Don't Order Dog (36 page)

∞

“Oh Christ, not you again,” Joe Brown said angrily as the old door groaned opened and Tom entered the saloon. “Haven’t you done enough damage already?”

Tom ignored the jeers from the bar owner as he stood in the entrance of Joe’s Last Stand
Saloon and quickly stomped the wet snow from his black leather shoes.

“Don’t even think o
f asking for a drink, agent-man,” Joe growled. “I only serve people who aren’t trying to fuck-over their own fellow Americans. Understood?”

“Got it,” Tom said as he marched past the bar towards the far corner of the saloon. “I’ll only be a
minute.”

A handful of young co-eds seated at the bar watched with sudden interest as the heavyset bar owner grunted with irritation. Sitting nearby on his usual stool, Chip watched
silently. His piercing blue eyes followed Tom across the room.

“Fine,” Joe mumbled. “Go look at the letters and write your little investigation notes. Then get the hell out of here.”

Tom stopped in front of the shrine and immediately focused his attention on the letter from China that arrived the day before. He scanned the precise, all-too-familiar handwriting, looking for anything that stood out as particularly odd or suspiciously phrased.
There has to be something here
he thought as he read. Then something caught his eye. He looked again at the first paragraph. When he came to the final sentence, he read it carefully and stopped.

Seriously… have you ever seen
The Iceman Cometh?

Tom took a step back as his lips silently mouthed the words. His eyes slowly widened as a new meaning
began to reveal itself.

…ever seen The Iceman Cometh?

…The Iceman cometh?

...The ICE man cometh.

Tom suddenly ripped the letter from the wall and began running towards the door, his wet shoes slipping noisily on the old hardwood floor.

“What the
fuck
are you doing?” Joe yelled as he watched Tom sprint past the bar with the letter clutched in his hand. “Stop right there you little flat-headed piece of shit!” The bar owner ducked under the counter and popped up on the other side, his thick hands curled into fists, but Tom had already disappeared out the front door. Joe turned and slammed his fist against the bar top, his face red with rage. He glanced over at Chip and shook his head. “Can you believe the fucking nerve of that guy?”

Chip
silently shook his head at Joe before staring out the frost-framed window at the front of the saloon. His eyes followed the running figure of Tom Coleman as he ran across the street and quickly vanished behind a white cloak of falling snow.

∞
 

Rick Martin stood
at the entry of apartment #1549 and carefully examined his surroundings. The single-room apartment, no more than ten feet wide and perhaps twice that in length, was dark and unfurnished. A stale mixture of cigarette smoke and mildew hung heavily in the air. On the floor in front of him, a rectangular patch of relatively clean concrete revealed the spot where a rug once laid. Other than that, the only sign of recent occupation was a cook pot left on the small stove in the far corner of the room. A flimsy-looking door leading to the apartment’s balcony stood next to the stove, the small pane of glass in its center covered with torn, age-yellowed newspaper. Rick walked towards it, pausing at the stove and laying his hand on its surface. As expected, it was cold.

I’m too late
he thought as he ripped the newspaper from the window and peered out at the balcony. A large black plastic bag sat in the corner, filled to the top with what appeared to be trash. Rick opened the door and gingerly grabbed the bag, tossing it inside before kicking it over with his shoe and scattering the contents across the floor. He pulled a pen from his pocket and began carefully poking through the rubbish, wincing at the smell. Nearly all of the items seemed to fall into two categories – empty packs of cigarettes, mostly Camel Lights, and leftover containers of street-bought food. A few pages of a newspaper were also mixed in, printed in unintelligible Chinese. He studied them closely for a date but couldn’t find anything even remotely decipherable.

After five minutes of fruitlessly picking through the trash, Rick stood up in frustration. He walked over and picked up the empty trash bag and roughly snapped it in the air to see if anything else was left inside. As he did, a flat, white-framed object flew out and twirled
gently in the air before settling face-down on the floor.

He bent down to examine it.

Looking closer, Rick realized it was a Polaroid photograph like the ones his parents took when he was a kid. He flipped it over with his pen and gazed at the smiling face of a middle-aged Chinese man dressed in a white lab coat. The man’s dark eyes stared out with intelligence as he stood in a large room surrounded by scientific-looking instruments. Along the bottom edge of the photo, the number “1556” was written in heavy black ink. Rick picked up the Polaroid and studied it curiously until the meaning of the photo and number suddenly struck him.

This man is the target. He’s in apartment 1556.
I’m in the wrong goddamn apartment.

He stuffed the Polaroid into his pocket and raced to the front door of the apartment. He started to open the door and then paused, his heart pounding loudly in his chest. He reached into his jacket and pulled out the “gift” the Director had given him before leaving for Amsterdam – a small, 22-caliber pistol. Until that morning, it had travelled in disassembled pieces, all of them concealed within various areas of his laptop, cellphone and backpack. He stared down at the ugly, dull-gray plastic weapon that looked more like a child’s toy than something that could deliver lethal power. A bead of sweat ran down his forehead as he pulled the slide back and checked to
make sure the gun was loaded. Satisfied, he tucked it back into his pocket and readied himself by the entryway. As he grabbed the door to leave, Preston’s voice sounded once again in his head.

For better or worse, the fate of this investigation
once again rests in your hands…

Rick shook his head dismissively as he opened the door. The cold, chemical-laced air of the factories filled his lungs as he peered down the
deserted corridor. 
This is it
he thought as he stepped cautiously out into the gray morning light. No more searching. No more instructions. He closed the door and focused his eyes on the dark entryway of apartment 1556 several doors down. A sudden surge of energy washed over him as he marched forward. He thought of the phone call he’d make to Director Preston when this was over. With any luck, he’d be calling with the confident voice of a freshly minted hero.
 

