It it Imperfections eleven?
I don't know. It might just be a busy day at work and a dinner party. But at least it is a finished busy day at work and a dinner party, which puts me way ahead of where it was when my plotting mechanism crashed three years ago.
And if I can get my act halfway together, it might become Imperfections Eleven.
Anyway here is the first section. Assuming Lochjournal can get this posted in chunks as large as 6 pages.
Sandburg was out getting lunch when the call came in. Jim had teased that if he'd known guides made such convenient gophers, he'd have come on line years earlier. Sandburg had swatted Jim on the head and laughed that he was just put out because there were some forms he had to fill out himself and couldn't pawn off on innocent partners. "I want a hamburger," Jim had changed the subject by hitting another of Sandburg's buttons.
"Roast beef with sprouts."
"Control freak." But that accusation had lost its sting with overuse. Sandburg had just cheerfully flipped him off, confiscated the truck keys, and trotted out.
Ten minutes later Joel came tearing down the hall, ducking sideways to shove open the door to Major Crimes and snap, "Bomb threat. I need a nose."
Jim caught up with him in at the stairs. "Where's Daisy?"
"Sickday," Joel said shortly, pulling out his cell phone.
"How is a dog out sick?"
"Stepped on a piece of glass." Joel waved him to silence, and said into his phone, "Wilson, we've got a bomb threat at Roosevelt High....No, I want you there, in case the press shows up. Right. Thanks." He shut the phone and glanced at Jim. "Where's Blair?"
"Out getting lunch. Can I borrow your cell?"
Joel handed it over as they exited into the lower parking lot. "What happened to yours?"
"It got wet," Jim answered, punching in Sandburg's number.
"You're not supposed to get them wet."
"I fell into the bay," Jim really wished Joel would drop it.
Joel didn't. He spared Jim a surprised glance as he unlocked the car. "During the boat chase yesterday?"
"No, after," Jim muttered. He ignored Joel's laugh and gave Sandburg directions to the school.
The scene when they arrived was already a zoo. Students were scattered in class-size clumps on the soccer field. Five black-and-whites had already arrived, the uniforms setting up barricade markers to keep back gawkers. They had some of them, too; a few of the neighborhood storekeepers and a handful of brightly-uniformed employees from the fast food place on the corner. Joel had been right to call the public relations guy; the Channel 5 van was parked by the bus lot.
Joel questioned the principal while pulling equipment out of the gleaming, bomb squad SUV. A bomb threat hadn't been called in. One of the students had heard a rumor, and, completely freaked out, gone right to the office to tell everything she knew. Unfortunately, that wasn't much.
Joel tagged two of his guys: Owens, Bradford. You're on equipment, but stay out here until we have a location." He winced. "Or locations. Damn. I was hoping Sandburg would be here by now."
Jim glanced at the looming brick building. Three stories, and fairly long. "We can start without him," he said. "It's not a particularly hazardous environment."
"Except for the bomb." Joel took a deep breath. "Are you sure?"
"Yeah. No problem."
Joel didn't hesitate when they approached the propped-open north doors, but he smelled like sweat. Jim didn't blame him. The last time they'd gotten a bomb call for a school, there had been six incendiary devices for Jim to find and Joel to dismantle.
There had also been Brackett, impatient, relentless, snapping at Jim with senseless, impossible instructions. All of a sudden the normal smells of the school--stale mac and cheese, used socks, floor polish, paper dust, young lust, sulfur left over from some chemistry experiment--hit him in the face like a solid object. His stomach twisted, but was held back from rebellion by the wash of panic and hopelessness that wouldn't let him breathe, let alone vomit.
It had barely been a year.
It had *been* a year. A whole god damn year, and Jim was not going to give in to this memory now. He wasn't going to cave in and carry Brackett with him, now that the man was safely hidden away in a padded room with locked doors.
"Hey? You okay?" Joel asked sharply.
Jim managed to keep himself from laughing at the question. Okay? He was a mess. In a building with a probable bomb. And no guide. Even Jim couldn't shade 'okay' to cover that.
