A Danger to Himself and Others: Bomb Squad NYC Incident 1

by J. E. Fishman

  Company C, 3rd Battalion, 8th Cavalry Regiment. For two tours in Afghanistan and three in Iraq, Albert Horn gave as good as he got, but it all caught up to him in Fallujah. That cursed city took away more than Horn’s legs, more than his sense of invulnerability, more than his curiosity about the wider world. It stole his patriotism.

  Because today, he informed his sister, speaking in tears into his cell phone as he rounded Sixth Avenue and Forty-Third Street, he realized that he’d repressed these horrible visions now floating back to him not to avoid reliving the fear but to avoid unmasking his own hatred. His hatred of God, of man, of country. It had consumed him.

  Albert Horn crossed Broadway with the tickets in his pocket and paused in front of the Times Square US Army Recruiting Station. His sister, still on the other end of the phone, noticed that her brother stopped talking in mid-sentence and that the air between them had gone silent, not even a crackle of static.

  On the sidewalk, Albert Horn would never hear the explosion that destroyed his eardrums, shredded his internal organs, and severed his left hand at the wrist. The force of the blast lifted his torso eight feet into the air and dropped him on the now-exposed rear of his sacrum and iliac bones. Without another word or voluntary movement, he fell backward from that position. Stone dead.

  THE THIRD PRECINCT GARAGE HAD been given over entirely to the Bomb Squad long ago. It consisted of two asymmetrical bays with steel shelving at the back and sides, loaded with equipment and supplies, all kept as neat as the contents of any firehouse. With the doors closed, Diaz and Detective First Grade Lakshan Higgins examined the Wolverine on the floor beside the rear workbench. Behind them, the squad’s two newest and most sophisticated response trucks gleamed blue and white under fluorescent lights.

  In a unit that increasingly attracted gadget lovers and puzzle solvers, Higgins was the most techie. Of both African and Indian extraction, he was thin, slight, and barely tall enough to fulfill the old NYPD height requirement—lucky for him they dropped it when they allowed women onto the force. He had skin the color of a purple potato, pitted cheeks, straight jet-black hair combed into a part, and he wore spectacles with thick clear plastic frames and lenses that always made his eyes appear to goggle.

  That was the outside. Inside, he possessed the intuitive flair of a math and physics whiz, having attended the Bronx High School of Science and graduated from RPI with an engineering degree in three years.

  All of this intellectual firepower he’d brought to bear on the robot. He tightened the last bolts, tapped a few keys on the laptop he was using, threw the control panel power switch on and off, rested his hands on his hips, and declared, “I give up.”

  “You really mean that?” Diaz said.

  “That thing hasn’t jerked one millimeter, hasn’t emitted so much as a peep, even though the batteries test fine. Software problem is all I can think. Maybe someone up the chain can call it in to the manufacturer. I’m sure as heck not authorized.”

  “More rules.” Diaz shook his head. “This place has more procedures than the army ever did.”

  “You can’t be serious.”

  “Well, my last two tours of duty it was a situation involving more slack. Put it that way.”

  “That was, like, eight years ago. You still have a hard-on for it?”

  “I don’t know. I’m probably just out of sorts because Kahn’s vigilance is testing my limits. The guy hasn’t shut up for a year, and I’m tired of having him on me like white on rice, no room to breath. I really lost it today, opened a suspicious package without the robot or the suit.”

  Higgins let out a whistle. “That was a mistake.”

  “I know. He’s, like, got me jumping into the deep end just to cool off.”

  “Reprimand?”

  Diaz shrugged. “Maybe I’ll get off light with the lieutenant out sick.”

  “You’d better watch your step. Kahn has Capobianco’s ear. Neither one likes guys getting restless on them. Why they don’t take more than a few EODs at a time in the first place.”

  Diaz looked at Higgins glumly. “I wish I had your interests, could lose myself in the guts of a machine, but that ain’t me.”

  “You have other assets.”

