America: The Cremator

Elena's attention was immediately drawn to this question, and she quickly stepped forward: "Where did you find the clue?"

Sulong handed the letter to Elena, pointing to the address on it.

"915 Dongsong Street, Century Ballroom. My source told me that you can buy the purest 'Dream' on the market there."

"We can go there and buy some samples, then give them to Professor Stella. Perhaps we can reverse engineer the formula and source of contamination for this drug."

Elena took the letter and looked at the address on it, her brows gradually furrowing.

"This intelligence came at just the right time."

"The Apache's machine guns were so powerful last time that they blew the signal tower and the sniper team on it into pieces."

"FDRF's cleanup team only found some fragments of glass medicine bottles at the scene; they couldn't collect any complete medicine residues for testing."

As she spoke, her tone suddenly turned serious: "However, the Century Ballroom is a big problem."

"That is the largest gang stronghold in the South Side of Seattle, where the interests of various forces are intertwined, and the internal security is extremely tight."

"We cannot rashly send a task force there to conduct a forced search; if it triggers a large-scale firefight, it could escalate into a serious street riot."

As Su Long watched Elena analyze the situation intently, a teasing smile crept onto his lips.

"It's rare to see you think about things so calmly. I thought you would just send a Bradley tank over and blast the gate open."

Elena looked up and glared at him, her bright blue eyes carrying a warning.

"What do you take me for? A manic-depressive patient who only knows how to pull the trigger?"

Su Long spread his hands, making a gesture of surrender.

"Since we can't lead the team to force our way in, we'll have to resort to infiltration."

"I'll go there tomorrow night, pretend to be a buyer, and bring back some samples."

Elena immediately shook her head and rejected the suggestion.

"No, you can't go alone."

She leaned back on the sofa and explained to Su Long: "Century Ballroom is a chaotic place that focuses on one-night stands and late-night dating. It's full of drug addicts who are overdosing, prostitutes who sell their bodies, and gang members who are looking for thrills."

Elena looked Su Long up and down, her gaze lingering on his handsome face with distinctly Asian features for two seconds.

"A young and healthy Asian face like yours will be very popular there. If you don't want to be bothered by a bunch of women with all sorts of illnesses, you'd better bring a female companion who can go along with you."

Surong looked at Elena, raised an eyebrow, and asked, "What, do you want to be my date?"

Elena decisively rejected the suggestion: "I definitely can't. My identity is too obvious. Those gang spies could easily recognize me, and it would arouse their suspicion."

She paused for a moment, quickly searching through suitable candidates in her mind, before saying, "However, I have a suitable candidate."

"Hannah".

……

The following day, in the evening.

Seattle, Federal Building Annex.

Inside the makeshift preparation room at the headquarters of the Federal Bureau of Oddity Support, Sulong, wearing a black waterproof apron around his neck, sat upright in front of a vanity mirror.

Elena stood behind him, holding an electric hair clipper in her hand, the blades emitting a continuous, monotonous buzzing sound.

As she moved her wrist, clumps of black hair slid down Sulong's shoulders and piled up on the gray terrazzo floor.

Looking at his increasingly shorter hair in the mirror, Su Long asked, "Can't we just keep this hair?"

Elena didn't stop what she was doing. The clippers slid close to Su Long's scalp as she calmly asked, "Do you think your neat, tidy Asian youth appearance fits the social norms of the Capitol Hill red-light district?"

"The guys at the Century Ballroom are extremely wary of strangers. Any quality that doesn't fit into that chaotic environment will give you away."

She turned off the clippers and gently ran her hand along the contours of Su Long's cheek.

"Don't worry, Su. You're in much better shape than when we first met, and you look a lot more handsome too. A buzz cut won't look bad on you."

After shaving Su Long's head completely into a buzz cut close to his scalp, Elena picked up a can of yellow quick-drying hair dye spray with a pungent smell and sprayed it evenly onto Su Long's hair, turning his short buzz cut into a golden yellow.

Immediately afterwards, she picked up an oversized, imitation gold necklace and fastened it around Su Long's neck.

Su Long stood up, untied his apron, and looked at himself in the mirror. His short, yellow hair, rough gold chain, loose hoodie with exaggerated graffiti, and ripped jeans with severe holes at the knees gave him the look of an unemployed young man on the streets of Seattle.

