Live Bait

by David Archer

  Sam, who had drawn a pistol and had it aimed directly at Heinrich, narrowed his eyes. “The money? What about it?”

  “You looked at the currency in the top of the bag and decided not to count it, just as I thought you would. Had you bothered, you would have realized that the money was not all the bag contained. Did you notice that the bag was rather large? That’s because it contains a small nuclear device, far too small to be a terrible threat against a government, but certainly large enough to kill everyone on that level and collapse the elevator shaft forever. When I closed the bag, I armed it. It will detonate in just over two hours, or it can be detonated immediately by one of my men on the surface, with a remote device, should I not check in with him periodically. Those of us down here might survive the explosion, but that would be only a very short extension of life, I’m sure.”

  Sam stared at him. “You son of a bitch,” he said. “Do you think we didn’t realize we might not get out of this alive? If that’s what it takes to protect the world from you and your kind, then so be it.”

  “Oh, I was certain you would feel that way,” Heinrich said with a smile. “But can you really let so many civilians die? Remember, Mr. Prichard, I have read a great deal about you. I don’t believe you could possibly allow that to happen, especially when you know that children are involved and at risk. And yet, that is exactly what you will be doing if I do not leave here with these bombs.”

  “You expect me to trust that you would disarm them if I let you go? I’m not that crazy, Heinrich.”

  “Neither am I, Mr. Prichard. No, my plan is much more simple than that. Each of the devices is connected to a cell phone. A simple call to the phone will disarm the device. You will designate one man to ride up the elevator with me. Once my bombs are loaded, I shall give that man all six of the numbers that will disarm them, as well as the precise locations where they can be found.”

  Denny and Darren were standing close by, their own weapons aimed at the men who were still in the vault with them. Rob Feinstein and three of his own men stepped into the room at that moment, and Rob looked at Sam closely.

  “Sam?” Rob asked. “Something wrong?”

  NINETEEN

  “How do I know you’re telling the truth?” Sam asked.

  “I am willing to prove it to you,” Heinrich said. “But only on my own terms.”

  Denny was filling Rob in on what was happening while Sam was staring into Heinrich’s eyes.

  “What terms?”

  “I happen to know that the elevator can carry two of the bombs at a time,” Heinrich said. “I can be happy with two of them, so here is my proposal. We load two of the bombs onto the elevator and go up to the control booth. I shall then give you the location and cell number of one of the bombs, so that you can disarm it personally and then send the police to confirm its existence. Once you have done so, you will allow me and my men to take those two bombs to the surface. As soon as they are loaded into the truck, I shall give your man the rest of the disarming cell phone numbers, along with the remote detonator for the one I brought down. We drive away and he can bring those numbers back down to you, so that you can disarm the one in the control room, first.”

  “You still won’t get away,” Sam said. “Satellites are watching this area all the time, we’d have no trouble tracking wherever you go.”

  “I'll take that chance,” Heinrich said. “If you’re correct, then you don’t really have much to worry about, do you? You will be able to catch me, anyway, right?”

  “He’s got a trick up his sleeve, Sam,” Denny said. “Don’t trust the bloody bastard.”

  Sam’s mind was racing as he thought about the innocent people who could die if Heinrich was telling the truth. While he might be willing to sacrifice his team, and even Indie, to save the world from a madman like this, he couldn’t bring himself to willingly sacrifice thousands of innocent people, many of whom would be children.

  “We don’t have a choice,” he said. “Rob, order your men to stand down. Same to the sergeants, everybody stand down. Get that first bomb on the elevator, and let’s get another one out there.”

  “Sam, you…”

  “There’s no choice, Denny,” Sam said. “Too many lives at stake. I don’t think there’s any way he can get these big mothers out of the country, and I don’t think there’s any way he can disappear with them, even in the desert. We’ll let him take them for now and let the army take over.”