∞

“Agent Coleman, the Director is in a meeting right now, but I’ll be sure to–”

“You don’t understand!” Tom screamed into his cell phone at Preston’s assistant as he sped back towards the ICE offices. “I need to speak to the Director
now!
Tell him it’s Agent Coleman. Tell him I have information that requires his immediate attention!”

The
assistant exhaled haughtily. “One moment, Agent Coleman.”

A few seconds later, the Director
’s low voice broke the silence.
“What have you got?” he asked curtly.

“Director, I’ve been digging a little deeper into the letters, and I believe I’ve found something. It’s not good.
Jesus
–” Tom dropped the phone and gripped the steering wheel with both hands as the car suddenly began sliding on the icy pavement towards an oncoming vehicle. The Director’s voice shouted from the phone on the seat next to him as he nudged the car back into the lane.

“
Agent Coleman? Hello? What the hell’s going on?”

Tom held his vice-like grip on the wheel as the oncoming vehicle miraculously slipped past him by just inches. He cursed under his breath and g
rabbed the phone off the seat. “I’m on my way to the office, sir, and I have the last letter with me – the one that just arrived yesterday. As I said, I think I’ve found something. A message in the letter.”

“What message?” the Director demanded.

Tom paused briefly, weighing the absurdity of his conclusion. He knew if he was wrong, Jack Preston would be merciless on him, but he also knew the stakes were much higher if he was right. He shook the doubts from his head and spoke slowly into the phone.

“I’m afraid he already knows we’re coming for him, sir.”
 

∞

Rick continued down the walkway, silently reading the apartment number as he went.

1552…1553…1554…1555…

He paused just outside of the next entryway and reached into his pocket. His fingers wrapped reassuringly around the grip of his pistol. Unlike before, the
door to apartment 1556 was closed. Rick glanced quickly over his shoulder to
see if anyone was approaching, but the corridor still stood empty. A cold
gust of wind suddenly swirled around him, carrying with it another
nauseating mix of chemicals.

He stepped cautiously into the entryway and placed his ear against the door.
The low murmur of a male voice could be heard speaking inside the apartment, followed by another, higher pitched response.  

He’s still alive
Rick thought with relief.

He stepped back and pulled the handgun from his pocket. His heart pounded loudly against his chest as he quickly leveled his leg against the apartment door and kicked hard. The heavy steel door swung inward and slammed against the wall with a loud crack.

“Department of Homeland Security! Don’t move!” Rick screamed as he pointed the gun into the dark interior and took a step closer. Staring into the small apartment, he could barely make out the rough silhouette of a man sitting in an armchair. He pointed his gun at the man and stepped inside.

“Identify yourself!”

The man didn’t respond.

“I said identify yourself!”

“I’m afraid you’re in the wrong homeland,” a low voice responded from the nearest corner of the room.

“Don’t move!”
Rick replied, immediately swinging the gun towards the voice. He then froze, staring in confusion. Instead of his target, a wooden table stood in the corner, a tiny black speaker resting on its surface. He glanced nervously around the room. “What did you say?” he demanded.

“I sa
id you’re in the wrong homeland,” the voice replied from the speaker on the table. “I don’t recall the US Department of Homeland Security including China as part of its jurisdiction.”

Rick swung the handgun back
towards the man in the chair. “Tell me who you are, or I swear to god I’ll put a bullet in your fucking chest!”

“I’m afraid he can’t help you,” the speaker
said calmly.

Rick stepped farther into the dimly lit apartment and peered over the barrel of his handgun at the man sitting in the chair. He appeared to be a slightly built Asian man, with thick features and a wide, oval-shaped face. He was wearing glasses and dressed in beige slacks and a simple button-down shirt. His arms hung loosely off the chair, and Rick thought something appeared odd about his hands.

“Can you speak English?” he asked.

“He can’t speak at all,” the speaker crackled.
“By the way, is that a real gun?”

Rick looked more closely at the man’s face. He couldn’t tell if it was the man in the photo. The pale tint of his skin seemed unnaturally gray, and behind the lenses of glasses, his eyes appeared waxy and dull.

“Wait, what’s wrong with–”

The tap on Rick’s back was soft and nearly imperceptible, like the finger of a child asking for attention. The sound that followed was equally soft and gentle – a fleeting breath of wind that seemed to rush past him through the narrow interior of the apartment. He immediately spun around and pointed the handgun at the empty doorway
, ignoring the odd, warm wetness that was now soaking into his shirt. Confused, his eyes searched the façade of the dormitory building that stood on the opposite side of the courtyard.

There, hunched low atop the edge of the roof, a dark figure lifted his head
and briefly looked at him before settling back into position.

Rick saw a brief flash of light appear from beneath the man’s head at the same instant he felt another tap on his chest. He stood quietly for a moment, staring across the courtyard at the anonymous figure with a mixture of shock and terror before turning and stumbling back into the apartment. A few steps in, he
dropped to his knees on the hard concrete floor and leaned heavily against the wall. The only sound he could hear was the sickening gurgle of air and blood rushing from his chest. He looked up at the man sitting placidly in the chair and slowly raised his small plastic handgun towards him.

“This is your last chance to talk.”

The tap against the base of his neck pushed Rick’s body violently forward. He gasped in pain, staring at the vibrant spray of blood along the wall next to him as the last bubbles of breath poured from his chest. A second later, his twisted body slumped lifelessly onto the floor.