by PJ Tracy
Take your pension. Get out now, Tinker.
His wife had been telling him that for some time.
God knew, the pension was good after all these years, and it didn’t hurt to be married to one of the country’s top heart specialists, who made more money on surgery Monday than he did in a whole year.
He was thinking of all these things as he watched the television; watched the number of boxes adding up. It’s just kids, he thought. Getting their rocks off terrorizing the whole damn city, just because they could; just because they raged and raged. These days they smashed the windows in twenty cars, broke into houses to scare sleeping families, or maybe, just maybe, they stashed a few suspicious boxes in places that would send a whole city into panic mode. That’s what it was. That’s what it had to be, because the alternative was unthinkable.
Joe Gebeke was at one of the bathroom sinks splashing water on his face when Magozzi walked in.
‘That was fast. False alarm at the Convention Center?’ Magozzi asked, then did a double take when Joe glanced up at him in the mirror. He didn’t look so good.
‘We’re not finished yet. Not by a long shot.’
‘And they let you come back?’
Joe braced his arms on the sink and looked at the drain. Water dripped from his chin and made tiny sounds on the porcelain. Finally he straightened, looked around the room, then stepped closer and almost whispered, ‘They sent me back because I haven’t finished my recertification for Hazmat yet.’
Magozzi felt like he was missing something. Between meth labs and chemical spills, Hazmat had gotten a lot of press time, and almost everyone had seen the rigs on the road at one time or another. Leave behind a can of hairspray or a case of wine at the airport, Hazmat was likely to show up, just like it had this morning. Even the media didn’t try to hype it up anymore, because eventually the thing that looked like a can of hairspray tested out to be a can of hairspray, leaving a lot of reporters looking like the boy who cried wolf, and a lot of other people pissed because so-called ‘breaking news’ made them miss their favorite show.
Joe got red in the face. ‘It isn’t two boxes, Leo. It’s five. At least, it was five the last time I heard. There’s a new one at the Mall of America; two more at the Metrodome. Every single box is absolutely identical, and every one of them has a Mason jar in it, you know those things your mom used for pickles and shit?’
Magozzi nodded.
‘Well, they’re all filled with some kind of liquid. Could be water – some sicko’s idea of a joke – or it could be nitro, or something a hell of a lot worse. It’s going to take a while to find out, because there’s something under each jar. Something they took the trouble to wrap in lead sheeting so the X-ray can’t penetrate. It’s creeping a lot of us out.’
Magozzi felt his fingers go numb, and wondered where his blood was headed.
Down the hall in Homicide, Gino switched channels when the one they were watching broke away to a commercial. This one had amped up the coverage, with a split screen of live feeds from the package sites, and a female anchor who looked suitably concerned as she interviewed a terrorism expert.
‘How the hell do you get to be a terrorism expert?’ McLaren asked.
Gino shrugged. ‘They’re probably all retired spooks.’
‘Sign up now, McLaren. I heard they’re looking for orange-haired agents with borderline albinism to plant in the Middle East.’
‘Do the words “Miss Clairol” and “spray-on tan” mean anything to you, Rolseth?’ Johnny returned his attention to the terrorism expert, who was clearly his new idol.
Gino was shaking his head in disgust. ‘They just always have to jump right to the doomsday scenario every frigging time, don’t they? I mean, this is probably just a sick, twisted prank, but oh no, it’s Muhammed Muhammed Whoever, blowing up the Heartland. I’m telling you, it’s just like the weather warnings. Remember last Sunday, when they were crowing about how this summer was going to be the worst drought in recorded history, how the crops were going to die on the vine, food prices were going to skyrocket, and by August, we’d all be rioting over the last can of corn on earth? And what happens the next day? We get five inches of rain in two hours, and suddenly the rivers are going to crest and the entire Midwest is going to get wiped off the face of the map in biblical floods. Jesus. If there are any terrorists, it’s those gel-haired assholes on TV who tell you every raindrop’s a tornado and every mugging is the end of Western civilization.’ He stopped for a breath and looked at Tinker, who was gaping at him, absolutely speechless.
