by Rawlin Cash
"My bad."
Hunter clenched his jaw.
Fucking amateurs.
There was a reason why he liked to work alone.
Hunter was about to tell Hank to fuck off when he felt a tugging on his arm. It was her.
"Hey," she said. "I'm talking to you. Do you want that drink or not?"
"And I'm not talking to you."
"One drink."
"No."
"Are you afraid?"
"Afraid?"
"Yes, of me."
"You talking to me?" Hank asked.
Hunter grunted and turned off his earpiece.
"So, you want that drink?" the woman asked again.
"You don't know when to call it quits," Hunter said.
"No, I don't."
Hunter wanted to laugh. The young British woman looked like a twig. She was tall but thin and lanky. A strong enough breeze would have knocked her over. One of her most striking features was her raven black hair. It seemed to glow in the light of the bar.
She giggled when she noticed Hunter look her up and down. "If you have one drink, I'll leave. How about that?"
Hunter smirked. He turned his attention away from Dr. Lin and tapped on the bar. If all he had to do was have a drink to get the woman away, then that was what he'd do.
The bartender. A young Dutch kid with a long blonde ponytail and thick eyebrows approached.
"Rum and coke," Hunter said.
The bartender nodded and turned his attention to the woman. "And you, Miss?" he said in English with a strong Dutch accent.
"I'll take a Blow Job," she said.
Both Hunter and the bartender blushed.
"Excuse me, ma'am?"
"The drink," she said. "I want a blow job. You do know how to make them, right? A quarter ounce of Bailey's, a half-ounce of Amaretto."
"Right," the bartender said as he walked away from the bar, giggling excitedly.
Hunter shook his head. "Ok, lady, you have my attention. "
“Good,” she said. "Why are you're eyeing up the Chinese doctor."
Hunter froze. Fuck. He should have known. He changed gears. He looked at her intensely. "Who do you work for?"
The British woman laughed so loud it attracted the attention of a group of young Dutch people around her.
"Oh, so you are watching the Chinese doctor," she said.
The bartender placed the rum and coke and blow job on the bar.
Hunter grabbed his drink, and before he took his first sip, he said to the woman, "I could put a bullet in your head."
"You don't want to kill your friends."
Hunter finished his drink in one gulp and looked at her with an eyebrow raised. The alcohol felt good as it slid down his throat. "Are you M16?"
She smiled. "Yes."
"What do you want with Lin?"
"I'll tell you if you tell me who you are," she said.
"I'm a ghost."
"How mysterious," she quipped. "Don't be coy. Who are you?"
"I'm a dead CIA officer working for the CIA on one last mission.”
He was making a calculated risk telling her anything at all, but he figured it was worth it. She'd already spotted him. She could make a scene and blow his cover. He had to trust her.
In his periphery, he noticed that the Chinese doctor was done his drink. It was only a matter of time before the two young girls brought him up to the room. The next phase of the operation was about to begin.
"I need to go," Hunter said.
He pushed past the MI6 agent and walked through the densely packed bar. He cursed himself for being so obvious. He hated working with a partner. It threw him off. He was better alone. He was always better alone.
Doctor Lin stood up from his table and followed the two girls toward the stairwell.
Hunter felt another tug on his arm again.
"My name is Margot Fox. What does the doctor have?”
“How do you know he has something?”
“Everyone knows. The Chinese, the Saudis, the Israelis. Everyone wants what the doctor has.”
“He’s got the blueprints for a very dangerous program. I’m here to make sure that he dies and the files are recovered.”
Hunter pulled his arm from her and made his way up the stairwell.
Five
The bar in Amsterdam was called the Yab-Yum. It was located in a 17th-century canal house on Singel, one of the canals in Amsterdam. The Singel had served as a moat around the city until 1585 until the city expanded beyond its historical borders.
On the top floor were the rooms. Hunter had made sure that everything had been taken care of in advance. He'd paid off the bar's manager to keep quiet about the whole affair.
If the girls guiding Lin up the stairs did precisely what they were told, he'd give them fifteen thousand Euros each. A year's salary as a prostitute in the city.
As he made his way up the stairwell toward the top floor, he heard giggling. It was the girls. They were damn good at their job.
They were speaking to Doctor Lin in bad English.
"You big and strong," one of them said.
"Would you like suck or fuck?" the other added.
"Both?" Lin said nervously.
The Chinese doctor was an older man, and he was about to live out one of his fantasies.
Hunter waited until the door for the room he'd rented closed and then made his way down the musky smelling hallway. He leaned up against the door, pulled out his M9, and then attached a silencer.
"We're going to tie you down!" one of the girls inside said.
The old doctor just giggled. He'd go along with anything they told him to do at that point. It was going exactly as planned.
Hunter waited.
He'd want the doctor tied down before he made his move.
And then she reappeared.
Margot was holding a pistol, a Glock 17 with a silencer.
“What does he have?” she said to Hunter in a hushed tone.
Hunter stared at her and fumed. “He’s stolen files from an CIA Director’s computer. They detail how to create super soldiers.”
