The Standoff Read online

  The grand total number of ambulance fleets for the entire county was eight, and the number of working ambulances all combined was twenty-three. They were all less than state-of-the-art, but all seventeen others, minus the six in Carbine, were headed to the scene. Even with lights flashing and sirens blasting and early morning traffic being slight, some of them would take forty-five minutes to an hour to reach Carbine.

  Lucky for Adonis, she was already seated on the back of one of the ambulances from Carbine. She sat on the back, inside two swung-open doors, her legs dangled over the rear bumper. Her feet were just above the ground.

  She was fifty yards from the compound’s front doors.

  The main building was still on fire. So was the church and the out buildings. Everything was on fire.

  Fire trucks were parked between the ambulances and the main building and behind the police cars that the ATF had arrived in. Most of them were damaged. Two were on fire; several had blown out windows and front fender damage. One had its two front tires blazing fast and furious in a raging fire.

  Three firemen stood in front of that truck blasting the flames with fire extinguishers before the flames reached the engine or the gas tank or spread anywhere else. The last thing they needed was another explosion.

  The rest of the firemen were either spraying the main building with water from two fire hoses attached to two fire trucks or dragging survivors out of and away from the building and the blazing fire.

  They started with the ATF agents and police. They worked fast to lift, carry, or drag the ones who were breathing as far back from the burning building as possible in case of more bombs or explosions.

  All six ambulances, and the pairs of paramedics that came with each of them, tended to the wounded ATF agents and police first.

  Adonis had a head injury, a superficial gash across her left temple that curved around to the front of her forehead just above her brow. It looked worse than it was. It bled profusely. The EMT told her to keep the bandages tight and clean.

  She also had several other cuts from broken glass, not from any of the bombs, but from the passenger window of the SUV she had arrived in. Like all the other vehicles they stormed the property in, all the vehicle windows shattered from the explosions and the shockwaves.

  The paramedic finished a quick field dressing for her head. He told her that she was lucky it didn’t look like she would need stitches, but that she should go get it checked out at the hospital anyway, but what he was really saying was that she should wait and check it out tomorrow at a clinic. He knew good and well that she wasn’t getting any face time with a local doctor. Not with all the more urgent injuries out there.

  She thanked him and insisted that he move on to the more important victims, which he did. He left her there alone.

  Adonis ignored the physical pain and took her phone out and looked at the screen. She had several missed calls, all from her boss, as well as several text messages. They all asked versions of the same question: Where are you?

  Adonis was the Resident Agent in Charge of the local region of South Carolina. She answered to the Deputy Director, a man named Mike Gibbs.

  Her first instincts told her that she had hearing damage because she hadn’t heard her phone ring, not once, not at all. But she realized that she could hear everything around her just fine.

  She heard the paramedic when he was asking her questions. She heard the ambulance sirens when they were blaring past the destroyed gate and entrance to the compound. She heard the fires crackling and sparking all around her as they burned on. She heard the screams and cries for help from injured agents and Athenians left lying on the ground among the soot and ashes and the dead.

  Her hearing was optimal. No problem there.

  She checked her phone. The ringer was switched on. She played with it, pushing the outer switch up and down, testing it out. The screen notified her each time that the phone ringer was on and then off.

  She pulled up the settings and tried to hear the ringer. It didn’t ring; then she realized that both the ringer and the vibration function were both busted. Maybe when she landed on her butt from being thrown back by the explosion she had crushed some vital internal piece of the ringer’s configuration.

  She swiped and pressed on the missed calls and tried to call him back.

  The phone rang.

  He picked up on the first ring.

  “Adonis!”

  “Yeah. I’m here.”

  She pressed the phone close to her ear and jabbed a finger in the other one to plug it up. The commotion around her was too loud to hear what he was telling her otherwise.

  Adonis had trained hard back in the day at the ATF National Academy in Glynco, Georgia. She wasn’t the only female in her class, but she was the only one to make top marks in combat courses, something that she was proud of. She was proud of showing the boys that a woman could do it too. This sense of pride was short-lived ever since because she was one of a handful of female agents on the ground in command positions. The men in the same positions outnumbered the women by a lot, by leaps and bounds. She liked to think she was fighting the good fight.

  Adonis was a rebel at heart, but very much a part of the system now. She was institutionalized. She was the lead agent in charge, which meant no more sticking it to the patriarchy. She was the patriarchy now. She had responsibilities and duties. She owed everything to the agency.

  The National Academy instructors beat the rebel side of her into submission, as best they could, and now, she was part of the cog of upper management. A tough spot to be for a girl who was a rebel at heart. She liked to look at it this way: she was still fighting the good fight, only she was also upholding justice for all—very egalitarian.

  Part of being institutionalized made her wonder if she should do a situation report for her boss. She didn’t know how much he knew already. So, she gave it to him.

  “There’s been an explosion. Several. Actually. There are dead on the ground: Athenians and ours. I don’t know where Clip is. I don’t see him anywhere.”

  Her boss interrupted her.

  “Adonis. Adonis. I know what’s going on.”