Jim did manage to scowl at Joel and wave him to silence. He could do this. He sniffed experimentally. The air smelled like every other school, including the last one. The memory wasn't unbearable, but it was vivid enough to bring up a distracting nausea. Right. Okay. He tried to ignore the stink and open up his hearing.
Water moving to his left. Close. Jim glanced into an open classroom door. Fish tank. An odd hum, vibrating through the floor. Refrigerator? Plumbing? Which way was the cafeteria? Right. Refrigerator.
Slowly, Jim took a step forward and then another. Joel, barely breathing, shadowed him.
Above was a weighty sort of sound. A computer lab or library, probably. Jim ignored it. He needed to focus on one floor at a time. One floor at a time, one sense at a time. Sound first, incase the bomb was on a timer. Then scent, if he could handle it. He could do this....
"Geeze, Ellison? In a hurry much?" At the sound of Sandburg's voice, something in Jim's gut uncoiled a little. Jim took a deeper breath.
"What's wrong?" Joel whispered.
"Blair's coming." He was coming like a storm front, grumbling at the uniform who was manning the barricade, sparing a couple of words to chew out Simon for letting Jim go in unguided. His fast footsteps didn't slow down for the Captain's protest that he had just gotten here himself and hadn't 'let' anyone do anything.
Jim was glancing over his shoulder at the still-open door when he heard the flat, atonal click echo faintly in the hallway up ahead. He grabbed Joel by the shoulders and shoved, but gravity wasn't nearly fast enough, and they were still both in mid-air when sound disappeared completely and the air itself turned into a stone wall that crushed them from both sides.
Jim came down, dimly aware that he was on top of Joel. He suspected that the concussion had scoured his skin raw just before crushing him, but there wasn't any pain. No pain, no sound, no movement. He could still see the tile floor an inch from his nose, but it blurred and refused to focus. Jim tried to push himself up, but there was no strength, either. He was frozen.
The blur of floor shifted. Jim couldn't have resisted the hands that moved him, but when he saw that Sandburg was attached to him he cursed to himself. Moron. Of course Sandburg would run into a building that had bombs going off--
Sandburg said something. Jim had no idea what. He shoved Jim around until he was sitting and held him still with ruthless strength. Enthusiastic and gentle and *careful* and completely wrong! "God damn it, Sandburg, it doesn't matter whether I'm hurt or not. We need to get out of here--never mind what the hell you're doing in here in the first place." Jim's hearing cut back in halfway through this speech, but he wasn't nearly embarrassed enough by his shouting to restrain himself.
Not that it mattered. Sandburg was as impervious to intimidation as he was to common sense. He neither backed down nor did something useful; he laughed and hugged Jim. He smelled worried and stressed and way too happy. Jim shook him--
And smelled, along side the familiarity of Sandburg, the acrid bite of explosive. And something sweet. What the hell?
Awkwardly, Jim surged to his feet. The world was oddly tilted, and his body still felt numb. It was just as well that Sandburg wasn't letting go; Jim was still swaying badly. "Joel--" he began.
"He went to take a look," Sandburg answered, glancing further up the long hall.
"I smell wet paint...." He hadn't before. The hallway, when Jim finally succeeded in focusing on it, didn't appear to be badly damaged. The walls were still standing and the floor was uncracked, although the ceiling tiles were knocked askew, and at the far end of the hall, a couple of lockers were sagging limply, their doors twisted and shredded.
Still stunned by the concussion, Jim was useless. He let Sandburg lead him outside and settle him on the curb in the shade of one of the squad cars. It was cooler out here. The world came into focus enough for him to notice that he had locked his hand so tightly around Sandburg's wrist that the circulation was stalled out. Very carefully, he let go. "Well. That was pretty much a mess," he said bitterly. "Tell me Joel's not hurt."
"Joel's fine."
"Good, good, that's...." Lucky. Jim swallowed. They'd been lucky. Jim couldn't take credit for their survival any more than he could pick out a mistake he'd made doing the sweep. There just hadn't been *time.* Shit, Jim hadn't even had time to make one pass of the first floor
That was almost worse, maybe. It didn't matter if he'd been in control or not, if he'd been competent or not.
