C1- Manaus

An ocean of green was extending as far as the eyes could see, filling every porthole on one of the many planes that landed in and out of the international airport every day. The city of Manaus was a metropolis and the capital of the Brazilian state of Amazonas, at the heart of the tropical rainforest. Despite its two millions of inhabitants, the city was ensnared by the rainforest, which encroached onto the suburbs, its giant trees looming over the dwellings and bringing with them shade, heat and humidity.

Fittingly, Manaus was also an isolated city, to which no highway led and only by air or by the rivers could one enter, or, inversely, leave. In such a location, it was no surprise it was just as ripe with crime and violence as the rest of Brazil; it was the perfect place to be for someone who wanted to be away from everything, yet keep access to the convenience of a large city.

While it was fairly hot, a lone figure among the tightly packed arrivals wore a long, hooded coat which would have seemed more fit for significantly colder climates. The forecast predicted downpour later that day, however, so no one truly heeded it any mind. What was one person's eccentricities in the frantic world of the current year, with its fast pace, and inwards closure? It was nothing anyone else would have the time nor energy to care about, such was definitely a certitude. For the operative, this certainly was a fortunate state of the world, as it made her job that much easier.

"Although we've been able to take a number of prisoners, our knowledge has barely advanced at all. They seem to be animated by an extremely sturdy sense of loyalty and kinship to one another, and some seem like they would sooner lay down their lives than to betray it. I think we're using the wrong method. If we really want to learn, and learn something substantial, we should try to do so from the inside this time. It's the only way to get them to lower their defenses and to open up."

The words echoed in her head; words she had herself pronounced to convince an alien cat to allow her to attempt a rather dangerous, high stakes mission in which she deeply believed in and, just perhaps, had ulterior motives of her own about. First and foremost, she was at the service of the truth, after all...

Much of the preliminary ground work had already been done and the operative had to meet with a contact going by the name - code or otherwise - of 'Cruz'. The meeting was to be done at a modest bar on the outer part of West Manaus, far away from the towering skyscrapers and luxury of the central hub of the city. Because of its size, another commute of roughly three quarters of an hour was necessary to get from the Eduardo terminal to the specific district in the west. By the time she stepped off the bus, coat and hood still on despite the heat and a backpack for all possessions, the odd girl still hadn't drawn many stares, as if people just seemed to instinctively want to avoid her.

The streets around her at the bus stop were withered. All of the houses had one day been of a uniform, pristine pre-fabricated white, but by now, poor conditions and lack of maintenance had made most of them grow gray, brown, or some other mixture of dirt and dust. The rooftops were a mismatch of black and red-orange tiles, disparate, and with no rhyme or reason to their presence. The buildings were clustered together, tightly packed on both sides of the dried out asphalt, and beyond them, the impossibly dense and thick green wall of the Amazonian rainforest blocked everything, with even its most nearby trees easily 10 to 20 meters high.

The bar, whose name in a local dialect was lost on the operative who had no real knowledge of the subtleties of Portuguese,  was just about as rundown as everything else around it, on the outside at least.  Upon entering, it revealed to be at least decently accommodated, with somewhat old furniture and a stereotypical look, the kind which made it look like almost indistinguishable from all other bars. This unremarkableness was its own benefit, however, as for a city full of people with less than righteous intents, locations that easily vanished from everyone's mind and never stood out were ideal.

Lighting was dim, but sufficient, and the jukebox played a rather mellow song of folk inspiration with a good amount of traditional instruments such as Ilù drums and reed flutes mixed with more modern guitars. Two singers, a man and a woman, alternated in taking the lead vocals from one stanza to another. The small group at the nearest pool table glanced over to the door when it opened, but quickly discarded the thought as they returned to their game without addressing a word to the girl in the coat.

The feeling was mutual, and she proceeded inside, neither desiring to poke their nose in the other's business. There was much to be done already, anyway, so she scanned the room with piercing violet eyes, looking for someone who matched the description she was given. Soon enough, there it was, at the counter and over on the left side, relaxing with the seat turned over: short brown hair of a very light, bleached-like shade, red eyes, gray-black jeans short, and a matching sleeveless top that covered the neck but left much of the midriff exposed.

The hooded operative took a seat next to the girl fitting the description she was given and ordered some rum in English. The red-eyed one glanced to her and let out a casual "Nice weather, huh?" Also in English, although with an accent. The most common icebreaker in the world, but there was purpose to it.

"Nah, it's getting cloudy." The hooded one responded in a detached tone as she awaited her drink. Outside of the bar, the skies were clear and sunny, so one might be wondering just what exactly she was talking about.  Of course, the answer was: not the weather.

"Sure is." The red-eyed one continued, leaning closer with a slightly increased interest. "But what can we do about it?" She shrugged with a tone and expression of bored resignation.