  “After all this time I’m still addicted to the adrenaline rush. Useless bomb sweeps don’t do it for me no more.”

  “Sounds like you want to find a live bomb.” Higgins tapped his fingers on the workbench and studied Diaz from top to bottom. “You’d better keep your head down, Manny.”

  Diaz frowned. Before he could respond further, the inside door flew open.

  “Diaz!”

  He took a deep breath and muttered to Higgins, “Here we go.”

  Kahn appeared, spotted Diaz and began walking fast toward the side door to the parking lot. “Explosion in Times Square,” he barked over his shoulder. “You and me!”

  An old feeling, one that had almost been lost, awakened inside Diaz’s chest. He jogged a few steps across the painted concrete to catch up. “Times Square?”

  Kahn nodded. “Casualties.”

  UNTIL YOU KNEW FOR SURE, you assumed the worst. No more complacency. That was the signal impact of 9/11 on attitudes in the law enforcement community. A bomb went off, it could be a lone nut, but you allowed for the possibility of terrorism. A series of bombs or—like this happened—a suicide bomber in front of a US government installation: you presumed terrorism unless and until you confirmed otherwise.

  So Don Burbette, one of the supervisors out of the local FBI office, was already there when Kahn and Diaz arrived. They pulled up to a crime scene well under control with blue sawhorses lined up end-to-end blocking the nearest lanes of traffic along Broadway, Forty-Third Street and Seventh Avenue. Dirty whitish canvas that stretched between stanchions shielded the views of gawkers from strategic angles, while police and other emergency service vehicles screened out most of the rest.

  Burbette greeted Kahn and Diaz at the curb. As it had begun to drizzle again, he escorted them to a police trailer that had just been locked into place. They went up the few steps and through the door, but they didn’t sit.

  “What we got?” Kahn asked Burbette.

  The FBI agent drew his shoulders back. He presented as your average straight-laced white guy, medium height with good posture and blondish-gray hair cut short. Across the bridge of his nose he had some youthful sun freckles that had decided one day to stay year-round. He had fingers so thick and long that they could only have been developed doing daily chores on some Midwestern farm. Except that he grew up in downtown Dorchester, Massachusetts, son of a fireman.

  “The suspect blew himself up in the middle of the sidewalk in front of the recruiting station, but by some miracle no one else got it bad, only some minor flesh wounds and some shock, what looks like temporary hearing loss in a few pedestrians.”

  Kahn nodded. “Anything known about him?”

  “Negative. He’s fresh. ME hasn’t moved the body yet, CSU still snapping pictures. They should be done in a minute. Take a look?”

  “Sure.”

  They climbed into white Tyvek suits and sterile booties and walked with great care sixty feet up the sidewalk, through a cone of spooky silence. A photographer, a CSU tech, and an assistant medical examiner, all similarly clad, were just throwing a tarp over the body.

  “Are we clear?” Kahn asked the ME.

  It was a woman they all knew, Sabrina Thompkins, short and chubby, otherwise nondescript. She nodded. “You can search what’s left of him, but try to keep your fingers out of the body cavity.”

  “Go ahead,” Burbette deadpanned, “ruin all of our fun.”

  Thompkins tucked some hair back into the netting on her head. She said, “Oh. I get it.” Stared a mock challenge at Burbette. Added: “Don’t get too attached. Your new friend will be gone in a few minutes.”

  “Watch your step on the way out,” Burbette said, as if she didn’t already know. Blood and flesh greased the sidewalk. Thompkins playfully
shot the detectives the middle finger as she retreated.

  “God, she’s cool for a geek, isn’t she?” Burbette concluded.

  He and Diaz elevated one end of the tarp and all three men looked down.

  It was a body, all right, African-American and lying on his back, what was left of him. He’d been wearing khaki pants, a patterned sweater, button-down shirt, open winter coat. The face remained relatively unscathed but the rest was a mess. His open eyes had rolled back into his skull.

  “Yuck,” Diaz said. “Where’d the legs go?”

