She had her back to the aisle. She never heard him coming.
“Get up,” his voice growled.
She turned around slowly and saw a portly Mexican guy. About 25 with a tattoo on his neck.
“I’m… I couldn’t get out in time.”
She pressed her finger down on the flash charge button of the camera.
His eyes narrowed. He flicked the gun barrel towards her. “I don’t give a shit. You had your chance.”
“I was in the bathroom.”
“Get up.”
“I can’t… I hurt my ankle when I was running.”
“Get up.”
Devin felt her heart start to pound. “Can you help me then?”
He sidled into the row with his gun trained on her. Eyeing her suspiciously. He walked slowly towards her. By the way he was holding the gun with only one hand and the way he was shuffling his feet, she knew he hadn’t had a lot of training. She could probably take him out, given the chance.
That was if he didn’t do something stupid like kill her first.
Devin reached up her hand for him to help her up. “Come on…”
He suddenly scowled, stepped back. Placed both hands on the gun, aiming it at her.
“I’m not giving you my hand. You could be planning something.”
Devin could hear the whirring sound of the flash charging. Still not there.
She flapped her hand in exasperation. “What could I be planning? I’m sitting here in a dress and high heels with a broken ankle!” She sighed. “I mean, seriously…”
He took a step toward her. About a foot away now.
She looked up at the gun pointed right at her.
The whirring stopped, the flash was charged. Now or never.
Before he could even flinch she slammed the makeshift taser and exposed wires into his thigh. It made a sickening electrical and flesh sound as it filled his body with enough volts to make him collapse.
As he went down, she stood up, grabbed his wrist, flipped the gun into her own hand, grabbed he back of his neck and slammed his face into the metal backing of the seat. He collapsed to the floor unconscious.
In the next moment, in one fluid move, Devin then pulled his tie off him slipped it around his wrists, handcuffing him to the seat. She whipped the earphone out of his ear and the two-way radio receiver from his belt. She clipped the radio to her dress, placed the earphone in her own ear, and went on the move.
She whipped out her cellphone and dialed Brad. He picked up after one ring.
He sounded worried. “Are you okay?”
“Here’s what I need. I need you to not ask me any questions and I need you to get to a computer. Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
39
Sally Bixby felt her stomach growl. She wanted to punch herself in the stomach. Stupid stomach. Stupid hungry fucking annoying stomach. It growled again.
Sitting in a corner of the green room, surrounded by terrified hostages and scary men with scarier guns, apparently her stomach hadn’t gotten the memo that the rest of her body was in mortal danger. She was fucking sick of being a slave to her stupid stomach and its stupid needs.
Sally had an aha moment! She decided at that very moment that if she made it out of here she was going to have gastric band surgery. And any doctor who wouldn’t do it because she was only 105 pounds could go fuck himself. Yes, if she got out of here, she was going to have whatever she wanted.
She was going to be thin and work on documentaries and open a school for girls in Africa and get a name for herself and get a divorce and tell her mother she was an asshole. And stop pretending she liked receiving oral sex cause she really kinda didn’t. She was going to stop worrying about what other people thought of her. She was going to be someone no one believed she could be. She was going to do something good. And help someone. And be something. …Did I just say I wanted a divorce?
Just then she felt a presence behind her, and turned to see the guy with the buzz cut and the Eastern European accent looming over her. He slipped her some index cards onto the table.
“Here. Learn this.”
“What is it?”
“Your lines.”
She looked up at him. “Okay.”
He glared at her, his eyes were dead. So it wasn’t so much a glare as a dead eyed stare. Sally felt a shiver go down her spine. This man was evil.
Sally looked at the index cards. She flipped through to the last one and her poor put upon stomach lurched.
“Oh my god,” she whispered.
Sis Warren was just the beginning. They were going to start killing people soon. And Sally just read the name of the next victim.
40
Devin Jones with her phone to her ear, made her way through the lobby. She spotted a cloakroom across the way - and slipped inside, closing the door behind her.
“Okay… you on the site?”
“Yes,” Brad said. “LAPD Database…. enter name and password”
“DetectiveDevinJones all one word. Password, ‘Unicorn27’”
“Unicorn?”
“Like we’ve got time for this. I did it as a joke.”
“Hilarious.”
She could hear Brad typing.
“Okay,” he said. “I’m in.”
“Okay, go to public works records. I need a blueprint of the building. Enter the name of the theater and Hollywood Blvd.”
“Doing it…”
Devin looked at the door, she was hidden behind a counter, so no one would see her when they opened the door.
“Anything yet?”
“Says processing…. You okay?”
“Brad. Let’s not do this.”
“Okay. You’ll be great.”
“Yeah. Thanks.”
“Can I tell you I love you?”
“No.”
“…I just did.”
She smiled. “Fuck off.”
“Here…” he said. “Here it is.”
“Okay. Email it to me. I’ll download the pdf.”
She heard him typing some more.
“Done.”
“Thanks.”
