by Trevor Shand
He set the glass back down and took a sip of his beer trying to remove the taste of the whiskey from his mouth. A small burp came up and the contents of his stomach tried to follow. Adrian took a few deep breaths, then brought his hand to his mouth and clinched his jaw shut. The two other men watched Adrian with silly grins on their faces. After a moment Adrian removed his hand and relaxed. He paused for a moment and waited to see if his body would use this opening to try and reject the contents of his stomach again. It didn’t, so he relaxed further.
“So we showed you ours, now show us yours. How do you plan on getting them from here to your contacts?” Brian prompted as he refilled the shot glasses. Adrian paused as the smell from the pouring whiskey nearly caused his stomach to try another rebellion.
“Well,” Adrian paused, trying to relax again, “As you may or may not know, those large container ships that come over here are usually bringing in goods from China or Japan. OK, you most likely knew that, but did you know that for every two containers that come this way, we send one back. And not empty, one of the most common items sent back is scrap metal. Cars, appliances, construction debris, et cetera. And did you know one of the largest processing centers for scrap metal is here in Seattle?”
Without pausing for an answer to his rhetorical question, Adrian continued, “So I have a friend…” Adrian was feeling quite a buzz now and used his fingers to make air quotes when he said the word “friend.” “…who manages this yard, who can get specially made tanks into these returning containers. These tanks have all the ‘ducks need for a two week trip sealed up and surrounded by literally tons of scrap metal. Then on the far side, our guys pick up the containers and drive them out of the yard.”
“That sounds reasonable, and well enough thought out, so now down to brass tacks,” Mack said, “The gooeys are ten bucks a pound at wholesale, ours will cost you eight dollars a pound. How does that sound?
“Sounds,” Adrian paused for effect, “Like you two are under arrest.” Adrian reached in and pulled out his badge, but in his state of dulled senses, he did not quite close his fingers on the badge and it slipped from his hands. The metal shield in the thin leather case made a dull thud. For a moment the three men all froze. Adrian realized the position he was in and a shot of adrenalin rushed through his veins. He looked up from the badge, which was sitting face up on the table, at the two men. They glance at him, then at each other.
Adrian reached his hands toward his belt line. His left hand grabbed his belt which he intentionally left loose, his right hand streaking down toward his groin. Mack started to move out of the booth and around the small table. Brian was trying to come straight over the top. Adrian’s fingers found the small .22 he’d tucked in tight to his crotch and pulled it. His hand with the gun cleared his belt and was swinging toward Brian when Mack caught his arm with a meaty, calloused hand and jammed it back behind his head. Adrian did not let go of the small weapon.
Adrian shifted away from Mack, then stood up, allowing his arm to drop from being tucked behind his head out and down to shoulder level. From there, he had leverage against Mack and he pushed down. Mack crashed into the table, his head cracked the edge and he fell to the seat, blocking Adrian in. Mack moaned and let go of Adrian’s arm but almost immediately started trying to right himself.
Brian, by this point, had finished extricating himself from the far side of the table and was scrambling over on his hands and knees. Adrian met him face-to-face. Adrian jerked his right arm, trying to get the gun clear from under the table so he could bring it to bear on Mack. But Mack was already across the table and tackled Adrian, wrapping both arms around his torso.
The bench was too small for Adrian to fall back or even move more than a few inches, but he also couldn’t extract himself. Adrian tried to break free but Brian was more than a smuggler, he was a dock worker and a fisherman. Twenty years of hauling cargo, moving traps and rigging lines had made Brian strong and tireless. Brian was bent back, his arms wrapped low around Adrian’s arms, nearly at the elbow, not giving Adrian any leverage. Brian’s rough beard was jammed against Adrian’s neck. Adrian could feel Brian’s heavy wet breath on his shoulder.