Sandburg squatted beside him, pushed a bottle of water into his hand. "How are you doing?"
Jim wasn't sure how to answer that. He suspected that if he paid any attention to the dull ache in his bones and joints the pain would expand until he couldn't move at all. His skin, too, felt sore. Raw. "I didn't break anything," he said. He was pretty sure about that.
"Yeah, okay. That's good."
Joel stormed up, leaning his hip against the squad car. "Practical joke," he growled.
"Huh?" Jim grunted.
"It was a paint bomb."
Sandburg's head shot up. "What? You're kidding!"
"Isn't that hysterical, ha ha," Joel said sourly.
"But--it seemed like a fair sized explosion. Not enough to bring the walls down, but--"
"Oh, yeah. Whoever it was did a bad job of it. If it had gone off when the intended victim was opening the door, he would have been seriously hurt, not just covered in paint. And the trigger...just went off randomly...."
"So we saw," Sandburg muttered.
"....I'll have to reassemble what's left of the parts to see how it was supposed to work." Joel's voice hardened. "There won't be any real jail time, not for a teenager."
"Joel--" Sandburg began, standing up. Something in his voice got Jim's attention, and he leaned back so he could see Joel's face.
Joel was sweating. "My god, this is insane. If that bomb had been any bigger, they would be taking us out on stretchers right now." His hands were shaking. "I can't keep doing this, not now."
"O-kay," Sandburg said brightly. "Joel, how about you sit down?"
"I can't keep doing this. This isn't any kind of life--" he sat heavily on the curb beside Jim.
Blair dug out another bottle of water and leaned around Jim to shove it into Joel's hand. "You're the best at your job, man, you know that. Today--"
"It wouldn't have mattered today. Aw, jeeze. I can't keep doing this."
"Um," Sandburg said, sounding more uncertain. "Joel?" He jumped up and waved off an approaching medic, calling, "No, it's all right. Nobody was actually caught in the explosion."
Joel giggled once, but cut the spasm off before it could degenerate into full-blown hysteria.
It took another three hours to finish clearing the building.
And if I can get my act halfway together, it might become Imperfections Eleven.
Anyway here is the first section. Assuming Lochjournal can get this posted in chunks as large as 6 pages.
Sandburg was out getting lunch when the call came in. Jim had teased that if he'd known guides made such convenient gophers, he'd have come on line years earlier. Sandburg had swatted Jim on the head and laughed that he was just put out because there were some forms he had to fill out himself and couldn't pawn off on innocent partners. "I want a hamburger," Jim had changed the subject by hitting another of Sandburg's buttons.
"Roast beef with sprouts."
"Control freak." But that accusation had lost its sting with overuse. Sandburg had just cheerfully flipped him off, confiscated the truck keys, and trotted out.
Ten minutes later Joel came tearing down the hall, ducking sideways to shove open the door to Major Crimes and snap, "Bomb threat. I need a nose."
Jim caught up with him in at the stairs. "Where's Daisy?"
"Sickday," Joel said shortly, pulling out his cell phone.
"How is a dog out sick?"
"Stepped on a piece of glass." Joel waved him to silence, and said into his phone, "Wilson, we've got a bomb threat at Roosevelt High....No, I want you there, in case the press shows up. Right. Thanks." He shut the phone and glanced at Jim. "Where's Blair?"
"Out getting lunch. Can I borrow your cell?"
Joel handed it over as they exited into the lower parking lot. "What happened to yours?"
"It got wet," Jim answered, punching in Sandburg's number.
"You're not supposed to get them wet."
"I fell into the bay," Jim really wished Joel would drop it.
Joel didn't. He spared Jim a surprised glance as he unlocked the car. "During the boat chase yesterday?"
"No, after," Jim muttered. He ignored Joel's laugh and gave Sandburg directions to the school.