“Now what?” he said.
“Now I find a way to get these people out. I’ve just got to disrupt their plan.”
“Any ideas?”
“Not yet.”
Devin pulled out another random iphone she had grabbed. She got on her email and downloaded the PDF. “Got it.”
“Good… They’ve still got the cameras on. They say they’re going to kill someone in ten minutes.”
“I know.”
“Hard to do that without electricity.”
Devin smiled. “Yeah. It would be hard, wouldn’t it. And no telling what could trip a circuit. They would know there’s no way to do that from outside so it couldn’t be the cops. You’re brilliant.”
“I try.”
Devin opened the PDF and scrolled through it. She zeroed in on the electrical room. And how to get there.
“Okay. I gotta go.”
“Yeah. I know…”
Devin had so much she wanted to say. And so much she was afraid would happen. She decided not to say any of it.
“Brad…I’ll be okay.”
“You better be…”
41
Bronco Bennett felt his phone buzz. He looked at who was calling. Fucking Esteves. Now he’s the big man. Calling from his fucking vacation in Hawaii? Leaving him here to deal with this shit. And was probably going to step in and take all the glory when Bronco Bennett took these fuckers down. No way. He wouldn’t let that happen. And the first step to not letting that happen would be keeping Esteves out of the loop. He was in charge here, not Esteves. He hit the ignore call button.
Homeland Security officer Dan Milner came up behind Bronco Bennett. “We’ve got a problem.”
Bennett turned around and loomed over him. “You’re just realizing that now?”
“No. A new problem.”
“There’s no way of taking the signal out without them knowing.”
“Did you even try?”
Milner looked irritated. “That’s what I’m telling you.”
“They’re inside. How are they going to know?”
“They must have someone on the outside. Maybe they’re connected to a feed somewhere. We ran a test. Took it off the air. And 5 seconds into it, Gunnar Leise called my cell phone. Wanted to know what the fuck we were doing? I lied and said I didn’t know what he was talking about.”
“Shit.”
“Yeah, not the best idea.”
“I didn’t hear you come up with anything better.”
“They must have someone on the outside or some way of accessing the feed. We have to leave it up.”
“Great idea. And play right into their hands.”
“What else are we going to do?”
“Take it out.”
“They’ll start killing more people.”
“They’re not going to kill anyone if no one’s watching. Believe me.”
Milner shook his head. “It’s not a good idea.”
Bennett got in his face. “I don’t fucking care what you think, Milner. Do you not understand that? I’ve got a billion fucking people watching what’s going on here.”
He turned away from Milner; he’d had enough of this little asshole. Without even looking at him again, he said, “Take it out.”
“It’ll take some time.”
“Just do it.”
42
Sally Bixby smiled desperately as she held an index card in her hand, standing in a white swathed room filled with tables covered in goods. She spoke right into a TV camera.
“Hi everyone! It’s me again, Sally Bixby. We’re in the beautiful SWAG room backstage at the Hollywood Screen Awards!”
She moved her trembling hand in a majestic sweeping gesture, as if to illustrate Glitz! And GLAMOR!
“Here’s where the stars get their FREEBIES! Everyone who presents on the show gets a grab bag of goodies worth about $80,000. Isn’t that something?”
She glanced over to the collection of miserable looking movie stars. No one responded.
Suddenly a booming male voice could be heard from off camera. “She SAID isn’t that something?!”
Richard had his arms crossed and was standing next to the camera. Vidic stood on the other side with two other security guys all with their guns trained on the celebrities.
The celebrities all murmured assent and feigned interest.
Sally teetered over to a table. “For example here we have Aurora Sunglasses!”
She shakily picked up a pair, still with the same insane smile pasted on her face. “I’ll just put these on.”
She put them on her face with the tag hanging down her nose. “Don’t they look great?” her voice quaked.
This time as prodded by Richard’s menacing countenance, the celebrities sputtered to life, mumbling compliments.
Sally looked at a tiny cue card, reading what it said. “Um… Glynn Fielding, would you like to try a pair?”
A frightened looking 35-year-old English beauty, with smoky eyes, wearing an Indigo blue gown with intricate beading that a few hours she had given a shit about, stepped over unsurely next to Sally.
Sally handed her a pair of sunglasses. “Here you go.”
This time Glynn had the good sense to remove the tag. She slipped the sunglasses on.
“They’re lovely,” she managed.
“These are $2000 sunglasses,” Sally read off the cue card. She held the mic to Glynn Fielding who searched for words.
“Yes, they seem it.”
Sally read more from the card. “Made for $4 by children working for 15 cents an hour in Honduras.”
Glynn wasn’t sure what to say. “Oh.”
Sally looked at her index card. The next sentence came out with all the comfort of someone eating a bug.
“And tell me, Glynn, why is it you and these other Assholes get this shit for free?”
Glynn’s jaw dropped. “I – I don’t know.”
