by Lincoln Matt
Alejandra began conversing with the two men again, this time for quite a while. I didn’t bother to interrupt since she seemed like she was in a groove. After seeing her skills at the conference that day, I didn’t doubt for a second in her abilities to handle the situation on her own.
“They know the boy you talked to today,” Alejandra said. “What was his name….?”
“José Reyes,” I said, and both men perked up at the sound of the name.
They spoke some more.
“They say he’s a good kid,” Alejandra said. “Helps them out around the house sometimes. Everyone in town knows him, thinks he’s going places. They were shocked to hear he got mixed up with the cartel. They say he’s the last one anyone would expect to end up in that kind of situation.”
“Aren’t they all?” Holm murmured.
“He is a good kid,” I admitted, nodding so that hopefully the men would understand me some. “He just got mixed up in some things he couldn’t handle. It wasn’t his fault. He made up for it by helping us, though.”
Alejandra translated for me. I was hoping that since these guys knew José and seemed to care what happened to him, I could get in their good graces by saying we’d helped him. Get them to open up some more and trust us a little.
And it seemed to work. Soon, Alejandra and the two men were having a full-on conversation without us.
Holm and I exchanged a bemused look, but neither of us interrupted. Alejandra was proving even more useful than we’d expected.
She went back and forth with the men for a while, and then she turned back to us.
“So basically, they say that they don’t know anything about the cartel,” she said. “I guess a couple of guys from Haiti tried to see if they could set up shop in here on the down-low a couple of months back, but the owner said no.”
“Is he the owner?” I asked, nodding to the bartender.
“Yes,” she said.
“Good for him,” Holm said. “Need more like that.”
“And they just took no for an answer?” I asked, a little surprised.
“I guess they found somewhere else to go that would cause less trouble,” Alejandra said. “A similar place in a town down the road. As much as these guys love to threaten, killing a bunch of random Dominicans point blank wouldn’t have done them much good if they were trying to stay under the radar.”
“We should check that other place out next,” Holm suggested.
“Agreed,” Alejandra said. “They say it’s not like no one but the cartel goes in there anymore. These guys aren’t that pervasive around here. Not yet, anyway. They just stop in from time to time and do deals in the back. So it shouldn’t be too unsafe, at least.”
“Deals,” I repeated. “So I take it there have been a lot of drug deaths around here lately.”
“Oh yes,” Alejandra confirmed. “Some of these border communities, they’re very small. There are not a lot of opportunities. Add that to the proximity to Haiti and the poverty and discord there, and you’ve got a recipe for a lot of problems, including drug use.”
“So there have always been deaths,” I surmised.
“Yes, but not like these,” Alejandra said. “The customer, he said there’s never been anything like these.”
“How many? How often? What demographic?” I asked.
Alejandra turned back to the two men and translated my questions. The customer spoke again.
“They say all kinds,” she said. “There’s no real rhyme or reason to it, but that’s no different from the other drug use, they say. Anyone can get into that stuff. It seeps into the very fabric of the community.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” I said, addressing the men directly now. “Just one more question. We’ve heard a lot about this new drug recently. What have you heard? Has anyone described it to you?”
Alejandra asked the question in Spanish, but before either of the men could answer, the third, drunker one did. His voice was raspy, and he didn’t look at us as he spoke.
“He says… he says that he took the drug once,” Alejandra said.
I was taken aback, and so was Holm.
“Really?” I asked. “When? How?”
“What did it feel like?” Holm added.
Alejandra translated, and the man answered back in the same strange, disconnected manner as he had before.
“He says he doesn’t remember much about it, but it was months ago,” Alejandra translated when he was finished. “He was hopped up on some other drugs, as he often is—he lost his job two years ago and hasn’t been able to find another one in the area, it’s a common story for people like him—and he was getting his next fix from his dealer, a Haitian immigrant. And the next thing he knew… well, he says he woke up on a ghost ship.”
“A ghost ship?” I repeated. “You’ve got to be kidding me. What does that even mean?”
“What the fuck is it with this case?” Holm wondered aloud, throwing his arms up in the air.
Alejandra exchanged a few more words with the man, but he didn’t seem all that interested in talking some more, just giving her some gruff, muted one-word answers.
“He says he doesn’t know how to describe it,” she said. “But he said it felt like something out of one of those American horror movies.”
“Now that sounds familiar,” Holm said.
“The kids at the hospital,” I confirmed. One of them had said something similar about her experience with the drug.
“He also said… he said that he felt like he was away from his body, apart from it, but it was doing things without his consent,” Alejandra continued. “And then he thought he was going to die, but he found his way into the water and somehow managed to swim to shore. The next thing he knew, he was lying in the sun not far from the border, on the Dominican side. He never saw this ghost ship or heard from anyone there again.”
CHAPTER 18
Ethan
We tried to ask the man some more questions, but he was inebriated and irritable, and very uninterested in sharing any more about his experience. I gave him my card just in case he changed his mind, so he knew how to get a hold of me.
