Steve Martini - The Rule of Nine

A woman screams and tourists suddenly move away from the bench as if it were the entrance to hell.

Even before he hits the pavement, Thorn’s hands are reaching out, trying to grab the flying computer as if it were a fumbled football. He hits the ground and instantly rolls up onto one knee.

Before I can move, he scrambles ten feet across the cement to the computer. Single-minded and focused, he tries to get his fingers on the controls.

Just as he picks up the computer and starts to finger the keyboard, a moving shadow crosses the ground. A whooshing sound streaks overhead. Thorn looks up, a kind of pleading expression in his eyes. Two seconds later a flash of light followed by a massive concussive explosion rocks the ground.

Joselyn connected with the dispatcher at 911, and reported that there was a bomb in the U.S. Supreme Court Building. She was watching, wondering what was happening, as she saw Paul race across the sidewalk maybe a hundred and thirty yards away, and careen into someone seated on a concrete bench.

“Who is this?” said the dispatcher. “I need your name.”

“There’s no time to talk,” said Joselyn. “Just evacuate the building and do it now!”

Before she could even press the button to hang up she felt the ground rock beneath her feet with the force of the explosion. Her gaze turned toward the flash of light and she saw the rising mushroom cloud as it billowed two hundred feet into the air little more than a half mile away.

The VRE, Virginia Rail Express, had just pulled out of Union Station, headed for Fredericksburg, in northern Virginia, when the blast ripped up the rails a quarter of a mile behind it.

The explosion sent a mound of dirt and debris high into the sky as the concussion rattled the trailing truck on the last passenger car off the rails. The slow-moving train immediately applied its brakes and came to a screeching halt as flames and an immense plume of black smoke rose into the sky just down the tracks behind the train.

With the concussive blast, all eyes around us suddenly turn away from the brawl on the concrete toward the north and the rising plume of smoke. A couple of women are screaming. A few of the tourists start to run. Others seem frozen in place.

I look into Thorn’s eyes. What I see is desperation and anger. Only he and I know that the collision on the bench and the massive explosion were connected.

He looks at me for only a second before he darts toward the sidewalk on First Street. Suddenly he realizes he has a chance to escape. He looks at me with a scowl, turns, and starts to walk away.

In an instant I’m on my feet.

He turns, sees me, and starts to run.

“Paul, let him go!” It’s Joselyn behind me, running to catch up. “Let the police get him.”

I turn, look at her. “Stay there!”

She cups her hands around her mouth. She’s still a hundred feet away. “Let him go. The police will find him.”

But by then it’s too late. Adrenaline has taken hold. I turn back toward Thorn, and with the chase instinct of a cat, I find myself in a footrace. We run down the sidewalk on First Street dodging tourists and government workers.

Thorn is maybe two hundred feet ahead of me, running at full speed. He reaches Independence Avenue and doesn’t even slow down. He runs out into the intersection against a red light, dodging cars with honking horns.

By the time I get there, he’s opened up a lead of almost half a block. I continue running. I can see him in the distance. Suddenly a car pulls up next to me. It’s a cab and Joselyn is in the back. She opens the door. “Get in!” she says.

I turn and look back at Thorn just as he runs between two barricades blocking cars from turning onto First Street across the intersection up ahead. “Go around and head him off,” I tell her. “Don’t get out of the car. Use the phone to call the police.”

She nods, slams the door closed, and the cab speeds away.

I continue running down the block until I reach the traffic barricade, then step between the two gates and start to jog again. I am in a canyon between two House office buildings, in the shade. I catch a fleeting glimpse of Thorn as he steps off the sidewalk to the right and disappears somewhere beyond the next intersection up ahead. I begin to wonder if he has a car parked in a garage or a lot. I pick up the pace and start to run.

As I clear the barricade at the other end of the block, I see the yellow cab coming this way. Now if he has a car we can follow him and call in the location to the cops. The cab screams up the street and stops at midblock. A few seconds later I reach it just as Joselyn is getting out of the backseat.

“I hope you have some money. All I have in my pocket is some change, a credit card, and my Metro pass,” she says. “And we’ll need that.”

“Why?”

“Hurry up. Pay the driver,” she says.

I do it and she grabs me by the hand, pulling me across the street. Then I realize where we’re going. The sign says CAPITOL SOUTH. It’s an open, cavernous concrete hole in the ground with escalators. We jump on the one going down.

“You sure he went in here?”

“I saw him,” she says. “I just hope he hasn’t gotten on one of the trains yet or we’ll lose him for good.”

The escalator drops into the bowels of the earth, maybe two hundred feet belowground. When we reach the underground station, it’s a milling madhouse with vending machines and a ticket kiosk that has a long line in front of it.

“Follow me.” Joselyn reaches into her pocket.

I stay right behind her.

She reaches the turnstile and slips a plastic card into the slot then steps through. She grabs the card as it’s spit out on the other side then reaches and hands it to me. I do the same and within seconds we’re running for the platform. I’m looking both ways, scanning the crowd to see if there’s any sign of Thorn.

Joselyn sees two uniformed cops patrolling the station on the other side of the tracks. “Give me a moment, I’ll have to go back up and over the top so I can tell them what’s happening. I’ll be right back.” She leaves me standing on the platform as she heads back toward the ticket area.

I turn again and look for Thorn, but I don’t see him. I am beginning to think that he caught one of the Metro trains and disappeared before we got down here.

I look back toward the ticketing area where Joselyn was headed and notice that she’s still on the platform, and she’s not moving. She is stopped near a pillar, standing there motionless, not saying anything and not moving.

I start to walk in that direction and suddenly Thorn steps out from behind the pillar. He has one hand on her arm and the other in his coat pocket. The way he holds it there I can tell he’s handling some kind of weapon.

“Never mind that your friend’s seen us,” said Thorn. “This way.” He held her arm, gripping it hard above the elbow, and pulled her behind him, retreating toward the far end of the platform.

Thorn had already seen the two cops on the other side. He got up close in Joselyn’s ear from behind. “Don’t say anything,” said Thorn, “just motion with your hand. Tell him to stay away. Do it or I’ll kill you right here. Trust me-I can shoot you and nobody’s even going to hear it.”

Joselyn moves her right hand out, her palm facing me, away from her waist, her fingers open and extended, and while Thorn grips her arm tightly, she waves me off, a sign that I should keep my distance.

All I can do is stand there and watch as Thorn, with his hand around Joselyn’s arm, retreats toward the other end of the platform.

Suddenly I hear the rush of air coming from the open tunnel behind them. A train pulls up and stops at the platform. The automatic doors open and a flood of passengers disembark while others wait to get on. In the press of bodies, the invasion of a new army onto the platform, I lose sight of Thorn and Joselyn. Then I see his head. I move a few feet toward one of the open doors of the train in case he tries to get on.