Island of the Sequined Love Nun

if you will just tell me what it is that you'd like to report."
    "I can't. I have to talk to an agent. I won't be comfortable unless I talk to a real agent."
    She looked offended and her speech became even crisper. "Perhaps you can tell me the nature of the crime."
    Tuck thought for a moment. What did the FBI always handle on television? Al Capone, Klansmen, bank robberies, and… "Kidnapping," he said. "There's been a kidnapping."
    "And who has been kidnapped? Have you filed a missing persons report with the local police?"
    Tuck shook his head and stood his ground. "I'll tell an agent."
    The receptionist picked up the phone and punched a number. She turned away from him and covered her mouth with her hand as she spoke into the mouthpiece. She hung up and said, "There's an agent on his way."
    "Thanks," Tuck said.
    A few minutes later a door opened and a dark-haired guy who looked like a mobile mannequin from a Brooks Brothers window display entered the reception room and extended his hand to Tuck. "Mr. Case, I'm Special Agent Tom Myers. Would you step into my office, please?"
    Tuck shook his hand and followed him through the door and down a hallway of identical ten-by-twelve offices with identical metal desks that displayed identical photos of identical families in identical dime-store frames. Myers motioned for Tuck to sit and took the seat behind the desk.
    "Now, Rose tells me chat you want to report a kidnapping?" Special Agent Myers unbuttoned the top button of his shirt.
    "You allowed to do that?" Tuck asked.
    "Casual Fridays," the special agent said.
    "Oh," Tuck said. "Yes. Kidnapping, multiple murder, and the theft and sale of human organs for transplant."
    Myers showed no reaction. "Go on."
    And Tuck did. He began with the offer of the job on Alualu and ended with his arrival in Hawaii, leaving out the crash of Mary Jean's jet, the subsequent loss of his pilot's license and pending criminal charges, anything to do with cargo cults, cannibals, transvestites, ghost pilots, talking bats, and genital injuries. As he wrapped up, he thought the edited version sounded pretty credible.
    Special Agent Myers had not changed position or expression once in the half hour that Tuck had talked. Tuck thought he saw him blink once, though. Special Agent Myers leaned back in his chair (casual Fridays) and templed his fingers. "Let me ask you something," he said.
    "Sure," Tuck said.
    "Are you the Tucker Case that got drunk and crashed the pink jet in Seattle a few months ago?"
    Tuck could have slapped him. "Yes, but that doesn't have anything to do with this."
    "I think it does, Mr. Case. I think it affects the credibility of what is already an incredible story. I chink you should leave my office and go about the business of putting your life in order."
    "I'm telling you the truth," Tuck said. He was fighting panic. He worked to stay calm. "Why would I make up a story like that? As you pointed out, I've got enough on my plate just rebuilding my life. I'm not so stupid that I'd add charges for filing a false crime report to all the others. If you have to take me into custody, do it. But do something about what's going on out on that island or a lot more people are going to die."
    "Even if I believed your story, what would you like me to do?"
    And there Tuck lost it. " 'Special agent.' Does that mean that you had to take the little bus to the academy?"
    "I was at the top of my class." A rise.
    "Then act like it."
    "What do you want, Mr. Case?"
    Tuck jumped up and leaned over the desk. Special Agent Myers rolled back in his chair.
    "I want you to stop them. I want covert action and deadly technology. I want Navy SEALS and snipers and spies and laser-guided smart stealth gizmos out the ying-yang. I want surgical strikes and satellite views and a steaming shitload of every sort of Tom Clancy geegaw you got. I want fucking Jack Ryan, James Bond, and a half-dozen Van Damme motherfuckers who can jump through their own asses and rip your heart out while it's still beating. I want action, Special Agent Myers. This is evil shit."
    "Sit down, Mr. Case."
    Tuck sat down. His energy was gone. "Look, I'm giving myself up. Arrest me, throw me in jail, beat me with a rubber hose, do whatever you want to do, but stop what's going on out there."
    Special Agent Myers smiled. "I don't believe a word you've told me, but even if I did, even if you had evidence of what you're claiming, I still couldn't do anything. The FBI can only act on domestic