Chapter 613 Retired? Dead? On a Trip?
“Flegg, come in alone. Luke, go to the room opposite. Catherine’s there.” The door quickly opened, and Robert’s voice came out.
Hearing that voice, Flegg was stunned, disbelief in his eyes. “You…”
The two agents behind Flegg looked at their boss with puzzled expressions.
Doing his best to calm down, Flegg ordered, “The two of you wait outside.”
The two agents notice Flegg’s hand signal and relaxed.
That gesture meant that the situation was safe and there were no abnormalities.
The door shut.
In the corridor, Luke shrugged. “Do what you like.” He then opened the door opposite. The two agents looked at each other with bitter smiles. This was the hard lot of working under someone else.
Inside, Robert and Flegg stood in the living room.
Flegg slowly tidied up his clothes, stood straight, and saluted. “Greetings, sir! Member of the B34 Squad, Rick Flegg, reporting for duty.”
After a brief silence, Robert also straightened and saluted him in return.
Done with etiquette, Flegg finally continued, “It’s so good to see you again. I always thought that you…”
Robert gestured for him to take a seat and said, “You’re no fool; you know what our department’s usual practice is, right?”
Flegg smiled bitterly. How am I supposed to know if you really retired or the codename on paper died?
In their department, there were few who knew who was dead or still alive. As for those who were already dead, few knew how they died.
It was also the reason why he was so surprised to see Robert.
He had always thought that Robert had probably been killed by some bigshot at the prime of his life, or at worst had been sent on some suicide mission; there was no way he could have retired so early.
But Robert was actually alive and kicking, and was even on holiday on a cruise s.h.i.+p?
Flegg didn’t know what to say about this low-key living
Robert had never been one to beat around the bush. Staring at Flegg, he said directly, “I want you to cover up Luke’s role in this. Can you do that?”
After a brief silence, Flegg finally nodded. “No problem. But you and him…”
Robert: “He’s my son.”
Flegg smiled wryly. “That explains a lot…” Looking at his face, Robert asked, “What else has he done?”
Flegg looked conflicted, and didn’t say anything
Robert scoffed. “Alright, I know you’re always the most obedient, which is why you’re still alive. Go do your thing.”
Flegg stood up with a bitter smile. “Thank you for your understanding, sir.”
Robert also stood up, a little impatient. “Alright, after you leave this room, don’t say you know me. I’m already retired.”
While Flegg stayed silent, he mumbled inwardly, That’s right, your redacted files are probably collecting dust in some supposedly non-existent R.E.D. archive.
After Flegg left, Luke and Catherine returned to the room.
Looking at Robert, Luke asked, “An old colleague?”
Robert snorted. “What are you thinking? I’ve been retired for over ten years already. He was still drinking milk back then.” Luke: “No matter how you look at it, Flegg’s only in his thirties, right?”
Robert: “He looks older. Anything wrong with that?”
Luke shrugged. “Fine, fine.”
He could see that Robert didn’t want to talk about Flegg. He turned around and looked at Catherine. “The FBI guys are here. Do you want to continue with your trip?”
Catherine thought for a moment and shook her head. “Forget it. Once the s.h.i.+p docks, let’s just continue with our holiday on dry land.”
Robert: “…”
Luke: “…”
Suddenly, there was a knock on the door. Luke answered it, and an agent said to him in a low voice, “Captain Flegg needs to talk to you about something.”
Luke turned around and looked at Robert. After getting a nod in reply, Luke walked out of the room. He quickly reached the aft deck. Seeing that he had arrived, Flegg simply greeted him before he asked, “I need to ask you what happened in detail, you understand?” Luke nodded.
Just now, he had been the one talking while Flegg listened. It was now time for Flegg to ask the questions and for Luke to answer.
That was how investigations were usually carried out.
However, Flegg’s questions were mostly focused on the hostiles, the middle-aged man kidnapped by the criminals, and the secret special force that arrived later.
Unfortunately, they were now all in that giant octopus’s stomach, which made it very hard for Flegg to confirm their ident.i.ties. He could only speculate on their backgrounds based on Luke’s descriptions.
On the aft deck, Flegg’s men were wearing protective suits as they cut up the giant tentacle and packed the parts into big boxes.
The tentacle was very big. Thirty of Flegg’s men bustled around while the other half stood guard. The tourists and crew on the s.h.i.+p were all told that there was something dangerous on the deck that needed to be processed. They were all asked to remain in the main hall.
Except for a few overly-curious guys who were stopped by several soldiers, everything was under control.
Of course, this also had to do with the reputation of the soldiers.
They weren’t the people’s guardians, and instead were usually deployed to suppress a situation. For example, during a hurricane in Luke’s previous life, the soldiers rode armored trucks into the disaster zones.
Their responsibility was to maintain order, not to rescue the victims.
By the same logic, they only needed to maintain order on the s.h.i.+p, and didn’t have to be responsible for the safety of the tourists. Since the day they became soldiers, that had never been their obligation.
The men in protective suits were crouched on the deck as they carefully collected something.
Luke knew what they were looking for: the unknown red liquid.
This thing had drawn the hostiles into hijacking the s.h.i.+p and the special force in an all-out attack, and had even drawn a mutant giant octopus in the end; it was the key to the whole thing.
As a professional, Flegg had noticed this key point right away.
The men in protective suits were being very careful as they searched for the red liquid scattered over the deck. They divided the area into grids and slowly searched from the outside in, and didn’t miss anything suspicious at all.
As a result, they couldn’t move quickly.
Even after the giant tentacle had been cut up, packed and loaded onto the seaplane, they were still scouring the deck.
Suddenly, there was a voice from Flegg’s walkie-talkie. “Captain, two planes are coming.”
Since the agents were letting Flegg know, that meant that the two planes were already low in the sky.
Luke could already hear the noise.
Two ma.s.sive planes rumbled as they slowed down on their approach to the s.h.i.+p.
The rear sections were already down, and several shadows that weren’t small in size were dropped.
Luke glanced at Flegg. “It looks like you’re outnumbered.”
Flegg was silent.
Those were C5 Galaxy carriers, air behemoths that could carry three hundred soldiers at a time.