"Life goes on, we can't stop just because things get ugly." The hooded one concluded with a small nod, and with it, the last part of the code they were both given by the intermediary was acknowledged.

The more lightly clothed girl shifted her position, turning back around to face the counter, and extended a hand for the other to take. "Rebeca Cruz, I'm from Manaus, you?"

The slightly taller girl took the offered hand with a firm grip, which was soon reciprocated, and offered a wide grin under her hood. "Brandt, Liese Brandt. I'm from Aachen, in Germany." A few seconds later she released her grip and a glass was put down in front of her, filled with a golden-brown liquid. The bottle nearby had the name of the mythical golden city El Dorado and the picture of a caravel sailing in troubled waters.

"Pretty far away from home are you?" Rebecca mused in a casual tone as she leaned back, soon adding to her words. "Not that I blame you, it's not that rare for people who want to get away from everything to come to Brazil."

"It's not my first time abroad." Liese responded with a shrug as she took a sip from her glass. The brew had a relatively mild taste, with subtle spices for a dark rum blend; present, but not overpowering. "Besides, I'm from a mixed family, my Grand'pa was all the way across Europe, from Russia."

"Russia eh?" Rebeca shifted, looking out of the nearest window at that before continuing a bit wistfully. "That's pretty exotic. I've never actually seen snow, it doesn't get anywhere near cold enough in Brazil for there to be any."

"I can imagine, it's pretty damn hot here." The German added, taking another, longer gulp of the fortunately ice-cold liquor in front of her with a small, relieved sigh.

"You're not exactly helping yourself you know, with that coat and all." Cruz pointed to the obvious with a circular hand gesture that encompassed the whole outfit, before pressing on with a tone of genuine disbelief. "Why are you even wearing that? It's over 30 degrees here, girl."

Brandt could only shrug and give an apologetic smile under her hood. "I kind of stand out. A lot, that's why it's better this way, even if it's kinda painful..."

Rebeca rose a skeptical eyebrow and tilted her head, peering more sharply as if she was trying to see through the garments and figure out the other girl's secret. "I hope that won't get in the way. At least it'll be easy to justify on days with heavy rain." She sighed and leaned back.

Liese shook her head, but also let out a small sigh as well. "It shouldn't. I still need to catch up on things, so I'm not too sure what to expect." She concluded with a smaller sip, already half-way through the glass, before inquiring a bit further in a subtle manner. Her briefing only went as far as making contact, from this point onwards, everything that happened was off the rails.

"Nothing too wild, honestly, it's pretty standard business. We just need some more hands because the place is getting rowdier these days." Cruz gave an evasive explanation, saying some without actually stating anything concrete in an explicit manner. It was expected, however, so the German girl didn't mind. Even though this bar was a remote, secluded location, there were still 'civies' around, and that meant that anything too specific was classified for the time being.

It would of course have been more practical to discuss this in a secure location, but this would have been going too fast in business. More than anything else, Rebeca's task here was not to simply make contact, but rather to screen and judge. She needed to get a decent appreciation for the candidate's character and motivation as to avoid nasty surprises, and to weed out possibly troublesome individuals. As such, she couldn't quite trust the other with the knowledge of one of their hidden locations. Although no such words were exchanged, Liese could also understand this, so she did not push or press, giving her host the time she needed as to avoid looking like she was in a hurry. She sure was not, after all...

"Standard business' probably a lot different here than from where I come from; different people, different cultures, and all that stuff, you know?" Liese hazarded, rubbing the back of her head through the cloth before giving a wide grin. "But it sounds pretty interesting, so I look forward to hearing more about it."

"How'd you even end up here in Manaus though?" Cruz shifted the topic to another of equal interest to herself. "You're probably not from.. California." She hesitated slightly as she caught herself in time not to bring up the name of the 8th, nor the specific city Eightball's headquarters were located in. "So it's a long way off."

"I like to challenge myself." The purple-eyed half-German responded with a confident voice and a short nod. "Plus, you said it yourself, Brazil is nothing like Russia, so it's a nice change of pace." She leaned forward and took a jesting tone and expression before making fun of her own origin. "How do you even get around without dogsleds? hahahahah."

The red-eyed native blinked twice and was left somewhat speechless at the mental picture of big huskies attempting to pull a sled through the thick undergrowth of the tropical rainforest and couldn't but to laugh at well at the sheer silliness of it all. "Ok, ok, good one." She rose both hands in surrender as she settled down.

"Plus, this place is pretty isolated, so it's nice to get away from everything, cut off from the outside world, you know?" Brandt continued after shifting back to a normal, upstraight position, and with a more casual tone of voice.

That second answer, however, didn't seem to please the Brazilian girl nearly as much and her eyes narrowed ever so slightly. "If you're on the run from trouble, I hope you won't get us caught in it. We already have enough to deal with as is." She spoke a fairly stern warning, red eyes staring straight into purple ones through the darkness of the hood.

