Part 6: A Ross by any other name

Ross groaned as he woke up. His head was throbbing and he was face down on the floor of his own apartment. He was also tied up with duct tape and he now had to find a way to get free. Everything had all started this morning after his discreet call to Stark. The day had just spiralled out of control. It was either his luckiest day or his most unlucky one. He was leaning towards the latter since he currently needed to scratch an itch developing on his nose and his hands were tied behind his back.

That morning after the call ended with Stark he went up to the ground floor. Since his three months medical stay in Wakanda he had been put on probation. Mainly because he refused to tell his bosses just what went on after Busan and what he had seen in Wakanda. He figured that the CIA would keep him around because he was the only one who had actually made it into the heart of Wakanda. Something not even their other spies could do. Probation he expected. Being assigned the worst possible job in the building to make him crack, he also expected.

It was mind-numbingly boring work. He had been assigned to oversee the CIA records basement, which no one visited anymore because everything was digitized. The entire place was covered in dust and cobwebs. If his superiors thought he was gonna crack then they had another thing coming. All he had to do was keep his mouth shut about Wakanda for two more weeks. That was when T'Challa was going to do the big reveal at the UN. So on the morning of his new assignment, Everett went down to the janitor's closet grabbed a pair of mops and dusters and started cleaning. If he let a mouse or three escape the room and get into his boss' office, well it wasn't technically his fault. He was a lone man cleaning a large area and couldn't keep track of all rodents.

The one upside about being alone in the basement was that he could snoop around the old records without anyone watching. Something had been bugging him about the Secretary of State even before Busan. Most of the records had been blacked out but the ones that he found seemed to suggest that General Ross was more invested in finding the Super Soldier serum than he let on. That was basically what prompted the call to Stark. That and watercooler gossip. CIA watercooler gossip was mostly spot on with rumors. Although he did not want to know just why Andy from Logistics was wearing mismatching socks today.

It was around nine o'clock when Ross had come out of his stuffy office again for more coffee and he had expected the offices to be quiet. Analysts rhythmically typing away valuable data. Instead, the whole floor was in a flurry of activity. "What's going on?" Ross had asked one of the agents passing by.

"We've located one of Klaue's safehouses. It has a cache of weapons and Williams is sending out a team to gather them all up." The agent spoke quickly.

"ROSS!" Speak of the devil and he shall call your name. Ross turned to the right to see Agent Williams come bounding towards him. They had never liked each other during training. Ross thought that it might have been because he got a lucrative assignment right off the bat while Williams had to start from the ground up. That first assignment had mainly involved Ross' previous piloting expertise and that had later gotten him the position at the JCTC. Now with Ross' probation they had put Williams in charge and oh, was the man smug and irritating. It might just be another ploy of his superiors to make him crack. Seeing his rival take over his job. He might let a mouse run lose in the man's office after lunch.

"Yes agent Williams?" Ross turned towards the man looking calm and unruffled. That seemed to get on the man's nerves just a bit. Williams might have thought that Ross would have let some emotion show.

"We're short on manpower so I'm sending you with the team to go catalog everything in Klaue's safehouse." Williams worded it so as if to say that Ross wasn't part of the team anymore. Maybe he wasn't but it didn't ruffle his feathers that much. There would be a surprise waiting for the CIA in two weeks and it wasn't just what T'Challa was going to reveal. "Can I count on you to not disappear for three months while doing it?"

And there was the spite. He could have just brushed it off but he was feeling particularly sassy today so he answered with "If I don't get shot, sure."

Williams sputtered as Ross walked away towards the team that was assembling their gear.

Klaue's safehouse apparently was situated in Florida, in a retirement community............. Near a nude beach. The flight time lasted approximately two hours and the team got there by noon. It looked like any other home in a wealthy neighbourhood. This one just had a basement full of weapons and possibly vibranium stored. Maybe the attic too. Knowing Klaue, probably the walls and the yacht docked behind the house as well.

Everett entered the house and gave a low whistle. It was extravagantly furnished. Several of the younger agents had been assigned to this team to give them experience in the field and he noticed one was running a device along the wall.

"Excuse me," Everett said as he approached the man. "What are you looking for?"

"Uhm..... Vibranium, sir" The agent answered after he had been startled.

"Then you might as well rip the walls out. Vibranium can't be detected by conventional metal detectors." He muttered, figuring he'd save the young man some time.

"Uh, how do you know that sir?" The agent asked more curious than suspicious.

"Yes, how do you know that?" A much deeper voice asked and Ross turned around to see the Secretary of State standing behind him.

"Uhm....." Ross gulped. Of course Shuri had explained the whole thing to him, atom models included, and even showed him what would detect Vibranium but he just couldn't tell the Secretary that. So instead he told him something believable "Klaue didn't set off the metal detectors in Busan with the vibranium in his pants," Which he didn't. Just the multiple weapons he and his men were armed with.

The Secretary seemed to buy it and then ordered for the agent to get a sledgehammer for the walls. "Why are you here Mr. Secretary?" Ross now asked as the two stared at each other.

