“Hmmm–hm—hmmm—hmmm.”

Skipping along the sidewalk, Issac hummed to himself as he looked around for Amazon Lumber, a lumber yard known for only using wood straight from the Amazon rainforest. They even went and cut the trees themselves instead of contracting out the work to third parties. It was apparently a big deal for this company to be totally independent, doing all of the work themselves and keeping this whole national pride thing. They were also the main money-building operation for Miguel.

This would be the fifth of their shops that he had visited in the last few days.

After he left Lucy three days ago Issac visited hardware stores and warehouses that sell everything needed to build any type of house from plumbing to electronics. When he looked through old purchase records from over three years ago Issac noticed that while the material was bought by the gang, nothing ever led directly back to Manuel.

Materials were never bought in large commodities, instead everything was purchased by lower gang members with each one only buying small quantities of different parts and materials. And each of their phone records showed that not one of them made any trips into the woods with what they bought. No trucks ever did, any trucks under Manuel's control only ever led trucks out of the forest, no hauls ever going in.

After finding no clear connection Issac turned to police records thinking that maybe everything was stolen from the stores, maybe even from their delivery trucks.

However, it was apparent that no trucks were ever reported stolen and anything stolen inside was either money from the register or things of no value to a man like Manuel. All of this didn't make any sense. Manuel has a mansion located in almost every important city in South America, the one in Rio even looked like a castle, something that you would find out of a fantasy book instead of something owned by a leader of a criminal syndicate.

Before coming to Brazil Issac did extensive research on Manuel. Trying to see what kind of man he was, to see how he operated, how he lived, how he moved. Through his research, Issac concluded one thing, Manuel was a small petty man who had no business in a position of leadership.

Any decision that he made was made on the fly, he never planned things out. If someone passed him on the street without noticing him Manuel would kill him and his family while forcing the women into prostitution all to send a message that he would not be ignored by anybody.

Everything he did was screaming to be noticed, to make the quickest buck, to be known as someone important. Someone like that would not be made to live in some kind of bunker hidden in the woods. He would make sure that it was a state-of-the-art fortress to satisfy all of his needs, all the while making it look like a castle made of gold to satisfy his vanity.

And yet, there was not so much as a footprint in the sand on how they seemed to get the material needed for such a project. As a last-ditch effort, before he starts to bank on his luck, Issac decided to check his lumber yards for anything that might lead him to his prey.

But even after combing through the files of the four other lumber yards Issac still couldn't see any connection with them and any hidden projects.

This Amazon Lumber was his last shot before he was forced to start trudging it out on his own in the wild.

As he walked his way past the wire fences with his hand in his pockets Issac studied the surrounding area. The Lumberyard looked like all the others, a steel warehouse sitting on a dirt plot as forklifts drove around, constantly picking up lumber to take to trucks ready to deliver them to various customers.

Looking to his left Issace spotted the guard house, sitting right up against the fence overlooking the front gate heading into the company.

It was a quiet little thing, a small little structure that barely had enough room for four people to stand in. With only two windows and a door, it looked like a minute house, with its pale yellow color and ceramic roof tiles.

Looking into the guard house Issac noticed the security guard sitting at his desk checking the security cameras on his computer while at times looking out the window to inspect the yard. Place right behind his desk was a bookshelf containing books and binders.

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Walking into the hut without any resistance Issac made a beeline straight for the bookshelf completely ignoring the security guard. Fingering through the material, Issac searched through every binder before pulling out one of them.

“ Now let's see, the biggest office would be, room 15.”

Tapping the room on the blueprint Issac snaps the binder closed before placing it back where it was. “On the top floor, huh, obviously.” And just as he was about to leave, he heard footsteps walking towards the window right in front of the security guard.

Turning his head, Issac saw that walking over was another plain-looking man dressed up in the same uniform as the man sitting right in front of Issac.

“ Hey Alex, I see that you're still working hard huh.”

“What do you do Enzo, I'm too busy to deal with you right now, the new boss is getting rid of anybody who isn't of use.”

‘New boss? That's interesting.’Stopping from leaving, Issac decided to wait it out and see just what he could gather from these two guards, who knows, he might get lucky. The things that people say when no one is around always lead to something good for him to use, somehow.

“ Yeah I know, that's what I wanted to talk about.” Looking over his shoulder Enzo leans over the window still getting closer to Alex. “ What’s that guy doing here? He's been around for barely a month and now ten of our guys are gone. People say that they've just been fired but I can't get in touch with any of them.”

“ Leave it Enzo, you know that's how things are, people disappear, especially in our business. The only thing that people like us can do is just stay out of their way, doing our job quietly. Besides, have you ever thought that maybe there's some kind of secret job?”

“ Yeah and maybe they are, but this guy, I don't know something is off, it's like he doesn't even care how many of us go ‘missing’. It’s almost as if he doesn't care even if all of us went ‘missing’ at the same time. Someone like that isn’t thinking about the future, I mean at the end of the day aren’t we all that he has?”

“ I’m telling you to drop it Enzo”

Ignoring the way that Alex glared at him Enzo continued through, his words like a geyser that built up inside of him, and now the pressure was shooting out of him. “ No I have to say this, if the boss is gone and this is who is gonna replace him then we are done. No one can live like this wondering your gonna wide up dead-”

“ ENZO STOP! Right now. As your friend, I’m warning you.”

“ As my friend I’d hope that you would agree with me that this place is a sinking ship, if we don't leave now then we are just gonna go missing like everyone else that has been ‘fired’. Come on, let's run. Right now, if we go right now we can tell everyone we're doing some errand or something and no one will stop us.”

“ And then what do you plan to do, Enzo, in case you forgot you don't have any skill to find different ‘employment’, and no one is gonna accept you for running out on your last ‘job’. Is your plan to just go on the run, they will find you, and even if you can hide yourself I can't. I have a family.”

Standing from his desk Alex looks directly into Enzo’s eyes still talking in a low voice making sure that no one can hear him. “ I can't leave them, and I can't hide them forever. They will find me and then what, it's better if we just stay here and ride this out, who knows maybe this storm will only be temporary.”

Calming down from his rant Alex stared at Enzo for about a minute. Sighing Alex reached out and placed his hand on Enzo’s shoulder and tried to talk him down from leaving.

“Listen, right now things are rough I know, but it's not all that bad. As long as we keep our heads down then who knows we might even get promoted. But leaving, especially if you're planning on leaving now, is not gonna work out for you or anyone that you know.”

“ Huuhhhh, maybe you're right, but ten guys Alex, ten guys ?”

“ I know, I know, just...” Not knowing what to say Alex sat back down and as he put his head in his hands he said. “ Just go back to doing whatever you were doing, just don’t talk about this to me ever again.”

“ Okay man, —I’ll see you around.”

Making sure that he left Alex went back to looking through the cameras. Nervously staring at the screen, never lifting his head from the screen for the next ten minutes. Looking around for anyone around him he reached over to the desk phone and placed it over his ear.

“ I need to talk to the boss—yes it's important—-okay I’ll wait.”

~Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap~

“ Yes, yes sir I know—I’m here to report someone talking about desertion—His name is Enzo Marquiez.” Looking back over the window. “ He’s a guard in the North Gate section.”