As you turn from the beach and head up the hillside, you see the tell-tale buildings-stacked-upon-buildings look of the slums. This is the place where The Incredible Hulk laid low in one of those movies. So, yeah, you’re going to hide where Hulk hid out, except when criminals attack, you won’t turn into an invulnerable green monster. You’ll turn into a dead body.
“We’re going into the slums?” you ask.
“The favelas, yes. Don’t worry, it’s just one night, and we should be arriving late enough so as not to attract any attention.”
Should be? Greeeeeaaattt….
Streets give way to alleyways and everything gets more compact. This is where the crush of humanity manifests itself. There is so much noise—music, laughter, shouting arguments, television—it’s overwhelming. You don’t say anything to your new friend, in part because it’s hard enough to hear yourself think, but also because you’re hoping not to attract any attention from would-be muggers.
This area used to be a public park, wide and open and green (there are still trees around every corner), until one by one the squatters put up their shacks. The police are beset in this part of the world, and so they choose their battles. They abandoned this park, until it grew into a city for the homeless and for those who wish not to be found.
Those like you.
You head up poorly-constructed concrete steps, graffiti welcoming you at every turn, as the mystery man leads you deeper within. You’re starting to feel like you’ve returned to the crime scene from earlier tonight—as if inside any one of these shacks could be a dead body with a cryptic note.
“Hey, whatever happened to that note?” you ask. “The one that was in the room.”
The man looks at you and shrugs. “I don’t claim to have all the answers. But think—if something is missing from there, maybe it’s important. Who had access? The American agents and the Rio police. Whoever took it must be hiding something.”
You make it to Pousada Favela Cantagalo, your hostel for tonight. You know you’re there because the establishment’s name is spray-painted above the doorway. It’s late, the gate is closed, and the doors are barred. Your escort kicks his shoe against the gate in three quick clangs. A young woman shows up, but doesn’t open the barred door. Your companion speaks to her in Portuguese and she nods, but disappears. A moment later, she arrives with a man who lets you in.
As they lock you inside, you notice the place is surprisingly clean.
“One room or two?” your new partner asks. “One is safer.”
• “But two is smarter.”
• “I’ll take safer.”
MAKE YOUR CHOICE
Whatcha Gonna Do When They Come For YOU?
The street lights flicker on and you wait for the corrupt policeman to arrive. Soon he does, but it’s not what you expected. First, he isn’t alone. The man is in plainclothes, but he keeps two uniformed officers as his escort. Second, he knows you are.
In an instant, you recognize the cop. Incredibly, it’s Detective Lucio Muniz, the bleach-blond policeman who interviewed you on the night you were detained. Is he the one you’re going to bribe?
“You?” he says.
Viktor steps forward and you can tell the detective recognizes his face from your sketch. Explaining everything in a long, impassioned appeal, Viktor begs Muniz to help him find Jane Nightingale’s killer.
Detective Muniz listens carefully until Viktor is finished, then smiles and rubs his fingers together in the universal sign for money. Clearly, he’s waiting for his bribe.
“I’m sorry,” you say, “we don’t have any money.”
“You came to bribe me without money?” He laughs.
“Just think! With this new information, if you cracked the case, you’d be a hero!” Viktor says.
An evil grin appears on Muniz’s face. “You’re right, you are helping me. Here’s some free information: I’m being paid not to crack the case. And guess what? When I arrest you and bring you in—I’ll be a hero, you’re right about that too.”
• Go quietly.
• It’s a double-cross! Draw and open fire.
MAKE YOUR CHOICE
What’s Black and White and Red All Over?
The bar. Most of the room is constructed from a honeyed wood, offset by deep espresso barstools. The counters are smooth, white-marbled granite, and globe lamps suspended from the ceiling help break up the red light that pours from behind the bottles.
The bartender uses a rag to clean a glass, never taking his eyes off you as you approach. Once you sit, he places the glass before you, scoops five ice cubes in, and pours a generous serving of Cachaça—sugarcane liquor—from a bottle whose label looks like an Wild West wanted poster.
“Thanks,” you say, bringing the glass to your lips.
“Rough night?” he asks.
“You don’t know the half of it.”
“Why don’t you tell me about it?”
Another patron tries getting his attention from further down the bar, but the bartender ignores him. He keeps his focus on you, smiling warmly.
Your eyes narrow involuntarily. Why’s this guy so curious? What about you holds his attention?
“Saw something you shouldn’t have, right?” he continues.
It makes sense that a man who works at an international hostel speaks English, but his Brazilian accent is thick, and so is your suspicion. Downing the rest of the drink, you toss a bill on the table and get up to leave.
“Wait,” he says, sliding a note your way. “This is for you.”
The message is scrawled on a napkin and, most notably, was not written by the same hand as the note with the revolver—the now-missing note. This one reads:
“Let’s talk about the girl from Ipanema.
No tricks, no cops, just a walk on the beach.”
“Who wrote this?” you ask.
“It was called in,” the bartender responds with a shrug, pouring the other patron’s order.
“Your handwriting?”
He nods. “You’re supposed to give me 50 reais for the delivery.”
That’s the equivalent of around $20.