The two men struggled back and forth for a few seconds, Adrian trying to break free with Brian tenaciously holding on. The struggle lasted for a few seconds then both men stopped to breathe. Brian’s heavy weight sat on Adrian’s chest restricting his ability to suck in oxygen while Brian’s odd body angle made everything difficult. The men struggled again, rested again. The two men seemed to be at an impasse. Adrian saw a small movement out of the corner of his eye and realized that Mack was regaining awareness. He redoubled his attempt to break free but Brian held fast. Brian too heard Mack and knew he only had to hold on a little bit longer before help arrived.
Mack stood, and quickly reached over to Adrian’s right hand which was pinned against his thigh. With a rough twist, he wrenched the small gun from Adrian’s hand. He raised it and brought it down hard on Adrian’s skull. Adrian went woozy. The room spun and the edges of his vision blackened, making small tunnels for him to see through. But Adrian did not pass out. Still he closed his eyes.
“Did you kill him?” Adrian heard Brian ask. He felt Brian’s grip ease, slowly and tentatively.
“No, I can see him breathing but I may have given him a concussion. Adrian felt himself being pulled from the booth roughly. They dropped him on the floor. While Adrian knew this was happening his body was not responding to his brain’s signals and he could do nothing to prevent his head from hitting the floor sending another shock of pain through his brain. His cheek squished into the thin, grimy carpet.
Adrian heard the noise of the two men moving to either side of him. He opened his eyes. While his vision was still a bit tunneled, he could see the yellow-green carpet covered in unidentifiable stains and the black toe of Mack’s well worn boot. He could smell the musty mildew seeping from the carpet and feel a thin line of drool trickling from the corner of his mouth. He tried to flex his arms. They moved slightly but not enough. Still, some control was coming back.
Four hands strengthened by years of working on boats and docks picked up Adrian as if he weighed nothing. “What do you want to do with this piece of shit?,” Brian asked.
“I don’t know. It'd be easiest just to kill him, but he’s an FBI agent, that could bring down some heavy heat,” Mack replied, “Still I don’t know what else to do. We can’t let him go, how else can we keep him quiet?”
“There isn’t any other way,” Brian offer, “I say we kill ‘im and be done with it. They’ll never find him at the bottom of the Sound.”
“Would you shut up, I’m trying to think,” Mack spat back, “Screw it, you’re right. Let’s hurry. Let’s not move The Chive, it’ll be suspicious for us to move the entire boat. Let’s quickly, and quietly, move him to one of the launches, then we’ll take that out to the middle of the Sound and drop him.”
Mack hadn’t even finished talking before Brian was already headed toward the door. Adrian tried to move his legs but they still weren’t moving enough to do any good, not against these two. The group was too wide to fit through the tiny portals leading outside three abreast so Brian took the lead and stepped through. “Hold him,” he hissed to Mack when they got to the dogged hatch leading outside.
Mack easily took Adrian’s weight. Brian opened the door then took up his side of Adrian. Brian stepped through the portal and immediately asked, “What are you doing here?”
Mack heard a muted, “Hey man” from just behind the open door.
“Who is it?” he asked looking out the door to Brian who was washed in the orange phosphorous light while Mack stood in the dimness of the tiny hallway.
Brian looked back at Mack and replied, “It’s just the bum.
“He was just a bum, now he’s a witness,” Mack said.
Without a word, Brian let go of Adrian and lunged toward the bum. There was less than two feet between Brian and the bum when he lunge
d, and Brian’s movements were quick through years of dodging unexpected booms and objects moving due to snapped lines. Brian lunged through where the bum was, trying to put his shoulder hard into the man’s chest.
But trying was the operative word. In the blink it took Brian to get to the bum, the bum had already moved. Brian’s momentum carried him away from the still open hatch. The bum sauntered past Brian and poked his head around the door, “Hey, watcha doin’?” The bum’s tone was almost childlike.
“Get out of here,” Mack snarled. The bum locked eyes with Mack. Rather than the dull, shifty eyes Mack had expected, the bum’s eyes were bright, they almost seemed to dance, and they noticed everything.
Without breaking eye contact with Mack, the bum quickly took three steps backward, leaning his back over the rail slightly, just enough to let Brian’s stocky frame rush past him in yet another failed attempt to wrap him up. With Brian past, the bum moved forward, toward Adrian and Mack. He stepped calmly over the combing and into the tiny hallway, pressing up against Adrian. Mack instinctively took a step back.
