“That close enough?” he said.
Darger couldn’t tell if his tone of voice was expressing annoyance or just the discomfort of leaning into the cramped space.
The contents of the box grew blurry for a second as the focus of the camera lens adjusted. The dark clouded everything. Then the picture sharpened into full detail.
A gray wad took up most of the box — an L-shaped sculpture or so it seemed. Dimples in the surface seemed to suggest marks where fingers had pressed it into this form. Darger thought that made it look like acne-scarred skin, except ashen and lifeless like a dead fish. A mess of wires poked into the gray substance like clay, crisscrossing as they ran to a few mechanical pieces along the perimeter of the box that Darger couldn’t see as well.
“C4 charge this time,” Dobbins said, breaking the silence. “Plastic. That seem weird to you?”
Though she wasn’t any kind of explosives expert, Darger knew enough to know that plastic explosives were much less volatile than most types. So remarkably stable, in fact, that the Army issued it to the infantry. It was safe to transport. You could even set the stuff on fire without detonating it — something US soldiers did to warm their food in Vietnam. Anything short of a properly applied shock wave from a detonator, and it wouldn’t blow.
“Harder to come by, maybe,” Alvarez said. “Why, what are you thinking?”
Dobbins let out a breath. Seemed to think a few seconds before he answered.
“I don’t know. This guy seems the impulsive, reckless, self-destructive type, right? Just seems… interesting, I guess, that he’d go with plastic here. Like he’s being cautious for some reason?”
Everyone looked at each other inside the van.
“It could simply be that he’s trying to impress us with his skill level,” Loshak said. “He’s varied the device at each scene so far, almost as if to say, ‘Look at all the things I can do.’”
“Bottom line, Dobbins: if you’re having second thoughts, we should call it off,” Alvarez said into his mouthpiece. “I mean, everyone is safe. We could try to detonate it remotely.”
Dobbins shook his head.
“No, I’m good. Just let me take a minute and get comfortable with it.”
“Alright. But if you get cold feet, just say the word,” Alvarez said.
The camera held there on the tangle of wires and parts. That hunk of mottled gray in the center of it all. The picture rose and fell with Dobbins’ respiration. He breathed deeply, held the breaths for a moment at each apex.
Inside the CIRG truck, nobody moved. Nobody spoke. They only stared at that hypnotic image of the box on the screen, the edges of it pulsing faintly whenever Dobbins sucked in a breath.
Dobbins leaned forward again. The fat fingers of his gloved hands came into view, splayed on the wood on each side of the shoebox.
“OK,” he mumbled to himself. “OK.”
He held still like that for what felt like a long time, hovering directly over the bomb. His breathing seemed to grow heavier, perhaps due to the awkward position of sticking most of his upper body under a bathroom sink.
Darger felt something squirm through her middle — some muscle spasm reminding her of the tension to all of this. Dobbins was putting his head and chest directly over what looked like a couple of pounds of C4. Kevlar blast suit or not, it was insane.
“Ahh… I see what you did there,” Dobbins said then, his voice all low and gravelly in a way that made him sound like Alec Baldwin. He chuckled a little to himself.
His right hand rose from the wooden plank at the bottom of the vanity. Drifted within the borders of the shoebox.
His index and middle fingers extended. Stopped just shy of touching one of the loops of wire.
The two fingers traced along a red wire. Followed it from where it embedded in the mottled gray C4 to what looked like it could be a cellphone battery.
Then the fingers went back to the center of the box. This time they followed an orange wire.
“Tricky,” Dobbins said. “He ran all of the wires through the C4 just to muddle up what we’re seeing, but…”
Alvarez stared blankly at the screen, his mouth hanging open. After a second he responded, as though he’d forgotten for a moment that this was a dialogue.
“But what?”
“I’ve got it,” Dobbins said. “I think I’ve got it.”
Alvarez grimaced, but he didn’t have time to say anything.
The beak-like nose of the wire cutters roved into the frame. Moved quickly. Confidently.