• Call the agents!
• Take another drink for courage, then walk the five minutes down to the sand.
MAKE YOUR CHOICE
Who’s There?
Dressed as an Elite Squad member and wielding the policeman’s automatic rifle, Viktor looks surprisingly authentic. You wouldn’t think this bookish engineer could pull off the look of hardened killer, but he stands at ease in the armored uniform.
“Drop your weapon,” Viktor says with a wry smile.
You play along, tucking your arms (and the sub-machinegun) behind your back and step outside with Viktor escorting you, your gut full of nervous anticipation.
Just outside the doorway, not ten yards from you, another Elite Squad member approaches—looking for his partner. Viktor nods to the man and you feel his grip tighten around your arm. The cop looks at Viktor, unsure what to think. He squints, looking hard…
Then he raises his assault rifle. You close your eyes and grimace, ready to take your fate. Your last thought before you hear the gunfire is, We’ve been made.
But you’re not dead.
You open your eyes and see the Elite Squad policeman shooting above you, onto the rooftop. You look up above just in time to see the assassin who’s been following you. He has one pistol—and one eye—trained on Viktor, with the other on the Elite Squad member.
The Man in Black ducks out of the way, narrowly escaping the gunshots, and Viktor takes the opportunity to flee down the street. You both run as hard as you can, rushing around the corner and into the next alley.
“Come on!” Viktor shouts. “We’ve got to bed down, I need to ditch this gear. We find Jane tomorrow!”
• Follow Viktor to a safe house.
MAKE YOUR CHOICE
Window Dressing
“The Colonel” has a long and storied history, the highlights of w
hich are detailed for you on the walls of his waiting room. Photo ops with visiting dignitaries: the Dalai Lama, former President George W. Bush, actor Cuba Gooding, Jr., and many others. A diploma from VMI, the Virginia Military Institute. A group photo from an elite Army Rangers unit, his youthful face, from before he learned to smile, tucked under a beret. A family photo with his government-issued wife and two kids. A graduate degree from Harvard Business School. A promotion ceremony where he pins on rank. Plaques extolling his meritorious achievement. A ribbon-cutting in front of a Monsanto logo and a golden mountain of corn. Another military unit photograph, this one where he’s in command—you actually recognize a few of the faces: Howard, the blond agent, and at least three other men that you think you saw working at either the consulate or the embassy. They all have cold eyes. One man has a nasty scar on his chin.
And then there’s the centerpiece: A triangle-folded American flag with a label explaining that this particular Old Glory has been flown over Ground Zero, the White House, and Bagram Air Base, Afghanistan.
The door opens behind you.
• Turn to meet the Ambassador.
MAKE YOUR CHOICE
Would-a, Should-a, Could-a
You decline. They get it, or at least they say as much. Most likely, they think you’re a coward. So you eat the rest of breakfast in relative silence, Agent Bertram offering an olive branch by suggesting some sights you should see on vacation.
Then you meet up with your friends, continue your trip through Brazil, and enjoy the nonstop party of Carnaval and the rest of your time here. You take lots of pictures, eat plenty of good food, and fly home.
In the end, your name becomes slang for a witness too craven to help a DSS investigation. That and cold sores are your only lasting legacy from this trip.
You don’t hear anything about the case in the news, and you don’t know if they ever managed to catch the guy. To your dying day, you wonder what life would have been like if you had helped out those two agents on their murder investigation.
THE END
A Wretched Hive
Agent Bertram drives to the port outside São Paulo where merchants dock to unload their cargo, resupply, and embark upon the mighty Rio Fingido. Wooden gangplanks float in the shallow waters just off the muddy shore. Some of the fishermen set stands to sell their fresh catch and so the concrete parking lot around the dock is somewhat of a marketplace as well.
“Keep your wits about you, Hotshot,” Bertram says, smoking a cigar, looking and feeling like a badass with his black sunglasses and even blacker assault rifle. “This is no place for a tourist.”
The river is wide and expansive. Although the Amazon gives Brazil worldwide fame, the Fingido is not to be underestimated. Too far south to be part of the biggest waterway on earth, this river is massive in her own right. Brazil becomes connected like so many aqueducts during the rainy season, but major trade routes such as the Rio Fingido are formed from perennial water sources and remain traversed year-round.
Cigar smoke billowing out in the windless air, Bertram says, “You familiar with Star Wars? This is the alien bar where we hire the Millennium Falcon. Time to find us a ship.”
Several young boys run up and down the docks wearing nothing but tattered pairs of shorts. When they spot the obvious foreigners, they head your way. One of them steps forward and asks something of Bertram in Portuguese.
He takes a long drag from his cigar, blows smoke in the boy’s face, then with a voice made hoarse by tobacco he says, “Vai tomar no cu, garoto.”
The boy swats at the smoke but persists in his request, leaving an open palm and chattering at the agent. Bertram steps forward and raises his arm as if he’s going to swat the kid and finally they take off down the dock.
“What was that all about?” you ask.
“It’s a scam. They ask for change for a twenty, then they give you a counterfeit note in return. Or, if they think they can outpace you, they just grab your wallet and go.”
“What’d you tell ’em?”
