by C. G. Cooper
Higgins could see no difference between the red and green wires other than their color and their orientation within the device: one entered through the right side of the panel and the other through the left.
With no other reasoning than green meant go and red meant stop, Higgins shut his eyes, pulled at the red wire, and braced for impact of the exploding yellow cannisters. When a few seconds passed and nothing happened, Higgins opened one eye and watched as the timer ticked down from ten. It was now calculating seconds instead of minutes.
He reached forward and pulled out the green wire as quickly as he could, sending him sprawling onto his back. He looked up at the sky through the trees, expecting to see a spray of yellow blotting out the green of the leaves above him. Instead, he heard an audible click and then nothing.
Sitting up, he saw the timer had stopped on three seconds. He decided not to tell Johnson or Abrams how close he’d come.
After placing the red and green wires in line with the others, he got to his feet, brushed his knees, and made his way back toward the cabin. Out front, the guards were gone; the only trace that they had been there to begin with being a few stray splashes of color. Presumably, the trainers had walked off into the woods once their job was over. Higgins hoped they steered clear of the real bomb.
He snuck in through the front door of the cabin. He wasn’t sure what he had expected, but the scene before him was enough of a shock that it took him a full minute to really take it in.
Inside, the cabin was bare-bones furnished. A few chairs and a small round table, as well as some boxes stacked in the corner and a duffel bag against the far wall. Abrams was standing back, his gun loosely at the ready. The look on his face was one of concern and apprehension.
As for Johnson, he was in his element. There was a manic gleam in his eye that spelled trouble for their prisoners. Johnson had already taken his frustrations out on one of them. The face was bloody, and there was a purple bruise blossoming on his cheek.
Chapter Twenty-Two
“What happened?” Higgins directed his question at Abrams.
“Took out the guards in front. Then this one,” he pointed to the man with the bloody nose, “decided to try his hand at fighting his way out. Didn’t make it very far before he got up close and personal with the butt of Johnson’s rifle.”
The threat of being shot must’ve been enough for the other two because now all three were lined up against the wall, their hands bound behind them.
“Did you take care of the second device?” Johnson said, still staring down his prisoners.
“Yes. It was fairly easy. Whoever put it together had—”
“Don’t really care about the specifics, Higgins. We have more important work to do.” Johnson knelt down in front of the man with the bloody nose. “Like figuring out how we’re going to extract what we need from our friends here.”
Abrams sauntered over. “It’s been a long couple of days, boys. I just want to take a shower. What do you say? Tell us where your boss is, and we’ll make sure your jail cell has a few extra perks.”
“And if you don’t tell us,” Johnson said, “then a broken nose will be the least of your worries.”
Higgins faded into the background. He swept his gaze over the inside of the cabin once more and landed on the boxes he’d seen earlier. When he opened the top one, all he found were some basic supplies. Enough for the three men to stay in the woods for about a month, if they rationed correctly.
He walked over to one of the small windows and peered out into the woods, careful to stay back far enough so he wasn’t silhouetted. No movement. The sun was sinking lower in the sky. They didn’t have much more time. He moved on to the duffel bag.
The contents included some clothes, a few spare parts for the explosive canisters, and a radio.
“I’m running out of patience.”
Johnson’s voice clued Higgins back into the conversation. Abrams was standing back now, his eyebrows knit together as he watched Johnson take one man by the collar and shake him.
“Tell me where your boss is,” Johnson demanded. “Or I’ll slowly break your nose with a hammer.”
“What’s in it for me?” the man asked. Higgins wasn’t as familiar with Russian as he was with French, but the accent sounded more than passable. It was possible this agent was native, or perhaps his career revolved around passing himself off as native.
Johnson pointed to the third man. “I’ll break his nose instead of yours, that’s what’s in it for you. Either way, the longer I have to wait, the more blood there’s going to be on my hands. And that will only serve to piss me off further.”
“This isn’t the way to do it,” Higgins said. He couldn’t help himself. Johnson’s arrogance, his violence, and his mania, were all starting to get to him. “There’s a better way. That’s why we’re here.”
Johnson tossed the man down in between his friends and turned to Higgins. “You can’t always talk your way through an interrogation. Sometimes you have to get your hands dirty.”
Higgins turned to Abrams for support, but he just shrugged.
“All the information we need must be here.” Higgins gestured to the boxes and the duffel bag. “The window-sill is dusty, but the boxes aren’t. They haven’t been here long. There’s a radio in the bag. It doesn’t look to be anything more than an ordinary two-way radio. Whoever they’re talking to is close.”
Johnson looked at Abrams and nodded toward the bag. When Abrams handed Johnson the radio, Johnson held it out for the man in the middle of the group. “Your boss is out there, isn’t he? Get him on the line. Call him in. I want to talk to him face to face.”
The man took the radio and looked down at it for a moment. The one with the broken nose said something to him in Russian that made him stiffen. Then, in the time it took Higgins to blink twice, the man flung the radio at the wall. Splinters of plastic casing flew off in all directions.
