Page 69 of Cyn
“I’d like to send the files we have to my explosives expert,” Joe said, drawing her attention to him. “I know most of the images we’ve seen so far are ammo, but he might be able to spot something that will tell us how they plan to deliver it.”
Cyn didn’t have to think about this long and she nodded. “I can send them over when I send them to Beni if you give me his email. Do you want to give him the heads-up they are on their way?”
Joe gave a sharp nod and pulled his phone from his pocket, but before he made the call, he wrote down an email address and slid the paper over to her. His voice rumbled in the background as she sent an email to Beni, then another to Dan “Fawkes” Fowler. Joe was still on the line when both emails left her outbox, so she went back to looking at the files Bartlett had uploaded onto the USB.
It was two o’clock in the morning when they finally received some good news in the form of a phone call. Well, relatively speaking, it was good news.
“I think they are going to try to implode the building,” Fawkes said. He’d called Joe, and Joe had put the phone on speaker for them all to hear.
“Like they demo those old casinos in Vegas?” Six asked. “But doesn’t that take months of planning?”
“Yes and yes,” Fawkes said. “A proper demo would take months. But if the building isn’t that big, a haphazard version could be put together in a day using the same rough techniques and theory.”
“Theory?” Cyn asked.
“Yes, all building demos commonly—and misleadingly—referred to as implosion are based on two simple concepts. The first is that you take out the support structures. The second is that you then time a series of explosions to guide the building down rather than out.”
“That sounds sophisticated for three young men,” Joe said.
“Yes and no. Like I said, the principle is pretty straightforward. If you aren’t worried about collateral damage, as I suspect these young men aren’t, then putting a couple of explosive devices at key structural points, especially those below ground level, would be enough to bring a three- or four-story building down. Or at least do some serious damage.”
“Why would they go to the trouble?” Devil asked. “It seems easier to plant a regular bomb…if there is such a thing.”
Fawkes chuckled. “There is such a thing, and they are used by the military. Everything else is just homemade—and misguided—hopes and dreams. Planting aregularbomb would most definitely make a statement. But if you can bring an entire buildingdownin seconds, then not only do you have significant loss of life from both the explosion and the debris, but you also have a fairly intimidating image that will get projected across the world.”
“A form of psychological warfare,” Cyn muttered.
“Exactly,” Fawkes said.
“What led you to this conclusion?” Joe asked.
“And if we find those devices, how hard are they to defuse?” Cyn asked.
“Two things led me to my theory. Based on the list of chemicals you sent over earlier, I think they are planning a TNT-RDX combination. Mixing that with a few other elements, all of which are on the list, creates a combination commonly used in a shaped charge, and shaped charges are often used to demo buildings with steel supports. When I took a look at the pictures you sent—and holy shit, what a bunch of fucked-up kids—I noticed a couple of images where the kids had some canisters in the background. I think they intend to use those canisters as the delivery mechanism and create the shaped charges out of them. There’s a shit ton of science behind why those types of devices are so effective, but we can save that lesson for another day and go with the premise that they are very effective if done right.”
“And if they are done wrong?” Cyn asked.
“It will still be dangerous, but in a different way,” Fawkes answered.
“You said shaped charges were used to demo steel supports. Would it be safe to say we need to be looking for a newer building that might have those kinds of supports?” Nora asked.
“I don’t want to send you in the wrong direction, but that’s what they are most commonly used for in demo work. Cement supports generally use a different kind of setup. But that said, I don’t know these kids or how much research they might have done. I don’t think it’s unreasonable that if they went to the effort to research how to demo a building, they’d figure out the different types of devices used on the different materials. I’d hesitate to make that assumption given what’s at stake here, though.” His answer wasn’t what Cyn wanted to hear, but it was an honest one.
“Thanks. What about defusing them?” Joe asked.
“I’ll start with the public services announcement. I wouldn’t recommend doing it yourself unless you’re an expert. That said, there’s really only one or two ways the suspects would be likely to design the mechanism, and both of those are fairly straightforward to defuse.”
Six, Devil, and Nora joined her at her desk, and for the next twenty-five minutes, Fawkes gave them all a flash lesson in how to dismantle a shaped charge. In the end, all five of them felt reasonably sure they could do the job, although Cyn was pretty sure they all hoped no one had to.
“I know I shouldn’t ask because it’s probably some need-to-know shit, but is there something going down that I can help with?” Fawkes asked after wrapping up his impromptu lesson.
“Not unless you’re based in Boston,” Cyn said. Joe cleared his throat and nodded. She shot him a surprised look. “You’re really based in Boston?”
“I am. Didn’t used to be, but I got married, and my wife’s family is here, so here I am. It’s fucking colder than a witch’s tit. My wife is lucky I love her.” In the background, Cyn heard a woman huff a laugh and mumble something that sounded like “as if you could live without me.”
“As I was saying,” Fawkes continued. “If you need a hand, let me know. We’re in the area.”
Cyn thanked him but secretly made a note to herself not to call. It was uncomfortable having him volunteer for something that could be incredibly dangerous while his wife was right beside him. Not that Cyn knew anything about the woman—maybe she was an explosives expert herself—but even so, it didn’t feel right to agree to include him when she could be sending the man to his death. That was a little dramatic, sure, but erring on the side of caution seemed prudent.