The scene when they arrived was already a zoo. Students were scattered in class-size clumps on the soccer field. Five black-and-whites had already arrived, the uniforms setting up barricade markers to keep back gawkers. They had some of them, too; a few of the neighborhood storekeepers and a handful of brightly-uniformed employees from the fast food place on the corner. Joel had been right to call the public relations guy; the Channel 5 van was parked by the bus lot.
Joel questioned the principal while pulling equipment out of the gleaming, bomb squad SUV. A bomb threat hadn't been called in. One of the students had heard a rumor, and, completely freaked out, gone right to the office to tell everything she knew. Unfortunately, that wasn't much.
Joel tagged two of his guys: Owens, Bradford. You're on equipment, but stay out here until we have a location." He winced. "Or locations. Damn. I was hoping Sandburg would be here by now."
Jim glanced at the looming brick building. Three stories, and fairly long. "We can start without him," he said. "It's not a particularly hazardous environment."
"Except for the bomb." Joel took a deep breath. "Are you sure?"
"Yeah. No problem."
Joel didn't hesitate when they approached the propped-open north doors, but he smelled like sweat. Jim didn't blame him. The last time they'd gotten a bomb call for a school, there had been six incendiary devices for Jim to find and Joel to dismantle.
There had also been Brackett, impatient, relentless, snapping at Jim with senseless, impossible instructions. All of a sudden the normal smells of the school--stale mac and cheese, used socks, floor polish, paper dust, young lust, sulfur left over from some chemistry experiment--hit him in the face like a solid object. His stomach twisted, but was held back from rebellion by the wash of panic and hopelessness that wouldn't let him breathe, let alone vomit.
It had barely been a year.
It had *been* a year. A whole god damn year, and Jim was not going to give in to this memory now. He wasn't going to cave in and carry Brackett with him, now that the man was safely hidden away in a padded room with locked doors.
"Hey? You okay?" Joel asked sharply.
Jim managed to keep himself from laughing at the question. Okay? He was a mess. In a building with a probable bomb. And no guide. Even Jim couldn't shade 'okay' to cover that.
Jim did manage to scowl at Joel and wave him to silence. He could do this. He sniffed experimentally. The air smelled like every other school, including the last one. The memory wasn't unbearable, but it was vivid enough to bring up a distracting nausea. Right. Okay. He tried to ignore the stink and open up his hearing.
Water moving to his left. Close. Jim glanced into an open classroom door. Fish tank. An odd hum, vibrating through the floor. Refrigerator? Plumbing? Which way was the cafeteria? Right. Refrigerator.
Slowly, Jim took a step forward and then another. Joel, barely breathing, shadowed him.
Above was a weighty sort of sound. A computer lab or library, probably. Jim ignored it. He needed to focus on one floor at a time. One floor at a time, one sense at a time. Sound first, incase the bomb was on a timer. Then scent, if he could handle it. He could do this....
"Geeze, Ellison? In a hurry much?" At the sound of Sandburg's voice, something in Jim's gut uncoiled a little. Jim took a deeper breath.
"What's wrong?" Joel whispered.
"Blair's coming." He was coming like a storm front, grumbling at the uniform who was manning the barricade, sparing a couple of words to chew out Simon for letting Jim go in unguided. His fast footsteps didn't slow down for the Captain's protest that he had just gotten here himself and hadn't 'let' anyone do anything.
Jim was glancing over his shoulder at the still-open door when he heard the flat, atonal click echo faintly in the hallway up ahead. He grabbed Joel by the shoulders and shoved, but gravity wasn't nearly fast enough, and they were still both in mid-air when sound disappeared completely and the air itself turned into a stone wall that crushed them from both sides.
Jim came down, dimly aware that he was on top of Joel. He suspected that the concussion had scoured his skin raw just before crushing him, but there wasn't any pain. No pain, no sound, no movement. He could still see the tile floor an inch from his nose, but it blurred and refused to focus. Jim tried to push himself up, but there was no strength, either. He was frozen.
