“Every time I hear about an incident, I die a little inside.” Brixl to Red’s dad.
Red looked over the class of four remaining young men from the MCPD. They all looked nervous, even in their bomb suits. Red wore a bomb suit as well.
“Now, there’s a bomb in that building,” Red pointed to a building that the police used for bomb and SWAT team training. The walls were made out of drywall, and replaced after each training. “Baker, are you ready?”
“Yes, sir,” he said, though his voice was a little higher pitched than before.
Red escorted Baker into the building, and said, “Remember where to look for the bombs. Where are they normally?”
“Along the bottom floor, with the supporting studs,” Jeff said through the speaker in his suit. Red followed him, as the man looked from side to side, looking like a turtle – which is what the MCPD called these suits anyway.
There they saw the bomb, in the center of the building, lying against a stud. Baker walked toward it slowly, as sometimes the vibrations of people walking could set it off. Red followed close behind, doing the same thing.
They got to the bomb. Red could hear Baker panting in nervousness. He looked down at the bomb, which looked a little different than the bombs he was used to seeing. Maybe someone different had set this one up.
Baker looked it over, first finding the timer, then the wires. Five wires led out from it, and he carefully visually followed a lead to one. He took out the wire clippers, holding them in his hand. He was sweaty, Red noticed, and his hand shook.
“Stop,” Red said. “Take a breath. Hold the wire with the other hand – good. Keep holding it. Look at the timer, you’ve got plenty of time here. Stop shaking, it’s all right. Good, very good.” Baker snipped the wire and closed his eyes.
The timer stopped.
Nothing exploded.
Red smiled. If Baker had hit the wrong wire, he would have gotten yellow paint in his face. The bomb was made to look real, but it was only full of paint.
“Ok, we can go out—“
BOOM!
The bomb exploded in front of them, throwing them both back from the shock wave, and collapsing the stud, taking the floor above down with it. Red crab-crawled baclwards, getting out of the way of the collapsing floor.
Son of a bitch, that wasn’t supposed to happen!
“Baker!” He yelled into the mike.
“I’m stuck,” Red heard him say.
“Stay with me,” Red called, and tried to get up, but the suit was too big and bulky for him to get up without assistance. He only hoped that the guys outside would notice something was wrong and start digging for them.
“My legs, I can’t feel them.”
“Stay with me, Baker, we’ll get you out.”
He could hear shouting. Red yanked off his helmet and yelled, “North! Due north! Get Baker, I’m fine!”
Red started getting out of his suit, yet above him was a piece of flooring precariously looking like it was going to fall at any time. He got the helmet and the chest and back plates off, and then moved out of the way of the floor to find himself surrounded by drywall.
“Cutter!” Came a voice close to him.
“Did you get Baker?”
“Getting him out now.” He heard something move and crash, and there was a hole to the side of him. A face peered through.
Red was able to get his shoulders through the hole that they made, and someone pulled him out effortlessly. It was one of the MCPD guys in a suit. Red wondered why this guy, who was obviously strong as an ox, needed bomb training.
Red got on his feet and wobbled, the adrenaline starting to leave him. The man – Kamar was his name, though it was a shortened version of his last name Selvamuthukamar – held Red up.
Red watched as they got Baker out on a stretcher. His suit had been shredded from the legs down, and he could see the dark red lines of blood through the pants.
“That wasn’t supposed to happen,” Red said. “It’s supposed to be full of paint.”
The police captain of the bomb squad showed up about twenty minutes later, right after the bomb forensics team. Red was drinking some water – he had sent the other guys home, as there could be no training until they fixed the building.
“I knew something was wrong,” said Red to the captain. “The bomb was a different style.”
“You didn’t stop the exercise,” said the captain, lips pursed.
“Because I thought someone different did the bombs.”
“Only Rutland makes the bombs, and he made five.”
“There were six men,” Red mused.
“We had a request for five…” The captain said quietly, “I think you’d better take the next few days off while we investigate this further. You’re an independent contractor and not subject to IA – “
“But I’ll cooperate,” Red said quickly. “I’ll tell them what I know.”
The captain muttered, “You’d better,” and walked away.