Stone Undercover

by Bob Blanton

  “In modern times, the hula has been set to modern music with an expanded number of moves,” the announcer said. “Here they are dancing to Aloha Oe accompanied by a ukulele.”

  “And for those who really want to get their heart pumping, the Tahitian Otea.”

  The drums started up a fast beat as the hula dancers left the stage. Six women came out dressed in white grass skirts with wide belts across their hips. They had coconut bras and headdresses made of the same white grass. Their hips were gyrating to the beat.

  “Now this is dancing,” Tyler said.

  “Can you believe they can move their hips so fast and still keep their shoulders still,” Brianna said.

  “That drum beat is very primal,” Emily said.

  “And so are those hip movements,” Alex added. “How can they move them so much?”

  “The skirts are wider than their hips,” Matthew said. “It amplifies the movement.”

  “Boring,” Brianna said. “Don’t take the mystery out of it.”

  “Sorry,” Matthew said. “That reminds me though, I have to buy one of those outfits for Jessie.”

  “Oh, we should get one for Hanna and Sonja,” Brianna said, poking Emily to make sure she was listening.

  “That’ll be great,” Emily said. “They’ll be so cute.”

  “And now for our grand finale, the Samoan Fire Knife dance.”

  A man came out carrying a baton, which was aflame on one end. He wore a short loincloth, a headband and dried grass tassels just below his knees. His chest was bare, but he wore a necklace of grass like an ascot tie.

  “Is that a tattoo around his waist?”

  “Yes, and it goes to just below his knee,” Matthew read. “The traditional Samoan Warrior Tattoo.”

  “That must have been painful,” Tyler said. “I just have a small one on my arm and that hurt for a week.”

  “I think standing the pain is proof that you’re a warrior,” Matthew added.

  “Here he goes,” Emily said, as the drums started beating.

  The man leaned back and placed the flaming end of the baton on his mouth, then with flames coming out of his mouth he lit the other end of the baton so that both ends were flaming. He started spinning the baton faster and faster until it looked like a solid circle of flames. He passed the baton between his legs, keeping it spinning all the time.

  “Wow, he’s spinning that thing really fast,” Jennifer said, “and he’s throwing it up into the air.”

  “I hope he doesn’t lose it,” Brianna said. “It would land right in the middle of our table if he did.”

  “Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes the entertainment for tonight. Thank you for letting us share the traditions of Hawaii with you.”

  ◆ ◆ ◆

  “Wow, does anyone else feel like they just stepped out of a spaceship onto the surface of Mars?” Jason asked.

  “It sure looks like it.”

  They were on Haleakala, Maui’s largest volcano. The immense crater they were looking at was a pattern of blacks and oranges, with the black cinder cones rising from the floor. They looked out at a blue sky with white clouds below the horizon.

  “How big is it?”

  “It says here that it’s two miles wide by seven miles across and twenty-six hundred feet deep,” Alex read from the brochure she had picked up at the information shack.

  “I’m not sure we want to hike all the way in, with this thin air it will be a long climb back out,” Matthew said.

  “I totally agree with you,” Alex said. “I’m happy to walk around up here and just marvel at the views.”

  “Brrr, it’s cold up here,” Brianna said. “I’m glad you told us to bring a sweater.”

  “If we’re closer to the sun, and hot air rises, shouldn’t it be warmer up here?” asked Tyler.

  “Well, the air is thinner so it holds less energy; air cools as it rises because it has to fight gravity to go up; pressure is lower, so air is cooler; and since we’re so high up, there’s less insulating air to hold the heat in,” Matthew responded.

  “Should have known you’d have the answer,” Tyler said, sarcastically.

  “Play nice,” Emily scolded.

  “Can you believe a lot of people were up here to see the sunrise?” Alex said. “Way too early and way too cold for me.”

  “It might be nice,” Jeffrey said.

  “Well, you’re crazy,” Jennifer said. “Pictures will do it for me.”

  “Kallie!... Kallie!”

