Damn Bureaucrats

Ellie, Grant, Malcolm, and Doctor Marty Guittierez walked briskly towards the office of Senor Rodrigo Rodriguez, the harbormaster here at one of Costa Rica's smaller ports. The only port in Costa Rica where transport to Isla Sorna was available, albeit for a high price. The office in question was a small wooden shed, painted red, with the words, 'Oficina principal del puerto' on the wall in peeling black letters. Guittierez hd explained that the words meant 'Harbor Master's Office' in Spanish. They walked up to the front door, where a small, rectangular, white Perspex sign hung from a rusted chain. The sign said, 'Fuera A Almuerzo'. Underneath those words, written in minute black marker pen, were the words, 'Out To Lunch'.

Ellie turned to Guittierez, saying, "Does he eat in his office?"

Guittierez shrugged, "I guess so. There are no eating establishments around here for a mile or more."

Without saying anything further, Ellie yanked open the door, the rusted hinges screeching in protest. Inside, a short man with a bushy black moustache looked up from a red lunchbox, his bushy eyebrows jumping up like two birds in a fight. As Ellie marched up to his desk, he hastily pushed the lunchbox aside, but not before she saw some green salsa with yellow egg yolks pooled on top of it.

'Gross-looking food,' she thought, seating herself down on the plastic chair in front of his desk. He sat up straight, as though in an attempt to make himself look taller, while somehow managing to dab away some egg yolk that had stuck to his moustache with a grubby-looking handkerchief, which he then stuffed into his coat pocket.

"Senorita, estoy almorzando mi. No usted leyó la muestra en la puerta?" he said, closing his lunchbox and locking it shut with a click.

"I don't speak Spanish, Mr… What's your name again?" she said, as Grant, Malcolm, and Guittierez walked into the small office.

"My name is Rodriguez, senorita, and may I enquire as to why you have interrupted me during my break. It must be something important, si?"

"Right, Senor Rodriguez. What were you saying to me when I came in?"

"I said; I am eating my lunch. Didn't you read the sign on the door?"

"Oh, Marty here know more Spanish than I do."

"Sure he does, si. Hey Marty, cómo es su madre?" asked Rodriguez, looking at Guittierez with a raised eyebrow.

"Ella sobrovivió su puente pasado. Usted?" replied Guitteriez, smiling, "Long time no see, Rodrigo."

"You know him?" asked Malcolm, surprised.

"Yeah, man! He and I were best buddies down at school, entienda? We go wayyyy back," said Guittierez, turning to Malcolm.

"What was the Spanish exchange about?" asked Grant.

"He asked me how was my mother. I told him that she survived her last bypass," Guittierez replied.

"Let's get down to business, shall we?" said Ellie, who was staring at Rodriguez, who was now straightening piles of documents on his desk.

"Si, senorita. What urgent business has you rushing down to this hell's shithouse of a port?" asked Rodriguez, who now leaned forward in his seat, his hands folded neatly on the table.

"We need to go to Isla Sorna. What transport do you have available?" she said, making him sit up straighter, as if something had been rammed up a certain orifice of his.

He relaxed and slouched a degree or two lower, and said, "Las cinco muertes. Min maldiciones en usted, Marty! Esas islas son un infierno del papeleo!"

Guittierez shrugged, casually, "Desean ir, los dejaron molar allí. Es su opción."

Rodriguez slammed his fist on the table and shouted, "Ninguna manera, Marty! Si mueren, siento el dolor!"

"Es su opción!" Guittierez shouted back, "Y están intentando ahorrar vidas allí!"

Rodriguez stood up and shouted, "Usted está el sus en propio, Marty. No etoy tomango ninguna riesgos."

In a softer tone Rodriguez said, "El amigo apesadumbrado, viejo, pero mucha gente ha desaparecido también allí. Ahora salga de aquí antes de que llame seguridad."

Five seconds later, as they stood outside Rodriguez's office, they debated their options.

"We could ask one of the fishermen," suggested Malcolm, as he looked at the rows of brightly painted boats that were moored at the harbor.

