Page 111 of At Midnight Comes the Cry
“We’re five people with guns. We’ll do a rotation; two of us moving the bombs, three providing cover.”
Her lips moved, trying to find an argument against his strategy. All she could come up with was “I wish you didn’t have to do this.”
“I do, too, darlin’.” He folded her in his arms. “Get everyone in the corridor. Line them up in order. Keep them calm.”
She broke away. Wiped her eyes. “Donotget yourself killed. That’s an order, Chief.”
He straightened. “Ma’am, yes, ma’am.”
13.
Johnson and Khalil pushed their way through the disorganized mess of civilians squeezing their way into the tunnellike corridor. Hadley eyed them doubtfully. “How many trips will we have to make? Really?”
Flynn narrowed his eyes, calculating. She had a sudden image ofhis red head next to Hudson’s dark brown, tutoring him withFlash Factors: Learn Fractions in a Flash!
Oh God oh God oh God please let us get out of here safe.
“Eleven, including us. Maybe twelve.”
Two down, ten to go.
The chief finished with the synagogue security guards and led them over to where she and Flynn were standing. “Knox, one more time: How do we recognize the bombs?”
“Weight. The decorative ones weigh as much as an empty coffee cup. The dangerous ones are much heavier.”
“Okay. We’re not going to try to be clever, so no putting boxes back like we talked about earlier. Rotation order is me, Kevin, Knox, Johnson, Khalil. Two ahead, moving boxes, three providing covering fire if necessary. We’re going to leapfrog, so we don’t miss anything.” The chief faced the exhibit case’s glass and drew two imaginary parallel lines. “The IEDs go from position one to position two.” He stabbed with his fingers. “Then from position two to position three, and so on.”
“Once we get to three IEDs at one location, we’re going to slow down.” Khalil spread his hands apart, the width of a pair of boxes. “We can safely carry two at a time.” He flashed a grin. “For values of ‘safely.’ Which means the third rotation will have to leave one behind, and the fourth will leave two behind, etcetera.”
“I know. But we’ll be movingallthe bombs progressively farther away from the civilians, and staying close together as a group.”
Johnson hummed her agreement. “What’s the ultimate destination?”
“The food court. It’s closed with doors and rolldowns, but the space in there is big enough to absorb half the blast if they trigger the explosives.”
Flynn rubbed the back of his neck. “That’s within eyesight of the guarded corridor. If they decided to come right out to the edge.”
The chief looked at him steadily. “That’s right.”
Flynn nodded. Beneath the chief’s invisible lines, the newspaper image of Marine Corporal Leonard Schlesinger stared out at them. “All right, then.” Flynn tapped the glass over his face. “Oorah.”
Johnson reached past him and also tapped the glass. “Oorah.” One at a time, they all touched the spot.
They had already removed the armed boxes from behind the makeshift barricade. The chief and Flynn headed for the next pile of faux presents while Hadley and the guards fanned out. She focused most of her attention toward the distant, almost unseen corridor where the chief had come under fire, leaving just enough to advance down the concourse along with everyone else.
Flynn put down his boxes and headed toward her, pulling out his gun and motioning for her to switch. She holstered her sidearm and jogged toward the “presents,” Johnson mirroring her on the other side of the wide hall.
Flynn had marked the safe boxes by stomping on them; simple and fast. That meant there were already three IEDs waiting for her. She picked up two, pressing them together horizontally in the same way Khalil had demonstrated. She didn’t know why, exactly, but at this point she trusted his instincts about homemade bombs a lot more than her own, which were screaming at her to drop the boxes and run as far and as fast as she could.
Instead, she stalked to the next display group. She set the IEDs down gently and reached for the new boxes. To her dismay, only one was safe, meaning they were already up to five bombs on her side. She crushed the unarmed box and ran back to the firing line, pulling out her weapon and waving to the chief.
“How many on your side?” she asked Johnson, not taking her eyes off the distant corridor.
“Five.”
“Same here.”
The chief and Khalil each picked up one bomb, advanced to the next group, added another, and moved forward. She tried to do the math: armed boxes and armed cops and how many piles between here and the food court, but it all blurred into a sick, thick feeling in her throat. Better to just work the plan and not think about it. She was glad the chief had broken the assignments up; if she had had to spend the entiretime just moving boxes that could blow up and kill her instantly, she didn’t think she’d make it.