  Everyone looked around. They saw a woman in a mild panic yelling, “Kallie!”

  People near the information shack all looked around to see if they could see anyone who looked lost.

  “Has anyone seen a little girl in a pink sweater with a pink knit cap?” the woman asked. “Kallie!”

  Matthew opened his portal and got a bird’s-eye view of the area. He quickly saw the little girl out of sight of everyone behind a ridge.

  “Did you find her?” Emily asked.

  “How did…?”

  “You have that spaced-out look on your face,” Emily answered.

  “Yes, she’s behind that ridge over there,” Matthew indicated the ridge in question with a head nod.

  “Well, should we go get her?”

  “No, watch this,” Matthew said. He opened his portal by the girl’s mother and the other end by the little girl.

  “Kallie!” The little girl was startled hearing her mother as if she were right beside her. She looked around and made her way toward the voice she heard.

  “Kallie!”

  The little girl came out from behind the ridge and waved at her mother.

  “Kallie!”

  “Is that her?” Matthew asked, pointing at the girl.

  “Oh yes,” the mother said. “How did she get so far away?” She started trotting toward the little girl.

  “Another disaster averted,” Matthew said.

  “You need a Bat Signal,” Emily whispered.

  “Did you know you can ride a bike from here down to the base?” Emily asked.

  “It’s in the brochure,” Alex said. “You can really go fast, it’s downhill all the way.”

  “We’ll be bunching up behind some bikers on the way home,” Matthew said.

  “Kind of prissy,” Tyler said. “If you ride from the base to the top, then talk to me.”

  “Mr. Macho,” Brianna said. “Can’t you do anything just for the fun of it?”

  ◆ ◆ ◆

  As everybody was getting ready to head to the beach, Matthew’s phone buzzed. It was the tone he had set up to alert him whenever there was a tweet on the terrorist alert news. “Suicide bomber holds D.C. bank hostage,” was on the screen. Matthew sat down and turned the TV on.

  “The police tell us that a woman wearing a bomb vest has taken everyone in the bank hostage,” the news reporter said. “She has released one woman who had an infant with her. The released hostage informed authorities that the bomber would set off her bomb vest if anyone attempted to enter the bank. She also told authorities that the bomber had a dead-man switch so any attempt to shoot her or overpower her would result in the bomb going off. Currently this is the only information we have. The rest of the bank customers and employees are still being held hostage inside the bank. All attempts to contact the bomber have been fruitless. The bomber continues to refuse to answer the phone. That’s all we have for now; we’ll continue to update this story as it breaks. Our own Casey Newell should be on the scene shortly.”

  “What’s going on?” Emily asked.

  “I don’t know, some hostage situation in Washington, D.C.,” Matthew replied. “Can you stall everyone? I want to see if I can help.”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of it.” Emily got up and ran outside. “You guys go ahead, Matt got a call from his mom, so I’ll bring him after he’s through,” she yelled.

  “We can wait,” Tyler said.

  “No, get us a good spot on the beach; it won’t be too long
.” Emily headed back inside. “They’re going ahead without us. You’re talking to your mom.”

  “Thanks,” Matthew said. “Can you go get my backpack, while I figure out where this bank is?”

  Matthew googled the bank’s name. “Okay, just a few blocks from the White House.” He opened his portal and put the other end in New York, at Jason’s grandparents’ house. Then he navigated it down to D.C. and situated it over the White House. Now that he was oriented to the map, he easily navigated it over to the bank he’d found in Google Maps. He took it into the bank and checked out the situation.

  A small woman with a gray shemagh, a traditional Arab headscarf, was pacing around while everyone else was standing or sitting rock still. She was wearing a bomb vest and was holding a dead-man switch in her hand.

  “Here you go,” Emily said, handing Matthew his backpack.

  Matthew pulled a flashlight and a cellphone from the inside pocket. He turned the flashlight on and started to examine the bomb vest through his portal. The dead-man switch had wires running into a pocket sewn into the vest. Examining the inside of the pocket, he could see that the switch was wired to a battery, which was then wired across the detonators to the explosives in the vest. The wiring was straightforward and didn’t seem to have any other components except a cellphone, which was wired in parallel to the detonators.