"I'm here to secure any advanced weapons and vibranium you guys find," The man told him imperiously as Ross followed after him and through the throng of agents that were busy bagging and tagging things. Someone had already found a high-powered rifle under the couch.

"So when will the Wakandans be brought in?" Ross asked and the General turned around giving him a nasty glare.

"Why would we bring them in?" The other Ross scoffed.

"Because it's their Vibranium that got stolen?" Everett raised a brow. "It's only right to return it."

"Oh my god, you're actually serious!" The old man laughed. "Vibranium is the rarest metal on Earth. Why wouldn't we keep it?" The Secretary now asked. "It's bad enough that your team handed over what Klaue had back in Busan."

"Excuse me?!" Everett now asked with his eyes narrowed. "The mission parameters for that OP clearly stated that we were acquiring the Vibranium to return back to Wakanda in return for friendlier relations." He shot back. "It just so happened that they were in the area so it got returned sooner."

"Oh my god, this is why I hate your attitude." The Secretary now muttered and Everett noted that they had gotten some eyes on them. Several of the newer agents were listening in on the convo that was never really private. Only the Secretary seemed to have forgotten that. "You're a good agent Everett but you're also a goody-two-shoes. You returned the rarest, most valuable metal on Earth to a Third world country. What are they going to do with it?!" The man now laughed. "Make clothes out of it?"

'Well, you aren't far off,' Ross thought but didn't say since the Wakandas did sew Vibranium into their clothes. He kept his mouth shut as the former General ordered him to get to work. Ross shot him one last glare before he grabbed a datapad to start cataloging. Through his work he didn't notice the glances some of the younger agents shot him. Many were new to the taskforce. Just coming out of training and doing the grunt work. The glances were respectful because any agent that could stare down the Secretary that had hunted the Hulk was not one to be messed with.

Something caught Everett's eye nearly an hour into cataloging weapons. They were done with most of the ground floor. They found weapons already and hadn't even made it to the basement of attic yet. The something that caught Everett's eye was sitting innocently in an inconspicuous planter in a corner on a small table on the second floor.

"You have got to be kidding me," Everett blinked as he stared at the Heartshaped herb that he would recognize anywhere. Nakia had told them that the garden had been burned and the only sample they had left she had used to save T'Challa from the ice. To think that Klaue got so far into Wakanda to get an herb was surprising. And here it was just sitting, innocently, like a common houseplant. Either Klaue didn't know what he had taken or he was hiding it in plain sight. There was also the matter of Secretary Ross overseeing this cleanup. If the man knew that this plant gave superhuman strength....... Well.... That would be really really bad. The herb didn't look too bad. It might need some more water but otherwise seemed fine.

Ross kept his eye on the plant discreetly and nearly freaked when one of the agents almost knocked it over. At the end of the day he was tired much like all the others. They had found a cache of weapons in the basement but no Vibranium. When they were getting ready to leave Ross gingerly picked up the planter.

"What the devil are you carrying?" The Secretary asked as he spotted Ross with the herb when he was coming out of the house.

"Well......" Ross had to choose his words carefully here. Time to play the Secretary like a fiddle. "It was the only plant in the house. Doesn't it seem suspicious?"

Secretary Ross looked at Everett as if he was an idiot and then mumbled, "It's a plant. Just get rid of it! We're here for weapons."

"But....." Ross mumbled.

"Look, I don't care what you do with that stupid ficus. Just get on the transport!" The man now ordered, a twitch of his brow evidence of his irritation.

Ross eagerly nodded and then followed the team with plant in tow. He had just basically gotten carte blanche for the herb from the Secretary of State, though he swore he heard the Secretary calling him a tree hugger under his breath, but as of right now he didn't care. Little did he know, this plant was going to give him some trouble later.

That night when Ross finally got back to his apartment, that looked barely lived in thanks to his numerous missions out of State and Country, he was knackered to say the least. He quickly gave the plant some more water before taking out the long chain that held a Kimoyo bead that Shuri had given him. T'Challa had wanted to gift him one of the bead bracelets but that would have drawn too much attention at work so Shuri made a necklace that worked the same way. He just had to press the bead in the right place to open a communications line.

"Your Highness," He greeted when T'Challa answered. Luckily with the time difference it was in the morning for the King. "I thought you should see this,"

T'Challa greeted him cordially but nearly fell out of his chair when Everett moved to reveal the plant. "Where did you get that?!" T'Challa nearly screeched as his eyes widened. The King looked like a startled panther ready to pounce with his hands on his desk and him leaning forward a bit.

"The CIA raided one of Klaue's safehouses," Everett told the man.

"And they let you just take it home?" T'Challa now asked.

"Luckily they didn't know what it was," Ross stated. "Look, I have no clue how to care for it so if you could please send someone over....."

"Right," T'Challa said as he calmed down somewhat. He sat back down in his office chair and told Ross "I'll send Okoye and Ayo to come pick it up. Agent Ross you just keep on surprising me." The man laughed and the call ended not long after.

