The Manifest

Chapter 22

     Edgar had driven back to his office as close as he could, but the closer he got to the building the more gridlocked traffic became. When things had just gotten too slow, Edgar pulled over and ran the rest of the way. Devon hopped out and followed Edgar, as both men hauled ass to where the commotion was. They both stopped on a dime and looked up in horror as what they most feared had become a horrific reality. Edgar couldn't believe what he was watching as the building he had worked in for the last eight years was ablaze and burning with a hot intensity. It looked like every floor in the building was engulfed in flame, to the point where firefighters were not even trying to get in there.

     Edgar tried to go across the street, eager to go in and look for his people. Devon knew better and grabbed his friend from behind. The big biker dragged Edgar back and pinned him up against the wall of the building across the street from the raging fire.

     "What the hell are you doing?" Edgar yelled as he tried to fight free.

     "Saving your life, mate." Devon said as he refused to let go, "There are fully equipped professionals there, with oxygen and protective gear. If they can get in there and save our people, they will. Don't forget; I've got people in there too, but running in there right now is suicide and you know it!"

     "But what...'' Edgar couldn't' say it, just the thought of everyone perishing in the fire was more than he could take.

     "There are more than a few fire escapes." Devon reminded him, "Let's hope Tuck and the boys managed to get to one before things got really bad."

     Devon was he was holding out hope for the half dozen members of his own team that were still up there as well. Half of Devon's crew were going to spend the whole day and night scanning every part of that office for more bugs. As much as Devon couldn't handle the idea of losing any of his team as well, going in there was out of the question. The fire was too hot and just raging to the point where it was even too dangerous for the pros. Devon loosened his grip as he could tell Edgar was finally on the same page.

     "Let's look around to see if anyone got out." He whispered, "There's no need to hit the panic button without any proof to do so."

     Edgar nodded, "Alright, let's look around and see if we can find someone who looks familiar. Hopefully Tuck got everyone got out before it was too late."

     "Alright," Devon concurred, "You take the right side where those ambulances are. I know the fire captain over there and I'll pump him for information."

     The two men split up, Edgar raced over to the ambulances to see if anyone pulled out looked like one of his people. There were a lot of people from other floors. Most of them had black faces from the smoke, and where on oxygen to help clear their lungs. Most of them were a real mess, but seemed thankful to be out and alive. The building was a towering fireball, and every survivor looked up in amazement as they breathed in the pure oxygen and watched as their offices and work places go up in smoke. Edgar kept looking around, but could find no one from his office in the large crowd of people who got out. The more he looked around, the more concerned he became and couldn't help but think the worst. After looking around for around twenty minutes, he ran back to Devon who too wasn't looking around and talking to a few cops instead. He didn't look to happy as well when Edgar approached him.

     "What have you got?" Edgar asked eager to get just a shred of good news. Anything would be better than nothing at this point and he needed something to get through this.

     "I got nothing," Devon said someone upset himself, "They're saying there's no one from the third floor down here. People from the fourth floor up to the seventh are hard to come by as well. Many managed to get out through the fire escape but those who couldn't make it to the outside stairs seemed to have not been able to get out. You know what this means?" Devon asked, but he knew Edgar was fully aware of what was going on.

     "Yeah." Edgar quickly answered, "It means the fire started on the third floor. There no other offices on that floor, we were the only occupant and we took up almost half that floor." he looked back to the blazing building, "If the fire spread quickly, that would suggest some kind of accelerant."

     "Son-of-a-bitch." Devon cursed to himself as he knew where Edgar was going with this, "I had half a dozen people in there working with Tuck. Do you know how long I've been working with those people?" he paused for a moment when he suddenly thought of Tuck and how long he and Edgar has been together going back to their first meeting on the force, "Sorry, mate. I know how much you guys meant to each other. We have to hope he made it out. After all, he did page you. Didn't he?"

     "I'm not sure." Edgar said as he looked around for the pager, but it wasn't there, "Did you remember looking at the number that left the page?"

     "No, the message kind of distracted me." Devon said as he tried to figure it out himself. "What are you thinking?"

     "Think about what you just said." Edgar started, "You've been distracted since you read that message. That's the point of sending us this message, to distract us and keep us off our game. Someone sent us here hoping we'd waste a lot of time looking around for our people like wild chickens with our heads cut off. We've got to leave, now."

     "Where the bloody hell do you want to go at this time?" Devon said, somewhat distracted by the towering inferno behind him.

     Edgar looked back at him with a face of pure rage, "We need to get to Jessica as soon as possible. I have a feeling someone is going to use this distraction to make our only lead disappear."

     Devon seemed to be on the same page now as he pulled a 9mm automatic from his coat. He checked to make sure it was loaded and then quickly holstered it. He then looked back to Edgar. "I'm game. Just to let you know, I'm in the mood to break a few bones right about now. So let's go have a chat with the bastards who started this shit."

     "Amen to that brother." Edgar said as the two men started to run back to his car as fast as they possibly could. For the first time in a very, very long time the two men were on the same page, ready to fight a common enemy and not in the mood to take any prisoners.