Which he could do while reading. Absorbing multiple streams of information and keeping them ordered mentally was practically its own class at Langley. Those who could not master it never made it into the field. Wick's eyes scanned through another witness statement from a gas attack, mentally highlighting relevant or verifiable accurate information. It was a surprisingly competent witness. He would use them to balance others.

"I thought it odd that it was you briefing me at first. I imagine you have been avoiding using me for your missions. Only logical, I do not fit the image you are trying to cultivate. Now I see why I was chosen. This is quite the mess." Wick's face remained expressionless as he tapped the dossier for emphasis. His voice betrayed no hint of the alleged intrigue. Certainly it betrayed no emotion attached to Sang's personnel or public relation choices. Certainly, he was happy enough to not be working the new image building missions. The Agency had continued aiming him toward people they needed observed or terminated. Fewer and fewer of the latter with new management.

New management. New America. Wick did not truly trust either. However, he was not a petulant child to question authority. He proceeded under the assumption that God had put him in this place for a reason. "What is it you require of me specifically, Agent Sang?"

Sabine felt comfortable when she was not herself. In her civilian life, being a social mirror. It comforted people in social settings, but SUPER was not the civilian world. Not everyone on staff was trained in psychology, because it was not relevant to some agents and most soldiers. Sabine disagreed; in her eyes, knowing how people worked would ideally be mandatory, but some people brought too much value in other ways.

Wick… he was not one of those people. He was not a social creature, but Sabine knew better than to assume he did not understand people. He was a reader, noting the way she expressed herself. That negated her social advantages, because if he read her reflecting him, there was no lowering of his guard. She would still do it out of habit, because what else was she to do?

The agent was stern, but he was a quick study. With some of her newbies pushing at her patience, it was nice briefing someone who did not need hand-holding or a synopsis of the documents they were handed.

Competence and rationality were helpful in an agent, but uncomfortable when that agent was aware of the situation he was in with the new SUPER. Her brief smile was formal, followed up with a shrug of the shoulder. ”You’re a loyal agent who is good at his job. Why would SUPER choose to not use you?” Much of Wick’s record was written in red, but those were not the only jobs he was equipped for. ”We all find our place in a new world, Agent.”

At the very least, Wick was not going to refuse work. ”It has now been brought to our attention that the cause of the de-aging phenomenon was lab-created, whereas previously we assumed it to be a rogue mutant." It was also an unauthorized experiment from a defunct SUPER lab, but those pieces of intel were not relevant to the task at hand now. "As far as we can tell, the serum created was derived from a mutant, but can still affect humans and adapteds." It was marvelous science and an absolute danger to society. Very much old SUPER.

"The serum was taken from the lab it was created in, so we now believe these events have been malicious. Whoever is causing this, we need them tracked down and brought in. Alive, ideally,” she felt the need to clarify, keeping a dry tone throughout her run-down.

Wick did not address the question of why he may not be used. He knew very well that his was not a speciality or attitude that sat well with the new management. Perhaps a gun could be used to open a lock, but if you had a choice it would not be your first choice. As he understood it, what he had most experience with would fit best with the CIA in general. SUPER was moving more into FBI territory, which was not the type of training Wick had received. Obviously it was what management felt was most useful and necessary, and they were best positioned to know, but perhaps it was time Wick changed agency.

The De-aging phenomenon being lab-created was definitely relevant information. Mutant derived, but worked on humans and kappas. He would need to exercise extreme caution in that case. Business as usual to be paranoid and careful, but this could call for additional equipment. A gas mask, since the substance functioned as a gas, perhaps a complete hazardous materials suit depending on whether skin contact could be enough. Given how much black ink was in that particular section of the dossier, he would need to ask.

That the events were malicious and deliberate did not truly seem to be in question. Certainly Wick had not questioned it. Too targeted, they simply did not have the randomness of accidents. That the Agency wanted the perpetrator brought in alive also did not surprise him, unfortunately. Alive meant getting close. Getting close could go wrong. Wick would much rather have dealt with the situation through a rifle scope to mitigate risk. "Alive if possible. Understood."

He had his questions already queued in his mind. "What assets are being made available? Does the gas function through skin contact? Is this mutant from here or our side?" Wick paused, placed a finger where he was up to on the page, and drew his gaze up to meet Sang's, "What methods are permissible for making sure this gets done?" Even through Wick's emotionless voice they both knew what he meant. Could people disappear or be tortured to ensure this was dealt with. Was he operating outside the law. With something so sensitive, it bore asking.

Despite the direction she was trying to help lead SUPER toward, Sabine Sang was not an optimist by trade. They had to improve their public image and the organization needed to move away from their less humane practices of old, but they were not a humanitarian organization. That was Haven’s realm, and SUPER had real jobs to do that could get messy. They had to know when it was time to make hard choices and push past comfort to do what was necessary.

When things needed to get messy, they would want someone on the staff not squeamish about making those tough choices. With the de-ager being a risky rogue element, he was the right choice. Alive was the goal; not the requirement.

While Sabine was sure that was not Wick’s preference, he did not argue. Nice to see training and discipline won out. He was focused on getting the job done. ”We don’t have confirmation on the universe of origin for the mutant. This mission is high priority, so you can requisition equipment or supplies you feel you require. This includes needs for containment, capture, or surveillance. If you can get information on the ‘how’ of this process, that would be just grand. If you feel the need for assistance, we can get another agent on hand for you.” Somehow she doubted Wick would take that option. He was not a team-operations type of guy.

The trickier matter was how the serum was spread. They had volunteers that let themselves be tested, which helped. Not as much as an unwilling volunteer might have, but dissecting people was wrong. New SUPER policy, apparently. ”Now that we’ve seen samples of the serum, we were able to test contaminated parties. All had particles swapped from their cheeks and detected from their breath. The main problem is that some had those particles detected in their blood samples and others did not. We don’t know if that’s an example of the gas seeping in through the skin or a more direct method of contamination, but be prepared for anything, Agent.”