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DNS MOBILE TACTICAL COMMAND POST,
MARKET PARK
11:15 A.M. PDT
IT WAS TO AL’S CREDIT that, while Chucho was not the least bit happy about his ‘summons’, Al had at least cuffed him in front rather than behind. For Al, this was an act of pure bonhomie.
As instructed, they escorted Chucho Reyes to the DNS’s fancy mobile command headquarters, recently arrived and decked out like the ultimate touring bus. The bus came with a forensics bay and enough encrypted communications equipment to run a small police state; like Al had said: DNS played with a significantly bigger budget than the ‘New FBI’.
IT TOOK A COMBINATION of cajolery and threats— Chucho had an older brother still in Colombia on whom DNS had somehow mysteriously acquired information compromising enough that Chucho decided he had nothing to lose and clearly something to gain by co-operating but in the end, Chucho came around. Score one for the Feds, right?
Chucho explained he was in the courtyard between buildings 2 and 3 shortly before two in the morning when Ducroix came bursting out of Building 3. When Chucho pointed to the black-and-white picture of Christian Ducroix Rose had projected on a flat-screen, there was open contempt in his voice.
“That’s him. Little piece of shit trespassing in my building? Runs into Chucho Reyes? He’s lucky he’s alive, shit’s all tense and shit, he comes barging in.” Chucho shaking his head, saying, “Man, if we didn’t have a situation on, we woulda fucked him up.”
Pope said, “What was the situation?”
Chucho was hard. “That’s my personal business. Got nothing to do with blanco. You wanna talk about that or you wanna talk about your boy?”
Rose jumped in. “You say he ran into you? Did you make physical contact?”
Chucho looked puzzled. “Physical contact? You mean did I hit him?”
“Actually, did you or any of your other people ever touch Dr. Ducroix in any way?”
Chucho looked to Pope and back to Rose. “Blanco touched me. I didn’t touch him. He ran into me.” Chucho’s scowl broadened. “Running into me all sweaty from running. That’s bullshit. He’s lucky we didn’t fuck him up.” Chucho’s scowl turned suspiciously. “Why you asking if I touched him? There something wrong with him?”
Rose could lie with amazing grace. His mannerisms were flawless, his conviction to the lie, supreme. Pope found pathologically pure deceit was as impressive as it was disturbing. “You see,” Deputy Inspector Rose said, “Christian Ducroix has a rare genetic abnormality that impairs his body’s ability to fight off disease.” On the screen appeared a photo of somebody in one of those bubbles, literally like a ‘Boy in the plastic bubble’ bubbles. You couldn’t make out who it was, due to the polyurethane sheeting, other than it was a dark-haired male. Rose continued,
“Christian being exposed to infected people could kill him, since what for us are minor sniffles could be deadly to him. This is why we must find him as quickly as possible and get him back to his bubble.”
Seriously. A big, polyurethane bubble on the screen. And some shadowy figure inside. Pope was amazed it was being done, and almost more, the schlocky, ‘don’t give a fuck’, government half-assedness of the whole affair. Uncreative, assumptive bullshit that made you think.
They just lie to everybody . . . They don’t even pretend to take people seriously . . . Wow.
Chucho looked to the bubble . . . kinda buying it, but . . . and back at Rose. “That pussy lives inside that bubble? Like the bubble-boy?”
“It’s his home. All he knows.”
Chucho scowled, before asking an obvious question: “Then why was he in his car?”
“He can come out for brief periods.”
It was a great big lie, hanging in the air, but the absurdity of it, the sheer audacity, made it somehow more believable.
Pope said, “So who was it jacked the car?”
“Was wondering when you’d get around to asking,” Chucho said with a sly smile. “I don’t know who it was, but I bet Torres does. They the one’s chasing him, coming onto our turf. Them and some fucker in a pork pie hat.”
Porkpie hat?
Upon further questioning, Chucho could supply nothing more than that the guy being chased was wearing nothing more than a pair of pants and a wild-eyed expression.
“What about the kid,” Pope said. “Where’d he go?”
“I heard he ran down St. Angela. But I had other things going, so I didn’t see it.”
Rose said, “Did you see a bag in his hand?”
“No bag.”
“You’re sure?”
“He didn’t have a bag.” Chucho looked annoyed. “Why? What’s in the bag?”
“Mr. Ducroix’s medicine,” Rose replied. “Any more questions, Agent Pope?” When Pope offered none, Rose said, “Mr. Reyes, we need to draw some blood, see if there’s anything we should be ready for once we locate Mr. Ducroix. A cold, oncoming sniffles, anything like that. Rose turned to Pope. “Why don’t you follow up on St. Angela while I finish up here?”
Rose could hardly push Pope and Al out of the mobile command post fast enough.
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