Disco Bomb

Chapter 17

May 19th, 2017. 8:10 PM

The bullet tore the disco ball's threads from the ceiling and smashed into the bomb timer. The ceiling exploded in smoke, dust and sparks. Chunks of drywall plummeted to the floor as the lights flickered off. The screams began, and from the faint moonlight shining through the rain-splattered windows, I could see panicked silhouettes get up and run blindly. I couldn't discern any of Dane's men from the dancers.

But the lights were still on in the hallway, and the emergency lights still worked. I saw Dane run into one of the hallways. A window shattered behind me. I whirled around just in time to see Sykes jump out the window.

Someone grabbed my shoulder. "Sykes probably broke his leg in that fall," Brandon shouted above the screaming. "We need to get Dane now!"

"Okay!" I ran to the other hallway, shoving through the crowd and grimacing when drywall scraped my bare feet. When I stepped into the hallway and could see, my feet were bleeding and making bloody footprints on the carpet. I didn't care. What was really concerning was that there were multiple hallways branching off from this one and I had no way of telling where Dane went.

Then I heard a door close to my right and immediately went that way, Brandon right behind me. I tried to stay silent despite the sound of squishing carpet. I opened the first door I saw and, lo and behold, Dane's jacket was lying on the stairwell. But what was downstairs?

"All the electrical maintenance is downstairs," Brandon said. "He'll try to get out and trap us in."

I didn't feel like mentioning that downstairs was also where his best friend was bleeding to death with a bullet in his stomach. But this was a different stairway, so I simply ran and pushed all the doors open as I passed. Bathroom. Janitor closet. Two locked doors. Another bathroom.

We paused at the last door, pressing our ears against it to listen. Something was thrumming inside, like fans and machinery. I tried the door and, when I realized it was locked, shot the handle. The door flew open and Brandon and I stormed inside.

Bruce Dane was sitting cross-legged on the floor amidst generators and large pieces of machinery. Around him was a ring of wires in strange electrical configurations, connecting several red boxes. From each red box, a thick black wire branched off and connected to a generator.

Dane held a long, red flare in front of his face, with one end sparking. "My last ditch," he said. "I bet you know it's another bomb. I'm skilled with this stuff.

"Drop your guns, please," he said. "You shoot me, I drop this flare. I drop this flare, the flare lights the wires." He chuckled. "There's an awful lot of juice running around here. If the sparks from this flare touch the wires.... This whole place is going to blow.

"You. Me. The guests. Your friend. We're all gonna die if you shoot me. The whole plaza is going to go up. That's a lot of lost friends, orphaned children, widows. But if you drop the gun, I can snuff this out. I could go peacefully. I can accept jail time."

"You don't deserve it," I said through clenched teeth. "What about the people you killed? What about the ones you were going to kill if you didn't get the money? What about my nephew that you almost killed? What about Jack, who you shot and left to bleed out? Do you think any of them will give you mercy?"

Dane grinned. "You left them, too."

I fired.

The bullet blew off the top of the flare and lodged itself in Dane's throat. The sparking end of the flare flew into his eye. His body fell onto the mess of wires and spasmed as the current jolted through him.

Brandon quickly grabbed a pair of wire cutters from his jacket and bent down, snipping until the ring of electricity was isolated. When it was over, Bruce Dane's body was a shriveled heap of charred, smoking skin and clothes.

I sighed in relief and put the gun away.

Landesky looked up at me. "You said he shot Jack," he said. "Where is he?"

"Follow me."