JENNA AND OSHIRO arrived at the school and parked outside the police cordon. Most of the kids were gone, except for a bunch who mingled with other civilians beyond the barricades. The Allegheny County bomb squad was there along with the county’s mobile command center, taking point, but Jenna also saw a Pittsburgh city K9 unit and one of their own bomb squad’s tactical vans as well as patrol cars from the Monroeville PD.
Oshiro strode through the crowd of law enforcement like Moses parting the Red Sea, Jenna bobbing along in his wake. The hopeful warm spring air was rapidly being replaced by gusting winds that carried the promise of rain and snow. Despite the cornucopia of cop cars from various jurisdictions, Oshiro led her unerringly to the two things any cop needed: intel and a hot cup of coffee.
They found both inside the mobile command center where Andre and a state trooper were briefing the locals on what they knew about Gibson. When the statie finished, Oshiro introduced her to Jenna as Corporal Harding—“Call me Liz,” she interrupted him—and handed Jenna off to her while he joined Andre at the bank of monitors focused on the search inside the school.
Jenna quickly filled Liz in on what little she knew—well, what little she was willing to share—and watched as Oshiro and Andre quickly bonded over their joysticks and gadgets, conducting an entire conversation via monosyllabic utterances and the occasional chin jerk.
“Guys,” Liz said. “Always with the tribal bonding and alpha dog sniffing.” She shrugged and sipped her coffee. “Whatever gets the job done.”
The RV was small enough that there was no way Oshiro and Andre couldn’t hear her, but the only indication that they did was Oshiro shrugging one shoulder. Liz seemed to translate that as “Come here, we’ve found something,” and the two women moved closer until they could watch the screens over the men’s shoulders.
To Jenna’s surprise, they weren’t monitoring the progress of the bomb techs but rather video feeds of security cameras dating back the past week.
“Principal said there’d been no alarms and no record of Gibson being on the premises at all this week. We had their security company give us access so we could see for ourselves,” Liz explained.
“What about the bomb?” Jenna asked.
“Oh, it’s there. Hiding in plain sight.” Andre switched something on the monitor to reveal a live feed of a long hallway that ended in a set of double doors. A robot was making its way slowly down the hall; the camera he’d accessed must have been a body cam on a bomb tech’s suit.
“Where?”
“Inside the fire extinguisher. Kid emptied out the real one, replaced it. Big question is what with,” Oshiro said.
“And what the trigger device is,” Andre finished for him. “Gibson’s shopping list included European camp stove tablets.”
Damn. The tablets were made of hexamine—a popular detonating agent among amateur bomb makers and terrorists.
“They’ll handle the bomb,” Liz told Jenna. “Our concern is when it was placed. If it was sometime in the past day, we can track the kid’s movements, maybe get a lead on where he was going.”
“Which means a lead on where Clint is.”
“Exactly. If your theory is correct and the kid is our convicts’ conduit to the outside world, then he’s the key to finding them.”
“Except we’re not seeing anything on the security footage,” Andre said.
“Not for today, at least,” Oshiro confirmed, still scrolling through the sped-up footage of the hallway.
“Go back through the entire week,” Liz ordered, but Jenna heard the sigh in her voice. Going into their fourth day of the manhunt—which no doubt meant four days without sleep, proper food, or any hopeful answers, it had to be exhausting.
“In the meantime, we should come at this from another direction. Any word on the girl?” Liz called the question to one of the other cops in the front of the RV.
“Morgan?” Jenna asked. “She’s not in custody?”
“Didn’t have a chance to tell you,” Andre answered, the blur of security footage grainy as it sped past his monitor. “She ran.”
“After we got word of the explosion you were involved in,” Liz added.
“I’d hardly call it an explosion. A few firecrackers, that’s all.” Last thing Jenna needed was the fugitive task force to think she was stupid or careless enough to set off an IED.
“Still,” Liz said, “after Oshiro and Lester called it in, the girl left. No one’s seen her since. We’re not even sure exactly how she got past us.”
“Get used to it,” Jenna said, glad she wasn’t the only one who found Morgan’s propensity to vanish in plain sight irritating. “Morgan does what Morgan wants. She probably got bored and ran off to meet up with her new boyfriend.”
Morgan thought she was being so sly and secretive about Micah—except for the part where she’d asked Andre for advice, and of course, Andre had then told Jenna. Silly man, he’d thought it a sign that Morgan could change, that she had a trace of human feelings.
Andre glanced up at that. “Not a bad idea. We should call Micah. He might know something.”
“You call him.” Jenna had met the kid after Morgan had saved his life and had been barely able to coax two words from him. “He’ll talk to you.”
Andre looked to Liz, who nodded her approval. Leaving the video console in Oshiro’s hands, he stepped to the front of the RV where it was quieter and sat down in the driver’s seat with his phone. He was only gone a few moments when all of the law enforcement comms filled with the tense voices of excited cops. Footsteps pounded past the RV, and men shouted in the distance. Liz turned the monitor feed back to the live action.
The robot had reached the bomb and X-rayed it with its portable unit. The X-ray filled the screen with wires and circuitry that Jenna couldn’t interpret. But there was no mistaking the dismay that filled Oshiro’s face—the fact that he was showing any emotion told her just how bad it was.
Only the bomb tech stayed calm, his voice slow and steady. He seemed a bit impressed by the challenge before him. “Folks, hope you’re seeing this,” he said, not quite whistling in appreciation. “Because this baby is a beauty.”
When she’d worked with the Postal Service, Jenna had dealt with enough cases of mail bombs to know that when a bomb tech was in awe of a bomb maker’s creation it was most definitely not a good thing.
She had the sudden urge to volunteer her and Andre’s services to go on a food run. Anything to get far, far away from the evil contraption whose innards were displayed on the screen.
“Is that what I think it is?” she asked, nodding to the chemical composition supplied by the electronic sniffer.
“HMTD,” Oshiro said in a low voice as if worried he might set it off with sound alone. “Hexamethylene triperoxide diamine. One of the most unstable chemical explosives on the planet. Especially in the hands of an amateur. Heat fluctuation, friction, the slightest spark could blow the whole thing.”
“Which means they can’t move it,” Jenna interpreted. “They’re going to have to either defuse it or blow it on site.”
“Any way you put it,” Oshiro added, “if your truant schoolboy built more of these babies for Caine, then we’re in a heap load of trouble.”