Meanwhile, back to the central, the rest of the team also decide to take a break, except Raven. After Rivers comes back after smoking a cigarette outside, and Andrew comes back from the bathroom, she gathers both of them in front of the monitors.
"Rivers, get the video from the bus on screen 1 and the video from the meeting on screen 2." Raven orders, as Rivers does so, and plays both videos. Raven pauses the first video when the comforting lady was talking to Collins, and the second video when the undercover teammate talks to the same lady. "Now, zoom in that woman" Raven says, as Rivers zoom in the lady's face on both videos. "Well, this thing just got a bit more interesting..."
"What do you mean, Venus?" Andrew asks, with a curious tick on his eyebrows.
"You see, the advantages of the human being is their predictability. People here are either scared and defensive, or motivated and pleased. This lady is enraged and focused. Her upper lip is also a little 'pumped', expressing a disgusted reaction to all of that. She has no motives to watch the torture. All of this, plus her posture, indicates a funny factor in our operation." Raven brilliantly points out, just like always.
"Which is...?" Andrew asks.
Raven points to the lady on the monitors and says: "She's a CIA agent."
"What?! CIA is hiding this from us?" Andrew enrages.
"They have no commitment to the president. They can literally do whatever the fuck they want to do. It's obvious that FBI can't get permission to such operation, so CIA it's the only agency that lady could possibly be working for." Raven says, as she grabs her gun, strapping it on her waist. "It's fine, this mission just got even more exciting. Rivers, try and pull every info about this woman."
"Yes, ma'am." Rivers answers, and quickly types on his computer, efficiently cracking internet codes to get classified info about the private agent.
"What do you mean with 'they have no commitment with the president'? Of course they do! They are supposed to serve the president! And what about groups of mercenaries or something? How can you discard that this woman is part of one of them?" Andrew asks, not understanding Raven's statement.
"Commander... you've got a lot to learn." I've seen mercenaries before. She is definitely not one of them." Raven replies. "And CIA is more complex than you think... I know a few people there, and they don't like working for anyone. So, trust me when I say that they don't care about the president."
"Okay... So, what am I supposed to do? Collins is undercover, Rivers is doing his research, and you are analyzing those body languages..." Andrew asks.
"Don't worry, commander, I'm also not doing anything helpful right now." Raven says as she grabs the car keys from a desk. "Let's go, we've got to pay a visit to someone." She throws the keys to Andrew and says: "You drive."
Driving through the city, Raven tells Andrew to get an exit to a deserted avenue. He starts to get concerned about where they were going since that way would lead to an abandoned community of homeless people. He tries to deflect his mind out of those thoughts by starting a conversation with the detective.
"So, this man, who helped Collins get into that bus, lives around here?" Andrew asked.
"Yeah... I told you that 5 minutes ago..." Raven says, with a suspicion tone on her voice. She knew that Andrew was a little uncomfortable with that route.
The commander has been through crazy missions, but that was one he wasn't understanding. His short black hair was already gray on the sides. His face always had a neutral expression. His physical wasn't that muscular for a high ranking military man, and he had no facial hair. On his left hand, a golden ring on his finger, depicting his marital status. His clothes, always social style, wearing pants, shoes, a shirt, and sometimes a suit, but always with a holster beneath it all. Andrew parks the car in a dark alley and gets out of it, along with Raven. The detective leads the commander through narrow streets in that particularly dangerous neighborhood.
"Raven...?" Andrew says, calling the brave detective by her name for the first name.
"What is it, commander? Don't tell me you're scared." Raven replies.
"Of course not. It's just kind of stupid coming here like this." He says.
"What do you mean?" Raven asks while they keep walking through dark alleys.
"Even though we are skilled law enforcers, we are only two. I've just seen dozens of junkies with guns bigger than their bodies staring at us with an unpleasant face." Andrew replies.
"Relax... They all know me." She says, with no worries at all.
"They know you...? All of them...?" the commander asks, confused.
"Yeah... Look..." Raven says and immediately whistles loudly. The people who were stealthily observing suddenly started to show themselves completely and go directly toward the detective. There were tons of homeless people coming out of the shadows in that abandoned community. Covered with dirt and a putrified smell, they all seemed to have a different type of deformation on their bodies. As they all approached Raven, one of the hands she kept behind her back started coming forward, in a repeated action of caressing some of the children's on their heads. Andrew was simply astounded with what he was just witnessing.
"What in the world is this...?" the commander's eyes semmed like they would pop out of his head. He couldn't understand at all what was happening. It looked like Raven was some sort of "Mother Teresa."
"Pull yourself together, commander. These are just poor homeless people. They couldn't harm an ant..."
"Well, that's because guns don't scare ants, but they do frighten humans."
"Just follow me. We're almost there."
The two of them continue walking until they get to an improvised big old tent, with a faded gray tone and a lot of stains on it. Weird noises seem to come out of it, but as they approach, it becomes clear that some of them are just like moans, and as the tent looks like it's moving a little, it's safe to assume that the people inside are having a little fun. One of the kids go inside the tent to call whoever was in there, and that leaves Andrew speechless. Why would a child go inside that place when it was clear of what was happening? And why would anyone let a child go in there? The kid leaves the tent right after, and all the noise and movement cease at all. A teenage girl, approximately 16 years old, also leaves the tent, and then, right after, a man on his 60s.
"Raven! What 'surprise'! What 'I can' make for you?" the old man says, not knowing much about English grammar.
"Your intel. It worked." she replies.
"So you 'bring' me 'reward'?"