Dobbins snipped the orange wire. Hesitated for a moment, the tool floating in empty space above the tangle of wires.
Then he lowered his hand again and the bulky Kevlar of his glove got in the way. They couldn’t see what he was doing anymore.
Darger hugged her arms to her chest. Squeezed herself into something smaller.
“Dobbins,” Alvarez said, his voice going husky.
The wire cutters snicked again. Louder than before, as though they were cutting something thicker, something stronger.
That girthy Kevlar glove throbbed on the screen. Jerking and bobbing. Still working.
Dobbins gasped. Sucked in a big wet breath. The wind sounded hollow in the console speakers. Empty.
Everyone in the truck sat forward. Breath held. Eyes opened wide.
The wire cutters clicked like a dog’s toenails on linoleum. It sounded huge in the quiet CIRG truck. Sharp.
Then everything went still.
Darger’s arms quivered from hugging herself so tightly. Strange tremors jerking in her wrists and elbows. Pressing her flesh.
“OK,” Dobbins said, his voice small and tight. “I got it.”
CHAPTER 50
Dobbins rocked up onto his knees, the camera wobbling and ascending along with him. He heaved in a big breath. Let it out. That wind rattling in the blast suit’s microphone, sounding a little like dead leaves scraping over a sidewalk.
“Device deactivated,” he said.
He started breathing heavy then. Panting in fast motion. After a second, Darger realized that he wasn’t breathing funny, he was laughing. Wheezing out breathy chuckles.
“Dobbins does it again,” Fitch said. “Unreal. Dude is just unreal.”
The big guy clapped Darger and Loshak on the back, then rose from his seat. Gave Alvarez a high five. Then he drummed both of his hands on the edge of the console like he was doing a snare roll.
McAllister whirled around from his position manning the controls. His mouth curled downward so he looked like a hatchetfish.
“Um… the, uh, roughhousing… Not on the equipment. Please.”
Fitch stopped his drumbeat, though he hardly seemed perturbed. He transitioned to air guitar, his mouth squealing out some high-pitched Randy Rhoads-esque solo.
Darger felt her chest hitch in a big involuntary breath. Throat opening so wide it tipped her head back like a Pez dispenser. Air surging to fill the void.
And then the endorphins hit. Bliss flooded her brain, coursed through her veins, made her follicles tingle. The feeling of champagne bubbles popping in her head came over her. The word effervescence sprang to mind.
Dizzy. She put a hand on the console to steady herself, eyelids blinking rapidly. It almost felt like a drug experience, some painkiller euphoria kicking in so hard it almost took her under.
“You alright?” Loshak said. He put a hand on the back of her arm as though he might need to leap in to stop her from keeling over.
Darger shook her head a little before she could get her mouth to form an answer.
“I’m fine. Just a little lightheaded. Can’t believe he did it again, I guess.”
“Yeah, this whole thing is…” Loshak trailed off there, seemingly at a loss for words.
Fitch had started to do his frat boy rooster crow again when Dobbins’ voice cut through on the speakers. Sharp this time. Urgent.
“Wait. Wait. There’s something here.”
Everyone in the CI
RG truck fell quiet, eyes once again fixed on that screen that fluttered slightly with the agent’s breathing.
“Talk to me, Dobber,” Alvarez said. “What are you seeing?”
“OK, you see this?”
Dobbins’ chunky suit hand lifted onto the screen. His finger pointed at the back edge of the shoebox where the deactivated bomb still lay.
“When I changed positions just now, I noticed something. Here, I’ll get closer.”
The camera jostled back and forth a moment. Then it seemed to zoom forward into the shadows as Dobbins again stuck his head under the sink, this time angling himself off to the right of the box. He pointed the finger again, not quite touching the cardboard.
“Right here. Can you see that?”
The image clouded with shadows and then cleared, just like last time. Darger squinted to try to make out the details.
A tiny bit of white seemed to protrude at the back right corner of the shoebox. A triangular bit seemingly stuck to the side of the box. Maybe an eighth of inch showing — maybe less.