In one smooth motion, the bum closed the door and dogged it closed. He finally broke eye contact with Mack long enough to snap the lock into place so the door couldn’t be opened from outside. Mack used this moment to step back into the kitchen dragging Adrian’s body with him. Adrian was still slowly recovering and was now able to support part of his weight but was still unable to resist Mack’s strong grip.
The bum drifted down the small hallway toward the dingy kitchen and said, “Now why don’t we just drop the nice man…”
“Get out of here,” Mack repeated but this time rather than move farther back he reached into the pocket of his jacket and pulled a well-worn .45. The chrome barrel had scrapes and scratches on it. The wooden inlay on the handle was smooth from handling. But there was no doubt the piece would still do its job. Mack held the piece at arm’s length with a steady arm. The hole in the barrel didn’t waiver a millimeter.
The bum put his hands up, “Now let’s be cool man, what’s going on here?” The bum spoke in a soft, mellow voice. While his raised hands and quiet voice gave the initial perspective that he was threatened by the gun, he never stopped drifting forward to the doorway.
“Stop,” Mack said, then in a louder more force full voice he repeated, “Stop.” A small bead of sweat appeared on Mack’s temple.
“Yeah, man, I got ya’,” the bum agreed in the same mellow voice, never dropping his hands or slowing his progress.
“I said stop,” Mack was shouting now. The tip of the barrel started a small twitch side to side. The bum continued to drift toward him, now at the doorway. Mack suddenly pushed Adrian toward the small sink, and pulled the trigger on the big gun. The load bark filled the tiny space, the flash of the muzzle searing his retinas. A small whiff of smoke clouded the room which now smelled of burnt gun powder. Mack quickly blinked away the colorful dots in front of his eyes, trying to see the bum's body. As the dots shrank the panic in Mack’s brain grew. The body wasn’t there.
In the same moment Mack had pulled the trigger, the bum had reached the doorway. He’d seen Mack brace his right foot to push Adrian to the left. He’d watched in slow motion as Mack took a deep breath and tightened his grip on the gun’s trigger, taking up the minute amount of slack. In an instant he launched himself through the door, leaping--not straight, but to his right--toward where Adrian’s body had eased to the ground, slowed in its decent by Adrian’s somewhat functioning legs.
The bullet wanged against the still dogged door. The bum tucked and rolled, springing to his feet and pivoting toward Mack. In the fraction of a second it had taken for Mack to realize the bum wasn’t a heap on the floor, the bum was up and ready to fight. But Mack had other ideas. He turned and ran to his right, away from Adrian and the bum, toward a second door which led out of the galley and down into the ship.
The bum took a half step, then stopped and knelt down next to Adrian, “Hey, buddy, how you doin’?”.
Adrian was starting to recover faster now and with the help of the bum was able to stand. He gave his head a small shake and his vision leapt from the tunnel and back to reality. He turned and focused on the bum who was grinning back at him with a broad, white smile. He still stunk though. Taking a second look Adrian said, “What are you doing here?”
“Did you miss me?”
“Not at all, Steve, not at all,” Adrian said wrapping the figure in a quick hug.
“Yeah, and I’m sure you had this all in hand,” Steve said with a slight wave of the hand, gesturing around the room. Steve returned the hug then took a step toward the small table.
“Something like that,” Adrian chuckled, “Seriously, what are you doing here?”
Steve surveyed the table, righted a shot glass that had gotten overturned. He reached over to one of the tiny benches and retrieved the bottle which had come to rest there. He unscrewed the cap and poured himself a shot. In the same smooth motion he’d exhibited while dodging Brian, he slammed back the shot and poured another. “You want one,” he offered to Adrian.
“Oh no,” Adrian said, his stomach rolling at the idea.
“Fair enough.” Steve whipped the second shot down and set the shot glass on the table again.
“OK, now can you tell me what you are doing here? How did you know I was going to be here?” Adrian pursued.
