by Joe Craig
I saw him, Jimmy realised, the nausea returning. He drove past me on that moped. I could have stopped him. He felt faint, but his programming seemed to crank up a gear. It was like a belt fastening a notch tighter inside his skin, pulling his thoughts into calm, emotionless order.
First he found the van. That wasn’t hard – it was parked in the central row, right next to one of the pillars. The rear doors were locked, but Jimmy jabbed his elbow into the catch and pulled them open.
The vehicle was completely full of crates, stacked up three high and covered in a thick grey blanket. Jimmy pulled back one corner and nearly threw up again. It was even worse than he’d expected.
When he’d first smelled the nitroglycerin, he’d assumed that one or two crates might contain volatile bomb-making equipment of some kind. But here were dozens of crates, and every single one of them was packed with slim glass tubes of a clear, jelly-like solid, all connected by a network of black wires. The whole van was one giant bomb.
Jimmy wanted to run straightaway to warn people. He thought of all the residents in the tower above him, and the children in the playground alongside the building. They all had to evacuate. But Jimmy’s feet wouldn’t move. Instead he remained rooted to the spot while his eyes darted over the contraption before him. He traced the lines of wire as if following the map of a labyrinth, examining the piles of crates for precious seconds. How long did he have before the whole thing blew up?
Come on, Jimmy told himself, feeling the sweat crawling down his neck. There’s no way you can defuse a bomb. There was no ticking clock, no red digits showing him a countdown. There certainly wasn’t anything that looked like an ‘off’ switch, and all of the wires were the same colour – black.
Jimmy thought his eyes were going to bulge out of his head, they were flitting around so fast without blinking. He noticed the condensation on the glass tubes. Of course. Nitro freezes at thirteen degrees. The chemical was usually a liquid, but Jimmy realised it had been cooled into a solid to make it easier to transport. At the same time, he knew that as nitroglycerin thawed, it became even more unstable.
In Jimmy’s imagination, the piles of crates changed shape. Some of them even became transparent. In a flash, he could see exactly how this bomb was supposed to work.
Against his will, he felt a rush of pleasure. Something inside him was impressed by the artful construction of the bomb – even thrilled. It was built in such a way that only a single detonator was required. That would shoot a charge through the wires, setting off a chain reaction as it raised the temperature of each tube of nitroglycerin, melting them in a specific order. That intricately organised relay would multiply the size of the explosion a hundred times.
The beauty of it was that the bomb was virtually sabotage-proof. The detonator was nowhere to be seen – presumably hidden at the very centre of the pile of crates. Then Jimmy noticed tiny gold rings round the connections between the wires and the glass tubes. A second trigger mechanism, he realised. Any attempt to disconnect the wires or get to the detonator would set off the chain reaction early. That left no way of stopping it, and no way of predicting when it would explode. Even with the expertise of an assassin inside him, for all Jimmy knew this bomb could blow up at any moment.
About the author
Joe Craig studied Philosophy at Cambridge University, then became a songwriter. Within a year, however, his love of stories had taken over and he was writing the first novel in the Jimmy Coates series. It was published in 2005. He is now a full-time author and likes to keep in touch with his readers through his website www.joecraig.co.uk.
When he’s not writing he’s visiting schools, playing the piano, inventing snacks, playing football, coaching cricket, reading or watching a movie.
He lives in London.
Also by Joe Craig
1. Jimmy Coates: Killer
2. Jimmy Coates: Target
3. Jimmy Coates: Revenge
4. Jimmy Coates: Sabotage
TEAM UP WITH
JIMMY COATES ON MYSPACE!
WWW.MYSPACE.COM/JIMMYCOATES
Copyright
First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Children’s Books 2008 HarperCollins Children’s Books is a division of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 77-85 Fulham Palace Road, Hammersmith, London, W6 8JB
www.harpercollinschildrensbooks.co.uk
1
Copyright © Joseph Craig 2008 Map by Tim Stevens
Joseph Craig asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of the work.
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ePub edition June 2008 ISBN- 9780007281961
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Table of Contents
Half Title
Title Page
Dedication
The Big Bang
Slipstream
William Lee
A Wing And A Prayer
Send The Enforcer
Nasu Miso
Whiteout
Fear, Pain And A Red Beard
Birds In Flight
French Welcome
Lies Work
Chemistry Kills
The Half-Life Of Dead Rabbits
Mutam-Ul-It
Knowing The Drill
Chase Your Shadow
Marla Rakubian
Stone In A Barrel
22,000 Paces
The Fifth Pier
Jimmy Coates: Destroyer
Narnia Must Be Closed
Josh Browder
Voices Like Friends
Message From The Sewer
The Capita
A Good Head For A Deal
The Man Who Didn’T Run
The Second Thing
Pandora Should Hav
e Packed Light
Message From A Condiment
Last Orders At The Gregor’S Elbow
There Is No Euston
Only Like The Best Humans
Terminal Climb
Message From A Ghost
About the Author
About the Author
Copyright
About the Publisher