Ross settled down on his couch. It was already past midnight and he still had work in the morning. If he wasn't careful he would fall asleep right on the couch. A knock at his door however, woke him right back up. The knocking turned incessant and Ross got up while muttering "I'm coming, I'm coming!"

'This better be urgent,' Ross thought as he was about to give the person at the other end a tongue lashing for knocking so late. When he opened the door, he blinked. It was one of the female agents from the cleanup team and with her was a man he didn't recognize.

"What....." Ross didn't even get to finish his sentence when he was hit by a powerful stunner. Much more powerful than a normal taser. He groaned and sank to the floor. He could barely keep his eyes open and focus. His hands were spasming too much for him to reach for his gun which was still in its holster on his belt. The two people came in and shut the door and Ross caught the end of a conversation.

"You shouldn't have done that," He heard the woman admonish. He didn't hear what the man said as everything finally went dark.

When Ross woke up he was in his current predicament. Tied up with duct tape on the floor of his apartment, a major headache coming on and an itchy nose. The sunlight was streaming through the windows and he guessed he must have been knocked out for a couple of hours.

Ross shimmied a bit towards the coffee table where he knew he had a letter opener stashed in the cup of pencils. Before he reached it though, after bumping against his couches, which prompted him to ask himself why he had so many couches again, there was a knock on the door.

"Agent Ross," The person on the other end of the door called after rapping twice. Ross knew that voice anywhere. Okoye was here and he was so glad that his mouth hadn't been duct taped. He called out loud enough for her to hear and was hoping she would kick his door open. What he didn't expect was for the Dora to blow the entire door off its hinges. Now that would be a bit harder to explain to the landlord.

When Ross was finally freed he looked at the counter where he had placed the herb on. It was gone. He cursed under his breath and then he picked up his phone to look at the time. It was almost noon and he should have been at work four hours ago. There were several messages and missed calls from agent Williams but right now he didn't care.

"Now what?" Okoye asked as she looked around the room. Nothing else seemed out of place so that would suggest that it wasn't a robbery and that the people were after the herb from the beginning.

"Now we get their asses," Ross muttered as he pulled out a device from behind his kitchen counter.

"What is that?" Ayo asked out of curiosity.

"I put a small tracker in the soil." Ross told both Dora. "I wouldn't be much of an agent if I wasn't paranoid." Okoye nodded approvingly as Ross turned on the tracker.

The tracker actually led the three to an apartment building near Connecticut Ave. "This is it," Ross stated as Okoye and Ayo wasted no time in entering the building. Meanwhile, Ross' phone vibrated again but he shut it off as the tracker started beeping now that it was getting closer. The beeping seemed to be the loudest at apartment 3C.

Okoye, blunt as always, kicked in the door without any preamble, startling the occupants inside. Both sides had weapons aimed at each other. Guns and sonic spears. Then something happened. The female agent's eyes widened with recognition. "General Okoye?" She called in a distinctive Wakandan accent that Ross was sure he hadn't heard last night. Surely but slowly both parties lowered their weapons. Ross had a distinct feeling that there had been a huge misunderstanding here.

And huge misunderstanding it was. Ross was less than pleased as he listened. It seemed the two people who assaulted him were Wakandan intelligence agents sent undercover. When the herb was stolen he thought that they might have been AIM of Hydra, or maybe even working for the Secretary if he did find out just what the plant could do.

They in turn thought that he was merely acting out his concern with the Secretary to get the plant out of high security. He had to assure then two times that he and the Secretary of State were not related in any way. What was most startling was that the two agents had found a secret lab that Secretary Ross funded to try and recreate the Super Soldier serum. He apparently, through backdoor dealings with Russia, had gotten his hands on the corpses of the Winter Soldiers that Zemo had killed.

It took nearly two hours to get everything out in the open and when Ross finally answered his phone the irate voice of agent Williams was right on the other side. "WHERE THE FUCK HAVE YOU BEEN?!" The man cursed.

"I was dealing with a bit of a crisis...." Ross tried to explain the best he could but his new boss' voice interrupted him. "You should be damn glad you still have your job!" Williams spouted. "I have half a mind to fire you!"

The events of last night and today were already close to having Ross snap. He then growled into the phone "Well why don't you?! I already gave my two weeks notice to HR!"

"Wait what?!" This threw Williams for a loop as the man suddenly sputtered. Ross guessed he was expecting him to make some sort of feeble apology and then beg to keep his job.

"You'll never work in the Intelligence community again!" Williams now hissed.

"Who knows," Ross shrugged. "I've accepted a job as Wakanda's Foreign Policy advisor, so I'll be there to clean out my desk later today or tomorrow." He had signed the job contract before leaving Wakanda and had delivered his two weeks notice after the interrogation from his superiors. Now all he had to do was settle the affairs with his apartment and wait out the two weeks. He'd leave without anyone being the wiser but that went out the window now. When Ross ended the call agent Williams seemed to have been choking on his water.

The End

AN: The series in chronological order as of now is; Part: 1,4,2,3

More parts will be added to fill up some gaps and more villains will be introduced.