  “You do?”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s all over the media. Everyone knows. It’s Waco all over again!”

  She paused a beat and then she said, “I’m sorry, sir.”

  Her boss was quiet for a second. He spoke in a tone that sounded like the ones she had used in the past when she delivered to the nearest relative the sad news of an agent dying in the line of duty.

  “Clip is dead.”

  “Oh, no!” she said faintly, almost in a whisper.

  “The director has ordered Agent Marson’s team to get down there and take over. From this point forward, you’re relieved of command.”

  “What? Why?”

  “I just explained it to you! Are you listening! We’ve screwed up! We got agents down! We got citizens dead! Adonis, they’re airing reels of Athenian children storming out of the compound and then they’re cutting to the video of explosions. It’s playing on CNN! Over and over! You’re done!”

  “I did everything by the book!”

  Mike Gibbs, her boss, paused a beat a breathed in.

  Adonis felt like she had been punched in the gut, like they just clipped her wings. She said nothing, just waited and listened.

  Gibbs said, “Sometimes, that’s not good enough. Sometimes, our best is good enough. Sometimes, the bad guys win. This time, Abel won.”

  She held back tears.

  “Am I fired?”

  “I don’t know. I’ll be fired, I’m sure.”

  “Why? It’s my Op.”

  “I gave it to you. And that doesn’t matter anyway. Like I said, we’re all over the morning news. It didn’t make the morning papers, but we’re all over the online pages. Damage is done. It don’t really matter if we did our jobs or not. The agency will hang this disaster around our necks and feed us to the lions. The higher-ups hav
e to protect the agency and sidestep the blame.”

  “I’m sorry, Mike.”

  “Forget it now. Listen up. Marson’s guys will be there in two hours, probably.”

  “Two hours? Why not now?”

  Adonis looked at her watch. It wasn’t there. She stared at an empty wrist. Her watch was gone. She lost it somewhere. It must’ve blown off in the explosion.

  She frowned. She liked that watch. It had sentimental value.

  She took the phone away from her ear and checked the time. It was nearing eight in the morning, later than she thought. She synchronized the time in her head to a two-hour countdown.

  “Let me run cleanup till then. I need to. Let me make it up as best I can. They’re dead because of me.”

  Dorsch is dead ‘cause of me , she thought.

  “Adonis.”

  She stopped and listened.

  Gibbs sighed. She heard it over the phone.

  “I’m not saying it’s your fault. If you think that’s what I said, then I misspoke. I apologize. This is the fault of Joseph Abel and his followers. No one else. Don’t you take a single iota of blame. You got nothing to feel guilty about. Put those thoughts straight to bed. That’s a direct order.”

  No response.

  He asked, “Got it?”

  “I got it.”

  “Good. Now, are you okay?”

  “Yes.”

  “Any injuries?”

  “No,” she lied.

  “Good. Now, listen carefully.”

  She listened.

  “I’m instructed to tell you that you are off this case. As of now, you’re suspended. We’re all off the case. The FBI will take over, whenever the hell that is. Me too. I’m done. We’re all done.”

  Gibbs paused a beat, swallowed.

  “Now, that’s out of the way. We got one chance here and it’s not to catch this bastard. Don’t bring him in alive. Do you understand what I’m saying here, Adonis?”

  Her boss couldn’t see her face, but if he had, he would’ve seen utter confusion on it.

  She said, “But, Abel is here. He’s dead. We probably won’t find his body for days. He’s under a ton of brick and ash and not much else.”

  “Toni, you’re not listening. Please.”

  She swallowed hard and tuned in her ears.

  “Okay?”

  “No one knows this except some of the South Carolina State Police. So, keep it quiet. I mean it. No one knows. Not the FBI. Not yet. No one above me. I’ve not reported it yet.”

  “Okay. What is it?”

  “I’ve been looking over maps of the area and analyzing data for the last two hours with my team, in secret. We’re supposed to be shut down here too. I didn’t hear from you, so I just kept looking myself.”

  “Okay?”

  “Spartan County has miles and miles of backroads.”

  “I’m aware. During your raid, the highway patrolmen ran a perimeter, checking out all the backroad country they could. And…Adonis.”

  “Yes.”

  “This morning, right after the explosion, a radio dispatcher with the South Carolina Highway Patrol got a radio call on the police frequency. No one spoke on the call. It was just breathing and silence. It lasted for only a couple of minutes. It disconcerted her but didn’t mean anything at the time. Everyone was up in arms, running around like chickens with their heads cut off. Which is understandable, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “An hour passed, and about six a.m., someone over there noticed a patrolman wasn’t answering his radio. Their cars have GPS trackers in them. Naturally.”

  “Of course.”

  “So, they sent someone to the patrolman’s car. When they got there, they found him dead, Toni. He was shot in the street.”

  Adonis said nothing but listened as if her life depended on the information being transmitted.

  “It happened five miles, northeast of the compound on a backroad off Six-Oh-One.”

  Adonis’s ears and face perked up. Before she knew it, she was on her feet.

  “The patrolman’s dead. His CO is there now. I’ve asked them not to touch the scene.”