Sally swallowed hard. She continued. “Don’t you think it makes more sense that rich privileged assholes,” Sally was struggling, “Like you…have to pay for shit like $2000 sunglasses?”
“Yes,” Glynn Fielding said. “I suppose it does.”
Richard started laughing. He was loving this. He did write it after all.
Sally kept smiling. “Glynn who are you wearing?”
Glynn looked down at her dress. “It’s a Luis Ferrerra.”
Sally looked at the card. “Who gives a shit?”
“Oh…uh…”
Sally read the next line flawlessly. “I mean really… Who gives a fucking shit?”
“Um… I don’t know… I guess…I’m not sure…”
“How about no one?” Sally said. She squinted at the card and read the next section in a chipper monotone. “Who gives a shit what some spoiled bitch who’s probably mean to waitresses wears to walk into some wanky awards show like this?”
She held the mic up to Glynn Fielding for an answer.
“No one?”
“That’s right,” Sally said with a smile. “No one. No one gives a shit.”
“Okay.”
Sally flipped a card. “So, Glynn, you’re nominated tonight. For best actress…”
“Yes,” Glynn said. The two of them standing there looking ridiculous in their sunglasses.
“Do you want to know if you won?”
“I - - I don’t think I really care at this point.”
“Sure ya do.”
“No… Sally. I don’t.”
“Ya do. And we’ll be letting you know in about ten minutes time!”
She turned to the camera. “That’s right viewers around the world, we’ll be announcing the winners. So tune in for that.”
There was a silence. Glynn clearly felt she had to say something. “Okay, great…”
Sally flipped a card. She looked at it. Clearly it pained her to read it. She looked at Richard. He nodded at her. She hesitated. He flipped his holster open, pulled his gun out and casually pointed it at Sally.
“And Glynn… I’m sure you really wanted to win….”
She held the mic up to Glynn.
“I don’t know… I…”
“You did. Didn’t you?”
“Yes. Fine. I did. But I don’t now. I don’t care - ”
“Well, Glynn, I’ve got exciting news for you...”
Glynn perked up just a tiny bit.
“If we open that envelope on the air in ten minutes and you don’t win… That man over there is going to take you out onto the stage and shoot you in the head in front of a billion people.”
And with that, Glynn Fielding fainted. Right onto the table filled with $2000 sunglasses made for $4 by children making 15 cents an hour in Honduras.
43
Devin Jones bounded down a stairway from the 1st floor to the underbelly of the theater. It was exactly where the blueprint had indicated.
Her phone buzzed.
“Brad, I can’t really talk now.”
He sounded nervous. “They just said they’re going to kill some actress on the stage in ten minutes.”
Devin’s heart started pounding even harder. “Okay…”
“Just thought you should know.”
“Thanks.”
She pressed end call and continued hurrying down the stairs. At the bottom, she made her way through the door into a low and dimly lit corridor. She glanced at the PDF of the blueprint on her phone.
“Okay, left… left…”
She turned left and walked right into a concrete wall.
Then she flipped her phone around.
“Okay, right…”
She hurried down the hall about 20 feet. There was the room marked Electrical. She pushed open the heavy metal door.
The room was a concrete slab about 10 by 15 feet. There
were silver boxes in the center of the room and the perimeter was also lined with boxes, housing for all the circuitry.
“Where to start… I guess anywhere…”
She opened one of the small metal doors and started looking at the circuitry.
“Okay, circuit breakers. Simple as that. Let’s not go fancy, Devin. Stick to what you know… fuse box and circuit breaker.”
Everything was labeled by area. Finally on the last box on the wall she saw what she needed.
“Bingo…”
There labeled clearly was the circuitry for the stage area. She flipped the circuit breaker. Then she spotted something labeled backstage electrical, it had about ten switches. She flipped five of them. No need to make it look intentional. Just an electrical overload. Something that required fixing.
Now all she had to do was wait for the fix it man.
44
Sally was again smiling dementedly into the camera in the swag room.
“Next up we have an interview with Action Star Ray Kitson,” Sally Bixby beamed.
Richard stepped aside from watching and dialed a number on his phone. He spoke into the phone in hushed tones.
“It’s me. How are the numbers?”
He listened.
He looked irritated. “Zack, can you not think about fucking Twinkies or Ho ho’s or whatever for five minutes? Fine! I’ll have someone bring you something.”
Richard looked over to Sally, who noticed he was on the phone and clearly didn’t know if she should continue. Richard motioned, ‘Keep going,’ with his hand.
He listened to what Zack was telling him. “Okay. Fine. Not good but it’s a start.”
He ended the call and looped over to where Sally was standing with Ray Kitson on camera. He waved his gun at the others. “Everyone else go stand by the Ugg Boots.”
The celebrities all shuffled over to the Ugg boot table.
Richard looked into the camera.
“Ladies and gentlemen, I don’t know how seriously you’re taking this. I said I want a billion dollars. So far we have only 80 million dollars. Did you fucking think I was kidding?”
This is Devin Jones Page 10