Max - Freelance Police - Part 4

Chapter 3

Max awoke to the sound of the office phone going off. In the old days, as he now dubbed anything prior to 3 weeks ago, any time the phone rang, there would be a spontaneous race between himself and his now deceased partner to see who could get a hold of the handset first. A race subsequently that Max never won. This had never bothered him, finding the engagement a tradition for the partners in crime prevention.

Now however, after three weeks of actually be able to take front seat in handling the commissioner or clients that rang in, Max found the cheap piece of plastic to be nothing but a harbinger of worries and responsibilities. Responsibilities he felt he wasn’t proving capable of handling.

And after the last case, responsibilities he felt like ignoring, indefinitely. He hadn’t gone so far as deciding to quit and shut down BLANK and Max – Freelance Police, but simply ignoring everything and everyone around his had seemed to be working out for him.

So Max let the phone ring out and carry over to voice mail. He barely paid attention as he heard the still unchanged recording of himself and Sam come from the answering machine.

Sam’s voice came echoing around the apartment. “Good day citizen. You have reached the phone of Sam and Max - Freelance police. Please leave your message after the beep”

As usual, Max’s own voice suddenly chimed in “That’s it? That’s the message? I thought we were gonna do one of those duologues, where we go back and forth where I finish what you say. Like those creepy twin characters archetypes that keep appearing up in mainstream TV.”

“Max, you know I usually find your penchant for leaving eerie messages for our potential clients endearing, but this is our twentieth recording. We’ve already worn out two tapes so at this point, I really don’t care what we -(BEEP)”

As soon as Max and Sam’s voices died away, Max could hear through the sheets “Hello. My name is Mr Michael Liverstone. I’ve been asked by my employers to make a request for your aid in the investigation of missing shipment of chemicals from our warehouse. We store various compounds for our… actually, it might be simpler if we speak in person. Our address is 658 8th Avenue, the building name is FED Incorporated. You will be paid $2000 for making the initial visit to the site.”

And just like that, the message ended and the tape stopped recording. Max lay there, trying to bring himself to care about the message or be intrigued in the slightest, but it battled between that and going back to sleep, and the sleep was winning. He had no interest in money and a job that just paid you for turning up was just asking him to get stung in some way. He had already been burned by one client trying to use him.

Just as Max made up his mind to get up only to delete the message, he remembered his appointments. Today was the day he had his meeting with…. What was his name? Drakes? Max mentally shrugged as he stretched. Flint had spoken highly of him and Flint was one of the few people Max had not completely shut out over the last 3 weeks.

“Ok… its 1:00 now… meeting is at 4:00... eh, screw it” And with that being the entire basis for Max taking this potentially high profile job, he grabbed the keys to the Desoto and walked out the door.

It was only when he was reaching the warehouse when Max saw himself in the car’s rear-view mirror. Despite how lax Max had gotten with his personal hygiene over the last few weeks, even he was surprised with how haggard he looked.

“Hmm, will just tell them it’s shedding season for Lagomorphs or something.” Max said as he leaned out the window of the Desoto and pushed the intercom button for the gates. “Max from Sam and Max here”

“Thank you sir. You are expected. Please go through to reception to receive you visitors badge.”

“Groovy” Max murmured, already regretting coming here. However he still had 2 hours to use up before he had to head over to Drakes. He could waste that here, and despite his initial misgiving’s, he didn’t get the feeling of anything shady from this place. It looked like a normal warehouse, people going in and out… though.

Max grinned as he walked to the main entrance, spotting police tape on one of the truck delivery points. The door where the entrance was seemed to have been wrecked. So the police had been here… why then did they want a PI here then?

Max let that thought go as he entered the automated doors and met a young girl in a smart suit waiting for him. She was smiling broadly at Max and handed him a black plastic card with the word VISITOR  on it. “Hello Sir. I have been told to bring you to Mr Liverstone straight away. If you would hold on the card and follow me please.” And with that she began walking away, not waiting for a reply.

Max wasn’t in the mood for dialog in any case and just followed wordlessly, flipping the card idly as they walked. They moved from a welcoming reception area with white ceramic floor tiles and sleek looking doors leading to the rest of the build, straight to the main store area. The shelves seemed to go on further then Max could see, all of them filled with cardboard and wooden boxes of various shape. Max was tempted to make an “Ark of the Covenant” reference, but guessed the lady probably got asked something cheesy like that from every visitor.

As Max walked, looking down the aisles they passed, something struck Max… “This place stinks”

“Hmm?” The receptionist asked, surprised by the abrupt comment. “Pardon?”

Max sniffed the air again. “This place. Smells like… well… ****”

The receptionist gave Max a not too friendly look. Those were effectively the only words Max had spoken to here, so as first impressions go, it wasn’t a great start to forming the image of a respectable detective. But she decided to take a large sniff but ended up shaking her head “I’m afraid sir I smell nothing”

Lagomorph noise, Max guessed. How did humans manage with their crappy senses.

He put the smell out of his mind as he continued to follow all the way to one specific aisle, where a man was waiting for them both.

“Mr Max, this is Mr Liverstone, Chief Supply Manager.” The receptionist introduced as said manager held out his hand. He was large, in both height and girth and seemed to be balding, save a few strands desperately trying to do the job of a full head of hair. Failing badly. Despite that, he seemed pleasant enough as he introduced himself.

“Hello. My name is Michael or just Mike. Thank you so much for coming so quickly” He said quickly, dabbing a cloth from his shirt pocket over his sweaty fore head.

“No probs” Max said taking the hand. “So, let me guess. Arc of the Covenant stolen?”

Dammit, I promised myself I wouldn’t make that joke, Max thought irritably.

