Spy World Backlash

This is all true.

I sent a girl on a treasure hunt once.

More of a spy game actually.

Having liked this young lady for a long while I attempted the grand plan.

The first clue was sent along with flowers; kangaroo paws, green spider neon mums and a big orange Gerber daisy. Not wanting my handwriting to give it away I instructed the florist gal to write the Library of Congress number to an Ansel Adams book at the library on the card and the number 7 circled for the hour seven O’clock, they were then delivered to Marshall Fields, where she worked.

I waited and readied myself.

An hour before the scheduled time for me to meet her at the restaurant marked X, I was driving through the underpass by the giant smiley face water tower in the middle of town, on the very main road, when I saw the Pepsi cup.

“Oh-oh”, I thought, “that’s not good” and turned the car around.

On the ledge overlooking the underpass, the cup sat.

Had it been moved? Is that where I left it? I parked the car, got out and walked over to it.

Sure enough, the key was still inside; so I took it out and hid the cup; as near as one needs hide an empty soda cup weighted with stones. I walked back to my car and drove home, my mind racing as to what to do. The key was to a locker at the mall where the clues sat, readied for action; “No problem, I’ll just go back out and update the clues to set the plan in motion again” I thought to myself.

Since it was a calm September evening I decided to ride my bike back across town to the mall. A good 6 miles round-trip but I love bikes so it was an easy ride.

Rounding the last corner of the mall, I was startled to come across none other than she sitting outside of the employee entrance smoking a cigarette in her white work jacket. She didn’t see me as I silently glided past on my bike while she stubbed her cigarette out with her foot. I was on a spy mission, get to the locker and update the clues.

Parking my bike, I went inside and made my way towards the locker. I opened it to find a slip of paper inside instead of the clue I had expected. On the paper it read. “Attention, your property has been removed for your safety; please contact mall security to reclaim it”. The complications were arising.

Not wanting to be seen as her work station afforded a good view of the mall; I went outside and skirted the mall to the next entrance over to search for security.

With no luck at finding one by just looking around, I contacted the mall office and had one paged. When the officer arrived he informed me that my contents were locked up and I would need to return during the day shift to reclaim my property.

Damn and drat, double drat, “I work at 7:00am” I thought as I walked my way back around the mall. I got my bike and rode home.

At noon the next day, I told the boss that I needed some extra time to go and get flowers and go to the mall, he agreed.

I decided that the reason she may not have figured out the clue was that I had the gal write the LOC number all in one row. It looked like a web site address, not a book.

Letters and numbers .(dot) more letters and numbers.

I made a quick stop at the florist for more flowers; on the card, a drawing of a book with the LOC numbers on it, estimated time of delivery to her…1:30-2:00 o’clock.

Now just over to mall security to pick up the clues, and update them. Then put them back in the locker and hustle back to work.

I made my way to the mall security office and went inside. There I see a big ol’ security guard, towering, bald and imposing, talking on the phone. So, to bide my bide I just pretend to study an aerial photo of town, taken, no doubt, from thousands of feet up in the atmosphere by an uncertified pilot for the purposes of nefarious activities. After waiting for an indeterminable period of time he shoots me a perturbed look and hangs up the phone, I present my claim voucher with a smile and a mind full of innocuous thoughts.

For some odd reason he asks for my ID. I hesitate, yet oblige.

As he writes my name on the voucher he tells me that my property has been turned over to the police department because of what appears to be a small handgun and some other possibly ‘sensitive information’ found within.

I balked, “that’s not a real gun, it’s a toy”, I said. “Still…” he replied, again with the look that he’s foiling an inter-national plot, sinister in design. So I haughtily left the security office and out through the mid-week, mid-afternoon throngs of people, to make my way to the car annoyed that I would have to miss more work.

On the drive over I laughed at the sheer irony of it all.

Upon arrival at the PD, I asked for Detective Long-arm that Mall security mentioned. I was surprised to find that they already knew my name, as they said the words “Wait right there” in a, well, I would have to say that there was indeed a certain ‘tone’ to the way they said it, as though they expect people to just run off from the police station, willy-nilly to flee. As I was being escorted back deep into the heart of the police department to the interrogation room he asked me if I had ever heard of OSI. Other than Oscar Goldman’s offices in the old ‘Six-million dollar man’ TV show…no; I hadn’t.
It turns out…

Since it was a spy-game; I had to include props. The props that I made for the game were a space age ray-gun (hence hereafter known as a “Blast-Plasmalator”) that I fashioned, bolt-by-bolt, out of old bike parts; scrounged and scrapped together into the shape of a small, delicate ladies palm-sized Plasmalator; for protection purposes.

From parts purloined from my personal sized pistol ‘Blast’; hers went together with ease, at least a good 90% bike bits with the handle being the exclusion. I wrapped that with a white leather grip and leash. It was something else, complete with an old toy western style holster. Next locker over, I had made a map of the town with an X at the ‘Riverbend’ restaurant, on the outskirts of town, in the woods, by the river. The mistake I made was putting the items in simple paper bags in the lockers.

A hard card out of a big computer with diodes and circuits, green silicone board with gold connectors was the object of the mission. Protect it at all costs from CHAOS agents and meet with agent “Al” at the rendezvous point.

