day 29: also part 23 (it's late and I'm tired and there's like a grajillion things to do tomorrow but here's 371 words at least; only 4,300 words to go)

"We've got two objectives," Moone said, clinking his glass down on the table in front of him and shifting in his seat to readjust his pants. "Hopefully we'll be able to take out two birds with one stone here, you know?" They were in the [passenger area] of a midsized private jet en route to Athens, Moone sitting across a table from one of Unwin's men. Moone's own men, now, he supposed.

The man, Magico, ticked them off on his fingers; he only had three on his left hand, his thumb and forefinger missing. "Recover the NOC list. Take out, Xemf? Or MacBeth. That's three objectives." His right forefinger pivoted on the tip of his left pinkie, as if to emphasize the errant extra item.

"Well, that's the thing," said Moone, examining his glass, which was almost empty save for the ice cubes. "I'm not sure if we'll need to take out MacBeth. Just Xemf. If that thing's endgame with the NOC list is what I think it is, by the time we come face-to-face with it MacBeth is going to be out. Of the picture."

"Out out," said Magico. "Got it. And so we're tracking Xemf down in... Greece?"

"Athens," Moone specified. It was a short flight over the Mediterranean sea, between the lands; Moone realized with a raise of the eyebrows that that was what the word Mediterranean literally meant, in the middle of the land, and that made it synonymous with Middle-earth or Midgard. The opposite of Mesopotamia, between the rivers, from whence they were flying. Strange how geography shaped myth. And Midgard. There were indeed higher planes than this one, but what of lower ones, as in Teutonic myth?

[how do they know Xemf is in Athens, or going there? it's got to have something to do with the NOC list's backstory, or what Xemf is planning on doing with the list. Moone explains the whole thing. Specifically they're going to like the Parthenon probably.]

[more stuff happens to justify this scene- characterization with Unwin's men? Vern Magico, Tor Orson, Michael J Miracle, Art Rose, and "just" Larry.]

[They land at, probably whatever airport existed in 1992; the one now in use there was built in 2000.]