"No way they'll take you. Rodriguez would have seen to that," said Guittierez.

At that moment, a painfully loud, static-filled announcement blared out of the corroded loudspeaker on the roof of Rodriguez's office shed. It roughly was heard as, "Pescadores de la atención! No lleve cualquier persona las cinco muertes! Esto es una orden del amo del puerto. Los pescadores que los toman allí tendrán sus licencias confiscadas. Recompensarán los que dan vuelta en los pescadores que toman a gente allí con licencia completamente pagada. Gracias."

Guittierez stared for a moment, and then shook his head in a disheartened manner, "Rodriguez just ordered all the fishermen here to not take you to the island. He even threatened to confiscate their licenses if they took you there."

Grant coughed, drawing everyone's attention.

"He would penalize them if they took us there, right?" he asked Guittierez.

"That's right."

"What would he do if we er… commandeered their boat, huh?" Grant said, eyeing a medium-sized boat with a man sleeping on its deck.

xxx

Twenty two minutes after he had chased Guittierez and his (obviously) insane friends out of his office, Rodriguez heard some distant cursing in Spanish, followed by three loud splashes as some things were either thrown into the sea or fell off someone's ship. Rolling his eyes, he dismissed it as an accident. Suddenly, a thought struck him, and his mouth fell open in terror as he rushed out of his office.

'They couldn't have stolen a boat, could they?' he thought, in a panic.

His thoughts proved to be true. As he ran onto the harbor's labyrinth of wooden platforms, he heard the roar of a boat's petrol cylinder engine starting. Whipping his head around in an attempt to see which boat it had been, he saw Enrique Tortilla's pink-colored boat speed of, in the direction of the Five Deaths. He also saw Enrique, together with his two deck hands, Johannes and Líonel, clambering onto the harbor from one of the narrow steel ladders that were bolted to the harbor's side. The ladders were normally used by small-scale boatmen or kayakers, but the three men who were climbing onto the harbor were neither of the two.

Enrique, Johannes, and Líonel ran towards Rodriguez, their wet feet slapping on the sun-baked wood of the harbor. Enrique got to Rodriguez first, and breathlessly shouted, "Robaron mi barco! Per ova analiza, porque experimentaba reparaciones."

Rodriguez quickly asked them, "Cómo pueden ir lejos?"

"Diría cientos millas impares. El motor fue cogido bastante para arriba," replied Líonel.

"Su barco era asegurado, sí?" asked Rodriguez.

"Si," replied Enrique.

"Entonces no se preocupe de él que dirigían a las cinco muertes, de todas formas. Las criaturas extrañas les matarán apagado," said Rodriguez, walking back towards his office, "Venga por favor llenar para arriba la forma de demanda de seguro en mi oficina."

As they entered his office and he rummaged in a filing cabinet for the required forms, he thought with a tinge of sadness, 'Goodbye, Marty. The boat's gonna get fucked up on you. And you're gonna die a miserable death at Sorna."

xxx

As they sped through the waters at full speed towards Isla Sorna, 90 miles from the harbor, Guittierez looked up from the map he was referring to. Walking up to Ellie, he asked her, "So what do we do when we get there?"

"We'll sabotage the bastards there with the tools in this bag," replied Ellie, unzipping the bag to show him the large collection of heavy tools in the bag.

"I see," he said, walking off to aid Grant and Malcolm, who were steering the ship. He might have to correct their compass bearings slightly.

"Marty?" Ellie asked.

"What?"

"Do you know what the government of any country and senor Rodriguez have in common?"

"You mean my old friend the harbormaster?"

"That's the one."

"I don't know. What?"

"They're all just some damn bureaucrats, who just live their sedentary lives, pushing paper around."

"I'll remember that," said Guittierez with a smile as he headed to the ship's bridge.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: If you have any difficulty in understanding the Spanish terms used, please go to and use the Babel Fish Translation program to translate the terms into English. Sorry if I have caused any inconveniences.