“I’ll help,” Margot said. “MI6 got word earlier tonight that a Chinese intelligence unit arrived in Amsterdam. We believe they’re here to meet the doctor.”
The girls inside the room were giggling.
"I'm going to interrogate the doctor," Hunter said to Margot. “I’ll find if the Chinese have the files or not, then I’ll kill him.”
The giggling inside the room stopped. The girls had finished tying Lin to the bed. The final instruction Hunter had given them was to put a blindfold over the doctor's eyes. They'd then open the door and let Hunter in.
“Are you ready?” Hunter asked. “If the Chinese are in the city, then we need to be quick.”
The girls in the room knocked on the door. Hunter turned to Margot. "I've got to let them out."
"Okay," she said.
Hunter opened the door and let the two prostitutes out. He handed them a brown envelope with the Euros, and after they checked that the money was real, they ran down the hall and made their way out of the bar.
Hunter turned his attention back to Margot.
“Are you ready?” he asked.
"Yes."
Hunter peeked into the room. The girls he'd hired had done a poor job of tying Lin down. They hadn't accounted for the fact that the slender and frail doctor was a lot stronger than he looked. During the brief exchange Hunter had with Margot, Lin had managed to untie himself. He'd managed to remove the face mask. He'd noticed that he was alone and that the door to the room was open.
"Girls!?" he asked.
"Damnit," Hunter said from inside the hallway. He leaned up against the wall.
Margot followed suit.
“What is it?” she whispered to Hunter.
“He’s up.”
"Girls? Where are you? I want to play!" Lin said. "Girls?"
The doctor stumbled in his tighty-whiteys toward the door
and poked his head out of the room. His glasses were off, which meant that he had trouble focusing, but he saw well enough. The girls were gone. In their place were two people he'd noticed from the bar. A petrified look spread across his face.
He ran back into the room and slammed the door shut.
"Fucking hell," Hunter muttered. The operation was turning to shit. He turned his earpiece back on and radioed Hank. "You there, Hank?"
"What the hell is going on!?" Hank screamed. "I've been trying to reach you!"
Hunter winced. It was so loud.
"What is it?"
"You've got to get your ass out of there. I've got black SUVs headed to your location. They're less than one block away. The place is bugged or something. Someone knows you're there. They looked like Chinese special forces. Something big is going down.”
Hunter looked at Margot. His expression said everything. A Chinese kill team was on its way.
"I'm leaving the bar," Hunter said to Hank. "I'll meet you at the safe house tomorrow."
"You're an asshole," Hank said. "You owe me a beer."
"I'll get you a beer."
"I'm going to radio silent."
"Typical."
Hunter turned off his mic and turned to Margot. "We need to get out of here."
"I figured."
"But I'd be remiss if I didn't ask the Chinese doctor one question."
"Don't!" Margot said.
Hunter walked into the room. He was too close. He couldn't turn away just yet. He wasn’t going to let the Chinese get hold of Mantis.
He walked into the room and then froze.
“What the hell?” he said.
“What is it?” Margot asked.
The Chinese doctor was holding a small device and it was emitting a gas.
“Stay out,” Hunter said. “The doctor is dead.”
Doctor Lin was lying on the bed. A white substance was frothing from his mouth.
"What is going on?” Hunter said.
Margot peeked into the room. She nearly jumped when she saw the body. “You killed him?”
Hunter took a deep breath. “No,” he said. “We need to get the hell out of here.”
Hunter walked to the room window and looked out at the street below. The black SUVs were already there. In seconds, the Yab-Yum was going to be raided.
"We need to get to the roof," Hunter said.
Margot looked down at the street. “Bloody hell," she said.
"Follow me," Hunter said.
Six
The rooftops of Amsterdam dotted the dark and starry horizon. Chimneys puffed out grey plumes of white smoke. Down below, the streets were busy with drunk tourists. The city looked romantic. Christmas lights dotted the balconies and store windows. Christmas trees could be seen in most buildings.
Hunter guided Margot to the edge of the roof.
There was no point in trying to shoot their way through a team of six or eight Chinese special forces. They'd take out two or three, but eventually, they'd run out of ammo. Plus, they were carrying peashooters. An M9 and Glock 17 wouldn't stand up against a Chinese-made QBZ-03 assault rifle.
"What are we going to do?" Margot said. "Where now?"
Hunter peered over the edge of the roof. It sloped at a slight forty-five-degree angle. A six-foot gap separated a second building. It would be a bit of a jump, but they'd have to do it. It would be the only way.
"Take off your heels," Hunter said to Margot. "You're going to need to make sure that you don't slip."
"What!?"
"Take off your heels. You'll need to run."
Margot complied. She walked up to Hunter. "I don't even know your name."
"Jack," he said.
"Jack, what?"
"Jack Hunter."
"You're a real fun guy, eh?"
"No," he said with a smile. "I'm not."
He turned away from her and ran down the metal shingles of the roof. Once at the edge, he leaped into the air. He landed on the other building's roof and then turned back to Margot. "Come on," he said. "It won't take them long to realize that Lin is dead. They’ll every corner of this place.”