I did ask him if he remembered anything about a mask, but that seemed to scare the living hell out of him, so we left him alone after that, paid for our drinks, and thanked the bartender and the other customer for their time. I figured that his extreme reaction to the question alone was an answer in and of itself, in a way.
We called back the patrolman and told him to take us to the next town over to see this other bar where the cartel supposedly hung out, but when we got there, the doors were barred shut, and there wasn’t a soul to be found on the premises.
This town looked even smaller and more deserted than the last one. The small buildings lining the lone street looked dilapidated and like they were falling apart, and I didn’t see much color anywhere. This was accentuated by the dark sky, leaving the only light coming from the stars and the sliver of a moon.
“This is strange,” Alejandra remarked as we walked around, looking for anyone to speak with, anyone at all. “I wouldn’t have expected this. It’s not that late, even for a border town.”
“They didn’t say anything about the bar closing down,” I remarked. “They didn’t say anything about any of this, right?”
“Well, they did mention that since the cartel started frequenting the bar, this town has grown more infested with the gang than the others,” Alejandra admitted. “I didn’t say so before because I was afraid you wouldn’t let me come with you.”
“You would’ve been right,” I said sternly, but secretly I was impressed. I was beginning to think that Alejandra would make a good MBLIS agent.
“So, what do we do now?” Holm asked. “I vote heading back to the hotel.”
I nodded, casting one last look at the bar. “That would probably be for the best.”
But then, out of the corner of my eye, I caught sight of something pressed against the side of the bar, almost comp
letely obscured in the darkness of nightfall. But no, it wasn’t something. It was someone.
I tentatively walked up to the man, who appeared to be sleeping. He was no doubt Haitian and wore ragged, baggy old clothes with holes in them. He didn’t look or smell like he’d had a shower in at least a week.
I exchanged a look with Holm.
“Should we wake him?” he mouthed.
The fear was that doing so would be more trouble than it was worth, but I worried that we would lose out on some crucial information should we fail to talk to the guy.
“Do you speak French?” I asked Alejandra.
“Not well,” she admitted. “Only what I remember from school.”
“Well, let’s hope he speaks Spanish or English. Otherwise, it’ll have to do,” I said, gently shaking the man awake.
At the sight of me, he nearly jumped out of his skin, though he remained on the ground. I quickly checked him for weapons and confiscated a handgun.
“My name is Ethan,” I said, gesturing to myself. “What is yours?”
“I… I do not talk well,” the man stammered in English, to my surprise.
“Better than I expected,” I said. “What is your name?”
“Ricardo,” he said after a brief hesitation.
“Hello, Ricardo,” I said, bending down on my knees so I could be at eye level with him, resting my hand on the hilt of my holstered gun so that he remembered it was there. This guy could be with the cartel, and he had been armed, after all. “What are you doing here?”
“I… I sleep here,” he said, his voice trembling. Well, that much was obvious.
“I can see that,” I said patiently. “Why?”
“Nowhere else to go,” he said matter-of-factly.
“Why not?” I asked.
“I… I, what do you call it… chicken,” he managed.
Well, I had not been expecting that. I exchanged yet another bemused look with Holm. “You’re a chicken?” I asked, raising my eyebrows at him.
“I… chicken out,” he clarified.
“Ah,” I said. “So you were scared and didn’t do something you were supposed to do.”
He nodded.
“What is it that you were supposed to do?” I asked.
“I… I…” the man said, his eyes darting around wildly at myself, Holm, Alejandra, and the surrounding area.
“It’s okay,” I assured him. “There’s no one else here.”
“I… I was supposed to take papers,” he said finally. “At hotel.”
I looked back at Alejandra. “You were supposed to be with the group that shot up the conference today,” I said.
He nodded again and hung his head in shame.
“And why didn’t you?” I asked.
“I… I chicken,” he said again. “It is too much to shoot my gun at Dominican officials. Just too much. The Dominicans, they have terrorized our people for centuries.”
“That’s not how they tell it,” I said.
“Of course it is not,” he said bitterly.
Now it was Alejandra’s turn to kneel down next to him, though from a safer distance.
“Our peoples have a longstanding troubled history,” she said softly. “This doesn’t mean we can’t get along in the future. I, for one, appreciate that you didn’t come to kill me today. Even if it only was because you were scared.”
His eyes widened.
“Y-you,” he stammered, backing up further against the bar’s exterior wall.
“Yes,” she said, smiling slightly.
“You’d do best to cooperate with us,” I said, tapping my holstered gun again. If he was more afraid of us than of the cartel, he might just cooperate. “We know what we’re doing. And if you’re scared of the Dominicans, wait until you hear who my friend and I work for.”
The man’s eyes widened again.
“Okay, okay,” he said, holding up his hands and inching even further away from me. “I will talk with you.”
“Good,” I said, smiling at him and withdrawing the weapon slightly, though not far enough that he could forget it was there. “Tell us everything you know about your employers. And I mean everything.”
