Oh alright. One more. But this is all you guys get for awhile. I don't want to give it all away!
*****
“So what can I do for you, Ms. Ling?” I asked, sipping my soda. She smiled at me again, but her eyes considered me carefully.
“There is a shipment of human cargo coming through here on Saturday. A tractor-trailer full of slaves, crossing over from Canada. We do not usually operate in the United States, muchless an unlikely place such as this. It was our good fortune that you happened to be living in exile here. Will you help us?”
“There’s a lot of road between here and the International Bridge,” I said. “How do you know which way it’s going?”
“We…
extracted that information from one of their receiving clerks,” she replied, contempt dripping in her voice. “He was very helpful. There is a distribution center of sorts in Des Moines, and from there they’re sent to their final destinations.”
“I can’t believe that this goes on here and you never hear about it,” I said skeptically.
“They don’t operate in large numbers in America. Slave labor is cheap here. Drug addicts and illegal immigrants provide the vast majority of the manpower, whether they’re prostitutes on the street or workers in a sweat shop. These slaves are different, though.”
“What do you mean?”
“They’re all girls, Mr. Hopper, the oldest being seventeen. They’re extremely valuable in the American market as sex slaves. They were never officially in the country, so they can’t very well be reported mising, can they? They’re smuggled into the underground system, and from there to rich pedophiles, black-market porn rings, and high-end child prostitution rings.”
“Jesus,” I said, looking down at my burger. You hear about this stuff happening in the third world, but you’d never think it’d happen here in the States. It never ceases to amaze me how sick people can be.
“Will you help us?”
“What is it that you want me to do?”
“I was not able to assemble my usual team,” Ling replied casually. “We’re down three. I can’t very well stage an assault with just three of us.”
“Wait a minute,” I said. “Your team? You’re one of their shooters?”
“Yes, Mr. Hopper. I am a small unit leader. This surpises you?”
“A bit.”
“Because I am a woman?” she asked, an edge in her voice.
“No, because usually the negotiator isn’t a trigger-puller. It’s poor operational security.”
“Perhaps, but EXODUS is an old organization, and we do cling to our traditions. It gets tiresome sometimes, but it helps keep us grounded.”
“Just how old is EXODUS?”
“The organziation was founded in eighteen thirty-six. We had a larger presence in the United States in the old days, working with American abolitionists.”
“Is it true that you kill every slaver you catch?”
“It’s no less than they deserve.” Ling’s eyes could’ve bored holes in me.
“You seem…committed…” I replied carefully. I was wondering if she actually bought into all of this, or if it was just her sales pitch. Ling surprised me by rolling up her left sleeve. Tattooed on her forearm was an eight-digit number.
“I was once a slave, Mr. Hopper.
Committed doesn’t begin to describe my feelings in this matter. Will you help us or not?”
*****