"Ah, don't worry!" Brandt waved off the concern with a wide, dismissive hand gesture. "No one's after my head, yet at least." Or as far as she knew, but that wasn't an unknown she felt the need to share. "If any scheisse stirs up, it'll be local one, and then you'll be glad you have me around, trust me." She assured confidently once more, with one of these wide, warm grins she was so known for and which were difficult not to find endearing.

Before Rebeca could respond, however, the sound of said local trouble rose up in the form of police sirens. Some among the bar's patrons became visibly nervous, looking out to see where they were headed, or just trying to keep a low profile, but others just ignored it entirely as it was relatively normal of an event and they had nothing to hide nor to be concerned about.

The vehicles made an abrupt stop and the sound of slamming doors and yelling in Portuguese could still be heard over the jukebox, which one of the patrons lowered the volume of before looking out of one of the bar's windows. More yelling ensued outside, and hushed whispers followed inside, signaling that things were likely about to degenerate.

"Hell, speak of the devils, you're sure they're not following you?" Rebeca eventually broke the short and uneasy silence with a joking comment, herself appearing to not be bothered or worried in any way. It looked like she was in the camp of those with nothing to hide, but Liese certainly knew better and was able to appraise  that the Brazilian girl just had either a strong lethargy about it all, or was just that confident in not getting caught.

"Pretty sure they aren't, but now I'm kind of curious about what's going on out there." Brandt admitted shamelessly with a small hand gesture pointing back, behind herself and to the door. "I mean that was pretty fast.." Barely here for an hour and a half, and already some havoc was going on, fast indeed.

"Knock yourself out pal, I'm not going anywhere, so I'll wait for 'ya." Cruz noted with a nod and a smaller smile, giving her blessing.

At this, Liese stood up, taking the neglected glass of rum and downing the remainders of its content before heading over to the window, around which a few more curious patrons had also gathered. No later had she reached the window that the sound of gunshots arose, which her trained ears could identify as a mixture of service handguns, a few semi-automatic weapons, and the single low thud of a crowd control short-barrelled shotgun.

Trying to get a visual, she soon found the source. Four white and red police cars with flashing lights were parked in an half-circle around one of the houses further down the road. It was perfectly non-descript and would probably be impossible to tell apart from the others unless you knew the exact address. Most of the policemen had already gone inside but two were left outside to keep watch, pistols at the ready. It soon became obvious why as some of the locals started to gather and appeared to be hostile, shouting and raising fists in threatening or insulting manners. A young man threw a rock at the nearest car, but was frightened away when the officer stepped in his direction, gun aimed, and the man fled.

Soon, the firefight had died down and officers were starting to come out with what appeared to be contraband firearms of some sort, no doubt part of a larger black market to supply the local gangs. If there was one thing Liese had heard about Brazil before coming here, it was the fierceness of the gang violence and the strength of their presence. Soon enough, the crowd that had gathered was broken down with the return of the other officers and the confiscated weapons were loaded in the back of the patrol cars. She had seen enough.

"Welcome to Manaus, girl. This is our lovely town, get used to it." Rebeca stated with a wide gesture towards the window and chuckled as Liese walked back to the counter. "No really, it kind of never stops." She continued with a somewhat more somber tone, but she still seemed to give a rather small amount of shits about it all

"Lovely indeed." Brandt noted with a tiny amount of sarcasm before making a small guess. "This is why you needed extra hands?" She did not appear disturbed either, which Cruz noted mentally.

"Partially, but there's a lot more to it." The darker-skinned Brazilian shook her head before standing up as well. "But this isn't the place for it." She delivered a small smile, much more modest than the half-German's grins. "You seem alright enough to me, so I'll introduce you to the others."

Brandt quickly paid the bill for the liquor and caught up with her host as the later made her way out of the bar. "Sounds good to me, I'll be happy to be able to get this thing off me." She nudged towards her coat slightly.

Cruz crossed the door with a sure step, checking around for any other sign of brewing trouble before heading off in the opposite direction of the commotion. Brandt was quick to follow and glanced around as she did, trying to find any form of memorable landmarks to help her navigate the large city. Unfortunately, this part of Western Manaus was mostly empty of anything but low-rung housings as far as the eyes could see.

Eventually, the pair found their way into an even more neglected-looking part of the neighborhood and turned to an alley between the usually tightly-packed rows of houses. This path was barely beaten dirt and led... "Woah, really? Out into the jungle?" The purple-eyed German exclaimed with a mixture of amazement and skepticism.

"Yuuup, I hope you don't mind the big cats and snakes." Rebecca jested with a snicker, but common sense dictated that those animals really did inhabit the rainforest and that it was to be taken seriously.

"Ah, don't worry, I got some experience with -that- too." Liese dismissed with another hand gesture and wide grin. So started yet another journey.