  “Good question,” Burbette said.

  They looked around the sidewalk. Thompkins had also thrown a small tarp over another object about fifteen feet away. Burbette walked delicately toward it and lifted one corner.

  “That’s a hand,” he said.

  “Left hand,” Kahn said, still looking at the corpse.

  “So where are the legs?” Diaz repeated. “Pulverized?” All he saw were burned and bloody stumps.

  “They have to be around here somewhere,” Burbette said. “Or most of them.” He shook a finger at Kahn. “Officially, it’s my crime scene because of the federal installation, but you know how this works. Too many cooks…”

  There was mutual respect among them. Kahn said, “Two more from our squad should be here in a minute, Cai and Hassan.”

  “All right. Do your thing. I’ll be in the trailer with my secret weapon if you need me. The local precinct guys already know to keep everyone away.”

  Diaz watched Burbette’s back. “What’s his secret weapon?”

  “Telephone,” Kahn answered absently, honing in on a bulge in what remained of the corpse’s pants. The randomness of an explosion could be amazing. Some things got obliterated and others stayed remarkably intact. He tugged his thin rubber gloves on tighter, knelt down, and with some effort pulled out a fat nylon wallet. He flipped it open and read, “Albert Horn. Two Hundred and Tenth Place, Hollis, Queens. I’ll call and we’ll scramble a crew to make a sweep there. We’ll get this wallet to the A and E guy as soon as he arrives.”

  “Roger that,” Diaz said, producing a plastic bag for the wallet.

  Kahn looked around the area. “I figure the perimeter as between the sawhorses east-west, to the building on the south side. You agree?”

  Diaz nodded.

  “They need to block all of Forty-Third here and across the pedestrian plaza. Hustle over and tell Burbette, give him something to do.”

  “Okay. I see Cai and Hassan are here suiting up.”

  “Got ‘em. You can lay out the quadrants. Give me a second to make a couple a calls, including Cap. He has to know about this.”

  Watching his steps, Diaz hurried over to the trailer. Cai Yong and Victor Hassan were standing at the entrance in their Tyvek. Cai had grown up in Flushing and had the accent to prove it. Hassan was a naturalized American citizen, a Palestinian originally from Jordan. “This one’s for real,” Diaz told them at the entrance.

  “No shit,” Cai said.

  Diaz couldn’t tell whether he meant it sarcastically, so he kept his reply even. “Sarge says await instructions.” He went inside to give Burbette a fill, and by the time he returned, the corpse had left and Kahn was just wrapping up his call with Capobianco.

  Kahn hung up and all four detectives stood silently on the empty sidewalk, getting their bearings.

  Improbably, above the noise of traffic, they could hear soft rain pattering on the wrinkled tarp that moments ago had covered Albert Horn. Puddles were forming in the depressions.

  IN ONE CORNER OF LIEUTENANT Joseph Capobianco’s bedroom, a police radio sat atop a chest of drawers and crackled quietly. In the other corner, his wife, Jill, sat on a hard chair and read a magazine. The radio didn’t bother him. The sound of the snapping magazine pages made him wince.

  “What time is it?”

  “Late afternoon. Almost time for your medication.”

  “I’m nauseous.”

  “Go puke. It’ll make you feel better.”

  “It didn’t the first six times.”

  Jill set down the magazine, Sports Illustrated—work reading. Tall, blond and leggy, she’d been a college track and hoops star and now worked in the marketing department of the NBA offices on Fifth Avenue. Sometimes Capobianco got to visit the league’s executive skybox at the Garden. Today he could barely lift his head from the pillow. Jill looked concerned. She’d taken the day off to minister to him.

  “I’m glad Sam is out all week on that school trip. She doesn’t need to catch this.”

  Samantha was their teenage daughter. Capobianco agreed with his silence. He swallowed a plug of mucus with effort.

  “You want some Coke, some ginger ale?”

  “Sure, thanks. Either one.”