“Looks like a piece of paper?” Alvarez’s voice went up as if it were a question.
Dobbins scuttled back from the sink. The camera pulled out and flashed to white, totally washed out for a second as the brighter light assailed the lens. Then the picture congealed again, contours returning as the contrast came back, returning to the normal bathroom view.
“OK. Here’s what I think I see,” Dobbins said. “It looks like the bottom of this vanity has a cut out beneath the device. A little compartment. Almost like a false bottom, you know. So this piece of paper is jutting out of there. I think it’s another clue.”
The silence inside the CIRG truck swelled again. Big and tense. Made Darger’s skin crawl.
“He hid it right under the bomb?” Darger said, her voice soft. “Why would he do that?”
“Had the bomb gone off, the clue would be destroyed, right?” Fitch said. “So maybe it’s like… a reward for figuring it all out.”
Loshak raised an index finger as he chimed in.
“That could make sense. Huxley referred to this whole thing as a game. Perhaps this is our prize for completing the task he assigned.”
Fitch nodded.
“And the dude seems eager as hell to spread his gospel through these journals. So this sort of ensures we find the next piece, right?”
Dobbins cleared his throat, apparently impatient with all the speculation going on in the truck.
“In any case, let’s have a look, shall we?” he said.
The bloated-looking fingers of the glove moved to the paper. Gingerly poked until it peeled away from the side of the box. Pinched the flap between thumb and pointer. The bloated hand held there for a second as Dobbins took a few breaths.
He slid the paper out. Slowly. Carefully. It rasped against the wood and cardboard, sounded dry. Looked like someone tugging a sheet out from under a blanket.
Spiky letters revealed themselves on the page. Scrawled in thick black sharpie script.
Darger could just read the two words as they slid into view.
Game over.
CHAPTER 51
The whoosh seemed to throw Dobbins. Lifting him. Flinging him.
Everything on the screen went blurry. Moving. Smearing past.
The camera lens shattered. All of it at once. Cracks stretching across it like broken ice atop a lake in winter.
Then the bright flash hit. Seared Darger’s eyes. Flared through the fractured lens, through the monitor.
The explosion rattled in the speakers next. A boom and then an exhaled gust. Sounded like someone blowing on the mic again, crackling and growling.
Everything on the screen came apart.
Tiny motes burst everywhere. Traveling outward. Disintegrated bathroom bits and crumbled drywall flung like wads of dirt.
Then the sound and video cut off abruptly.
The screen went black. Vacant.
But the boom still roared around them. Thrummed its vibration through the ground. Through the building. Through the walls and floor of the CIRG truck. Rattled everything.
Fitch tried to leap into action. Lurched out of his chair only to be slammed to the quaking floor of the vehicle. Chest thudding the ground. Partially catching himself with outstretched arms.
He tried to push himself up and flopped down again.
The rumble seemed to build. Deep and booming. Growing louder, thicker, heavier.
And the shaking of the CIRG truck intensified. Turned violent.
The tremor knocked a mug full of pens and paper clips off the console. Bounced open the cooler door and tumbled cans of Monster out onto the floor, twirling them around on their sides.
Darger gripped the arms of her chair with both hands. Gritted her molars. Felt her bottom lip pull down into a grimace that exposed her lower teeth.
The shaking stopped all at once. A quick cut to stillness.
Silence.
Motionlessness.
Darger’s skin contracted like a membrane. Pulled taut against the musculature of her body.
The quiet seemed wrong around them.
Empty.
Profane.
CHAPTER 52
“Jesus Christ!” Alvarez said, his voice quavering. “That… that was a much bigger charge… it had to be…”
“Bigger than the plastic we saw?” Darger said, her voice coming out in a dry rasp.
Alvarez blinked and nodded.
“Had to be. It was… there had to be a second bomb.”
“It was a trick,” Darger said. “The whole thing. He played it off like a game with rules just for the chance to do this.”
Fitch pushed himself up on wobbly arms as the others talked. Looked a little like a baby deer rising for the first time. He shook his head as though to clear the cobwebs.