  With all of them working together, they got the second bomb out of the vault and down the tunnel quickly. Within fifteen minutes, two of them were loaded onto the elevator and then Heinrich’s men boarded. Sam, Heinrich and Denny stepped on with them, leaving everyone else on Level 6.

  Sam spoke into the little radio he was carrying. “Bring us up to Level 1,” he said. The elevator began to rise only a few seconds later.

  Sam turned to Heinrich. “Denny will go up with you,” he said. “If you don’t give him the numbers, I'll do whatever it takes to track you down and skin you alive.”

  “I’m certain you would,” Heinrich said. “I'll do exactly as I have said, because the distraction will help me. While your American authorities are busy dealing with the small devices, I'll be able to take these to a place where they can be most effective.” He smiled at Sam. “And you and I can play a game. I'll be the mouse, and you can be the cat. If you can find me, so be it.”

  “I'll find you,” Sam said. “Don’t worry about that.”

  On Level 1, Indie had been watching the video from the tunnel on Level 6. She had brought what was happening to Steve’s attention.

  When the elevator arrived, Heinrich told his men to remain with the bombs. He and Sam stepped into the control booth, and Sam saw Steve aiming his pistol at Heinrich.

  “Stand down, Steve,” Sam said. “He’s planted bombs all around Tucson, suitcase nukes. If he doesn’t take these two bombs and leave, all of them will go off.” He glanced at the duffel bag. “There’s also one in that bag. Once he is up on the surface, he’ll give us the means to disarm them all.”

  Steve looked him in the eye as he laid his gun down on the floor. “You honestly trust him, Sam?”

  “Not as far as I could throw one of those bombs,” Sam said, “but he’s holding all the cards. There’s nothing I can do but cooperate, I’m afraid.” He turned to Heinrich. “All right, your turn.”

  Heinrich recited a telephone number.

  Sam glanced at the cell phone relay. His phone and the one in the bomb would need it in order to function, but it seemed to be working fine, so he dialed the number Heinrich had given him.

  He put the phone to his ear and heard it ringing on the other end. There was no answer, but it stopped after three rings. Sam looked at Heinrich.

  “That one is in a small briefcase under a garbage can near the entrance of the Park Place mall. You can contact the mall security office to verify this.”

  Indie turned to her computer and tapped the keyboard, then read off the number for mall security to Sam. He dialed it quickly.

  “Park Place Security,” came a voice. “How may I help you?”

  “My name is Sam Prichard, and I’m a special investigator with the United States government. I need you to check under the trash cans near the entrance of the mall, look for a suitcase or briefcase. If you find it, do not open it. It may contain a small nuclear bomb.”

  The man who answered the phone sputtered, but then Sam could hear him issuing orders frantically. Sam waited for almost three minutes, and then he came back online. He sounded nervous. “Okay, we found a briefcase. What am I supposed to do with it?”

  “Call the police,” Sam said. “And tell them there may be more, shortly.”

  He ended the call and put the phone into his pocket again, then looked at Heinrich.

  “You see? I am telling you the truth. When I am safely on the surface and the bombs are loaded, I'll give your man the other numbers.” He pointed at his own head. “They only exist here,�
� he said. “It wouldn’t do you any good to kill me and try to find them, because only I know them.”

  Sam stared at him for a moment, then nodded. “Go ahead,” he said. “But don’t you dare doublecross me.”

  Heinrich tried to look innocent. “Me? Doublecross the man who killed my beloved nephew? Believe it or not, Mr. Prichard, I look forward to the next time we meet.” He turned without another word, walked out of the room, went straight to the elevator and then looked through the window at Sam.

  “Send them up,” Sam said.

  The elevator operator looked at him for a moment, then turned and activated her system. The elevator started to rise, and Sam began trying to answer the questions that were being thrown at him.

