by Krister Persson
>"My friends," the man said, "You wouldn't shoot a man strapped with 10 pounds >of C4, would you?" He brought his hands up to show the team the two triggers >he held in both hands, his thumbs poised above the little red buttons sitting >on top. The team also saw the armaments strapped to his chest and the wires >going to it...
"What do you want?" Jordan called out to the man.
"Nothing much," he replied, "just the six of you dead and buried." The man laughed. "Zulu has stuck their noses where they don't belong one time to many," he added.
While Jordan tried to reason with the man, Zenya leaned over to Leo and whispered: "Is there any way you could take him out, before he could reach the triggers and without setting off the explosives?"
"Don't think so," Leo replied with a glum look. "If he only had one trigger, I could have severed the wire leading to it, but two...I don't know..."
Both Zenya, and Martin who had overheard the conversation, had been hoping that "Deadeye" Jones could save the day, but perhaps that was hoping for the impossible. There was probably nothing any of them could do, but wait it out and try to negotiate with the man.
Suddenly Martin remembered something he had seen in a movie a few years ago. Martin very gently pulled up his Zippo lighter from his pocket, while all the time looking at the mad bomber. He was still busy putting down the team in general and Vanessa in particular. He used the words 'little kitten' several times.
Lighting the Zippo behind his back, while clearing his throat to cover the sound, he then lifted the lighter slowly towards a nearby smoke detector. He tried to disguise it as stretching himself and strangely enough, their enemy bought it. The Zippo was getting extremely warm in his hand, so Martin was hoping for a quick result.
Everything happened at once! The fire alarm went off and the system for putting out fires sent out Halon gas from nozzles in the ceiling. The gas temporarily blinded everyone including Martin, but he was already out of the blocks, racing towards the coughing man. Martin slammed into him so hard, he hit the back wall and lost consciousness, before he could press the triggers. The force of the impact ripped Martin's wound wide open and made him see tiny white stars before his eyes. The bomber and Martin landed in a heap on the floor, with every part of Martin on top, except for his left hand. Two fingers snapped like twigs, when the man landed his elbow on top of them. The combined pain from the open wound and the broken fingers, caused Martin to pass out.
Leo and Vanessa was on the bomber the second he landed. Vanessa placed her gun against him temple, and sheer Asian will power alone stopped her from blowing him away. Leo rubbed the gas out of his eyes, trying to focus on the triggering mechanism.
"Get everyone out of here," he yelled, while waving his hand towards the emergency exit. "It's gonna blow any second..."
Jim punched a button, sending the cabin door flying across the runway. A slide inflated outside the plane. Zenya and Jordan pulled Martin to safety, with the rest of the team close behind them. Leo was the last one out of the plane. Thanks to his speed, he was more than 50 yards away when a tremendous explosion rocked the plane. The blast sent Leo flying through the air, but he managed to land on his feet. When the smoke cleared, the team could see that the entire tail portion of the plane had been severed from the main body.
One ambulance that had been standing by, rushed Martin to the nearest hospital. The paramedics in the second ambulance gave the rest of the team members a thorough check-up, to make sure they weren't injured. Leo had a small piece of shrapnel lodged in his butt, but apart from that, they were all fine.
"What the hell happened back there?" Jordan asked rhetorically.
Leo ignored the retorics and answered the question anyway. "The explosives were set to blow after 10 minutes, unless someone punched in an override code. I guess he wasn't taking any chances..."
"So if Martin hadn't acted when he did, we would have still been in the plane when it blew?" Vanessa was deeply shaken.
Leo looked at his feet. "I'm afraid so."
"Someone must really hate us, to do a thing like this," Zenya said. She looked at Leo. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"
"Yup, Docker must be involved in some way. Perhaps it has something to do with the organization Martin was talking about - The Group."
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[NRPG]
All: I think I'll leave it at that. Hope you don't think I was rushing things along too much.
Jeff and Sydnie: Crucifix Games --> The Group --> Docker. What do you think?
Jeff: Emily (Tango) will call Leo as soon as Zulu is back in D.C. Then I will also have a look at the connection between Martin and Sandra.