Page 57 of So Sinister
Larry swallowed.“Yep.Yes, they are.”
Hartford sobbed, tears running down his cheeks.Larry knelt carefully in front of him and said, “Hey, buddy, it’s okay.No need to freak out, all right?I’m going to get you out of this.”
In his twenty-five-year career, he'd disarmed a total of thirty-three explosives.Of those explosives, thirty-one had been training weapons.Two had been actual bombs, one a shitty IED in Afghanistan that he'd disarmed in ten seconds by popping out a pair of double-A batteries, and the other a reasonably sophisticated but still straightforward suitcase bomb some college genius decided to sneak into a government building.
Third time’s the charm, he thought as he looked over this weapon.Only what was the charm here?
Hartford gasped, then gasped again.As his chest heaved, the bomb moved.“Sir?”Larry said.“Mr.Hartford?I’m gonna need you not to do that.”
Hartford’s breaths came quicker and quicker.His eyes stared blankly at the ceiling overhead.His body trembled, and Larry repeated, “Sir!James!Stay with me!”
Turk barked and nestled against Hartford, pushing his head against Hartford’s chest and looking up at him with beautiful brown eyes that communicated better than Larry ever could have,it’s going to be okay.
Gee, Larry hoped he was right about that.
But James calmed, his breaths slowing, his eyes regaining focus.The bomb stopped moving back and forth, and Larry was able to look at it more closely.
It was also pretty straightforward.It was a brick of Semtex about the size of a paperback.It weighed about twelve ounces, Larry guessed.That was a pretty damned serious chunk of plastique to begin with.That was what had brought down Pan Am Flight 103.It would take out this entire room and everyone in it along with anyone standing in front of it or a good twenty feet on either side of the doorway.
The resulting ignition of the fuel lines would destroy the entire airport.
Larry nearly laughed as he remembered his boss telling him why the people who designed the airport chose to run the aircraft fuel lines under the terminals instead of the flight lines.To reduce the likelihood of terrorist attack.If a terrorist attack occurred, she said, terrorists would assume the fuel lines were located near the tanks adjacent to the flight line.Those tanks actually held fire retardant, so if they blew those, the foam would put out the fire.They could have the airport up and running within a day.
Freaking idiots.Or what did Stevenson call them?Incompetents.Yeah, that was a good word.
He felt a touch of guilt at giving that asshole credit and focused on the bomb.The plastique was detonated by a pair of wires connected to a radio transceiver embedded in the front of the brick.The trick with these systems was always cutting wires without causing a spark.A single spark was game over for everyone.
He pulled out a small putty knife and worked it gently under the radio transceiver.What he hoped to do was remove the batteries so that no power could be generated which could transfer to the plastic and cause the big boom.He chuckled a little.This really wasn’t any more complex than the pipe bomb he’d disarmed in Afghanistan.Just a much better explosive and placed somewhere that it would cause the deaths of thousands of people.
But not bad.If he could just get to the batteries.
He pulled it free, and his heart sank.Instead of the AAA battery he expected, the radio was powered by four LR44 button cells.Removing one would cut off power, but there would be a number of transient little pulses of electricity running through the system in the process.The only safe way to remove the batteries was to remove all four at once at the exact same time without changing their positions relative to each other.
“Shit.Travis, gripper.Thin and wide.”
Travis pulled a pair of needlenose tongs from his belt.The tongs were flared at the end so the points could slip directly in between the batteries.
“Marsha, big gripper.Hold this thing steady as hell.”
Marsha got to her knees and used a large pair of pliers tipped with rubber to hold the brick of plastic still so Larry could use all of his concentration to remove the batteries.
“Okay, Mr.Hartford,” Larry said, carefully positioning the grippers.“I can’t begin to tell you how important it is that you stay as still as you possibly can.One movement, and we’re all…” He glanced up at Hartford to see his eyes as wide as dinner plates.“Actually, we’re good,” he lied.“I thought this was something else, but it’ll be a piece of cake.”
Hartford didn’t seem to believe him, but he stayed still, at least.
Larry took a deep breath, released it slowly, and gradually increased pressure on the edges of the batteries.Sweat trickled into his eye, but he pushed through it, took a deep breath, and pulled.
His grippers slipped.Terror—white hot and powerful—coursed through him.Then acceptance.He had failed.They were all dead.He didn’t want it to end this way, but he knew what might happen the day he signed up for EOD.He was ready to die.
Only he didn’t.The Semtex didn’t explode.For a moment, Larry was confused, almost offended.What was taking so long?
He looked more closely.When he realized what went wrong, he laughed.The dumbass had placed the batteries correctly, but he’d connected the wires to the batterycase, not the batteries themselves.The case was hard plastic and wouldn’t conduct any electrical energy.
He laughed again.He was so panicked he hadn’t noticed that when he first inspected the bomb.Stevenson might not have meant this one to be a dud, but dud it was all the same.
He chuckled once more, popped the batteries out, then placed them in the bag.
Then the elation came.He grinned at Hartford while Marsha and Travis laughed and cheered.“Sir, congratulations.That’s the closest I’ve ever been to anyone since my wife left me three years ago.”