“Oh no” Mike replied, himself and the receptionist giving off an obviously fake set of chuckles to the joke. “Nothing so dramatic, but you are right, there has been a theft. Dorothy, that will be all. Thank you for escorting our guest.”

“Not at all” Dorothy replied, obviously finding it difficult to remain cheerful and polite in front of Max and happy to get away.

Yep, Max thought cynically. Still a charmer.

Max wasn’t really annoyed though. He found anyone he spoke to nowadays he automatically tried to annoy or act vulgar around. He was someone who liked to push peoples buttons, and the event three weeks ago, it had only gotten worse.

“Now then, I should probably go into detail on what we do” Mike started.

“Ooh ooh, let me guess. Store stuff?” Max asked, hand raised like answering a teacher in class., seeing how far he could annoy this guy, now the girl was gone.

“Yes, that pretty much it.” Mike replied unphased, “But we don’t house for multiple companies, just one. Our company FED is the child company to EGI”

“EGI… wait…” Max said, mind racing. He knew he knew that name. “… do you mean Egghead Industries?”

“Um. Yes” Mike replied, obviously not too happy to use the full name of the company. “I was told by a representative from EGI to call you. We already had the police visit and make an initial investigation a week ago but we don’t believe much progress has been made so far”

OK, Max thought, now suddenly in a good mood. Now I know why I was asked to come… Alright. Probably best I don’t embarrass myself.

“Ok, so what was stolen” Max asked, at least trying to sound professional.

“Five crates containing Dryhazometosin” Mike said easily.

“Ok, anything over five syllables long you can assume I won’t recognise.” Max replied dryly, trying and failing to pronounce the word even in his own head.

“That’s understandable. We act as store house for all raw material and compounds EGI produce or require for the various labs they have around America. There are materials here that have potentially enormous financial value, even in small quantities. By comparison Dryhazometosin is a relatively cheap, if difficult to acquire, substance used in the creation of blasting gel.”

“Blasting Gel?” Max asked, suddenly getting his hopes up. A group of criminals with five crates of high explosives. I love working on cases that can generate the word “catastrophe” in the newspapers.

“Yes, but not the actual explosive part. It’s pretty much inert on its own and you can buy it legally without the need for any sort of license, as far as I know. The blasting gel is just an example. It’s used in the production of many items but… well, since so much of it has been stolen, it’s hard not to think about possible terrorist involvement… you know. Stealing the stuff means there’s no trail” Mike said, rubbing the cloth again over his increasingly sweaty forehead.

“Hmm, OK. Where were these crates taken from?” Max asked, suddenly annoyed he hadn’t taken his notebook with him.

“Right here” Mike said, indicating a noticeably large gap of empty shelving. “All the crates were stored here. And nothing else was stolen. Only these crates”

“Value” Max asked.

“Well, in such quantity, probably $50,000. But as I said, for weight and size, there are far better targets here, even in this very aisle. And that, from what I was told by EGI, it isn’t that sort-after a material. There is no market for it. Really the only use this stuff has in relation to anything criminal from what I can see is its connection to high explosives”

Max seemed hesitant. He didn’t want to jump to conclusions but Mike did seem convinced on the explosives link to the stolen goods.

“Ok… could you get me as much information on this stuff as possible? The exact amount inside each crate, how big each one was, when the stuff arrived…”

Mike just handed Max a folder, obviously already prepared. Probably the same notes he gave to the police, Max thought as he skimmed his way through the details the missing Dryhazometosin. The notes didn’t really tell him much, but he could work through them later.

I guess I am taking one more case… fine. The police are already working on it. My input won’t screw anything up then.

“Is there anything else I can help you with?” Mike asked.

“No, thanks. I’ll look around and…” Max let the sentence hang as he wondered what he should do next. The crime scene really wasn’t much of a scene. Just some empty shelves. And every aisle was a mirror of each other. Nothing seem to stand out, except the smell, Max thought bitterly. It was pretty invasive here.

“What is that smell by the way? I know I’m not imagining it” Max asked.

“Oh, that. Well…” Mike paused, looking obviously embarrassed. “I don’t’ know if I should admit this, but sometimes the seal on some of the chemicals we store gets torn, at least the ones not tagged “Handle With Care” or “Dangerous”. We get a whole spectrum of smells around here. After a few years, my nose just doesn’t register anything anymore” Mike said jovially.

Max cringed. So I’m breathing in the local areas chemical waste… freaking A.

With that Mike left, but not before handing a check to Max for the promised $2000 and a contract for the job. Following that, Max wondered around the aisles looking for clues. He had didn’t have high hopes though, if the police had already had full access to the place, a full week ago. But Max tried, looking under and around the shelves for anything that looked out of place.

Max tried to operate like Sam did. Sam seemed to have the knack of picking up seemingly useless junk which later on turned out to be integral in moving them forward in the case. Max however didn’t feel he could pick up any amount of stuff laying around and hope it would prove useful later. Mostly for the reason he didn’t have any pockets to store them in.

God, might actually have to think about getting some clothes, if only to keep stuff… no! Don’t think like that. You’ve been a proud nudist for most of your life. No need to go over to the Dark side now.

Max continued looping around the same aisle, lost in his thoughts when he noticed he had wasted the full hour he had left. And…. Nothing. Nothing had come to him on how he was to progress the crime. And no clues seemed to be around.

Or maybe there are clues but I’m too Max to notice them, Max thought, who had sadly been using his own name as a derogative recently. Maybe ask the cops… no, they won’t discuss an open investigation with me, not whilst I’m uncertified. No… maybe…. God, what they hell do I do? How the hell am I supposed to catch a bunch of terrorists?

Max kept thinking trying to move even one step forward in the case until he realised he was going to be late for his appointment and decided to leave. He walked fast out of the main warehouse, threw his visitor card wordlessly on the desk and left.