Blood & Thunder (THIRDS 2)

Sloane turned to Allan. “Can you get eyes on my team?”

“Sure thing.”

They watched Calvin and Hobbs enter the elevator, the position of the camera outside in the corridor giving them an angled view. It wasn’t perfect, but it was enough. Calvin hit the emergency stop, and the elevator’s alarm went off, its doors remaining open. As soon as he stepped inside, Calvin’s voice confirmed their fears.

“I got a read. It’s somewhere close.”

Allan thankfully terminated the shrilling beeping, and Sloane gave him a nod in thanks. He checked his watch. “Ten minutes. Come on, guys.”

Hobbs’s height allowed him to reach up, and he pushed open one of the access panels situated on the roof of the stainless steel elevator. He removed the Packbot and placed it on the floor to one side before he propped one booted foot on the railing. They all cringed along with Calvin. Sloane sure as hell hoped those things were strong enough to take the weight of Hobbs’s nearly 300-pound frame. Sometimes being a Therian of that size had its drawbacks. Like when it involved small spaces or climbing flimsy structures. Hobbs tested the rail’s strength before hauling himself up, his upper body disappearing through the opening in the roof and his other booted foot resting on the opposite handrail.

Calvin’s stern voice confirmed their fears. “Hobbs found it.”

“All right. Destructive Delta, fall back. Calvin, that includes you.” With Calvin and Hobbs up on the large screen, Sloane gave Allan a pat on the shoulder. “You’ve been a great help, Allan. I need you to get yourself and your team out. If you wouldn’t mind speaking to Agent Rosa Santiago outside; she’ll take your statement.”

“Sloane, the bomb’s been deactivated.”

“What?” Sloane turned to the screen. Hobbs was climbing back down. He held a thumb up to the camera. “Talk to me. That seemed too easy.”

“Because it was,” Calvin said, heading toward the stairwell with Hobbs close behind. “According to Hobbs, there were no antihandling devices, motion sensors, overrides, kill switches, or anything that might trigger the explosion, just the one wire to the power supply. None of this makes any sense.”

“Thanks, guys. Get the disposal team up here.” Giving his final thanks to Allan, Sloane headed out with Dex beside him. He tapped his earpiece. “Sarge?”

“Yeah, I heard. As soon as Disposal gets here, we’re heading back to HQ, to see if we can’t figure this shit out. I don’t know what the hell is going on, and I don’t like it. Lieutenant Sparks is going to like it even less.”

“Copy that.” Sloane removed his helmet, chucking it into the back of the truck in frustration before he climbed in, Dex behind him. “This asshole’s jerking us around.”

“Yeah, but the question is why?” Dex removed his helmet and dropped down onto the bench as the rest of the team climbed in. “He’s got to have something bigger up his sleeve.”

Sloane agreed. There was no telling what Isaac was up to and worse than not knowing was the fear of not being able to do anything about it.

“ALL RIGHT, let’s run through this again.”

Dex tapped files open on his desk’s interface, and Sloane had to hand it to the guy; his partner was determined.

They’d been at this for hours since returning from the CDC registration office, and they were no closer to figuring any of it out now than they had been at the time of the call, yet Dex persisted. Sloane admired his partner’s dedication, and went along with it. “Okay. Thanks to you and Simon, we figured out the base at College Point was a distraction to keep us busy, though at the time, we didn’t know from what. Now we do. While we were there, Isaac was carrying out his plan at the registration office.

“He came out of hiding to plant a bomb in that specific office. Why, we don’t know. He puts in a call, giv

es us enough time to get there and disarm it. The bomb itself was a quick job. Yes, it could have resulted in casualties had we not disarmed it in time, but he gave us plenty of it. He taunts me by using the name Zeph Hyacinth, knowing I’ll catch onto it and find out what it means. He knew we’d bring up the surveillance footage. So he signs in at reception, heads to the elevator, plants the bomb, walks around a bit, takes the elevator back down, and leaves. We’ve established the phone call he made on camera is the one placed to 911.”

Dex ran a hand over his face and sat back, his frown in full force. “I would have thought it was a trap, except it wasn’t. What the hell was the point? I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m extremely relieved it went that smoothly, but why bother? To taunt us? To piss us off?” He shook his head. “That dick. I can’t believe I was friends with the guy.”

“He fooled us all, Dex.” Sloane watched Dex lean over his desk and tap away, bringing up Morelli’s file for the hundredth time that week. “Obsessing over that file isn’t going to add any more information to it.” His partner was frustrated. Sloane understood that. He was too, but after many years of fieldwork, there was only so much you could do with the information you had until something new came up. Staring at the same files over and over wasn’t going to make the case move any quicker.

The majority of Unit Alpha was working on this case, but unfortunately, information trickled down to Defense agents last, unless they came across the info themselves. Intel and Recon did the brunt of the investigating while Defense provided support and waited to be called out. Their objective was to employ special tactics in an effort to preserve life and apprehend dangerous suspects, often resulting in the use of weapons and aggressive maneuvers. Yes, they collected information along the way, interrogated suspects, and kept a clear channel of communication open with Recon, but in the end, Defense agents were the muscle, following orders and procedure. It was an aspect of the job his partner was finding difficult to accept. Sloane could see Dex going into “detective mode” every time he opened a file. It made him once again question whether Dex would be happier in Recon. He quickly pushed that thought aside.

“You’re right,” Sloane said, focusing on the task at hand. “It’s good to talk through it. What have you got?”

“We know Morelli accessed his THIRDS file before he was killed, most likely under duress, since he signed in on his personal laptop. It’s clear Isaac didn’t get what he wanted and killed him. What was he looking for?”

“I don’t know. Morelli tried to log in to Themis, but he would have known he didn’t have access. Only Team Leaders and those with higher clearance levels have offsite access. Isaac wouldn’t have known that. Maybe Morelli was buying himself more time.”

Dex nodded somberly. “Other than that, I can’t come up with any other reason Isaac would have picked Morelli. According to his file, the guy was a regular Lupus Therian agent. He was single, had a few girlfriends, and worked Defense before he moved to Recon. Do you know why he was moved?”

There had been rumors, but Sloane never relied on hearsay. Like any other organization, the THIRDS wasn’t completely void of office politics or gossip. He gave Dex a shrug. “Something about his health. I think it got too stressful for him. That’s not the first time it’s happened to a Defense agent. Everyone wants to be on Defense until someone tries to blow them up.”

“Glamor comes with a hefty price, huh?”