Steve Rogers and Silver Sablinova knew nothing about the argument that had taken place in the Royal City conference room. All they knew was that they were facing a group of terrorists who had hijacked a small freighter and a coastal village. A few weeks earlier, the Italian military had fired missiles at refugees attempting to flee Syria's coast by boat, trying to reduce the number of refugees illegally entering Italy. The result was that more human traffickers had accelerated the frequency of their shipments, while more extremists seized the opportunity to smuggle themselves by sea to Albania's coast, intending to enter Europe, the "paradise on earth," from there.
Border military police were the first to spot the smuggling freighter lowering its small boats. When they approached in speedboats to intercept it, they came under attack from armed men in the coastal village. One speedboat was hit by an Anti-Tank Missile, and the three military police officers aboard were obliterated. Alerted by the alarm, the navy and aerial patrols immediately moved to blockade the waters, trapping the smuggling freighter to prevent it from escaping into international waters. Though the village had a small population, nearly every household was involved in the smuggling business for extra income. Yet these coastal fishermen were merely the second link in the black-market chain. They did not earn much, and their money would be skimmed once more by underground banks abroad. Still, it was enough to make up for years of runaway inflation and dwindling catches, allowing them to support their families.
From the moment the first human trafficker transported refugees from Syria's coast to Albania, passing them through layer after layer of middlemen until they finally reached Western and Northern European nations such as France, Germany, and Sweden, then delivering them to private refugee