Higgins dove for the radio, knowing it was their best chance at getting their ultimate target, the man in charge of the bombings. If he could fix it, there was still a chance.
At the same time, Johnson reared back his fist and hit the offending prisoner right in the solar plexus. The man wheezed as he fell over sideways.
Johnson turned to the third. “You have anything to add?”
“No.”
Johnson laughed. It was a booming guffaw that danced on the edges of insanity. He popped up to his feet and grabbed the knife hanging from Abrams’s belt before Abrams could even react. When Johnson held out the weapon, the blade was inches from the third man’s jugular.
Higgins cried out. “You can’t. They’re agents.”
“They knew what they were signing up for,” Johnson said. “They were instructed to hold out as long as possible. We don’t have time to test their limits.”
“Come on, man.” Abrams sounded nervous. “There’s only so much you can do.”
“There’s a lot you can do to a man before you actually kill him. There’s a lot I can do that will have them begging for me to kill them. I could make them feel pain that they have never felt before and not leave a mark.” He spat at the prisoner. “How’s that sound, huh?”
“You could cost us the program,” said Higgins. He was reaching for anything now. “If you really hurt them, you could get disqualified. We’ll all be shut out.”
Johnson’s voice was abnormally low now. “You know what? I’m not sure I care anymore. At least I wouldn’t have to listen to you all day.”
Higgins looked down at the radio in his hand. The back cover had popped off and the antenna looked slightly bent, but otherwise it was in good shape. He switched it on and reveled in the satisfying sound of static.
Johnson pressed the blade even harder against the third man’s neck. A dribble of blood slid down his skin.
“Lay off, man.” Abrams took a step closer, but he didn’t dare try to pull Johnson away. It wouldn’t have ended well for the man with the knife to his throat
.
“I want to know how to get in touch with your boss.” Johnson leaned in. The other man winced. “Tell me now, and this all ends.”
“Go to hell.”
Johnson threw his head back and laughed. Between the span of one breath and the next, he grabbed the third man’s hand, pressed it to the floor, and balanced the tip of the blade in the middle of the back of the hand. It hadn’t punctured the skin just yet, but judging by the look on the guard’s face, it was close to going through.
“I wonder how well you’ll shoot after losing a finger -- maybe two?”
Abrams swore. Johnson leaned forward just a fraction of an inch.
The other man cried out. “Channel three! Channel three! Call for Ovechkin. Wait till he asks who it is for the second time, and then tell him it’s Talanov.”
Johnson looked back at Higgins and nodded. With a shaking hand, Higgins turned the dial at the top of the radio to channel three, and then hit the call button. He tried to instill a sense of confidence in his voice, but it cracked in the middle. “Ovechkin?”
A man answered in Russian. Johnson held up a single finger. When thirty seconds passed, the man spoke again. Johnson held up a second finger then nodded.
“Talanov,” Higgins replied. At least his voice didn’t crack this time.
The line went silent.
The only sound in the room was the low breathing of the six men inside. And so, when a voice sounded loudly from the door, everyone jumped. Abrams raised his weapon, Johnson crouched lower and held up the knife, releasing his prisoner’s hand, and Higgins dropped the radio.
“Congratulations, you caught me. I am Ovechkin. You’ve completed the objective.” Decker stood in the doorway, a tight smile on his lips.
Johnson whooped and popped up onto his feet, immediately moving to untie his three prisoners. “You guys okay?”
Higgins sputtered. “Are you serious? You hold a knife to someone’s throat, and then you pretend it never happened? What’s wrong with you?”
Johnson clapped Higgins on the back. He was in rare form, smiling and inspecting the superficial wounds he’d inflicted on the other agents. “It’s called acting, Higgins. It’s not always about beating the shit out of someone to get them to talk. Sometimes just the threat of doing it will loosen their lips. You must to act like you mean it.”
“He was bleeding.”
“He’s probably gotten worse from shaving. Besides, like I said, they knew what they signed up for. I wasn’t going to do any real damage. I’m not that stupid.”
“You were pretty convincing, man,” the third agent said. He flexed his hand. “Had me worried there for a minute.”
“That was the whole point.” Johnson turned to Decker. “So, how’d we do?”
“Second to last,” Decker said. “You just barely managed to scrape by.”
Johnson whirled around on Higgins, his smile completely erased. He was obviously going to place all blame on someone else as usual.
“Sir...” Higgins stepped forward, derailing Johnson’s blame game. “There’s a bomb in the woods.”
“I didn’t see any indication it had exploded,” Decker said. “I assume you disarmed it.”
“No, sir,” Abrams said. “A real one. At least as far as we can tell.”
Decker’s face clouded and then went stony. “Show me.”
Higgins led the way back to the bomb, showing Decker where he had found it and how the trip wire had been set up. Decker had immediately pulled them all back and used a different radio to call into headquarters.
“Bomb squad will be here soon. In the meantime, I suggest we get going.”
“Who planted it?” Higgins asked. “Why would it be here?”
Decker merely shook his head in response.