  Adonis moved away from the back of the ambulance involuntarily. She didn’t realize her feet were moving. For a split second, she thought she was floating away.

  Where was she going? She didn’t know.

  “Adonis.”

  “Yeah?”

  “South Carolina Highway Patrol cruisers have dashcams, like everybody else.”

  She listened closely.

  “The head of the state police out there called me. He told me they’ve got the video. He emailed it to me. I watched it.”

  “And?”

  “It shows a black panel van. I saw the patrolman get shot through the driver’s side window. I watched the driver and a passenger get out, and then I counted five others.”

  “Five?”

  “And…Adonis.”

  “Yes?”

  “I saw Abel. He was the passenger. He was the shooter. He stood there over the dying patrolman and stared at him like he was getting his jollies watching the poor guy dying.”

  “Abel? You sure?”

  “Yes. I’m sure. He was dressed in a white getup like one of those phony TV evangelists. Like he was a high priest or something. In my twenty-three years of law enforcement, I’ve never seen anything like it.”

  Abel was alive. Alive.

  Adonis felt the hairs on her neck stand up. She felt shivers all over her body. She felt the rage coming on like a bad cold.

  “Abel got away. He planned this whole thing.”

  “He caught Dorsch. Probably killed him in some horrible way. He must’ve set this whole thing up, killed so many of his own people just to cover his escape.”

  “How? He had a two-day notice we were coming. Tops. Are you saying he had all these explosives lying around already?”

  “Yes. He’s been planning it for years.”

  “How did he know we were coming?”

  “He didn’t know that we were coming. Not us specifically. But he’s always known that someone would come. Someday. We know they ran shooting drills. We came here based on the luck of finding materials being shipped to them for packing bombs. There’s no telling how many shipments came before. Could be years. Abel’s wanted this day to come.”

  “If he planned for this, then he must have a phase two. He must have something coming next. Doesn’t seem likely he would plan such a terrifying escape and nothing else.”

  “I agree. We gotta find him. Where’s the dead patrolman exactly?”

  “I’ve ordered Ramirez to fly you there. Find him. He should be looking out for you. Go with him. Check it out. There are two patrolmen on scene, waiting. I’ve been reassured that they’ll be cooperative, but Toni…”

  “Yeah.”

  “He killed one of their own. Hopefully, they’ll play nice. I told them that we would do the same, but tell them nothing. See what you can get and report back.”

  “Okay. Got it.”

  She started to click off, but he said one more thing.

  “Before you take off, I counted seven of them—Abel and six others. They will be tough. Probably his guys from the Army. So, grab as many other uninjured agents who’ll fit on the helicopter. Take them with you. Tell them to do as you say. If they give you shit, call me. Now, go get this bastard before the Feds take over.”

  She looked around, instinctively, and surveyed the agents who looked like they would be useful going further.

  “Toni, we’re on the clock, but off the books here. You get the shot, you take the shot. I’ve gotta go. Be careful.”

  “Always.”

  She pressed the phone end button, and got off, slipped the phone back into her pocket.

  She left the ambulances and the EMTs behind her and reentered the scene. She walked past police, past police cars, past wrecked police cars and searched for able-bodied ATF agents.

  Without thinking, she walked to
the front of the mess. She tried not to look below the level of the horizon. She didn’t want to see how bad it was. She didn’t want to see the severed limbs and the dead bodies of her friends.

  A moment later, she heard the WHOP , WHOP of helicopter rotor blades. She thought it was Ramirez circling overhead, probably looking for her, but then she heard another set of rotor blades and then another.

  She looked up and saw two helicopters flying in from the north.

  They were both stamped along the sides with emergency services markings from different hospitals but flying in from nearly the same direction.

  They were big helicopters—bigger than the ATF’s own helicopter.

  She watched them swoop in and circle around, looking for landing spots. They both found spots not far apart within the Athenian walls. She watched them land.

  Suddenly, the paramedics on the ground seemed to release a sense of relief at the sight of several more paramedics coming out of the helicopters to help.

  Adonis turned back to looking for available agents.

  She walked toward the main building, which was nothing at this point, but one big blazing fire and surviving brick sections.

  On the ground, she found a long set of tracks in the snow leading up to the back of a small convoy of fire trucks. She looked at the fire trucks. She never even heard them come in, or at least she hadn’t noticed.

  The fire trucks’ emergency lights swirled on top of the roofs, mixing in with the red lights from the ambulances. The snow in the cones of the lights appeared red like seeing it through a red filter.

  Some of the fire trucks were being used to spray water over the blaze, but a few were unused. They seemed forlorn and forgotten in the red snow.

  The main building blazed, and the flames roared on, no matter how much water was sprayed on them.

  There were firemen fighting the fires. There were firemen swarming and scattering all over the grisly scene of carnage. They were picking up scared children and injured elderly, moving them out further from the buildings and the flames. They carried many of them out to the cluster of ambulances back where Adonis had come from. They dropped them off there as fast as they could. Then they scrambled back to the carnage to repeat the pick-up-and-carry process.