  As she went to the kitchen he dragged himself to the bathroom, had an ugly time of it in there, feeling the blood draining from his face, cold sweat stippling his forehead. When he emerged he went over to the police radio and turned up the volume. Jill came back through the door, stormed over and twisted the knob down to zero with emphasis. “You need to rest, Joe.”

  “Aw, hell. I woke up just three minutes ago.”

  “What’d you do in the bathroom? Still coming out both ends?”

  “TMI! Do we need to talk about this?”

  “Only until your fever comes down.”

  “Yes, nurse.”

  She set his Coke on the side table and handed him the digital thermometer. “You’re welcome.”

  He held the tip of the contraption in his ear until it beeped. She grabbed it from him before he could press reset. “Damn it. Hundred and four. The doc said it would be high for a while. No school for Joey tomorrow.”

  Capobianco didn’t have the energy to protest. He hadn’t kept down a piece of toast in thirty-six hours and he felt dizzy when he sat up.

  “I’m running down to the grocery store,” Jill said, “for more liquids and Tylenol. Anything else you need?”

  “How ‘bout my youth back?”

  “If I could do that I’d still have my fast break.” She brushed back his greasy brown hair and kissed him on the forehead. “You’re burning up.”

  “Thanks for reminding me.”

  “Keep the radio off or I’ll call the doctor and we’ll send you to the hospital, really embarrass your ass.”

  When she left he slid back down into the pillows, feeling useless. He closed his eyes and saw the hard face and sharp chin of Hank Gowen, his predecessor as head of the Bomb Squad. Gowen was a living legend, now working directly with the mayor’s office as a consultant. He reputedly hadn’t missed a day of work in thirty-eight years on the force. Just Cap’s luck to follow a human specimen like that, someone who leapt tall buildings in a single bound. Capobianco himself had made it just nine months in the new job before the bird flu knocked him off the pedestal. Little solace that it had also broadsided a quarter of his squad. In fact, that made him all the more anxious to get back, wondering whether they could handle the action so short-staffed, whether the whole thing would go to hell before he reached his first anniversary in charge. Maybe, he thought, facing the ceiling, eyes closed, he should ask for reinforcements from the precinct regulars. But what the Bomb Squad did was unique. You couldn’t just slot in another cop, even an experienced detective. A guy in that position would only get in everyone’s way.

  Capobianco propped himself up on his elbows and took a couple gulps of Coke, bent over and held the cold can against his forehead. His body had been alternating between chills and hot flushes for hours—covers off, covers on. The blanket still felt damp from sweat. He lay in his boxers atop it, sinuses on fire. Miserable.

  The ringing phone startled him alert. As he had all day, he thought he’d let Jill take it, but the damn thing kept ringing. Then he remembered that she’d gone out. He picked it up.

  “Cap here.”

  “You don’t sound too good, my friend.”

  “You got that from two syllables? Than
ks, Kahn. What the hell is it?”

  “Sorry to bother you, Lieutenant. Just that I didn’t want you to be the last to know.”

  “Spit it out already, Sandy. I only got so much time between bathroom visits.”

  Kahn told him what they knew so far: African-American male, thirty-three, army veteran, employed by National Bible Publishers nearby—they were sending someone there to check it out. Lives in Hollis—scrambling a crew there, too. JTTF notification sent out by Burbette of the FBI, minor casualties other than the perp, insignificant property damage—just a couple of cracked first-floor windows, not at the recruitment center, which had ballistic glass. AES notified and on the way, four Bomb Squad guys in the hole gathering evidence, some complications due to rain.

  Finally Capobianco interrupted. “Blew himself to smithereens and only cracked a couple windows? Sounds like an idiot. News cameras there yet?”

  “Yeah, but kept at bay.”

  “Good boy. I guess I’d better call the inspector. I’ll be down to you in half an hour.”

  Capobianco felt Kahn hesitate, but think better of what he was about to say. “Roger that, Lieutenant. We’ll proceed.”