  “So either the dead-man switch closes and the battery energizes the detonator, or the cellphone connects the detonator to its battery when someone calls the number.”

  “What are you seeing?” Emily asked.

  “The bomb vest. It’s wired so that either the dead-man switch will set it off or there’s a cellphone, so someone calling it will energize the detonators.”

  “Can you disarm it?”

  “It should be easy,” Matthew said. “First I’ll turn off the cellphone… Phone is off… Now I need to disconnect this battery… That’s one lead… Now the other… Okay that’s it. Now just in case I’ll disconnect the phone… Got it.”

  “Then you can call the police and tell them it’s disarmed,” Emily said.

  “Not yet. Since there was a cellphone connected to it, someone else must be involved.”

  “What can you do about that?”

  “I want to check things out. Why would a suicide bomber let one hostage go so they could contact the police, and why wait to blow everyone up?”

  “That doesn’t make sense…. Unless you’re trying to draw a crowd,” Emily said, snapping her fingers.

  “And if you want a crowd…. I’d better check around the bank for other bombs.”

  The bank was on the ground floor of an office building in the center of the block. The front was basically just a sidewalk and the street. Across the street was a park, which is where several news vans were setting up shop. People were starting to gather around the news vans and reporters were conducting on-the-scene interviews. There was no parking allowed on the street, which was being ignored by the news vans. The police had a large command center van parked directly in front of the bank.

  “Nobody can park in the area, so I think that means no car bombs,” Matthew said. He continued to survey the area, looking for any packages or backpacks lying about which might hold a bomb. “I don’t see anything that looks like a bomb,” he said.

  “Let me help,” Emily said.

  Matthew opened his portal up wider so Emily could see. Then he took it up so it had a bird’s-eye view of the park area.

  “What about the TV vans?”

  “I don’t think so,” Matthew said. “They’re all regular vans with reporters and camera crews, seems unlikely that a terrorist could commandeer that many people.”

  “So nothing unusual in the park?” Emily asked.

  “Right, just a bunch of other people. I don’t see any that look like they might be hiding a suicide vest.”

  As they watched, a reporter tossed a Coke can into the trash.

  “Trash cans,” Emily said excitedly. “You hardly notice them.”

  “I missed that,” Matthew said. He shifted his portal back to himself only and started to search the trashcan.

  “There’s a bomb here at the bottom,” Matthew said.

  “Can you disarm it?”

  “Let me look… All I see is a cellphone trigger,” Matthew said. “Yep, just a simple cellphone wired across the terminals. I’ll just do the same thing. Turn the phone off first… It’s off. Now to disconnect it for extra security.”

  Matthew inspected the other five trashcans they saw in the park. Three of them also contained bombs. Matthew disconnected each of them. “Whew, I got them. Let’s call in the cavalry.”

  “How are you going to do that?” Emily asked.

  “I’ll call Agent Caruthers.”

  “She’s in San Diego, how can she help?”

  “She’s the only one who knows Ranger Zero,” Matthew said. “I have to call someone that will trust me… him.”

  “But won’t that blow your cover? It’s not like you can text her this information.”

  “That’s why I have this setup,” Matthew said. He connected the cellphone to his computer, then he opened an app on his computer and typed, “Hello, Emily.”

  A voice came from the computer, “Hello, Emily.” It was a deep masculine voice, very unlike Matthew’s.

  “So she won’t recognize your voice,” Emily said.

  “Right. I’ll connect the phone to my computer. Then I’ll open the portal over the phone with the other end in D.C. Then I can turn the phone on and send the voice to that cellphone. Based on my previous text, Caruthers will expect Ranger Zero to be in the D.C. area.”

  “That’s cool.”

  “I programed this cell phone’s number into her phone right after I got it, so she’ll see Ranger Zero on the screen, hopefully that will get her attention. Okay, here goes nothing.” Matthew turned the phone on and pressed the speed dial.