The blur of floor shifted. Jim couldn't have resisted the hands that moved him, but when he saw that Sandburg was attached to him he cursed to himself. Moron. Of course Sandburg would run into a building that had bombs going off--
Sandburg said something. Jim had no idea what. He shoved Jim around until he was sitting and held him still with ruthless strength. Enthusiastic and gentle and *careful* and completely wrong! "God damn it, Sandburg, it doesn't matter whether I'm hurt or not. We need to get out of here--never mind what the hell you're doing in here in the first place." Jim's hearing cut back in halfway through this speech, but he wasn't nearly embarrassed enough by his shouting to restrain himself.
Not that it mattered. Sandburg was as impervious to intimidation as he was to common sense. He neither backed down nor did something useful; he laughed and hugged Jim. He smelled worried and stressed and way too happy. Jim shook him--
And smelled, along side the familiarity of Sandburg, the acrid bite of explosive. And something sweet. What the hell?
Awkwardly, Jim surged to his feet. The world was oddly tilted, and his body still felt numb. It was just as well that Sandburg wasn't letting go; Jim was still swaying badly. "Joel--" he began.
"He went to take a look," Sandburg answered, glancing further up the long hall.
"I smell wet paint...." He hadn't before. The hallway, when Jim finally succeeded in focusing on it, didn't appear to be badly damaged. The walls were still standing and the floor was uncracked, although the ceiling tiles were knocked askew, and at the far end of the hall, a couple of lockers were sagging limply, their doors twisted and shredded.
Still stunned by the concussion, Jim was useless. He let Sandburg lead him outside and settle him on the curb in the shade of one of the squad cars. It was cooler out here. The world came into focus enough for him to notice that he had locked his hand so tightly around Sandburg's wrist that the circulation was stalled out. Very carefully, he let go. "Well. That was pretty much a mess," he said bitterly. "Tell me Joel's not hurt."
"Joel's fine."
"Good, good, that's...." Lucky. Jim swallowed. They'd been lucky. Jim couldn't take credit for their survival any more than he could pick out a mistake he'd made doing the sweep. There just hadn't been *time.* Shit, Jim hadn't even had time to make one pass of the first floor
That was almost worse, maybe. It didn't matter if he'd been in control or not, if he'd been competent or not.
Sandburg squatted beside him, pushed a bottle of water into his hand. "How are you doing?"
Jim wasn't sure how to answer that. He suspected that if he paid any attention to the dull ache in his bones and joints the pain would expand until he couldn't move at all. His skin, too, felt sore. Raw. "I didn't break anything," he said. He was pretty sure about that.
"Yeah, okay. That's good."
Joel stormed up, leaning his hip against the squad car. "Practical joke," he growled.
"Huh?" Jim grunted.
"It was a paint bomb."
Sandburg's head shot up. "What? You're kidding!"
"Isn't that hysterical, ha ha," Joel said sourly.
"But--it seemed like a fair sized explosion. Not enough to bring the walls down, but--"
"Oh, yeah. Whoever it was did a bad job of it. If it had gone off when the intended victim was opening the door, he would have been seriously hurt, not just covered in paint. And the trigger...just went off randomly...."
"So we saw," Sandburg muttered.
"....I'll have to reassemble what's left of the parts to see how it was supposed to work." Joel's voice hardened. "There won't be any real jail time, not for a teenager."
"Joel--" Sandburg began, standing up. Something in his voice got Jim's attention, and he leaned back so he could see Joel's face.
Joel was sweating. "My god, this is insane. If that bomb had been any bigger, they would be taking us out on stretchers right now." His hands were shaking. "I can't keep doing this, not now."
"O-kay," Sandburg said brightly. "Joel, how about you sit down?"
"I can't keep doing this. This isn't any kind of life--" he sat heavily on the curb beside Jim.
Blair dug out another bottle of water and leaned around Jim to shove it into Joel's hand. "You're the best at your job, man, you know that. Today--"
"It wouldn't have mattered today. Aw, jeeze. I can't keep doing this."
"Um," Sandburg said, sounding more uncertain. "Joel?" He jumped up and waved off an approaching medic, calling, "No, it's all right. Nobody was actually caught in the explosion."
Joel giggled once, but cut the spasm off before it could degenerate into full-blown hysteria.
It took another three hours to finish clearing the building.