"Yeah, there you go." Raven says while throwing the bag of cocaine that Andrew had brought her earlier.
"That is 'good' thing!" The old man gets happy with it.
"Hang on! What are you doing?" Andrew asks Raven angrily.
"Not now..." she says, in a lower voice.
"Yes, now! You just gave a load of drugs to an old creep who was obviously having sex with that minor! What the hell, Venus?" he asks, undignified.
"She 'are' my daughter! I have 'take' care of my children!" the old man replies.
"Your daughter?!?! That's it! Let's get out of here now. And bring this pervert with you!"
"Sorry, Lester! My colleague here is a little upset with some personal things. Please, enjoy your product and keep doing a good job! You are a very good person!" Raven stops Andrew from arresting the addicted homeless, speaking very slow so he can understand everything she says. "Let's go, Commander." She tells him, with an angry tone on her voice.
The two start to walk back to their car in silence. Andrew was outraged with what just happened, but as they kept walking, the commander started to understand that maybe a fight there wouldn't have been the best idea. Then, he finally breaks his silence.
"What just happened?"
"Have you ever heard of 'keep you friends close and your enemies closer'?" She replies
"Yes."
"Well, keep your friends high, and your CIs higher." Raven says.
"I see..." He replies, with a sad tone, but unable to do anything since the young detective was the superior on that operation.
"Look... I know you're a 'boy scout' and always play by the book, and this is not something you would've signed for. But you gotta face it. Try to understand that we're gonna deal with things here the hardest way. That old creep might be an incestuous junkie son of a bitch, but he led us to a bigger fish in the ocean." She says, trying to be at least a little sympathetic with him. "I know that you think that the ends don't justify the means, but let's work first on this big thing. Then, we'll go after the little ones, alright?"
"Fine, Venus... I don't agree with this, but I can't just simply put our main mission aside here." He replies, trying to get his mind out of the awful incestuous homeless community he'd just seen. "So, we just came here to pay your debt with that creep?"
"Of course not. I bugged that package, it's already being transmitted and recorded by Rivers. That old man doesn't fool me, he's a fucking double-crosser." She says as they keep walking towards their car and she calls their tech expert.
"You knew he would betray you." Andrew affirms.
"Of course, darling. I'm always one step ahead, remember that." She says, as he took that as a suspicious commentary.
"Okay... well, at least I'm glad you didn't use that cocaine I brought you." He says.
"I've never said I would use it, commander, I just said I needed it..." She replies.
While Andrew started to drive them back home, Raven finished her talk with Rivers, telling him to stay aware for something out of the ordinary in the audio transmitter on the bag of cocaine. After about 15 minutes, they arrive back to the central. Rivers starts to talk about the progress of the mission.
"Hey, guys. So, nothing weird on the bug you told me to keep an ear on. Right now, it's just making some weird noises of moans, and I think I know what it is..." Rivers says, bothered with it a little bit.
"It's exactly what you think..." Andrew replies, disappointed as well.
"But the good news is that I've found our golden girl. This is Brandi Spaccia, she joined the army when she was 18 and people started to pay attention on her skills. At the age of 21, she was already a CIA agent. As you know, their system is absurdly protected, so I couldn't get any info about her position there, but I'm sure she is one of their top agents on the field." The "tech mage" says.
"Well, do you have anything else about her?" Andrew asks, as Raven stays silent looking at her.
"Not much" Rivers replied. "Apparently she is a very smart person, but she has an issue with-"
"... Anger management?" Raven interrupts.
"Yeah..." He answered, surprised. "How did you-"
"I've had this suspicion for a while." She replies.
"Alright 'Ms. Body Language Expert", we get it, you're good at this." The commander replied, tired of Venus' bragging about her own skills.
"Shut up, Andrew. This has nothing to do with body language." Raven replied back, a little angry about his condescending tone. "The thing is..." she gets closer to the monitor that was showing two pictures of the CIA agent side by side: one screenshot of when Collins encountered her, and one picture from her CIA files. "I've seen this face a few times... She will blow up our mission."
"What the fuck are you talking about?" Andrew asked, confused with what she'd just said.
"It's hard to explain, but I feel that she won't have the guts to watch those tortures." She replied.
"Well, that doesn't matter since we're gonna break in before they happen." He says.
"What...? That wasn't the plan..." Rivers says, confused."
"Of course it was! Venus told me that while I was driving her to that creepy neighborhood" Andrew replies.
"Well... She told me and Collins that we would wait until the first torture session finishes. Then, Collins would go there again for a second time, and then, we would bust in" Rivers says.
"What?!?! Are you fucking crazy, Venus?! You were planning to let innocent people get killed for the sake of the mission?!" The commander asked, completely outraged.
"We need proofs, commander." Raven replied, calmly.
"Fuck the proofs!" He screamed.
"No, Andrew, fuck YOU!" She replied. "I've tried my best to make you understand that this is a disgustingly nasty job, but you keep insisting on playing it by the book! Don't you get it? There is NO book here! There are no rules, neither dignity! We've been assigned to this because we are capable of taking it all without whining! So, quit the fucking attitude and just do as I say." she gets very close to the commander and says: "I am the boss here, do you copy?"
Andrew stood there, absolutely angry with not only Raven's decisions and her crazy plan, but also the way she talked to him. He'd never had anyone younger than him trying to give orders like it was coming from his parents. But, deep down, he knew she was right. Before he could say anything, Rivers interrupted their "staring contest".
"Guys..." The tech expert says, as Raven and Andrew look at him at the same time. "The torture... It has begun."
"Oh shit..." Raven says.
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