Chapter 79: The Great Mango Farm Explosion

TL: LittlePeach

This whole business ultimately started with the Italian Mafia, the Carlo Family, buying up laborers to work the Mango Farm.

Why a mango farm, of all things?

Common sense says you can cook meth anywhere, so there's no particular reason to bother running a whole mango farm for it.

'If you're shipping the product to Australia, though, that changes everything.'

Just tossing the drugs into an ordinary distribution channel would never get you past Australian customs quarantine, famously the most exacting in the world.

So they had to disguise it as a legitimate export and ride a legal route.

In which case the mangoes served as both a smokescreen and packing filler for shipping the drugs.

'Southeast Asia means mango, mango means Southeast Asia.'

The smuggling methods that popped into my head alone were practically endless.

Harvest the mangoes in Cambodia, dry them or process them into purée, and hide the drugs inside the boxes or packaging.

Southeast Asia is crawling with mango processing plants, so how on earth would anyone crack open thousands of shipments one by one?

And if the drugs did get flagged en route, you'd just run them through a specialist firm in Malaysia or the Philippines, where quarantine is as lax as Cambodia's, repackage them, and try again.

Even that modest amount of effort is enough to slip past the initial sweep of Australia's customs officers, who are overworked enough as it is.

And on the off chance a drug-sniffing dog wagged its tail in front of a box, if cracking the packaging open just revealed a case of sweet dried mangoes, the officers' guard would inevitably drop a notch.

That's exactly why the Carlo Family had every reason to run this Mango Farm as a serious operation.

'It's pretty huge.'

Maybe that was why.

The Mango Farm laid out before me was bigger than I'd imagined.

Right in the middle of the farm stood a massive factory-style structure for washing and sorting the freshly picked mangoes, and around it sat countless trucks for loading the fruit.

Beyond that, tens of thousands of mango trees were packed in neat, even rows across a plain so vast the far edge was out of sight.

The sweet mango scent drifting past the tip of my nose. Slurp.

My mouth watered before I could stop it.

'The laborers' quarters are over there, the guards' quarters over that way.'

Since the Mango Farm was so vast, the guards weren't just wandering around on foot.

They each rode a scooter, tearing around inside the farm.

Just then, two guards on scooters pulled in tight on either side of the Bongo van I was driving.

"Hey! Stop the vehicle!"

"Slow down right now!"

They screamed at the top of their lungs and kicked at the side of the Bongo van.

Italian, thick with a southern accent.

One of my teammates back when I worked at the PMC had been Italian, so my ear was used to it.

"La-di-da."

But I had no intention whatsoever of slowing down.

If anything, I wrenched the wheel toward the guards' quarters and jammed the accelerator to the floor.

"Fuck!"

One of the guards swung the rifle slung over his shoulder around toward the driver's seat.

So I calmly drew the pistol from inside my jacket and thrust it out the window.

Bang, bang!

"Gaah!"

A bullet must have lodged in his shoulder, because his body twisted.

The scooter tipped and clattered over, crashing down on top of its owner, and with the sound of bones breaking he stopped moving for good.

"Intruder! Intruder! All personnel arm up and rally!"

The remaining guard on the other side gunned his scooter and frantically called it in over the radio.

A quick glance in the rearview mirror showed him closing in tight behind the Bongo van, taking aim.

He was going for the rear tires, no doubt.

Screeeech!

I stomped the brakes at once.

Crash!

"Ngg!"

Unable to check his own speed, he plowed his scooter straight into the back of the Bongo van.

No need to get out and check on him. I threw it into reverse and hit the gas.

Crrrunch!

"Aaaaargh!"

After shifting gears and rolling the van back and forth three or four times, the screaming quickly stopped.

Having leisurely disposed of the two of them, I hit the accelerator again and headed for my destination.

Vrooom!

"La-di-da."

I'd only ever driven pickup trucks before, so I hadn't realized it, but there was no vehicle better for hauling cargo than a Bongo van.

Made sense, too. Who'd have thought it could fit a whole twenty gas cylinders?

And since I had a new spectator named Frank, I put on a bit more of a show than usual.

Vrooooom!

"It is a little slow, though."

The thing was, even flooring the accelerator, it wouldn't pick up speed the way I wanted.