McLaren, on the other hand, who always appreciated a good rant, was beaming at him. ‘Man, two snaps up …
Gino looked up at his partner’s rigid face and felt his insides go cold.
Red hair or not, Johnny McLaren had one of those pale faces you never associated with the Irish. Neither round and rosy nor dark and haunted, his was one hundred percent affable, and, as the ladies were fond of noticing and slow to respond to, boyish. It hadn’t looked boyish since Magozzi told them what he’d learned in the bathroom.
It took the media about five minutes longer to learn about the Mason jars, and now the coverage was nonstop, and about as close to grim as Minneapolis television ever got, which meant the anchors weren’t smiling. Magozzi and Gino had gone back to their desks, but McLaren and Tinker were hooked to the TV like dogs on a leash.
‘Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,’ McLaren murmured, and for the first time Magozzi heard Ireland in the lilt. ‘They found another one. How many is that?’
‘Seven,’ Tinker said.
‘And how many bomb squads have we got?’
‘Last time I checked, we had four. In the whole state.’
Magozzi looked across the desk at Gino, whose eyes were fixed on the TV. The sound was muted, but the picture was bad enough. They had a graphic of the city up, with seven blinking red dots, marking the location of each suspect box. While they watched, three more lights popped up in the center of the city.
Angela’s irritated voice came through loud and clear when Gino held the phone away from his ear. ‘Oh, gee, Gino, I don’t know. Was I supposed to be watching them?’
Gino winced. ‘All right, all right, I’m sorry, okay?’ And then he told her what was going on, listened for a long time before turning toward the wall and murmuring some things Magozzi couldn’t hear before hanging up.
‘Everything okay?’ Magozzi asked his partner.
Gino looked miserable. ‘I told her to pick up the kids and take them on a little field trip.’
‘Where to?’
Gino took a breath. ‘Out of the city. Wisconsin, maybe.’
‘Christ, Gino …’
But Gino didn’t hear him. He’d raised his eyes to the television, where at least half a dozen new red lights were blinking.
Things were getting out of hand. Most Minnesotans watched the news coverage, decided for themselves whether the threat was real or exaggerated, and the only measure of the majority decision was the number of cars on the freeway heading for Wisconsin, because nobody wanted to attack Wisconsin. Ever.
‘Lot of cars on the bridge to Hudson,’ Gino commented, his eyes on the television.
Magozzi nodded. ‘Where’re Angela and the kids?’
‘Feel better now?’
Gino nodded. ‘Big time.’
Magozzi glanced at the caller ID when his cell rang, then picked up. ‘You’re watching this, right?’
Grace never worried about anything, except the bag boy at Whole Foods pulling out an AK-47 and shooting her dead. ‘Of course we’re watching it, Magozzi. We have been, since seven a.m., when we got a pre-post. You need to check the messages on your cell more often, especially when your switchboard is jammed.’
Magozzi thought about that for a minute. He always checked for messages, hoping one of them would be from Grace. But not this morning. This morning things had started to happen really fast, and his heart did a little flip-flop at the thought that he’d lost prec
ious time on a potential murder. ‘You’re calling me, so I assume it’s local. Did the post give you any ideas on the potential victim or location?’
‘It’s not another murder, Magozzi. We think the pre-post was about the boxes.’
‘What?’
‘All it said was “City of Lakes, Many, Everywhere.” Half an hour later the TV was nonstop boxes. The post was untraceable, like the murder posts, but it didn’t follow the same routing as the others. Your profiler friend, Chelsea, is in the know, according to John, and she says it’s something else entirely.’
‘She is not a friend. We had a beer and a burger and a
‘She’s even got a name for it. Chaotic terrorism. You know how little boys get a kick out of popping out of closets and scaring the crap out of you?’
‘That was really sexist, Grace.’
‘How many little girls pop out of closets to scare people?’
