You're a US police officer, what are you thinking about going back to the East for?

The focus shifts back to the entrance on the first floor of the apartment building.

The two men in suits whom K mistook for "third-rate idiots" were not actually there to see Leon, or rather, not yet.

They were sent by Raytheon: former FBI agent Victor and former Air Force intelligence officer Carter.

At this moment, the faces of these two elite agents were even more unpleasant than if they had swallowed flies.

The situation spiraled completely out of control after they followed orders from headquarters to splurge money in Seattle's underworld through gangs like Big T and offer a bounty for William McIntyre (Old Bill).

A generous reward will surely attract brave men, but it will also inevitably attract fools.

The huge sum of money—tens of thousands of dollars in reward for finding someone and thousands of dollars in tips—drove the drug addicts, pimps, and low-level thugs on the streets of Seattle into a frenzy.

These past two days, Victor and Carter's private phone lines have been ringing off the hook.

These idiots will come up with any ridiculous lie just to scam a few thousand yuan in information fees.

Some people swore they saw old Bill fighting with stray dogs for hamburgers under a bridge, others said they saw him being taken to a basement by a gang to make drugs, and one high-drug addict even said that old Bill had built a spaceship and flown back to Mars.

Victor and Carter, carrying large sums of cash, followed their sworn informants to countless stinking junkyards and abandoned factories, only to find either completely unfamiliar, crazy old men or simply deserted dead ends.

But they were helpless.

All of Old Bill's electronic traces have been erased, leaving them with only this most primitive human wave tactic. If they don't verify this junk information, their investigation will be completely stalled, and they won't be able to report back to headquarters.

Just half an hour ago, a street thug came running up confidently with a clue, saying that he had seen a homeless man who looked a lot like the white old man in the photo, who had been loitering near this old apartment complex.

So, the two of them had no choice but to suppress their annoyance at being treated like an ATM again and drive there.

Victor stood outside the glass window and looked at the old man in the duty room who was wearing reading glasses and filling in a word puzzle with his head down.

He took a deep breath, adjusted his facial expression, put on what he considered a very approachable and elite smile, stepped forward, and gently tapped the glass of the duty room with his finger.

"Knock knock".

Mr. Harry, who was engrossed in filling in the word puzzle, stopped writing, looked up, and glanced somewhat impatiently at the two uninvited guests in expensive suits outside the window.

Victor pulled a photo of old Bill from his suit pocket, showing him at work, and stuck it on the glass, trying to make his tone sound friendly and professional.

"Excuse me, sir. Have you seen the elderly white man in the photo in the neighborhood recently?"

"He's bankrupt now, and he looks like a homeless person, with messy hair and a scruffy beard. He's probably around sixty years old."

"His full name is William McIntyre, but everyone usually calls him Old Bill."

Grandpa Harry took off his reading glasses, held them in his hand, squinted, and stared at the photo for a long time.

Then, he looked up at Victor with a blank expression and asked loudly:

"Huh? What's wrong with you?"

Victor's smile faltered slightly, but he maintained a polite tone and repeated clearly, "Old Bill."

Grandpa Harry frowned and tilted his ear: "Grandpa what?"

Victor's eye twitched involuntarily. He took a deep breath, and the professional fake smile on his face began to stiffen.

"Old Bill, sir."

The old man nodded in sudden understanding, then asked again:

"What Bill?"

"..."

A vein bulged visibly on Victor's forehead.

Why would a former senior FBI counterintelligence officer and Raytheon's security chief, earning hundreds of thousands of dollars a year, be standing in front of a run-down apartment in Seattle, playing this kind of idiotic crossword puzzle with a hard-of-hearing doorman?

What the hell did I do to deserve this suffering?!

"Sir, please take a rest."

Victor completely gave up on his plan to discuss the name with Uncle Harry. He put the photo back in his pocket and pointed to the tightly closed electronic sensor door next to him:

"No need to remember his name. Just open the door for us, and we'll go up and ask the resident ourselves."

"That won't work."

Upon hearing that he was to be allowed in, Uncle Harry's hearing instantly returned to normal. He immediately put his reading glasses back on and refused with a stern face.

"You two, dressed to the nines, come to my apartment building looking for a homeless person?"

"How am I supposed to know what you're up to? If I let you in and you cause trouble, who's responsible when the police come? You can't just open the gate like that."