She hesitated at first but then came to her senses. She ran across the cold and damp surface of the roof. Her only problem, she'd timed the jump wrong.
She was going to be short of the six-foot gap.
Hunter compensated for her momentum loss and caught her arm before she plummeted four floors to her death.
Her body slammed against a window.
Hunter partially hung over the ledge. He used a metal beam put in place for window cleaners as leverage.
Margot looked inside the window she'd just slammed against.
There were a group of young men inside. They were sat in a circle, passing around a joint. They looked at her and all mouthed "whoa…" at the same time. Their eyes were all red. They didn't know what they were seeing was real. They'd been smoking pot since they got off the train from Brussels.
Hunter pulled Margot up to the top.
"Thank you," she said.
"We need to talk," Hunter said. "I want to know what you know."
"Of course."
Seven
They made their way down the building beside the Yab-Yum and made sure to move through the city slowly, staying in the shadows when possible. They didn't know if they'd been spotted or how many men were after them.
Hunter had chosen not to reach out to Hank to confirm anything because he wasn't sure if the radio frequency they were using was clean.
"We need to act like a couple," Hunter said.
He put his arm around Margot and pulled her in close.
"This isn't my first operation," she said. "I know what we need to do."
"Of course," Hunter said.
“What killed the doctor?”
“A toxic gas of some sort. He was holding something.”
“But why?”
“I don’t know.”
They walked down the cobble streets slowly, crisscrossing over bridges, staying with the general population. It was easier to hide in numbers than it was on a quiet street. Now and then, someone would whisper into Margot's ear, "XTC? Cocaine?"
She was startled at first. When they realized she didn't know what they were talking about, they disappeared.
"You're good at acting like a tourist," Hunter said to her with a wide smirk on his face. "It's like you've never been to Amsterdam before."
She gave Hunter a dirty look. "I haven't been to Amsterdam before. This is my first time. What do they mean by 'XTC?'"
"The drug," Hunter said. "Ecstasy. MDMA. The drug dealers figure us a couple on holiday looking to inebriate our minds with chemicals and sex."
Margot scoffed. "This city is so beautiful, yet it feels so trashy."
"It's the Venice of the North."
"Then why do people come to drift away from consciousness? Why don't they enjoy the beauty of it all?"
Hunter shook his head. "Because it's fun?" he said. "Or maybe, because they can. You give the people the option to do what they want, and they will."
After an hour of walking through the streets, they made their way into a quiet bar. Inside, strung to the walls, were cheap knockoffs of Van Gogh's most significant works. Hunter looked at the version of 'The Starry Night.'
He wasn't much of an art aficionado, but he liked that painting. There was something about it. Something real, despite its abstractness. Hunter didn't know much about the painting, but he had read in the inflight magazine on his way to Amsterdam that Van Gogh had painted it six months after cutting off his ear and one month after being released from a lunatic asylum. Maybe that was what Hunter liked about it.
Maybe he felt a kinship with the madness.
His mind, after all, was equally damaged.
Maybe when he was done with this operation, he should pick up a paintbrush and try to create something.
"Are we safe?" Margot asked, noticing that Hunter was lost in thought.
; "I checked in with my watcher," Hunter said. He was referring to Hank. "He says the streets are quiet. The black SUVs are gone. He'll let us know if anything comes our way."
"He has eyes all over the city?"
"Hank’s good at computers. He hacked into the Dutch Police CCTV network," Hunter said.
"Right," Margot said.
The two of them drank and talked. Hunter learned that Margot was more than just an MI6 spy—she was also a political analyst. She was regularly interviewed on outlets like the BBC and Sky News—all under the cover that she was a University professor at Cambridge. Her field of expertise was China, North Korea, and the military, political tensions in the region.
“What do the other intelligence agencies know?” Hunter asked. “What does MI6 know?”
“All we knew was that Doctor Lin was a biochemist. He lived in America, in Virginia, I think. His name started popping everywhere about a month ago. He said he had something dangerous. He wanted to sell it to the highest bidder. He said he’d be in Amsterdam.”
“Bastard,” Hunter said.
"What is he trying to sell?"
“Documents relating to a CIA operation that went bad.”
"Can you tell me about it?"
"No."
Margot rolled her eyes. "We've already shared so much. Why can't you tell me what he has? Or... I guess, had."
"Let me tell you that it isn't good. He was a biochemist?"
"Yes."
"Well, that should give you a hint."
Hunter didn't want to tell her the whole truth. He picked up his pint and took a long sip.
They continued to talk and drink for hours. Hunter began to forget himself. For the first time in years, he felt normal.
When they were done, they both decided that it was best to stick together. They found a nearby hotel. Hunter gave them his fake passport and paid for the night.
"Only one bed?" Margot asked.
Hunter just stared at her. He didn't respond.
The two then made their way up to the room.
Ten hours later...
Hunter left the hotel and made his way down the early morning Amsterdam streets. He had to make his way to the safe house and meet up with Hank. The whole city smelled of piss and vomit. Down almost every alley was a passed out tourist or a pile of still-warm puke.