Accessing archive...

5:34 p.m.

Au Naturel Herbs, Spices, & Teas / Front Door Security Camera

Tracking asset: Fusco, L.
Tracking hostile target: (Unknown Subject)

"The Verrat? What're European dinosaurs doing in New York?" - "This is your one warning, Fuchsbau. Leave now."

Accessing facial recognition databases...

Subject identified
Pelletier, Denis, aka Gilles Boucher aka Gérard Gagnon
DOB: 12/19/72
POB: Geneva, Switzerland
Occupation: Private security
Violence Probability Index: Extreme
Threat Level: High
Outstanding INTERPOL warrants-
Category of Offenses: organized crime/transnational crime, assault, murder
Wanted by: Federal Republic of Germany (Bundesrepublik Deutschland), United Kingdom, France (République française)

...

Outgoing Phone Call: 212-XXX-XXXX

"This had better be important, Lionel." - "That depends, how important's a pack of Hundjäger to you?"

~o0o~

"Hundjäger?" Wonderboy asked sharply.

"Yeah, that's what I said," replied Lionel with equal bite. "They're watching our guy, and I just got warned off not very politely."

"If you're still alive, Lionel, they were being extremely polite. Did they happen to mention who they were working for?"

Lionel snorted rudely. "The Verrat. Can you believe it? Those Old World nutballs bringing their problems over here. Why can't they stick to Europe?"

A familiar fussy voice cut into their conversation. Somehow, Lionel was not surprised he was listening in. "A better question is why they are interested in Detective Burkhardt," Mr. Glasses pointed out.

"Hey, we're open to ideas here," Lionel snapped sarcastically.

"Unfortunately, Portland lies outside my area of general monitoring, so it's taking a bit longer than usual to get the normal background information." The gimpy professor-type sounded annoyed at the delay, as if it were somehow a personal affront to him. "I do know that our wandering detective was born in Rhinebeck, New York, and raised there until he was 12, when his parents, Reed and Kelly Burkhardt, were killed in what appeared to be a car accident-"

"Appeared?" cut in Wonderboy in disbelief.

"As I was saying, Mr. Reese," their friend in the glasses continued primly, "the accident was eventually reclassified as a homicide but soon became a cold case. I haven't been able to get anything more than that on that particular subject yet. After his parents died, the young Burkhardt pretty much dropped off the grid until he joined the Portland Police Bureau. Then, a little more than a year ago, he was attacked in the street by a man wanted in several states for robbery, rape, and murder."

"He sure seems to attract the winners, doesn't-" Abruptly, the Hundjäger's SUV pulled out, passing by Lionel's sedan with one last feral glare of warning through the window for him. "The Hundjäger are pulling out," he reported. "Should I follow them or-" A sharp, somewhat muffled crack interrupted him again, coming, it sounded, from the alley behind the store. That answered his question for him. "That didn't sound good," Lionel said as he threw open his car door and rushed into the shop.

Prettyboy was nowhere to be seen, nor was the Reinigen who ran the place; to make things worse, the smells from the multitude of herbs and spices and whatnot on the shelves made it difficult to pick out their scents.

"Lionel..." Wonderboy said distantly from the phone that now hung by his side.

"He's not here. Sorry, gotta put you on hold." Lionel unceremoniously dropped the phone into his pocket, trading it for his gun. Grimacing, he let himself woge, and the scents in the air became crisp and clear, like putting on his reading glasses.

There! A human scent, with hints of gunpowder and oil and rain, heading towards the back of the store. Cursing himself for an idiot, Lionel cautiously followed the scent, exiting the rear door into the alley just in time to see a dark sedan pull around the corner and out of sight.

Now clear of the store, Prettyboy's scent became much more clear - and it abruptly ended in the alley. Tossed aside were a white paper bag and a cell phone that Lionel recognized as belonging to the Portland detective. But possibly most telling was the heavy, lingering smell of Hundjäger.

The stream of invectives he let loose would probably make a sailor blush.

He re-holstered his gun and put his phone back to his ear as he returned to human form. "Looks like our mangy European friend had backup, and I'm pretty sure they have our guy now, too. Don't smell any blood, so he's probably still alive."

"Did you happen to catch a license plate, Detective?" asked Mr. Glasses, not missing a beat; Lionel could hear the new tension in his voice, however, and could imagine his eyes going wide at the sudden news.

"Not the car they had back here, it was too far away. Our mangy friend's SUV out front looked like a rental - New York plates, Yankee Sierra Foxtrot six four two two," Lionel replied as he bent down to retrieve the discarded cell phone and bag from the ground. "You know, something doesn't make sense here. Prettyboy only flew in from Portland this morning, and he told me that he was a last-minute fill-in for some other poor slob. So, unless these guys are psychic or suffering from a case of mistaken identity, they have to've thrown their plan together at the last minute."

"No wonder they're being so sloppy," Mr. Glasses mused distractedly.

"Good work, Lionel. Now if you only hadn't lost Burkhardt in the first place..." Wonderboy opined, the annoyance clear in his tone, which was drier than the Sahara during a drought.

"Hey, we can play the blame game all night long, but it won't help us find him," Lionel snapped defensively, dropping Prettyboy's phone into his jacket pocket. Out of curiosity, he opened the white bag, but recoiled almost instantly. "Well, that answers one question."

"What is it, Lionel?"

The Fuchsbau snorted, rolling the bag up and stuffing it in his pocket with the Portland detective's cell phone. "He's definitely into the Wesen scene somehow. The Hundjäger left behind a bag of wolfsbane when they probably threw him in the trunk. Stuff's gonna play havoc with my sinuses," he grumbled. "And, before you ask, all I could smell was human on him. Then again, you smell human until you start beating the crap outta someone. Sure love to know how you do it."

"Yes, Lionel, I'm sure you would," the man in question replied ever-so-mildly.

"Putting aside all of that," cut in Mr. Glasses, almost as if he didn't want to be left out of the conversation, "you might be interested to know that the SUV was indeed a rental, and I've activated its GPS transponder. I've forwarded the tracking information to your phones. If the Hundjäger all end up at the same location, you should be able to find Detective Burkhardt fairly easily. Hopefully before anything permanently untoward happens to him."

"Thank you, Harold. Lionel, you should probably get going. We wouldn't want Carter to get worried, now would we?"

With a huff of annoyance, Lionel hung up and hurried back through the shop to his car. Carter had enough problems to deal with without discovering the giant steaming pile hiding just behind the curtain.