‘Not enough, but I get your point.’
‘So Chelsea thinks this is the post-puberty version. Disenfranchised dweebs hiding in their basements, power-tripping on scaring a whole city to death. The coverage of the murder posts probably gave them the idea.’
Magozzi pushed wrinkles into his forehead. ‘So she doesn’t think it’s real.’
‘Obviously it doesn’t have to be real to stop a city. The threat is enough, but it’s still terrorism, plain and simple.’
Magozzi started rummaging in his desk drawer, looking for aspirin. ‘So our choices are a terrorist attack or a teenager attack?’
‘And if it’s the latter, you better get those monsters in cuffs by the morning news or every media-addicted creep in the country is going to try to outdo what happens here. Go to work, Magozzi. We can’t find them, so it’s all on you.’
When Magozzi hung up, Gino was peering over his computer screen at him, powdered sugar parentheses enclosing his mouth. ‘I choose teenager attack.’
‘Huh?’
After Magozzi gave him a rundown, Gino folded his hands over his paunch and leaned back in his chair. ‘If it’s a terrorist attack, we’re all screwed. If it’s a teenager attack we can waterboard a couple thirteen-year-olds and no one will ever try it again.’ His eyes drifted over to the television and his mouth turned down. ‘I don’t know, Leo. Mason jars with liquid, lead sheeting to beat the X-ray … ? Seems like pretty sophisticated shit for a screw-up kid.’
Magozzi nodded. ‘That’s what I was thinking.’
One of the newer hires out of Vice – a tall, loose-limbed guy who looked like he just got out from behind a plow – walked into Homicide and found McLaren. ‘Hey, Johnny. I’m guessing nobody bet on Mason jars.’
‘Nope.’
‘So give me my fiver back.’
‘Sure thing, Scarecrow. But I’m afraid there’s going to be a processing fee.’
‘I don’t think so, you red weasel. Processing fee means I book you on gambling charges.’ His eyes drifted up to the TV. ‘This is some scary shit.’
McLaren squinted at him. ‘You see, that’s the part I don’t get. You get a bomb scare at a school, you automatically think it’s a kid making trouble. I don’t get the panic button on this one.’
‘Are you kidding? All that crap at the schools and the mall in the past few months? Amateur hour. This one was really put together.’
‘You whistling in the dark, McLaren?’
‘You bet your ass I am.’
‘Well, keep your head out of the sand, because even if this scare is a bust, it doesn’t mean the next one will be. Al-Jazeera already picked this up. They’re streaming news from Minneapolis, if you can believe that. It’s like a playbook on how to terrorize people.’
‘Jeez, Scarecrow, get a grip. And don’t trip over your petticoats on the way out.’
‘Fuck you, McLaren. You Homicide sissies make damn sure you hit the scene after the perp is long gone. Call me when you get a sack, and I’ll take you on a meth bust.’
‘So did you walk all the way over here to bust my balls or what?’
‘Nah. I’m the town crier. You got anything to eat over here?’
‘Last donut just hit Rolseth’s gullet. You might be able to get him to cough it up if you use some of those cool macho meth-bust moves.’
‘Man, you’re testy today. Listen. They’re pulling together surveillance footage from all the box sites that had security cameras, which means all of them, which means about four million hours of tape, and the brass is begging for help from anybody with a uniform and one good eye.’
‘You actually saw the Chief?’
‘Oh, hell, no. He’s been locked up with the mayor and the governor since this thing started. They only let him out long enough to parse out the hourly updates on TV.’
‘You ask me, he’s allowed. The man’s got a lot on his plate today. Anyway, we’re going to set up in one of the old conference rooms on three, so anybody without an active case, come on up and watch some movies with us.’
‘Tinker and I can help you out.’
‘Good deal. Bring popcorn.’
The task force room in City Hall had been transformed into a makeshift media center full of laptops, TVs, and volunteers from every department and every precinct, squinting at screens and taking notes.
