by Matt Lincoln
“So, this group is specifically targeting women from overseas,” Fiona muttered. “And that definitively makes this an international case.”
“Which means it falls under MBLIS’s jurisdiction,” I declared, gathering up my things. “I’m going to go tell Charlie what we found and then go talk to Wallace.”
“Wait, you forgot your flowers!” Fiona called when I was already halfway out the door.
“Oh, no, those are yours,” I smiled. “Svetlana said someone dropped them off for you upfront. For Valentine’s Day, I assume.” Fiona seemed confused at what I’d said, but I was so focused on relaying all the new information we’d discovered to Charlie that I didn’t pay the thought any mind.
8
Charlie
I didn’t waste any time after Junior came and told me what he and Fiona had discovered. If what they’d found was true, then there was a very real danger that they could kidnap another woman at any moment. On top of that, I was itching to get back in the action with a new adventure, so I suggested we go see Wallace right away.
Nelson, as usual, was in there as well when we entered.
“Is everything alright, agents?” he asked as we stepped into the room, clearly taking note of the grave expressions on our faces.
Wallace noticed too, and rather than offering us his usual cheerful greeting, he merely gestured for us to sit down.
“No, not really,” Junior frowned, handing Wallace the tablet he’d taken from Fiona. “We’ve uncovered evidence that the Jane Doe case in Chicago is related to the exotic animal trafficking case we handled three months ago. As you can see, we managed to find several similar cases in Tokyo. In all of those cases, the victims all had the same flower tattoo from both the Jane Doe case and the animal trafficking case. We’ve also uncovered evidence that Jane Doe might actually be Laura Turner, a twenty-five-year-old woman who went missing on a trip to Japan and hasn’t been heard from since. Finally, we managed to get in touch with someone claiming to be holding several American women captive in Japan, and we believe this individual is connected in some way to the organization at the center of both cases.” I turned toward Wallace, feeling a little useless just sitting here while Junior did all the talking. I had to admit, though, that he was a lot better at it than I was.
“This is an incredible amount of work, agents,” Wallace commended as he looked through the files on the tablet. “You did this all on your own?”
“No, Gardner helped us,” I answered. “Honestly, she did most of the work. We only really consulted with her. She’s the one who researched everything.” It was the truth, and I felt that Gardner deserved credit for all the work she’d done. Out of the corner of my eyes, though, I could see Junior tense, and I suddenly worried I’d said the wrong thing.
“I see,” Wallace stated calmly, handing the tablet back to Junior. “And how exactly did you gain access to this information? A lot of it seems as though it would be confidential.”
Oh, crap. I suddenly realized too late that I might have just thrown Fiona under the bus. Junior had mentioned she used to be a hacker, but I hadn’t actually thought about what she might have done in order to get the information.
“A confidential informant,” Junior replied steadily. “They told me they had information that might be useful to us, but they wanted to remain anonymous.”
I could feel my own heart pounding. Junior sounded so calm and confident as he spoke that an ordinary person wouldn’t have been able to tell he was lying. At the same time, it sounded like such an obvious and convenient lie. I looked at Wallace, who had an unreadable expression on his face. After a moment, though, he shrugged his shoulders.
“Well, that’s good enough for me,” he shrugged, and for just a split second, Junior’s eyes widened in surprise before he regained control of his expression. “You’re certainly right that this is both an international crime and undoubtedly related to the animal trafficking case. I’ll have Agent Nelson get in touch with the Tokyo Police Department to begin a line of communication. It will probably take a few days to get everything in order and work out when you two should fly out there. Did you have anything else you wanted to discuss?”
“No, I think that about covers it,” I answered a little too quickly, still in shock that he’d let it go that easily. I was honestly a little scared that if we lingered in here too long, he might change his mind and call us out.
“Well, then I will let you get back to work,” Wallace smiled. “And well done, by the way. It’s commendable that the three of you dedicated your own time to investigate this matter.”
“Glad to do it,” I responded as I moved to stand up. “Come on, Junior, let’s go tell Gardner the good news.”
Junior stood up and followed me out the door. Once we were on the other side, I exhaled. I hadn’t noticed when I’d started holding my breath.
“I can’t believe he bought that,” Junior whispered.
“I don’t think he did,” I shook my head. “I think maybe he was just choosing to look the other way. Wallace isn’t an idiot, and your little story sounded like a load of-”
“Yeah, well, regardless of whether he believed me or not, the investigation is going to be official now,” Junior smiled excitedly. “We’ll finally be able to do some real investigative work.”
“Yeah, let me go tell Gardner,” I called over my shoulder as I moved toward her office. “She’s probably panicking right now, thinking Wallace is about to come down on her.” I was only a few steps away from her office when my vision went white. The last thing I could remember after that was being engulfed in intense heat.