  Indie was watching the elevator on her monitor, keeping her eyes on Denny as he rode silently up to the surface. When they got there, she switched the monitor to outside the front entrance, and then they watched as a large truck backed up to the entrance. A crane lifted the bombs off the carts when they got there and set them into cradles. Tarps were quickly thrown over them and the truck driver climbed into the cab.

  Heinrich turned to Denny, who had been standing quietly off to the side. The microphone couldn’t quite pick up what he was saying, but Denny was scribbling something onto a notepad. A moment later, Heinrich climbed into the cab of the truck and the SUVs followed as it drove away. Denny rushed back into the entrance of the mine, running for all he was worth to get back to the elevator.

  “Okay, bring me down,” Denny said into the radio as he stepped onto the elevator.

  Down below, the elevator operator prepared to do so, but that’s when the door from the security room suddenly opened and a man stepped through. He fired two shots, one of them instantly killing Private Landry and the other turning the cell phone relay into electrical junk. As Sam and Steve turned to aim their own weapons at him, the man turned his gun and shot himself through the head.

  Sam stared at the two dead bodies. “Where’s the other elevator operator?” he demanded.

  Indie was staring at the dead girl beside her, but tore her eyes away and turned to her husband. “Level 3,” she said haltingly. “He was sent down there with Summer and Jade and Walter, to hide until it was safe.”

  “Dammit,” Sam said. He looked at Steve. “The ropes,” he said. “Indie, can you communicate with them?”

  “Well, yes,” she said.

  “Tell them to get to the elevator shaft and to tie the operator into a boatswain seat with one of the ropes. Steve and I'll pull him up. We have to get that elevator operating again, now. Then call Denny, and tell him to start calling those numbers.”

  “Sam, he can’t,” she said. “Heinrich took his phone from him before he drove away. Without the relay, Sam, there’s no way we can disarm those bombs. I can have him give me the numbers, then try to contact someone at the air base, have them do it.”

  Sam nodded. “Do it, but first tell Jade and Summer to get the elevator operator on the rope.”

  Indie nodded and spoke into the microphone in front of her as Sam and Steve hurried to the elevator shaft. It was only a couple of minutes before they heard voices from below them, and a moment later Jade shouted up to them, “Pull him up!”

  Sam and Steve braced themselves and began pulling on the rope that was taut. Slowly, almost inch by inch, they were raising the man along the wall of the elevator shaft. It was almost sixty feet from where they stood to the floor of Level 3, and both of them were straining by the time they got him close enough that they could see him in the darkness.

  The operator, Corporal Jenkins, was trying to help. He was using his fingertips to try to claw his way up the wall, taking at least a little bit of his weight off the men who were pulling him upward. As he finally scrambled over onto the floor with them, all three of them dropped and began gasping for breath.

  “What happened?” Jenkins asked. “What happened to Julie?”

  “One of Heinrich’s men,” Sam said between gasps. “Hid in the security room and shot her, then killed himself.”

  Jenkins looked heartbroken, and Sam suspected that he and the girl might have been close. Unfortunately, there was no time to worry about that.

  “Come on, Corporal,” he said. “I’ve got to get up there, now.”

  The three of them managed to get to their feet and stumbled into the control booth, and then Sam and Steve dragged the dead girl’s body into the security room. Jenkins sat in her vacated seat and stared at the blood and gore splattered all over her console for a moment, then shook it off and got to work. He logged on to the console and then signaled the elevator to come down.

  “Sam,” Indie said, “there’s another problem. Something is jamming radio transmissions, I can’t contact the airbase or anybody else outside of here.”

  Sam stared at her for a moment. “Then you have to go up to the surface and call those numbers yourself,” he said. “Captain Howell said there was a relay set up to a cell tower somewhere in the area, so there must be a signal up there somewhere.”

  “Me? What about you?”

  “I’m going to be busy,” Sam said. He turned to the elevator operator. “Jenkins, are there any vehicles up there?” he asked. “Anything in the garage, maybe?”

  “Our personal vehicles, the vans, maybe an army pickup truck or two. I don’t know where the keys would be, though.”