Either he didn’t know the answers or refused to share them. Neither possibility was better than the other.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Higgins awoke with a start. The only visible light came from the crescent moon shining through his window. He lay there for a moment getting his bearings. All was quiet in the hallway. He was alone and safe. No more woods. No more worrying about bugs, and bears, and whatever went bump in the night.
It took him a solid minute to realize why he had been pulled from his slumber. His brain, as it usually did, continued to work out problems he couldn’t solve while he was awake, and had jolted him into consciousness in order to utilize his full resources.
Something had been bothering him about the real bomb they’d found outside that cabin. Its presence was alarming enough, but its placement was peculiar. There was no guarantee which direction the candidates would be coming in to ambush the cabin. In fact, the one area they were sure to avoid was the path.
When Higgins woke up in the middle of the night, he knew without a doubt that the bomb had not been intended for them. It had been intended for someone else, maybe someone in the cadre of instructors.
He replayed the scene in his head one more time. Decker calling for the bomb squad. The four of them waiting outside the blast radius until the experts showed up with the resources to detonate the bomb safely. Higgins had felt the shockwave alter the beating of his heart, and despite being perfectly protected, he felt a sense of queasiness that didn’t go away until he was safely back in his tiny room at Headquarters.
Decker had refused to answer any questions. He’d packed the team of three up in his car and headed back down the mountain. The several hours back to HQ were spent in awkward silence, broken only occasionally by awkward jokes. Even Abrams was subdued.
Higgins’s mind spun in circles. The bomb had been planted with purpose, but for what purpose? Decker obviously had more information than the rest of them, but Higgins couldn’t figure out what it was the man refused to share.
This new assumption that the bomb was meant for someone higher up the food chain – perhaps Decker specifically — precluded any more sleep for Higgins. It didn’t help that they’d been instructed to keep news of the bomb quiet until someone could figure out what it meant.
Higgins had to talk to someone. Johnson wasn’t an option, but Abrams was.
He got up without getting dressed and slipped out of his room and down the hall. He’d never been to Abrams’s room before but knew roughly where it was. The trick was not being seen by anyone else. Strictly speaking, everyone was supposed to keep to themselves—and wandering around CIA quarters in the middle of the night was more than a little suspicious.
He tiptoed his way down the hall and knocked with a single knuckle on Abrams’s door, his heart pounding. After a tense moment of silence, he knocked again, a little louder. When another sixty seconds passed, he tried the doorknob. It turned easily in his hand. Looking both ways down the hall, he pushed open the door, slipped inside, and peered around.
No Abrams.
Curiosity warred with his fear. Why wouldn’t he be in his room? Decker’s rules had been clear. Then again, Higgins wasn’t exactly abiding by them either, and Abrams was a bit of a loose cannon.
Fear began to outweigh curiosity. He backed out of the room and clicked the door shut as quietly as he could. When he turned around to go back to bed, he faltered. Abrams was standing a foot away, staring at him.
“Can I help you with something, Al?” The cavalier tone to Abrams’s voice was still there, but the underlying suspicion was loud and clear.
“I wanted to... talk to you about something.” When Abrams didn’t respond, Higgins stuttered on. “About the device. You know, the live one. About what it might mean.”
Abrams sighed and rubbed his eyes. Then he brushed past Higgins and into his room, holding the door open and gesturing the other man inside. Higgins scurried forward.
“You haven’t talked to anyone, have you?” Abrams collapsed onto his bed. Higgins remained standing.
“No, of course not.” He paused for a beat. “Have you?”
Abrams opened one eye and leveled him with a glare. “I’m not stupid, Al.”
“And you think I am?”
Abrams waved away the comment. “Go to sleep, Al. It’s not worth worrying over.”
“Except I think it might be.”
Abrams yawned, long and loud. “And why’s that?”
“Because, I think someone was targeting Decker.”
He eyed him momentarily, then closed his eyes in dismissal of the idea. “You have no evidence.”
“The bomb was meant to catch someone who drove or walked down that path. If they knew about the exercise, they would’ve known that would be whoever came to get us.”
“If they knew about it. Who knows who uses that cabin? It could’ve been some psychopath working out the best way to build a pipe bomb.”
“And you’re not worried about that?”
Abrams sat up and put his hands on his knees, dropping his chin to his chest. He looked exhausted. “Of course, I’m worried, but this isn’t our job. They’ve got people on the scene. They’ll figure it out. Maybe you should stop looking for conspiracies where there aren’t any.”
Higgins stared at Abrams for a solid minute before speaking again. “Where were you?”
“Talking with Johnson.”
The answer came too fast. “About what?”
He eyed Higgins with some annoyance. “Who are you, Judge Wapner? Why is that any of your concern?”
“Because we’re teammates.”
“Don’t worry about it, Al.”
“Were you talking about me?”
“What? Not for nothin’, Al, but you’re starting to sound like a high school drama queen. And the answer is no. I’ve got nothing but respect for you.”
“Johnson doesn’t feel the same way.”
“He doesn’t, but he still knows you have valuable skills.”
“So, you’re worried about the bomb.”
Abrams gripped the back of his neck. “What?”
“You were talking about the bomb to Johnson, weren’t you?”