Chapter 9: Up in Smoke
Outside of Chicago April 8, 1929
The plane jolted Jake out of his sleep as its wheels touched the ground outside of Chicago.
"Hey Duke, did anybody ever tell you this thing is a lousy alarm clock?"
"Just be glad you don't sleep walk." Duke killed the engine and both hopped out. While Jake stretched his legs and shook off the unpleasant night, Duke began to unload the plane. He undid the latch on the cargo compartment and nearly fell over when the compartment opened itself. Two loud and unhappy geese flew out of the cargo bay and one caught a flipper in Dukes face. As they flew off, Jake quickly finished his calisthenics and ran to Duke, who was covered in white feathers.
"What happened? Did you get attacked by a feather duster?" Jake asked; he quickly went to work brushing the white feathers off of Duke.
"You know, if I didn't know better, I would say that was Boris and Stella." Duke said, picking more feathers out of his hair.
"You mean those two geese that hang around your boat? Why were they in the cargo bay?"
"Can't help you there. But we don't have time to sit around and talk about it. We have a warehouse to raid." Duke grabbed the packs out of the compartment and tossed Jake his. Duke took a look in the compartment to make sure they had everything and closed to with a horrified look on his face.
"Now what? You look like you saw a ghost."
"I am not cleaning that up."
"No biggy, we need to get a move on." Jake said. Both men put on their packs and walked out to a row of cabs. High above, Boris and Stella flapped overhead and Stella was non to happy for the ride in the plane.
"Since when does bird get air sick?" Boris asked in a condescending tone.
"Hey! I've never been in a plane before, mister ' I'm afraid of heights.'"
"I still have the scar. Being shot is no fun." Before Boris could continue his tirade, Stella saw something below
"Look, down there." Boris saw Duke and Jake loading their gear and hardware into a taxi. Both clamored in and the cab sped away.
"After them, we can't lose them!" Both began a close pursuit. Down below, the inside of the cab smelled of a peculiar mix of cigar smoke and coffee. Jake restrained himself to not yell at the cab driver who had a massive Cuban cigar hanging out of his mouth.
"Good afternoon gentlemen." he stuck out his hand and both Duke and Jake politely shook it. "Where am I taking y'all today?" The driver asked in a thick and gruff Irish accent.
"We need to head over to this address." Duke handed the driver the note that Jimmy had written the warehouse's location on. The driver read the address and his eyes opened wide.
"This address is in the dockyard, now that is a bit of a jaunt from here, I'd hate to sound impolite, but it will cost a pretty penny to-" Jake took out his wallet and handed the man a twenty dollar bill.
"Will this cover it?"
"You will be there in no time; I'm Tomas by the way." Tomas snatched the twenty and put it in his money box. The cab wove around corners and through the city, passing landmarks and beautiful buildings. Jake, who had spent most of his life in Old Crow and other rural Canadian towns, was a tad overwhelmed by the sheer size of Chicago, and the sheer smell.
"So, you guys are headed to the docks, eh?" Tomas asked from the front.
"Yep." Duke answered.
"It's a rough section of town these days, what are ya doin' down there? If you don't mind my asking." Between his thick accent and his cigar, Duke felt as if he needed an interpreter.
"Oh, just a business contract went south, so the boss sent us down to straighten it out."
"Business contract?" the man asked.
"Ya, you might call it a hostile takeover." Jake played along. The cab turned onto the road to the dockyard and from behind Duke could hear a siren.
"Do you hear that?" More sirens could be heard in the distance and a fire truck flew by the cab, then another. More vehicles rocketed by and Duke saw the reason, a thick column of jet black smoke had arisen into the air. Duke and Jake shared one concerned look.
"Step on it!" Jake nearly yelled.
"Your wish is my command." The cab started back on its course as they mimicked the movements of the emergency vehicles. The source of the smoke came into view. The address on the paper lead to the warehouse, or rather what was left of it. To boot, a large herd of random animals were scattered throughout the surrounding area. Things like ostriches and kangaroos ran wild, gazelles and rhinos, wolves and bears. It seemed as if Noah's ark had just landed and the entire animal kingdom was having a reunion. Tomas stopped the cab and leaned over the seat.
"Um, I think this is it. Do you want me to-"
"Just let us out here." Jake tossed him a five dollar bill. "Keep the change." Both got out and removed their packs from the trunk. Overhead Boris and Stella observed the maelstrom below.
"Boris, what am I looking at?" Stella asked.
"I don't know. See if you can find Balto or Steele."
"I just hope we find them before the firemen do." Both birds broke away and flew in a circular pattern around the docks. Boris saw nothing and Stella had an emotionless face upon her. Things were not much better on the ground as the firemen were undulating between fighting the fire and catching the stray animals. Jake ran towards the inferno shouting madly.
"Steele! Loki! Did anybody see some dogs come out?" Duke grabbed Jake's arms and held him back.
"Jake stop! We can't do anything here! We gotta go!" Jake attempted to struggle out of Duke's grip. "Stop, come on, we gotta go, now!" Duke pulled him away and began to drag him over the pavement and onto a sandy clearing.
"Duke let me go!" Jake knew wrestling off a man with two inches and twenty pounds on him was futile. "I won't go anywhere, just let me go." Duke released him and he flopped into the sand and began to cry. "Why? Why did they blow it up?"
"I don't know." Duke took out his anger at the sand, kicking into it. Now tired and frustrated, he sat down next to Jake and ran his hand through his hair."That makes no sense, why would they blow it all up?" Jake looked up from his distress to answer and saw a small glint in the distance.
"What is that?"
"What's what?" Duke asked. Jake got up and walked through the wet sand with Duke behind him. The glint was something caught on a culvert entrance. Jake picked it up and had a look of perplexion on his face.
"What is it?" Duke asked again. Jake silently held out his find. It was what looked like a leather strap; he opened his hand revealing the gold ornamentation and the raised gold letters that spelt out Steele.
"Steele's collar, where? How?"
"I haven't the foggiest. Hey take a look at this." Jake pointed at the ground. Duke knelt down and saw four sets of tracks, two large and two small. "From what I can tell, whoever made these tracks was in a hurry. And if I had to guess, the who in this case are our boys and girl." Two more sets of tracks were off to the side, except they where human tracks and in a haphazard manner.
"And these are the ones putting them in a hurry." In one of the tracks, Duke saw something metallic; he exhumed it out of the ground. It was the casing to a large pistol round.
"This is still warm, we just missed them." Duke said, examining it, on the back of the casing was a .44 a revolver round. Duke remembered the two men shooting at him the other night, two and two equals four.
"Great now what are we supposed to do?" Duke stood and thought for a minute.
"I have an idea. Remember what we did with Jimmy?"
"Nobody here to interrogate."
"No, Jake, we need a phone book."