He shrugs. “To get lost. Now c’mon, let’s find us a boat!”
The smell of fish fills the air and makes you a little seasick, even though you’re still on terra firma. One nearby fisherman bails water into a bucket, flushing out his deck of guts from the previous day’s catch. The birds love it.
A larger boat sits in port; looking much like an old river barge you might have seen traversing the Mississippi in an 1800s black-and-white photo—that is to say, large, multi-decked, flat on top, and tapered on each end. The only thing missing is the waterwheel churning in the back. Instead, this one has a lifeboat. You can’t be sure if it’s a passenger barge or if just runs supplies, but most likely it does both.
Agent Bertram stops by a man who’s loading crates of fruit, bottled water, and other supplies onto his vessel. The seaman wears a sleeveless Pink Floyd t-shirt as his uniform, the Dark Side of the Moon just enough to cover his potbelly. He has the sinewy limbs of a sailor and walks barefoot on calloused feet. He smiles through missing teeth, stopping his task when Bertram calls to him in greeting.
While the agent talks to the man in Portuguese, you take the opportunity to look at the boat in more detail. It’s a medium-sized transport, about the size of a deep-sea fishing trawler, like that of the Orca in the movie Jaws. This one certainly has spent a fair time on the water and her once-white paint is now faded and chipped. Stenciled on the stern is the name Navio do Destino.
While they chat, a teenage boy comes from inside the boat’s cabin. He’s thin and shirtless and resembles a younger version of the proprietor. He looks at you and smiles with a few more teeth than his father.
“Hell-o,” he says in a stilted, unsure tongue. “You talk English?”
You nod. Bertram takes note of the boy, and assessing no threat, turns back to speak with the ship’s owner.
“You are looking for passage, yes? How you like my boat?”
“Your boat?” you say.
The boy smiles. “One day, yes. It is my family.”
“Heirloom?” you try.
He looks at you blankly, not understanding.
“Inheritance?”
Still he shakes his head.
“Never mind, I think I know what you’re saying.”
He nods cautiously. Unsure what else to say, you break eye contact, awkwardly pretending to inspect the ship. Finally, your eyes go to Bertram, and so do the boy’s.
“What are they saying?” you ask.
“He wants to know is she fast ship.”
“Well?” you grin. “Is she?”
The boy leans forward and says, “She’s fast enough for you…old man.”
Bertram snaps out of his conversation and turns your way. “What did you just say?” he demands.
“From the movie! Eh… Guerra nas Estrelas.”
“Star Wars?” you say.
“Yes! That’s the one.”
Bertram grins. “This is destiny. It’s our ship; our Millennium Falcon.”
“Just like that?”
“Just like that. Plus, his father quoted us passage for two at a rate within our budget.” Bertram explains. “This is the captain, Bruno. That’s his son, Neto. There are two more crewmen who’re filling up the gas cans right now. They’re headed into the interior to sell supplies, and our stop is on the route.”
“How long until we leave?” you ask.
“Not long. But the journey will take us overnight and I don’t think we should both sleep at the same time—just in case. So the question I have for you is this: would you rather sleep right away, hang out while I’m asleep, then snag another nap in the morning, or…the opposite of that?”
• “Ummm, I’ll sleep first, if it’s all the same.”
• “I’ll take the opposite. One sleep chunk sounds lovely.”
MAKE YOUR CHOICE
Wrong Time, Wrong Place, Wrong Everything
You head back to the scene of the bribery. What was in his other pocke
t? You wonder. A gun? What about that backpack? The boldness of paying off the cops when you yourself are a wanted man, not to mention the effrontery it would take to pull it off, is staggering. This certainly is a dangerous man.
With your own weapon—the murder weapon—pressing tight against your hip, you lean against the threshold that leads to the street. You slink out into the street, heart pounding in your ears. Hard to believe you’re stalking the detective who showed you around earlier today. Harder still to believe, you’re frightened of him.
“They’re gone,” you say.
“What?” Irma asks, looking out herself. “Damn. Maybe still close by? Keep sharp.”
Moving forward, you stay quiet, all too aware of the crunching grit beneath your shoes. Up ahead there’s the muffled echo of speech, blurred by footsteps and shuffling. You look to Irma—it’s them, but she can’t make out what they’re saying. She signals you to move to the alley to the right. You continue on with caution.
“Irma?” calls a voice from behind.
You turn back to see Lucio Muniz and the two policemen in the alley behind you. The echoes have betrayed you, carrying the sounds of these men into the alley across the way, and now you’ve stepped out into the open.
“And the American witness?” he says, dumbfounded.
The alley they stand in is bordered with old car tires and several gas cans tucked in one corner. Your eyes focus on the ground where the two cops roll something into a tarp. All three men turn red with guilt when they see your gaze, and the two uniformed officers stand up, hands on their guns in fear. The tarp unfurls and you see why they’re worried.
Lying prone with arms outstretched in a permanent crawl for help is a skeletal body. This poor soul has been burned beyond recognition; only a charred corpse is left behind. You can’t tell gender, age, or even ethnicity.
MURDERED: Can YOU Solve the Mystery? (Click Your Poison Book 2) Page 38
