The area beside the gangway was brightly lit.
Several subordinates Pierce had carefully selected were already in position. They wore crisp uniforms, their faces carrying well-trained, courteous smiles, their manners impeccable.
Each of them held a beautifully wrapped gift box tied with an elegant ribbon.
"Thank you for coming. Have a safe journey."
"We look forward to seeing you again. Take care."
"This is a small token prepared for you. Have a pleasant trip home."
Warm farewells accompanied slight bows as the gifts were steadily handed to every departing guest.
Their smiles were flawless, but in the fleeting moments when their eyes lowered or lifted, they swept silently over every guest's face, build, gait, and even the contours of their neck and shoulders like precision scanners.
Using the unavoidable closeness of handing over the gifts, they watched for even the slightest unnatural stiffness or disguise.
The gifts were a sweet cover, and the smiles were perfect masks.
Beneath this warm facade of seeing guests off lay a silent, meticulous search.
Those ordinary blessings were actually prearranged signals. Offering a blessing meant the person had been cleared of suspicion.
Carrying their gifts and final polite farewells, the guests gradually disappeared into the deeper darkness of the dockside night.
The glow beside the gangway illuminated fewer and fewer figures, as well as the sharp, wary eyes of those "attendants," who had never relaxed their vigilance.
Within the harbor's shadows, the Alpha Group members stood like a cluster of silent statues.
No light fell directly on them. Only the hazy glow spreading from the gangway in the distance and scattered laughter carried away by the sea breeze reached them.
Through high-powered binoculars and rifle scopes, their vision was fixed on that brightly lit passage. The eyes behind the lenses did not blink.
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