Maybe because it was such a round, chubby little thing, it waddled along, its suspension in absolutely dreadful shape.

But hey, as long as it rolls, that's all that matters, right?

"Block it! Block the vehicle!"

"Open fire!"

Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat!

You can wring a rooster's neck, but dawn comes all the same.

Let the mobsters who came swarming fire their rifles, let them spray their machine guns.

I paid them no mind and rammed the nose of the Bongo van straight into the front of their quarters.

Crash!

Crunch-crumble!

Short on speed, the chassis buried itself only halfway into the building's wall before stopping.

"Aaaargh!"

"Oh."

As I poked my head out for a peek, I locked eyes with a mobster who happened to be sprawled on a sofa inside the building.

Startled by the Bongo van that had crashed halfway through the wall, he shrieked and leapt to his feet.

"Wow. You guys really decorate the place nicely, huh?"

I sat in the driver's seat admiring their interior design, and from behind me a deafening hail of bullets came pouring in.

Ping, pi-ting!

Hisssss!

Thanks to the boys kindly firing into the back of my head, gas started leaking from the cylinders where the holes had just been punched.

Saved me the trouble of cranking the valves open myself.

"Alley-oop."

I pulled a grenade out of my pocket.

The very same one I'd started to use back at the wenchi compound before thinking better of it and slotting the safety pin back in.

Ping, clink!

This time, of course, I made sure the fuze was good and armed.

The trembling, quivering thrill of the instant before detonation traveled right through my grip.

It spoke to me.

'Hae-chan. Do I not have to hold back this time?'

'That's right.'

The mobster who'd been blankly watching me do all this had a dazed look in his eyes.

"What's the matter? Like you've never seen a grenade before."

"Uh, uh?"

When I greeted him lightly in Italian, his eyes went wide.

Along with the noisy hiss of leaking gas behind me, I heard the voices of guards frantically swarming in at my back.

"You son of a bitch! Get out of the vehicle right now!"

"He'd have been shot full of holes and croaked already. Check the face first!"

"Ah, fuck! What the hell is even going on here?"

The presence of his fellow guards pouring in one after another.

The face of the man slumped on the sofa turned ashen.

He screamed, but the timing was already far too late.

"R-run! This bastard, he's, he's out of his goddamn mind, he wants to die!"

"What?"

"R-right now this lunatic's got a grena-"

I didn't wait to hear the rest of what he said.

Kaboom!

Starting with the roar of the grenade, the gas cylinders packed tight into the passenger seat, the back seats, and the trunk got caught up one after another in the shrapnel, triggering a chain reaction.

Wooooom.

As if all the space and time in the world were being wiped out, everything around me seemed to bleach white.

'Nice and toasty.'

Like being inside the sun.

I really did love the scenery inside an explosion.

*****

The first thing to reach the eye was the enormous flame staining the whole view red.

An instant later, KABOOM!

A colossal roar that set the skin trembling shook the entire world.

The moment the sound and shockwave, slower than light, reached the secluded hilltop far off in the distance, the parked vehicle began to rattle.

Turning his eyes dazedly toward it, he saw a pillar of flame had risen where the Mango Farm's guard quarters used to be.

"...."

Frank, ASIS Narcotics Team 3 leader.

He just stared at the sight, utterly dumbstruck.

Making a mockery of all the tension he'd felt when the operation began, it was a scene that left every muscle in his body going slack.

That was when it happened.

"Let's move in."

"Yes. Advancing now."

Two agents of the Cambodia dispatch squad exchanged words in leisurely voices.

Without a moment's hesitation, they started the car and hit the gas.

Vrooom.

Frank, aghast at the two men's utter composure, thrust his body forward.

"W-wait.... You saw that, and this is what you're talking about right now?"

"Sorry? What is?"

"Your own teammate might have just been caught in that explosion and killed!"

At this preposterous scene, Frank found himself wanting to appeal to someone, anyone.

Even when they'd asked to borrow the Bongo van, he'd had no idea what it meant, and who could have guessed they were planning a suicide attack, loading that much explosive into the vehicle!

And yet these two agents, far from grieving their fallen comrade's sacrifice, were only trying to move on to the next step in the process!

'These psychopaths!'

The two agents, puzzled by Frank's reaction, glanced at each other.

