Hunter's Hope

by M. J. O'Shea

“That makes this sound about ten times more insane. Have you actually seen these people, or is this Alo Green guy living in his head?”

  “I’ve seen them. I punched one of them in the face. It’s real. Nobody can fake that kind of fear.”

  “I think you’ve lost your mind.”

  “And I think I can prove you wrong today. Today, Marshall. It would take hours, not days for us to see if the letters are for real. If there’s nothing here in Berlin, we’ll know by tonight.”

  “Even if they are real, the items could be lost, the buildings torn down.”

  “Yes. And again, we’ll know by tonight. Give me the day to figure this out. It could save my show. I don’t want to do something else.”

  Marshall sighed. “You have one day, Jack. I don’t like this.”

  “Then why did you give me that speech about finding something new to bring to the table?”

  “To be honest?” Marshall was silent for a few long moments. “I didn’t think you’d take it. I thought you’d sign your resignation and move on.”

  There was something in his voice that made Jack freeze mid-pace.

  “You have something that you want for my spot, don’t you?” Jack thought about it. “Oh, Jesus, you want to give Daphne a show, don’t you?”

  Marshall’s girlfriend had always wanted a slot on the Adventure Channel—Lord knows what for. Jack barely spoke to her at network functions, and when he did, he didn’t really listen. Awfully convenient for her to have fallen for one of the network producers.

  Jack felt like he was going to throw up. Chances were, Marshall wouldn’t want to keep him on no matter what he found in Berlin later if it would make his little sugar baby throw a tantrum. Too damn bad. He was going to give the rest of the suits something they couldn’t say no to. He wasn’t going to lose to Daphne and her gold-digging ways. Fuck that shit.

  “Listen, Jack. I just don’t want you to get your hopes up,” Marshall said. “Nobody’s enthused about what you’ve got going on here.”

  Jack wished there was some sort of technology that let him go through the phone lines and take Marshall out. He’d never wanted to hit someone so badly in his entire life.

  “Why don’t I hang up before I say something that I’m going to regret?” Jack said. “I’ll talk to you later and let you know what I’ve found here.”

  Not a chance in the world. Jack was absolutely going to go over Marshall’s head if he found something. He wasn’t stupid.

  “I’ll talk to you later, then.”

  Jack hung up his phone and threw it on the bed. He hated politics. It had nothing to do with what was actually good and everything to do with who’d managed to get the channel execs’ good graces bestowed upon them. It had worked in Jack’s favor before, but it wasn’t working anymore. He’d get them the find of all finds. They wouldn’t be able to ignore him then.

  He went out to the main sitting area of their suite, which was quite nice actually. Alo was out there nursing a cup of coffee. Which would be his third, if Jack had counted right. Poor guy was probably caffeinating himself to keep from going insane.

  He remembered sitting next to him on the long plane ride. Alo had fallen asleep curled up against Jack’s side. He’d been oblivious the whole time, completely had no clue that the moment he’d fallen asleep, his somewhat prickly stuffy facade disintegrated and he was just a kid—probably terrified, nowhere near as savvy and adult as he thought he was. A kid. A beautiful kid who was in way over his head, but still a kid.

  “Still breathing?” Jack asked.

  “Probably not if you keep asking me that,” Alo snapped. “Sorry. Just tense.”

  Wow. An apology. Jack was finally getting somewhere with him. “I know, I shouldn’t have brought it up. Why don’t you ease off the coffee, though? I don’t think it’s helping.”

  “I don’t either.” Alo smiled ruefully. “I’m just afraid if I stop drinking, and I don’t have anything to do, I’m going to lose my mind before Kendra and Brad are ready to go.”

  “So... talk to me. Tell me about what you study at Columbia.”

  “You don’t really want to hear that, do you?” Alo smiled. “It’s really not that exciting for anyone but me. Well, people like me.”

  “Hey, I look for historical treasure as my job. I like history.” Alo raised his eyebrows like he was calling Jack’s bullshit. “I do. I’m more into relics and gold scepters than court rituals and succession of kings, but I like that part as well.”