9
Junior
I opened my eyes blearily and turned onto my side to shut off the high pitched ringing of my alarm. To my surprise, though, my phone wasn’t on the bed next to me, where I usually left it to charge overnight. I tried opening my eyes wider, but the morning light felt searing, and I closed them again. I’d give myself just a few more minutes to sleep, I thought. The noise from my alarm was resonating in my head, though, causing it to ache. I reached around with my hand to try to find it and realized only then that my bed covers felt unusually rough and stiff. I wondered if I had fallen asleep on the couch again, but that wasn’t right. Whatever I was lying on felt hard and firm.
I forced myself to open my eyes again, fighting through the pain as everything began to come into focus. The first thing I saw was the metal leg of a desk. I wondered how I had managed to fall asleep in the office and on the floor, no less. I turned onto my back, and the movement caused my vision to swim and my head to throb. I could hear voices talking and what sounded like yelling, but the sounds were muffled. It was only then that I realized the ringing I’d been hearing was coming from my own ears, and I couldn’t hear anything else over the high pitched tone.
I looked up at the sky and tried to remember what had happened. My brain was still moving sluggishly, so it took me a moment to register that the sky shouldn’t be visible from the inside of the office. As that thought formed in my mind, suddenly the ringing stopped, and everything came back to me.
Charlie and I had just left Wallace’s office. He was going to tell Fiona about Wallace approving the case. Then suddenly, there was a flash of light, and I felt the ground move away from my feet before something struck me on the head. I reached up to where the throbbing in my head was centered. When I pulled my hand back, it came away wet with blood.
I could hear the voices now. Agent Patel was screaming at someone to hold their head steady. Agent Nelson was speaking to someone quickly. It sounded like he was talking on the phone since I couldn’t hear anyone responding to what he was saying. He said something about an explosion and a possible terrorist attack. My mind reeled as I took in the words. Had someone set off an explosion?
I did a quick examination of my own body before I tried moving. I’d rolled onto my back just now so my spine wasn’t broken. I had an intense headache but otherwise seemed conscious and alert. There were sm
all pinpricks of pain all along my torso and arms, but I could move them, so it appeared that any injuries there were superficial.
I stood up slowly. For a moment, I felt unsteady, as though the ground was shaking. After a few seconds, though, I was able to regain my balance and take stock of my surroundings. There were papers scattered all over the office. Half of the desks and furniture had been overturned, and the entire room was hazy as ash and smoke floated through the air. Part of the ceiling was entirely gone, which was how I’d been able to look up at the sky when I first regained consciousness. I followed the damage across the roof and down over the left side of the office, freezing in horror as I realized what I was looking at. Fiona’s office was completely gone. In its place was only empty air and a gaping hole where her office door had once been.
I looked around frantically. Maybe she hadn’t been in her office when the bomb went off. Charlie had been about to go inside, though, I reminded myself. I was shaking, and I tried taking deep breaths to calm myself down, but it wasn’t working. I was going into shock. That’s what I would have said if we’d been dealing with a victim who’d just been through an explosion and was exhibiting the same symptoms I was.
I heard Patel’s voice again and turned toward it. She had blood on her head and on her blouse, but she seemed okay. She was kneeling beside Miranda, who had a large piece of shrapnel sticking out of her left leg. There was a pool of blood around her, and she was unconscious. Patel was looking at someone across the office and yelling instructions on how to bandage something without disturbing the area. I looked over to where she was yelling and sagged with relief when I saw Charlie lying on the ground. He was unconscious as well, and Wallace was leaning over him.
My legs seemed to move on their own, and a moment later, I was walking toward them. Any relief I felt at seeing that Charlie hadn’t been blown out the window by the bomb drained away as I approached and saw the state that he was in. Blood covered the entire left side of his face, and I could see pieces of shrapnel sticking out of his face and torso. Although Wallace was doing his best to staunch the flow, it seemed as though the red stain underneath Charlie was steadily growing bigger every second.
The calm, logical part of my brain told me that it made sense that his injuries were the most severe. Judging by the gaping hole in the wall, Fiona’s office had been the epicenter of the explosion. He’d been standing just a few feet away, facing directly into it. I told myself that he would be fine. I kept repeating it, like a mantra, until I realized that someone was calling my name.
“Agent Chapman? Junior?” I turned to see Nelson standing beside me.
“Yes?” I asked. My voice sounded unnaturally calm.
“I asked if you were okay,” Nelson said slowly and clearly as his eyes roved down to assess if I had any visual injuries.
“I’m fine,” I responded. “My head hurts, but I’m fine. Do you know what happened?”
“A bomb,” Nelson coughed. “We don’t know who or how. All I know is that we need to evacuate right now. Since we aren’t sure how or when the bomb was planted, we don’t know if there are any more. We need to leave the office ASAP.’
“What about Miranda and Charlie?” I asked, looking over at my partner. “We can’t move them, right? How are they supposed to get out?”
“Director Wallace is going to stay here with them until paramedics arrive,” Nelson responded. “Right now, everyone who can move needs to get out immediately.”
“I’m not leaving my partner here,” I argued, dumbstruck that Nelson would even suggest it.
“That’s exactly what I told him,” Patel called from her position on the floor by Miranda. She was giving Nelson the most poisonous look I’d ever seen her make.
“Listen, I know it’s not ideal, but-”
“No,” I barked, interrupting him.