“What’s the protocol here?” Loshak said, eyes locked on Alvarez. “Do we wait for the NYSP Bomb Disposal Unit to clear the scene? Do we have time to do that?”
Alvarez’s chin shook. It looked like he was having a hard time processing this. Probably going into shock. Mind retreating into itself.
“Dobbins,” he whispered, teeth and lips oddly wet. “Oh fuck. Dobbins.”
“I’ll say this,” McAllister said, glancing up from his control station. “Anyone even contemplating going in there now, whatever might be left of the building, should take a gas mask out of that locker over there. Explosions like this kick all kinds of nasty crap into the air, OK? Clouds of toxins, pollutants, carcinogens. It’s no joke.”
Fitch staggered to the locker. Ripped it open. Situated a gas mask on his face and adjusted the straps. He tossed one to Darger, tossed one to Loshak. He looked at Alvarez’s glassy eyes for a second and chose not to toss him one.
“You guys can wait for the State Police to clear the scene if you want,” Fitch said, his voice muffled by the mask. “Me? I’m going in. Dobbins could still be…”
Fitch trailed off there. Jaw flexing a couple of times, making the sides of the gas mask bulge.
He strode across the truck. Ripped open the door. Bounded out into the wedge of daylight there.
And Violet Darger followed.
CHAPTER 53
They rushed up the set of wooden stairs leading from the driveway to the house. Darger touched her palm down to the wooden rail every few steps, feeling the cool coarseness of the timber. She followed Fitch, his broad shoulders swaying as he climbed, heavy boots thudding down on the risers, legs thrusting.
She craned her neck to try to see the house, but the hill blocked most of the view from here. Hard to say how bad the damage was. Hard to know what she was heading into. She kept running.
She pulled the gas mask over her head. Secured it around her chin and forehead. Looked out at the world through the rounded edges of the visor, a black line cutting off the top of her field of vision.
She breathed. Heard that Darth Vader-like suction sound of the gas mask with every inhale. Felt her own
breath billow inside the chamber around her face.
The staircase spilled out onto a landing and veered into a hairpin turn, zigzagging up the steep slope. They made that u-turn and zipped up the final set of stairs. The land leveled out at the top, and the immense house came fully into view at last.
Black smoke coiled from the top of the structure, a thick shaft twirling up from the roof. Ominous. Otherwise, Darger could detect no damage from here which surprised her some, given how violent the explosion had felt inside the truck.
The sun glared against all the big front windows. Painted the glass in blinding brightness. Made it impossible to see anything inside.
A stone footpath led to the front door. They hurtled toward that reddish rectangle that would lead them inside — the one pop of color on an otherwise solid facade of stone and glass.
Fitch hit the door first. Bulled into it with a dipped shoulder as he cranked the knob. The heavy steel thing flung out of his way like balsa wood.
He disappeared into the opening. A few paces later, Darger crossed the threshold as well.
A gray cloud filled the interior of the home. A roiling thing. Unsettled bits drifting, gliding, hovering. Dust and debris.
Darger gasped. Sucked in a big breath. The gas mask scraped and popped.
Fitch moved into the cloud. The gray swallowed him up.
Darger hesitated a second. Shaky breaths rasping through the gas mask. She took a couple of choppy steps forward. Then she too pushed into the murkiness.
The gray swirled around her like liquid. Obscured her vision. Disoriented her.
Still she advanced. Shuffling her feet. Her hands bobbed in front of her just in case, fingers going hazy as they dug into the smoke.
It felt like she was drifting through it. Gliding like the faux fog around her.
She pressed forward. Crossed a vast living space populated with suede furniture that she could only kind of make out. Moved toward where she knew the bathroom would be, where the blast would have taken place.
And pictures of Dobbins pulsed through her head. Memories of him gearing up in the back of the CIRG truck. Jogging in place to get himself pumped up. Always smiling, laughing. Always talking tough.
Violet Darger | Book 8 | Countdown To Midnight Page 21