  “Well, sorry for judging you,” Alo said with a chuckle. “But really, I think it’ll be better for me if I just kinda... wait.”

  “Okay. Wait it is.”

  “Hey, are you ready? They have everything set up to go,” Jack asked. Alo was sitting by himself near the windows, staring out at the city while Kendra and Brad talked in the sitting area. They’d gotten the equipment set up and ready to film. Jack knew they hadn’t done the usual prep, and hell they could get in a lot of trouble, but he’d acted. He had to act. Alo looked nervous, which was understandable.

  “Ready?” Alo made a noise. “I’m not sure if I’m ever going to be ready.” He looked away from the window. “Do you think I’m crazy, Jack? I keep going over it in my head. Did I want those streets to work out? I can’t help but think I’m trying to make things work because I want them to.”

  He’d been so sure the night before. Jack was sure. Fuck, the people after Alo were sure. “No. There’s no way you’re crazy. It’s not just some family story, Alo. It’s real. All those people, if they thought you were a crackpot with some old family documents, they wouldn’t be trying to get the letters would they?”

  “No, you’re right.” Alo sat up a little faster.

  “Listen, I know we acted quickly. I didn’t get a chance to talk to you about that part of it. Do you really think it’s Watson after you?” He and Alo had discussed his earlier conversations with Watson. From what Alo had said, he was intense, but Jack wasn’t sure he’d call him diabolical. Yet.

  “I honestly don’t know. I mean, I wouldn’t put it past him. The guy seemed very intent on getting that amulet, and he has more than enough resources to pull something like this off. I just don’t know if he’s that sinister.”

  Just what he was thinking. Jack shrugged. “We also don’t know they were planning to hurt you. Like, permanently.”

  “The guy did have his hands around my throat,” Alo snorted. “But who knows who’s behind it. I guess that’s why there are anonymous stooges.”

  “Makes sense that Watson could hire someone else to do his dirty work.”

  “An eccentric billionaire.” Alo shook his head. “Really. An eccentric billionaire who wants a mysterious Egyptian amulet. Are you afraid of snakes, by any chance?”

  “Hate them,” Jack teased. He grinned. “You know, stuff like this always brings out the crazies. There’s a reason it’s a cliché. He has the interest, and the money to deal with it. Maybe others have the interest as well. He didn’t tell you what he wanted with the amulet?”

  They’d gone over it, but Alo seemed like he was starting to trust Jack more. Jack wanted to know what the hell he was getting into. If there was information the kid was still holding back.

  “No. Just hinted at it having some sort of supernatural power. Which is absolute bullshit of course. Even if Ira found that amulet and hid it and it’s still available for us to find, it’s a fucking necklace. An old fucking necklace, but it doesn’t have any goddamn magical powers.” Alo rolled his eyes.

  “Hey. Don’t knock it, history boy. You never know.” Jack nudged Alo on the shoulder.

  “Right.” He rolled his eyes. “What I do know is if we end up finding it, we might want to watch our backs pretty damn closely.”

  “Already on it.”

  Jack clapped Alo on the shoulder lightly and stood. He cracked his back, poured himself a coffee from the carafe on the dresser, and checked on Kendra and Brad.

  “Guys, we’re going to have to be pretty
stealthy about this. We don’t have the correct permits. Got it?”

  Get in, get out. Look like tourists. No problem, right? Jack hoped. The last thing he wanted was to stir up a bunch of publicity shit getting permits and wading through bureaucratic nonsense. Plus, he hadn’t had time.

  Brad grinned. “You know, I’m actually looking forward to this. I think it’s going to be a lot more fun than we’ve been having. For a long time.”

  At least someone else liked living on the edge. Jack smiled back. “I think so too. As long as we don’t get arrested.”

  They gathered their gear, much less than they usually took when they were on fully sanctioned hunts, and headed for the door. Alo had his list in his hand—the places they could possibly find hidden fucking Nazi treasure. Jack was damn sure there was going to be something. Damn sure. All the weird stuff that had happened wouldn’t all be on a slight possibility.