  “What about yours? Do you have your keys?”

  “Well, yeah,” Jenkins said. He reached into a pocket and held out a key ring. “I rode my motorcycle out yesterday,” he said. “It’s a BMW 650, a dirt bike. Can you ride one?”

  “Oh, yeah,” Sam said. “And if I break it, I'll buy you a new one.”

  Sam turned to Steve. “As soon as that elevator comes back from taking me up top, you get everyone else out of here.” He looked at the duffel sitting beside the wall. “We’ve got about half an hour before that thing goes off. Corporal, is there any way to start the elevator going up and let you get onto it?”

  Jenkins looked at him. “No, sir,” he said. “Once it starts moving, if I leave my seat, it will stop. I can’t leave here until another elevator operator comes down and takes over.”

  Sam looked at him sadly. “Then I may be asking an awful lot of you,” he said. “That duffel bag contains what may be a nuclear bomb. I was told that if I move it, it’ll go off, but it’s going to go off in about thirty-five minutes no matter what. I need you to get as many people out of here as possible before that happens.”

  Jenkins swallowed hard. “I know my duty, sir,” he said. “I'll get them out, you can count on me.”

  “Sam,” Indie said. “There may be a way I can disarm this bomb. If Denny has the number, I can use this computer system to generate a signal on eight hundred megahertz. I should be able to make the phone think it’s a cell tower and dial its number. Just dialing the number is what disarms it, right?”

  “Yes, that’s what Heinrich said,” Sam replied. “Here he comes, now.”

  The elevator was just dropping to their level and Denny came running into the booth. “I got the numbers, Sam,” he said. He held out his notepad and Sam snatched it instantly.

  “Any idea which one of these goes to the bomb in this case?”

  Denny shook his head. “No, he didn’t say. He just gave me the numbers, and then four more locations where he said bombs are hidden in Tucson, but I don’t know which number goes to which location.”

  “Try them all,” Sam said to Indie. He handed her the list and she started tapping her keyboard frantically.

  It turned out to be the fourth number, and they suddenly heard the phone ringing from inside the case. It rang three times and stopped, and Sam let out his breath.

  “That should mean it’s disarmed,” he said. “Unfortunately, there’s only one way to know. Jenkins, whatever you do, don’t touch that bag. If everything goes well, we’ll get a relief down here for you as soon as possible.”

  “And if it doesn’t,” Jen
kins said with a wry grin, “I won’t know about it anyway.”

  “Remember, as soon as we’re off the elevator, you get everybody else out. Pack them in like sardines if you have to, the elevator can handle the weight.”

  “I'll handle it, sir,” Jenkins said. “Go get that bastard, will you?”

  Sam snatched a machine gun, grabbed Indie by the arm, and then she, Steve and Denny hurried to the elevator with him. As soon as they were on, it started rising.

  “I’m taking Jenkins’ motorcycle and going after Heinrich. Denny, see if you can hotwire something else so you and Steve can follow. Indie, you call the rest of those numbers, then notify the police to check all those locations. As soon as you’ve got that done, call Ron and tell him what’s going on.”

  “I will, Sam,” Indie said. “Sam, please be careful.”

  He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her tight, then kissed her passionately. A moment later, they arrived at the surface and all of them hurried out of the mine.

  Sam, Denny and Steve stepped out first to make sure all of Heinrich’s people were gone. As soon as they were sure the area was clear, Sam yelled for Indie to come out and make her calls while he and the men hurried into the garage.

  There were two motorcycles in the garage, but the BMW was easy to spot. With the high fenders of a dirt bike, Sam had no trouble telling it from the Ducati speedster that sat beside it. He climbed on and stuck the key into the ignition, then hit the button for the electric starter. The engine roared to life and Sam squeezed the clutch and dropped it into gear.

  “I’m going after them,” he said loudly. “If you can get something running, I can use all the help I can get.”