On the hard-card were some placards from an actual U.S. Air Force missile silo. One said ‘Detector; missile away signal, the other was red and official. . It said “this drawer is classified TOP SECRET; US Air Force, 1971”. I used double-stick tape to secure it, obviously un-official in its hokey-ness. I explained that I found them at a salvage yard, leftovers of the cold war, scrapped missile silos and what not.

That’s who OSI is…Office of Special Investigations from the Air Force base. the PD called the base some 20 miles away to drive in and have a look at it.
So far it’s been mall security, the PD, & now OSI.

The detective laughed and explained that we had to go into the booking room to look up the number for my property but I think it was just to go in the room with all the cameras on the wall to get me on video as per procedure. Oh well, we got the number from the ‘book’ and left, none-the-less.

Proceeding down the stairs deeper into the bowels of the PD, we made our way to the Evidence room where I received my ray-gun and map in plastic bags marked ‘EVIDENCE’. Cool!

They never did let me have that hard card with the cool stickers on them back though, OSI hadn’t driven the twenty miles into town yet to look at my ‘props’.
I had to laugh on the drive back to the mall, this was too good, I had a really good story to share with Veronica when she figured out the clues and met with me. I was stoked.

I updated the clues on the paper bags and returned the props to the lockers.

Tracking down security, I explained that I reset the clues. He reminds me that if she doesn’t get to them that night they would again, be removed. I understood and agreed seeing that there was no way that I could do all this before 7 the next a.m., she would have to go to the security office and pick them up herself; which, by-the-bye, may have ultimately doomed and dashed the secret-agent plan to its inexplicable demise.

Confident I had everything back in place I returned to work at the crack of 2:45 in the afternoon; the boss was peeved…until I pulled out the Evidence bags and told the story, we all had a real good laugh on me. Har-dee-har-har.

Nothing to do now but wait and watch for the Pepsi cup full of rocks and the key to disappear.

And it did.

In case you’re confused about the whole spy-game. Here’s the rundown on it.

I mentioned flowers with a clue to an Ansel Adams book, a book full of beautiful photo’s at the Chester Fritz library on the UND campus
At the library, in the book was a letter, in an envelope. The paper was artificially aged with tea, wrinkled and the edges burned. I purchased a packet of old stamps for $4.99 from an antique store to put a 3c stamp on it. I then went out to the post office to get it canceled with an official stamp. Seems a bit overkill, but the beauty is in the details, right? In it, it said; “if you are reading this than your country needs you, you have been chosen to undertake a highly sensitive mission. You will be issued a space-age ray gun and will need to meet with a secret agent (me) at a designated rendezvous point. Proceed with caution as CHAOS agents are everywhere”, except more and a lot cooler sounding. At the bottom of the page was the number “:17”, circled, for seventeen after the hour. And another LOC# to another book located in another aisle, not far away.

At the next book, there was what looked like a page torn from a book and torn in half. On the front was the drawing of legs of the water-tower with an X on the trunk.. On the back was a fitting poem I found. At the bottom of the page was the number “9” circled, which corresponded with the month of September.

After a short drive to the water tower from UND, she would have found written the words “pick up a Pepsi” upon the water towers trunk. A cryptic clue indeed, until having read that and glancing around she would have noticed the large Pepsi cup sitting on the ledge overlooking Washington Street, as I mentioned earlier.

In the cup was the key.

Racing to the mall with the key in hand and searching the many lockers that flank the exits until the proper number was, at last, located. Once there, she would have simply turned the key to find the space-age ray gun (Blast Plasmalator) in a paper bag with the number “22” circled on it and a key to another locker. The “22” represented the day, September “9” – “22”; which was on a Saturday, the perfect night for espionage, dinner and wine.

In the next locker was a hard-card (not the same one because OSI hadn’t made it to town yet like I mentioned) and another key.

In the third locker was the map. Complete with an X and four big circles for the numbers 7, :17, 9, and 22. The time and date, the confusing clues that foiled things (cursed clues). In hindsight, those should have been much, much clearer.

At the appointed hour, I waited at restaurant X, she never showed. The wait-staff at the restaurant cast a curious eye in my direction, but said nothing. I also saw, but have never told anyone this until now, two deer; a Doe and a Fawn, through the window walking across the lawn down near the river. I watched them as they moved across and out of sight. That was when I rose to leave, sure that she was not to arrive that evening.

Again, I plotted my next move.

A smiley-face balloon arrived Wednesday the 26th, first thing in the morning at her work. It said, “have a nice day” on the card. More flowers around 10-11. More flowers after lunch with the new clue; “22” crossed out and “29” written beside it… the next Saturday.

She never showed that Saturday, or any Saturday since, I made it too complex.

The whole thing became a big confusing mess after that, plus she had a boyfriend who administered a sound thrashing all about my head and shoulders, (seems a broken finger remains askew ever after; weird huh?)) a short while later because of instances and circumstances surrounding the event. Perceived dastardly deeds done by I, no doubt.

There’s more to it see, the mystery deepens and what of her side? A story untold, forever unknown.

Treasure hunts are difficult things to set-up and juggle. Sometimes they don’t go according to plan and it all ends in CHAOS.

Questions and comments: http://www.bmxmosquito@yahoo.com