The metal door to the preparation room was pushed open, accompanied by the crisp sound of metal ornaments clinking together, and a female clerk led Hannah, who had changed her clothes, into the room.

"Captain, it's done."

The two turned their heads and saw that Hannah was wearing heavy black lip gloss and exaggerated black eyeshadow, with seven or eight cheap metal earrings of different shapes hanging on her ears.

She wore a tight-fitting black cropped tank top that revealed a slender, smooth waist, and a frayed denim mini skirt that just covered the top of her thighs. Her arms were covered with colorful and grotesque temporary tattoos.

Hannah glanced down at her outfit, fidgeting with her clothes somewhat awkwardly, and hesitated, "Captain Elena, do I really have to dress like this?"

Elena held up her index finger and said confidently, "Excellent, this is exactly the street style we need."

After saying that, she turned around and took out two transparent silicone film products from a sterile plastic box on the table: "Su, open your mouth."

Sulong opened his mouth, and Elena precisely wedged one of the membranes between his left alveolar bone and cheek muscle.

"This is a storage film for temporarily storing prohibited drugs. If gang members in the dance hall force you to swallow pills in front of them, hide the pills in this film and take them out or spit them out when you have the chance."

She used the same technique to put another membrane on Hannah, then stepped back two paces, her gaze sweeping over the two of them as she began to make the final confirmation of the task.

"Su Long, your core mission is to enter the dance hall and purchase a physical sample of 'Dream.' All expenses incurred during this process will be fully reimbursed by the bureau."

"Hannah, your task is to provide cover for Suron. You two must act like a downtrodden couple who have been hanging around on the streets for a long time. Remember, loosen up a bit, act even more unconventional."

Hannah took a deep breath and nodded reluctantly: "I'll try my best."

……

At 10 p.m., the streets of South Seattle were shrouded in the thick darkness and thin fog.

A tremendous roar echoed through the street as Su Long drove a second-hand Yamaha motorcycle with a crudely modified exhaust pipe, carrying Hannah across the potholes filled with puddles and garbage, finally stopping in front of the building at 915 East Pine Street.

The two dismounted from their motorcycles and looked toward their target location.

The building has almost no exterior decoration; the peeling concrete walls are covered with messy gangster graffiti, there are no flashing neon lights, and not even a decent sign that could identify the Century Ballroom.

The huge corrugated steel roller shutter door on the first floor of the building was half-open, and two burly black men stood in front of it. They were wearing black windproof jackets, and the black grips of Glock pistols were faintly visible beneath the hems of their jackets. Their eyes warily scanned every pedestrian passing by in the area.

Surong adjusted his breathing, reached out his right hand, and naturally put his arm around Hannah's slender waist exposed to the air, leading her towards the two guards while chatting and laughing.

He stopped a step away from the two of them, slightly raised his chin, and spoke in a tone that was both casual and provocative.

"Hey, you two, let's go in and have a drink."

One of the black guards glanced at the two men and slowly said, "Search them."

"That's the rule, you know."

Without waiting for Su Long's consent, he reached out and roughly slapped Su Long's torso, waist, and outer thighs.

After confirming that Su Long was not carrying any knives or guns, the man withdrew his hand, turned his massive body to the side, and the other man pulled the huge roller shutter door down to a height that required bending over to enter.

"Go in."

"Watch your eyes, and watch your hands."

The moment you step inside, a wave of heat, a mixture of cheap alcohol, leaf smoke, and a strong smell of sweat hits you.

The music was jarring, the lights were dazzling, and the dance floor was filled with young men and women, headbanging and dressed provocatively.

A woman dressed in provocative clothing is performing a pole dance on a high platform.

A very obvious beam of light swept through the dark crowd, and wherever the beam stopped, the men and women who were touched immediately and without hesitation began to kiss passionately.

There were even male-male and female-female pairings.

Suddenly, the overhead lights shifted, and a massive beam of light shone directly on Suron and Hannah, who had just entered the dance floor. The emcee's exaggerated voice rang out:

"Oh ho ho, look at them, what a beautiful young couple!"

"Another lucky couple has been touched by our Cupid's rays. As is customary—let's have a passionate kiss!"