Normally, I wouldn’t have dared to refuse the order of a superior agent, and I definitely would never have interrupted him to do so. I had just survived an explosion, though, and frankly was not in the mood to maintain any sense of decorum.
“If there’s any chance there’s another bomb in here,” I elaborated, “I’m not about to leave my partner here unconscious. I’ll drag him out myself if I have to.” I moved toward Charlie as if to make good on my word, but Nelson put up a hand to stop me.
“Fine, I agree with you,” he smiled derisively, glancing over at Wallace apologetically. “Nathan’s just going to have to deal with it. Can you bring me that table from the break room, the one that has the coffee machine on it? We can use it as a gurney to carry Hills and Castillo down.” I nodded before turning and making my way past the bullpen and toward the break room. As I got closer, I realized that there were two people crouched in the corner by the entrance to the room.
“Fiona!” I called out. She looked up, and to my immense relief, she didn’t seem hurt at all. She was leaning over Agent Howard as she helped him bandage his arm. “Thank goodness you’re here. When I saw your office, I thought…” I couldn’t finish the sentence and instead crouched down beside her to pull her into a hug.
“I’m fine, Junior,” she mumbled, although I could hear her voice trembling. “I was in the break room when the explosion went off. Didn’t even get a scratch on me.” She laughed weakly, but there was no humor in her voice.
“I need to get the table from the break room,” I said, pulling away from her. “Charlie and Miranda are hurt, and we’re going to use it to get them outside. Nelson says there could be another bomb, and we need to get out of here now.”
“I’ll help you,” Fiona stood to follow me. We walked into the break room and quickly moved everything off the table before lifting it between the two of us. We made our way back through the bullpen toward Wallace’s office, where Miranda and Charlie were still unconscious.
“Let’s take Miranda down first,” Patel instructed. “Her femoral artery has been punctured, and she’s bleeding out fast. The faster we get her to an ambulance, the better. Her neck isn’t broken, so we should be good to move her just onto the table.”
I helped her lift Miranda onto the table, careful not to jostle her leg any more than I had to. I tried to ignore how slick my hands became with blood as soon as I touched her.
“Gardner, come take over for me,” Wallace said through a fit of coughs. The smoke in the room seemed to be getting thicker despite the gaping hole in the wall. “Chapman and I will need to carry the table so Patel can maintain pressure on Castillo’s wound.”
“Yes, sir,” Fiona nodded, quickly walking over to where Charlie was lying on the ground. She placed her hands where Wallace showed her. As soon as she did, Wallace got up and came over to help me lift the table with Miranda on it.
“Felix, you need to start making your way down, too,” Wallace insisted. Nelson looked up at him in surprise.
“I’m not leaving until I’m sure everyone else is safely out,” he tried to argue.
“It’s going to take you longer than everyone else to get out,” Wallace stated sternly, and I saw Nelson’s face fall. “I’ll make sure everyone gets out. You need to start making your way down now.” Nelson nodded and began to make his way out of the office, using his cane to support him as he went.
“Lift on three, okay?” Wallace instructed as we got into position on either end of the table. “One, two, three!”
The way down was agonizing. My body was already in pain from being injured during the explosion, and every muscle seemed to scream at me as we made our way toward the elevator. Patel suggested we take the stairs since it might be unsafe to be in the elevator if another explosion went off. Ultimately, though, we decided that Miranda might bleed out in the time it took us to climb down eighteen flights of stairs.
We risked the elevator, and I held my breath the entire way down. I watched anxiously as each floor ticked by, certain that at any moment, we’d hear another boom or feel a quake. Finally, we got to the first floor. We rushed out of the elevator and through the main l
obby of the building. Outside, I could see a crowd of people had gathered, no doubt consisting of both office workers from this building and curious onlookers. As we burst through the doors, a commotion broke out among the crowd as people struggled to get a look at what was going on.
We slowly began to move Miranda off the table and onto a small patch of grass outside the building.
“Excuse me!” I heard a voice call and looked up to see a woman forcing her way through the crowd toward us. The explosion had put me on high alert, and my first instinct was to reach for my gun. When my fingers closed around nothing, I realized it must have been knocked away in the explosion.
“I’m a nurse,” the woman announced as she knelt down over Miranda.
“Oh, thank goodness,” Patel sighed. I didn’t hear what she said after that, though, because the next moment, Wallace and I were lifting the table again and heading back into the building. Even though the table was empty now, the ride on the elevator on the way back up was even more grueling. I kept going through all the scenarios I might be faced with when we finally got back. Maybe Charlie had bled to death already. Maybe whoever had planted the bomb was still lurking around and had come back to finish the job. I tried to shut the thoughts out, but they kept coming, each horrifying scenario worse than the previous one.
Finally, the elevator chimed as we made it back to the top floor of the building, and we rushed out as fast as we could while carrying a table between us. To my immense relief, Charlie and Fiona were still in the same position we’d left them in. Fiona had tears streaming down her face and was saying something quietly to Charlie. She looked up as we made our way over to them and sagged in relief.