“Actually it was Sam who knew you’d be here. Apparently you aren’t as stealthy as you think with your undercover assignments. Plus, you being you, you still filed all of your paperwork,” now it was Steve’s turned to let out a laugh, “Really?” He looked over at Adrian.
“Paperwork is an important part of any investigation.” Adrian straightened up a bit.
“We can argue this later, if you don’t mind. Now what is this all about?”
“These guys are smuggling gooey ducks,” Adrian said, straightening his shoulders a bit.
“Really? I’m about to go get in a fight over clams?”
“What can I say, some folks just like a good fight,” Adrian spread his hands, palms up.
“Well then, let’s take this fight from good to great. Now, if you don’t mind, I think I’m going to go look for tweedle-dee and tweedle-dumb,” Steve replied.
“By all means,” Adrian said as he swept his hand toward the door Mack had left through, “Go right ahead.”
Steve downed the second shot then swept out the door. Adrian, head still pounding, gingerly walked toward the tiny hallway. It took him a few tries to open the door in his weakened state, but finally got the door un-dogged and he stepped out onto the deck. The briny air felt refreshing and his head started to clear.
Meanwhile Steve exploded through the portal Mack had left through and poured down the tiny metal steps. He knew Mack could be around any corner, waiting for him but figured Mack would want to put a little distance between himself and Steve before planning any sort of ambush. Bursting from the door at the bottom of the stairs a bullet wanged against steel wall showering Steve with tiny sparks of hot metal.
“I guess he didn’t need that much distance,” Steve thought to himself as he instinctively leapt toward a tall cabinet bolted to the wall. The cabinet wasn’t great cover, it was fairly thin so it wouldn’t take much of a shift in angle to uncover him and for all he knew it was empty and an empty cabinet would only be optical coverage as a bullet of any size would tear through the thin metal and straight at him.
But he also knew that ducking back into the stairwell was a worse idea. The thin walls that would provide him cover would also be his coffin. The stairwell would allow Mack to camp out at the bottom. Then if he had any contact with Brian he could easily send him around to the top to flush him out right into Mack’s now ready gun sights.
No, the key to success was moving and speed. Pausing for one moment, he identified the room as an engineering room, a place for the mechanics to work. If they broke apart at sea they couldn’t simply pull into the local auto parts store and
pick up a new piece, so the shop was well stocked with metal, black lathes, machining tools and other heavy duty manufacturing items.
He identified his next move, a medium sized generator stored near a work bench. With a large lunge, Steve leapt from his precarious hiding spot, rolled across the rough metal deck and popped up perfectly on the balls of his feet behind the generator. He heard two distinct reports, from different areas ring out. That meant either Brian had joined Mack or Mack had recruited more help. It didn’t bother Steve either way. He knew where they were and now he’d take the fight to them.
Adrian stood on the deck and took a deep breath. He thought about heading back in and back downstairs to lend a hand to Steve but knew he’d be more help here, stopping anyone’s retreat. He moved toward the gangplank and took up refuge behind a collection of pots, rope and worn canvases. His head was still aching but now it was more of a dull pressure where the brain met the spine. His vision was clear and he tucked himself into a nook where he had a full view of the deck, sacrificing some coverage. In the end, he doubted anyone would make it out from under decks to his position.
With his right hand, Steve slid a Smith and Wesson Model K from a shoulder holster on his left side. Repeating a mirror image of this move with his left hand he withdrew a Colt .45. He took a quick moment to glance at the two guns. The Smith & Wesson was finished in a dark gray designed to reflect no light. The Colt was silver though not chrome with a worn wooden handle. Both guns showed extensive nicks and scrapes on their finish, however a trained eye would notice that anything that moved or affected the guns performance was honed to mechanical perfection.
Steve had used these two guns for many years, mostly in similar situations. He was right handed, and while he could outshoot most with either hand, he was still a bit more accurate with the right hand. So he carried the lighter Smith & Wesson in that hand. Its smaller caliber, and correspondingly smaller kick, meant it was easier to fire repeatedly while being accurate. However, it lacked stopping power and could punch through fewer objects.