If travel had been undertaken with as much haste as his trip to Tokyo had back in his day then it never would have taken him ten years to get home from Troy. Then again he would have gladly traded a couple of those gained hours for a more sedate journey were he didn't have have to white-knuckle his way through a flight, consciously and consistently willing the plane to stay in the air. No matter how many trips by plane he undertook, he still couldn't shake the conviction that man wasn't meant to fly. If they were then what was Icarus's bleached bones doing at the bottom of the Aegean?
Still, the trip went without incident, and before he knew it he was delivered safely unto the bosom of the offices of the Prime Minister.
Straight into the belly of the beast.
He received several dark looks from security staff, no doubt concerning the sword that was belted around his waist, but he politely yet resolutely refused to relinquish the weapon. Not that he was particularly attached to the blade. In fact he preferred to stay at the polite distance of a bowshot when it came to battle, but a sword was a handy signifier of his – former - political office. The sword lent him a royal air, even while wearing the nondescript yet excellently tailored dark suit and tie he had chosen to don for the meeting.
He wasn't kept waiting outside the meeting room for longer than a minute, which was worrying. Usually committees like this would keep visitors like him waiting for an age, using the wasted time as a juvenile power-play, reminding everyone of just who held the most influence. The fact that they'd abandoned the tactic showed that they really meant business.
The meeting place was an elegant room, one long window displaying a quiet exquisite view of Tokyo's early evening skyline. Odysseus's could hardly spare a look for the lavish scenery however, as his attention was instead fixed upon the rooms occupants. Nineteen men and women, no doubt some of the most politically powerful members of Japan's government. He wished he had time to study them in more depth earlier, to have researched their strengths and weaknesses so as to give him some kind of advantage, but this meeting had been so rushed he'd hadn't the chance. He hated going in blind, but there was nothing else for it.
Sad fact, but life was just a series of doing things you hated.
Odysseus declined to return the ministers bows, instead gracing them the merest dip of his head. A king does not bow, the gesture said. Which was utter dung of course. Kings possessed the exact same capacity to bow as any other man. Agamemnon used to make him bow every time they passed each other in a hallway. It was all a ploy though. If their initial impression of him was one of a haughty cur, then any concessions he made them later would seem far more harder won.
He undid the buckle of his sword-belt before looping it over the back of the proffered chair, his movements slow and deliberate, before seating himself.
“Comfortable enough, Prime Minister, thank you. My apologies that I cam alone, but my comrades find themselves currently employed in tracking down and capturing the villain Tinhead Ned. I say capture, but re-capture seems more apt. After all, we already seized the cur once before, but it seems the Australian's misplaced him, and lack the capacity to apprehend him without our specialized help.” He smiled apologetically. Let that serve to remind them that, like it or not, there were still men and women out there that the government's conventional forces just couldn't match.
Like it or not, they still needed the Champions.
Refreshments were brought forward while the Prime Minister asked if he'd prepared a statement. Again Odysseus inwardly cursed how rushed all this had been. He could come out with any number of statements, but without knowing what the exact intention of this meeting was then the chances where high that he'd be addressing all the wrong points, which would be worse than addressing none of them. It would make him look like a fool, and potentially ruin whatever credential that the Champions had left. No, better to let them open. Surrendering the initiative went against everything he knew about both war and politics, but sometimes a man had to take a backwards step to give himself room to attack. There was nothing else for it.
"With respect, you invited me here, not the other way around. It seems only right that you begin Prime Minister."
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Mixtape Ghost N,
Hillan,
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