  “Okay,” Brad said as soon as they were in the van. They always filmed a short intro in the car before they headed off to whatever site they were about to search for. “We’re rolling in three... two... one....”

  “Jack Hunter here, and I’m on the hunt of my career. I’m with Kendra, my lovely assistant, and a guest correspondent, Alo Green, on the hunt for missing treasure stolen years ago by the Nazis then confiscated and hidden by Alo’s great-grandfather all over Europe.” Jack smiled winningly at the camera. Alo looked nervous. “This hunt is unprecedented. We could be recovering art, artifacts, pieces of history that have been long thought to be lost to time. I’m honored to be here. And to bring our viewers with us.”

  Jack waited while Brad panned over the people in the van. Then he started talking as soon as the camera was back on him.

  “We’re here in Berlin to start our journey. Alo’s unlocked several clues in his great-grandfather’s letters that could lead us to places where he hid the loot during the war. Sadly Alo’s great-grandfather, Ira Greenblatt, died before he could escape to America. But he left his family quite the legacy. And we’re going to help Alo find it.”

  He nodded and Brad shut off the camera.

  “You think you can do this?” Jack asked Alo.

  “Yeah. I can.”

  “Okay, we have everything, people?” Jack asked.

  “Got it,” Brad said

  “I’m ready,” Kendra said.

  “I am too.” Alo’s voice was less certain but steady.

  “Then we’re off.”

  Chapter Five

  Berlin was freezing cold, far colder than New York had been. A little surprising, but not much any of them could do about it. Alo had noticed the ice and snow on the way to the hotel, but the bone-deep arctic chill sank into their bones after two hours of searching around the grounds of the Brandenburg Gate.

  And finding nothing. Zero.

  They’d skimmed their hands over the walls, looked for divots, loose stone. Checked the ground for the same. Other than a lot of wear and tear on an old monument, there wasn’t a single thing that stuck out. Of course, Alo felt like a moron for thinking there might have been. If it was really that easy, the necklace would’ve been found years ago. Or maybe it had been found years ago.

  “This site has had some renovation done,” Jack finally muttered. “There’s a chance that whatever is here or was here has gone.”

  Looks like Jack had the same idea as him. Alo decided to be a bit more optimistic.

  “Or it’s sitting right where it’s always been, and I have no idea what ‘the necklace’ means other than that’s probably what’s hidden,” Alo said.

  “Is that supposed to make me feel better?” Jack asked. Brad turned the camera on him. Jack glared. “Think, Alo. Is there anything else in the letter? A direction, a landmark, anything other than the word necklace.”

  “No. Nothing else that sticks out.”

  “What about any of the other Berlin letters?”

  Were they already giving up on the Brandenburg Gate? “I don’t know. I’d have to look at them more closely to see.”

  “Why don’t we take a break, go get some late lunch at a café.” Alo nodded silently. He was starving, after all. His body had no

  idea what time it was supposed to be.

  He snapped a few pictures of the gate on his phone just because it seemed like something he should do, document the trip or whatever, then followed Jack back to the van.

  Twenty minutes later, they were ensconced in a small café table close to the gate. It was a cozy little place, filled with locals and people Alo assumed were tourists. He didn’t feel like anyone was watching them. Everyone seemed too focused on their meals and their conversations to pay his group any mind. He relaxed and took his coat off.

  Alo spent most of the next few minutes translating the menu for the rest of the team. They placed their orders and sank back into the cushy booth.

  Alo halfway listened to Kendra, Brad, and Jack talk shop. He didn’t know or care much about office politics, so he pulled out his phone to play with the pictures he’d taken and see if, hope against hope, there was some Wi-Fi in the café. He was in the middle of brightening one of the pictures of the chariot on top of the gate when he saw it.

  The necklace. Holy how the hell could he have missed it? The necklace. Right in front of his goddamn face.

  “Jack, Jack, Jack.” Alo elbowed him. Good thing they were about two millimeters apart in the tiny booth.

  “What? Ouch.”

  “I have it. The necklace.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I feel so stupid,” Alo said.