The confusing olfactory potpourri that had always been a trademark of the space still lingered, even though it had been officially retired for years. As Magozzi stepped into the room, his nose picked up the familiar old scents of sweat, bad cologne, cleaning chemicals, and cigarette smoke, along with the newer contributions of the current occupants. He caught a whiff of breath mints, a fleeting hint of patchouli, and the cloying, pervasive stench of microwave popcorn that had been steamed to death in fake butter.
And then there was Grace MacBride, whose sensory ghost trumped all in this place, at least for Magozzi. He’d met her here for the second time in his life, almost two years ago, after he’d basically accused her of murder and a laundry list of other horrible misdeeds. Probably not the kind of courtship ritual little girls dreamed of.
‘Leo?’ Gino gave him a nudge.
‘What?’
‘I’ve been regaling you with brilliant insights for the past thirty seconds at least, and you’re acting like you just popped a handful of Oxys.’
Gino snuffled, and rearranged some southern part of his wardrobe. ‘For one, where the hell is our chalkboard? You and I solved many a murder brainstorming on that thing, and I loved it like a child.’
‘Probably got stashed in storage someplace.’
‘They can’t just take an important piece of our life and mothball it without checking with us first.’
‘Sure they can. Some killjoy with asthma complained about the chalk dust, so they replaced all the blackboards with whiteboards.’
‘Whiteboards suck.’
They wended their way through the tables and desks and found McLaren and Tinker in the far corner of the beehive, both hunched over a laptop, noses practically pressed to the screen. ‘How’s it going?’
McLaren shook his head without looking away from the black-and-white security footage. ‘This is damn near impossible. Everybody at the mall is carrying a shopping bag, damn near everybody at the library convention is wheeling around a suitcase full of books … and none of us have seen any boxes get dropped yet. The locations must have been scouted, because they’re all out of camera range.’
Gino grunted, still pouting over the chalkboard. ‘That’s a little spooky.’
‘Yeah, no kidding … Tinker, wait. Back up a few frames and play it in slo-mo for me.’
Tinker clicked the mouse a few times and McLaren jabbed a finger at two kids who were milling around at the Mall of America. ‘Check out those guys. Look familiar?’
‘Yeah, but I think I’ve seen these dudes before, in some of the footage we checked out earlier. Maybe from the Metrodome. Go back.’ He pushed away from the desk while Tinker worked the mouse some more. ‘So, you solve your case already, or what?’
‘I know what you mean – I went through those two files you gave me and came up with nada. I have a list of names for you, but I gotta tell you up front that nothing clicked. The most interesting thing I pulled was the blood alcohol on your river bride – that guy should have been wearing a biohazard warning label. I’m surprised he had a liver left, especially with all the meds he was on.’
‘Meds?’ Gino asked.
‘Yeah. He had AIDS.’
‘He did?’
‘Yeah. Don’t you guys read autopsy reports?’
‘Not recreationally, like you, McLaren,’ Gino grumbled. ‘Besides, we already knew how he died.’
Tinker tapped the screen. ‘Rolling tape, Johnny.’
The four of them turned their attention to the computer screen and watched a motley assemblage of humanity unwittingly pass beneath the all-seeing eyes of the Metro-dome security cameras. Ten minutes later, Gino slid his eyes to look over at Magozzi. ‘The Tiara Club film was way more entertaining.’
Magozzi nodded.
‘Stop!’ McLaren said, then pointed to the screen. ‘See? Same two kids. Exact same skater punk clothes, same faces.’
Magozzi and Gino were now breathing down McLaren’s neck. ‘I think Johnny’s right,’ Magozzi said. ‘What kind of time frame are we looking at?’
Tinker scrawled down the time stamp, then went back to the mall footage and compared them. ‘About two hours apart. You might have something, Johnny.’
Gino shrugged and pushed up the sleeves of his wrinkled white button-down. ‘Or not. Could just be bored kids making the rounds. And I gotta tell you, these two don’t look bright enough to tie their own shoes, let alone pull something like this off.’
