Puzzle Madness

Chapter 13 Recycling
Richard stuffed the report into the inner pocket of his windbreaker and quickly caught up with John Dou, walking side by side with his partner. He pressed the Jingming point on the top of his nose desperately, recalling the contents of the intelligence:

"Mong Cai. Why here? There are so many places to go, why hide here? It's not a big city."

"I've never done field work before, and I've only been in the business a year—how can I carry a package so far?"

"."

John Dou didn't answer, but simply lit another cigarette: still using the butt from the cigarette he had just smoked. It wasn't so much that he was addicted to smoking, but rather that this slovenly middle-aged man wanted to fill his lungs with tar.

Richard rubbed his eyes, which had recovered some of their fatigue:

"The form only said the package should be recycled, but did not require [the customer] to do anything specific with it."

"What do you think? What exactly do we want to do? Living? Dead? After the package is collected, should it be destroyed on site as usual? And the intelligence report doesn't even say what the package looks like."

Before he could take two puffs, John Dou suddenly pressed the still-sparkling cigarette butt into his palm, crushing the remaining tobacco into pieces and making a hissing sound. Then he opened his pocket and threw the cigarette butt into it:
"You think too much and have too many questions. Talk to [the client] first: Don't clean up Corey's mess and end up with the shit on us; if things go wrong, just pull out. If you're not careful, my name will become a reality."

"I worry every day about how to do my job well, but how will I spend my salary if I die?"

In the English context, John Dou is not much different from Zhang San Li Si or Jane Doe - unclaimed male corpses in the morgue are often given this name.

This was not his real name, but John Dou had become accustomed to this unlucky name; he even liked it better than his original name.
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"I know, I understand the reason. But—ah."

Richard wasn't actually asking his partner questions - he was just thinking a little "out loud": talking out loud about what was going on in his mind was his way of relieving anxiety.

After a moment's thought, he came up with a possible reason why the target was lurking in Mong Cai:
"I seem to understand a little bit."

"Mong Cai, for example, is a small city even in Southeast Asia, but it sits right on the edge of the southern Eurasian pipeline network; this way, the city's residents can use two logistics networks."

"That means the workload will double if we have to screen the items. Where would we get so many people in Mong Cai? Is this how [the customer] wants to ship the package?"

Furthermore, Mong Cai City had only just established a branch and service point for the Special Package Handling Department—even the list of personnel to be deployed was still being finalized. Aside from a few informants, there was no secure channel covering the entire city.

"Southern Logistics Network, Southern Logistics Network—the routes reach as far as Australia and New Zealand. So the goal is to deliver the packages directly to Australia?"

Richard scratched his head: This seems to be the only explanation. Apart from this, there is nothing else that is unusual.

John Dou suddenly stopped and turned around. He raised his head slightly, stared at Richard's chest pocket, and then patted his partner's shoulder vigorously:

"Don't even think about it. Leave it to the people in the analysis department. If there's a chance, try to catch him alive. This order is very treacherous, and we can't just turn a blind eye."

"Be careful. Remember what we saw last night? If anything happens, we should retreat."

He squeezed the empty cigarette box and took another pack from his pocket:
“Let’s go, let’s collect [customers] and packages.”
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Liujin Garden, along with Tianhu Community and Huayue New Village, forms a residential complex that housed workers and their families from several nearby tape factories. In recent years, the tape factories' profits have declined, and Liujin Garden is no longer as crowded as it used to be; a few mangy dogs roam freely in the community square. Under the scorching sun, a creaking, green-painted garbage truck pulls into the gate of Liujin Community, casting a shadow over the entire guardhouse. It's not regular garbage collection time, but the security guard, his face covered with a newspaper and his shirt pulled up to his chest while fanning himself, doesn't even bother to look up.

The garbage truck drove past the garbage station that had just collected a wave of garbage in the morning and had not yet had time to add much new goods; it bypassed the flower beds that were not watered and were full of dead branches and the greenhouses full of bicycles, and turned into the back door of the Gilded Garden.

The grayish-green garbage truck rolled across the road, completely blocking the rusty iron sliding door at the back door of Gilded Garden. Now, if someone didn't want to go out through the main door, they could only choose the surrounding four-meter-high brick walls with sharp glass fragments sealed on top with cement.

Richard, sitting in the passenger seat of the garbage truck, flipped open the manila folder: The [client's] name and most of their information had been sealed off with a printed black stripe, leaving only a one-inch ID photo, the types of training they had received upon joining the company, and some notes from the pre-employment physical examination report.

He looked through it, running his fingers over every documented piece of training the [Client] had and any skills he might have - nothing special, honestly; just a run-of-the-mill support.

But this also casts even more doubt on this expedited order.

"[The client] is a bit too ordinary, it's really abnormal. How can it be so easy to be discovered and located?"

John Dou got out of the car first and slammed the door; he stuffed several enlarged A4 papers with photos of [Client] printed on them into his pocket.

"Don't even think about it. The tip says [the client] is here; get ready for the recovery."

Smoke billowed from his nostrils and the corners of his mouth, covering John Dou's face like the hood of a helmet; only now, no passersby cast disgusted glances at him:
"The information was approved by the Analysis Department. If they make a mistake in arresting someone, it's none of our business. The department will try to shift the blame. It would be even better if we could just get away with it. It would give us some time to delay the arrest."

Richard glanced at him and shook his head:

"I don't want to clean up afterward—in an urban area like this, if we make a mistake, it's hard to deal with the bodies. And the support team just walked away, leaving us field officers to do it ourselves."

"Don't forget, the [client] we captured this time is just a support. If the support team blocks us, I don't know how many reports we'll have to write."

Richard is a quick learner and he always likes to use what others say as a weapon; especially when complaining.

"Okay, why are you complaining so much?" John Dou patted Richard's shoulder through the car window. "To be safe, use my ecstasy: if [the client] plans to break in through the front or back door, remember to delay her."

Richard shrugged and rubbed his bloodshot eyes with the back of his hand. If he cried a few more times in such a short period of time, he might really go blind.

"So polite today? Go ahead. I've already taken care of the observation report. Take this with you. If things don't work out, we'll kill him and investigate later. It's safer."

He fitted the silencer on the CZ-75 in its holster and handed it to John Dou, then lifted up his trousers and patted the bulge in his ankle nylon socks where Richard's spare gun was.

"When the body is found, throw it directly into this garbage truck. If you catch it alive or if there's any change, rendezvous at the safe house. I'll wait for you for two hours. If anything happens, remember to call my pager."

John Dou waved his hand without turning his head:
"I understand, old lady."
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(End of this chapter)