“I could be killed, or worse,” the man said, nearly sobbing now.
“Worse?” Holm repeated. “How could you be worse than killed?”
“Well, I could be… you know… made to take it,” the man said as if this was obvious.
“Made to take it?” I repeated. “The drug, you mean. This new drug they’ve developed and started distributing.”
The man nodded. He really was crying now, thick, wet tears dripping down his face and rolling over his chin.
“Yes,” he confirmed. “Please, you cannot let them do that to me. You must just kill me first. Do it now, before it is too late.”
He eyed the gun nervously, then shut his eyes tight and braced himself for the incoming blow.
“I’m not going to shoot you,” I said, exchanging an astounded look with Holm and Alejandra, who looked equally stunned by this request. “You would rather I killed you now than be given this drug? Really? Why? Are you afraid you’ll overdose like those kids?”
“That is part of it,” he confirmed, not opening his eyes. “They are in so much pain when they die. And it lasts so long. They don’t scream or cry, they cannot, because of the drug’s effects, but you can see it in their eyes. The fear. It eats them alive, just like the drug.”
“That’s… terrifying,” I said, looking back at Holm and Alejandra again. It was getting later by the minute, and we had to do something to get this guy to feel a little safer with us. “Why don’t you come back to our hotel with us, get warm, get something to eat. And then we can talk some more.”
The man reopened his eyes and started sobbing again. “They will surely kill me if I do that.”
“We can protect you,” I said. “That’s what I’m trying to say. We have contacts with the Dominican Republic. We can get you leniency if you help us. We’ve already done it for two others, and they didn’t have anywhere near the knowledge of the organization that you seem to.”
I neglected to inform him that the other two were kids who got wrapped up in this mess against their will, but we’d cross that bridge when we came to it. If this man committed any serious crimes, he’d have to pay for them. But if he helped us, some leniency was in order, as far as I was concerned.
“And if you fail?” he asked. “You’re going after them, are you not? Who will protect me then?”
“We can send you to Santo Domingo,” Alejandra suggested. “We’ll make sure they treat you well there, and they know you’ve helped us. My father is the President of the Dominican Republic. I’ll see to it personally.”
“Unless, of course, your cartel is planning on overthrowing the Dominican Republic and taking over the whole island,” I chuckled.
“No,” he said, shaking his head. “They have no interest in anything like that. Not that they would get away with it if they tried.”
“So, does this plan sound reasonable to you?” Alejandra asked.
The man hesitated.
“Will you take me there yourselves?” he asked, looking around at all three of us. “I do not trust anyone else to transport me. They’ll beat me and make me pay for my past, no matter what I do to try to help you now.”
Alejandra sighed.
“I’ll escort you,” she relented. “I was considering going back to the capital in the morning, anyway. I’ll have to have patrolmen come with us, of course, but I’ll make sure nothing happens to you.”
This was turning out rather well. We had a witness who might actually know something we could turn into a tangible lead, and a way to get Alejandra away from all the danger at the border. And back where she belonged in the center of the political action. After just two days in the Dominican Republic, I didn’t have a lot of trust that they could figure things out without her help.
“Very well,” the man said. “I can agree to this.”
>
“Alright, then,” I said, nodding to him. “It’s settled. You’ll come with us, but you’ll have to be under observation at all times. You understand this?”
He nodded.
“And you’ll tell us everything we want to know?” I asked. “Answer all of our questions?”
He nodded again.
“Okay,” I said. “Good. Come with us then.”
He rose, and I gave him a more thorough pat-down, confiscating two knives in the process. I handed them over to Holm. He didn’t have any drugs on his person, which was something. Usually, the older ones like this who didn’t use were the bad ones, the ones who were in it to hurt people, not because they were desperate and didn’t know where else to turn.
“You don’t have any drugs on you?” I asked, even though I already knew that he didn’t. I needed to hear the answer.
“I stopped doing them a month ago,” he muttered, turning his gaze away from me in shame.
This surprised me. “What made you do that? I imagine being in a drug cartel while getting clean would be… difficult.”
“It was the only way,” he said, in a voice so low that it was almost a whisper as if he was afraid someone would hear.
“The only way to what?” I asked, shaking my head in confusion.
“To make sure that they didn’t slip me anything,” he whispered back.
“Slip you something?” I repeated.
“Yes,” he said. “The monster drug.”
CHAPTER 19
Ethan
The man, Ricardo, wouldn’t explain what he meant about the ‘monster drug’ until we were somewhere safer. He wanted to be far away from where any other cartel members might be lurking, lying in wait to see what we had to say, and then pouncing on us before we had a chance to leave.
But we got back to the patrol officer and his Jeep unobstructed, and then back to the hotel, which was still crawling with patrolmen after the incident earlier.
The officers were immediately wary of Ricardo, but we needed the guy to talk, so we convinced them to let him have a room with a bed right across from ours. They agreed, so long as there were patrolmen outside his door and hanging out below his window at all times, in case he tried to make a run for it.