"That's.... well, our team leader probably didn't die. This is the third time now, and if we jumped at every little thing like this, we couldn't do our jobs properly."

"Right. And even if he had passed, well.... honestly, would that be so strange? An explosion that size?"

"...What?"

Owl No. 11 in the passenger seat gave a leisurely shrug.

So did Crane No. 22 in the driver's seat.

Even Frank, who'd spent nearly his whole life going up against the Mafia and drug rings, couldn't wrap his head around their reaction.

"We just need to do our own job well."

"Exactly. If we handle our part properly, he'll come strolling up to join us like nothing happened."

Whether Frank was horrified or not, the dispatch squad agents leisurely drove the car toward the Mango Farm laborers' quarters.

The mission they'd been assigned was simple.

While the Team 5 leader set off an explosion to draw the guards' attention, they were to swiftly subdue the three guards stationed at the laborers' quarters and rescue the hostages.

"Whew. Let's focus."

"Yes. Don't you worry about me."

"No, I was talking to myself."

"...."

Fully armed with the rifles and body armor Frank had provided, the two agents shifted into operation mode with grim expressions.

The car threw up a cloud of dust and slid to a stop near the laborers' quarters.

"Over here, over here!"

"...Huh?"

"Huh? Hey, Sparrow, you little punk!"

"Welcome, sunbaes!"

Sparrow No. 10, an automatic rifle tucked under his arm, was waving both hands and cheerfully greeting the agents who'd just come storming in.

In the open lot in front of the quarters, the Mango Farm laborers were clustered aboard a minibus with its engine already running.

They were watching the aftermath of the explosion billow up, terrified.

"You little, hey! What the hell are you doing here?"

"I, I was infiltrating this place? Weren't you coming to rescue me?"

"Whaat?"

At the sight of his two flabbergasted sunbaes, Sparrow No. 10 just blinked, bewildered.

Coming to rescue him was technically true.

"No, when you contacted us, all you said was that some blonde bombshell had picked you up?"

"...Ah! Right. I did say that, didn't I?"

"Yeah! So we all thought you'd obviously been kidnapped!"

"That was, well, I started off bragging to mess with you two, and then I just clean forgot to mention I was going to infiltrate the place...."

"...."

"B-but I knew for sure you'd come to rescue me, I swear!"

Sparrow No. 10 gave an awkward laugh and scratched his cheek.

At such a shamelessly nonchalant excuse, the two agents burst out with an incredulous laugh.

"And how'd you know when we'd show up?"

"Right. No radio, and you're evacuating everybody with perfect timing?"

"No, I mean.... the guard quarters suddenly went boom, so I figured the Team 5 leader had arrived."

"Ah, hmm."

"Fair enough...."

Owl No. 11 and Crane No. 22 nodded at the same time.

It was a reason they couldn't argue with.

"So I brained one panicking guard in the back of the head with a rock, then dropped the other two with my rifle. After that I evacuated the laborers straight onto the minibus. Figured you sunbaes would be heading this way any minute now."

"Well, would you look at that...."

At the sight of Sparrow No. 10 proudly recounting his own war story, the two sunbaes wore looks of deep emotion.

They say even a dog at a village school will recite poetry after three years.

To think the baby of the group, who they'd assumed would be trembling and sniveling in some corner of the farm, had grown up this much.

The days they'd spent gluing him to the Team 5 leader's side like a shadow had paid off.

"You little.... just know I'm letting it slide this one time only because you handled the cleanup well here."

"Heh heh."

And from the back seat of the vehicle, Frank, who couldn't even bring himself to climb out, was staring blankly at the whole scene.

At the warm, wholesome mood they were staging, he felt his sense of reality coming apart at the seams.

"Dear God...."

When he'd heard the story about them blowing up the Irobuchi-kai, he'd assumed it was an exaggeration, but it hadn't been an exaggeration at all.

Before the actual rescue operation had even begun, the mobster guards were all sprawled out, the hostages had rescued themselves, and the agents were exchanging friendly little pleasantries with the aftermath of the explosion at their backs.

He had never in his life heard of a team that committed this kind of lunacy as easily as breathing.

'Four East Asians, so naturally I assumed they were with South Korea's NIS.... could they be something higher up?'

The misunderstanding was only deepening further and further.