  He put his phone on the table with the picture of the chariot expanded as much as possible. Right there, right on the standard that the charioteer was carrying was an equilateral cross inside of a circle that looked very familiar.

  “What is it?” Jack looked.

  “The necklace.”

  “Alo.” Jack looked at him like he might have lost his mind. “We’ve talked about the necklace. We don’t have any idea what Ira was referencing.”

  “I think I actually do.”

  “Start talking,” Jack said tightly.

  Alo took a deep breath and pointed at the cross in the circle. “It was too hard to see clearly from the ground.” At least that was his excuse. “But I’ve seen that exact shape on a necklace every single day of my whole life. My mother wears it.”

  “Do you know where your mom got the necklace?” Jack asked.

  “My father.”

  “Do you know where your father got it?” Jack’s voice was low and patient, but Alo knew he had to be about ready to drag the rest of it out of Alo by the teeth. Alo wanted to leap off the table himself and run back to the gate.

  “Of course I don’t. But, Jack, don’t you think it’s an awfully big coincidence that my mother wears a pendant that looks just like that standard, and a necklace was brought up over and over and over in the letter?”

  “Probably not a coincidence at all.”

  “Then what are we waiting for?” Alo went to leap out of his chair.

  Jack held him down. “Darkness, for one. If it’s really up there, do you think it’s a good idea to go climbing around on a national monument in broad daylight?”

  “Probably not.” Alo felt like the kid that Jack assumed he was.

  “Also, I’m hungry. Aren’t you?”

  Alo was too excited to be hungry, to tell the truth. But he nodded just the same.

  “Listen,” Jack said, “I don’t know if this is right, but it’s a hell of a lot more than we have right now, so I say we go for it. Agreed?” Brad nodded.

  “Hell yeah. We’re here, aren’t we?” Kendra said.

  “That’s what I thought. We’re going to need a rope,” Jack said. “And a ladder. Brad, you think you can make that happen?”

  Brad nodded. “I’m on it.” He pulled out his phone.

  “How are we going to get up there?” Alo asked.

  Jack smirked at him. “Hopefully without getting ar
rested.”

  It was late, close to two in the morning, and still the gate was lit up like a... well like a national monument. Jesus. At least Pariser Platz was deserted and the surrounding buildings dark. It had taken hours for the square to empty out.

  Alo shivered. “Why could I not have decided to go on a treasure hunting adventure in July?” he muttered to himself.

  “Maybe plan ahead next time,” Kendra teased.

  Alo was starting to warm up to her. Underneath her fake and far too efficient shell, she was actually quite intelligent and a little sarcastic. Alo thought Brad was kind of boring, but harmless. Jack seemed to agree.

  “’Kay,” Jack said. “We’re going to need to use the ladder to get up onto this side building, then pull the ladder up and use it again to get to the top of the gate.”

  “That seems extra safe,” Alo said.

  “Do you have any other brilliant ideas?”

  “No.”

  “Well then leave it to me. I painted houses for a summer in college. Have you ever been on a ladder?”

  Alo scoffed. “Of course. We have one in the stacks.”

  “Of course.” Jack rolled his eyes. “Follow my lead, library boy.”

  “I think I prefer ‘kid.’”

  “I’d prefer to get out of here without—you know what? Why am I arguing with you? Be quiet.”

  Jack and Kendra walked the ladder over to the side of the Brandenburg Gate. There were two shorter buildings flanking the enormous central gate. Alo figured Jack was probably right—it was their best way of getting to the top. Without a manlift at least. Jack put the ladder against the side of the building and started climbing. Alo went to follow him.

  “Oh, hell no. You’re not going to come up here and break something,” Jack whisper-shouted. He made flapping gestures for Alo to get the hell out of Brad’s way.

  “I’m not going to not come up there.” Alo gritted his teeth.

  “God, you can be annoying when you’re in the mood. If you’re going to do it, you might want to pick up the pace. We probably don’t have all night.”

  Alo didn’t answer, instead he climbed up the ladder until he was standing on the shallow-peaked roof next to Jack.