  “Who the hell is calling me now!” Agent Caruthers cursed, as she looked at her phone and read the caller ID. “Ranger Zero, what the...”

  “Just a minute,” she said on the landline she was talking on. She answered the phone. “Hello, what kind of game is this?”

  “Sorry Juliet, but you’re the only contact number I have. Are you aware of the situation in D.C.?” Matthew typed on his phone.

  “Yes, I was just getting an update. I appreciate all the info you’ve been sending, but it would be better if we could set up official channels.”

  “Sorry, no can do. Right now I need you to channel information from me to whoever’s in charge on the ground in D.C.”

  “And why is that?” Agent Caruthers snapped.

  “I have important intel for them. The bomb vest in the bank is not armed and I’ve disarmed four other bombs that were placed in the trashcans around the park area in front of the bank.”

  “Wait, how did you do all this?”

  “The same way I took care of the bombs in the Playhouse in January. Now do you want to debate or are you going to help?”

  “Just a second.” Agent Caruthers picked up the other phone. Sam, get me the man in charge on the ground in D.C. … Now!”

  “Capt. Mustafa, this is Agent Caruthers with the FBI. I have an asset on the line who is familiar with the situation in D.C. He was instrumental in helping with our situation here in San Diego in January.

  “Yes… Sorry, I’m not privy to that information, but I suggest we trust him. What do you have to lose?” Agent Caruthers said. “I’ll put you on speaker so you can hear from my phone and he can hear you.” She pressed the speaker button on the desk phone, then laid her cellphone down and put it on speaker.”

  “Okay, Ranger Zero, do you have a name?”

  “Ranger Zero works for me,” Matthew typed into his computer.

  “Okay, can you repeat what you’ve just told me?”

  “Yes, The bomb vest in the bank is not armed, or shouldn’t be. I only had a little time to do it, but the phone is disconnect
ed and turned off and the battery is disconnected so the dead-man switch should be inactive.”

  “Are you sure?” Capt. Mustafa asked.

  “I can assure you that what I said is true. I can’t imagine any other triggering device, but …”

  “Why isn’t it armed?” asked Capt. Mustafa.

  “I disarmed it before they put it on her. Some people don’t check their work.”

  “Okay. What else do you have?”

  “I’ve discovered four bombs in the various trashcans around the area in front of the bank. The man behind this is obviously going for crowd damage.”

  “Damn, we’ll have to see if we can disperse the crowd and bring in bomb-sniffing dogs.”

  “I wouldn’t advise that. As soon as the man in charge sees you looking for his bombs, he’ll set them off. I’ve disarmed the bombs I’ve found, but I don’t know if there are others. They all had cellphone triggers. The phones are all off. I pushed the phone that’s in the trashcan directly across from the bank to the top of the trash, so one of your guys should be able to get it without alerting anyone.”

  “Okay…”

  “Have someone get the cellphone. I’m guessing that all the phones are cloned off the same phone, so one call will set everything off. If you can determine if there are any other phones active on that number, you’ll know if there are other bombs. That will also confirm that the vest is still disarmed. If you don’t pick up a phone in the bank, then they didn’t turn it back on.”

  Matthew could hear Capt. Mustafa relaying orders to someone.

  “Okay, we’ll get that taken care of. Anything else?”

  “I’m pretty sure the woman in the bank is not a willing participant. If I were you, I’d have someone enter the bank from the rear and get her attention. She might be able to help you find who’s behind this.”

  “What makes you so sure?”

  “She looked scared.”

  “Okay, I’ll send the hostage negotiator in.”

  ◆ ◆ ◆

  Matthew zoomed his portal over to the bank and found the police command post. He was just tuning in when a woman entered the van.

  “Lt. Bennett, I need you to enter the bank from the rear; keep out of sight of the front windows and learn what you can from that woman,” Capt. Mustafa said. “You’re one of our best negotiators and, hopefully, she’ll be more comfortable talking to another woman.”