Apologies – RL took over this weekend, and I couldn't get on the computer.

UNTIL THE BELL TOLLS
By TIPPER

CHAPTER ELEVEN: BOOM, REDUX

Shea sighed softly, and his finger tapped the trigger of the gun. Plan A could still work, if he just winged—

"I also know that you're probably thinking of just shooting me right now," Hughes continued, his voice matter-of-fact. "The reason that's a bad idea is that I've reset the timer on the bomb in front of me, but my finger is still on the reset button. If I don't immediately hit it again after I lift my finger off, it'll blow up, and take all the highly flammable items inside this room with it. I figure, with the other bombs in this building, it should be enough to take out the whole block, which I doubt the people outside have realized yet. What do you think? Do they know how dead they all are out there?"

Shea closed his eyes briefly, and then opened them again.

"So what's it going to be?" Hughes asked, turning slightly to look over his shoulder, though he didn't look exactly at where Shea was. "Do we die together, or do you come out, hands raised? Here to beg on your knees for me not to destroy us all?"

Shea snarled slightly—so much for beating the answer out of this guy. Reluctantly, he uncurled his hands from the gun and raised his hands, stepping out from behind the shelves with the gun loose in his hand.

Hughes arched an eyebrow. "Huh. I wasn't expecting you. Oh, and, obviously, drop the gun."

Shea put the gun on the ground in front of him and stood up, hands loose by his sides now. "You were expecting someone else?"

Hughes smiled slightly. "Actually, I wasn't really expecting anyone. Not after I took the power down."

"You took the power down?" Shea repeated, though it was only confirming what he'd already suspected.

Hughes' shrugged. "I had it rigged so that, once morning came and this place was full of people, the power would go down and lock in as many as possible." He smiled horribly. "I wanted them running around in a panic, trying to get out, and then…" He splayed out his free hand. "Boom."

Shea really wanted to just call the man sick to his face, but the sensible side of him managed to keep the freaked side in check.

Hughes shook his head and looked down. "Sadly, I had to use that trick earlier than I wanted, in order to try to stop people from getting to these bombs before me." He looked up at Shea. "So, you here to stop me, cop?"

"Still not a cop," Shea replied. "And no…not really."

Hughes gave a confused frown. "Well then, whatever you are, why are you here?"

"I still want to make a deal."

Hughes's lips curled into a sneer, his eyes narrowing to little black beads inside his skull, black as pitch.

"And why," he asked slowly, "would I want to make a deal with you?"

"Because you need my help, that's why."

"I'm pretty sure I don't."

"Then why haven't you let that button go already?" Shea tilted his head. "More to the point, why did you prop open the door leading to the rear exit?"

Hughes smiled wryly. "Oh, I see. You think I did that so I could escape? Sorry to disappoint, but the electrical room is down that corridor – I needed to shut that down first. I propped the door open so I would be able to come back to reset this bomb's timer."

"But you left it propped. If you'd wanted to die, you wouldn't have done that. And you wouldn't still be standing here, holding that button down…having second thoughts."

Hughes stared at him, and then laughed slightly. It wasn't an amused laugh, it was a hysterical one.

"You found me out," he said, eyes too bright inside his skull. "I don't want to die. Not yet. Not like this. My blaze of glory was meant to have a much higher body count."

"And I'm guessing it wasn't meant to include your son," Shea pressed, hoping he had the man right. Hughes had wanted his son brought to the courthouse, but not brought inside. It meant he hadn't wanted the boy to be caught in the blasts at the hospital. "But now it might, right?"

Hughes's smile had frozen, the other man just staring at him now, obviously trying to figure him out. So Shea stepped a little closer, trying to see the bomb more clearly. Mostly, he wanted to see what button Hughes was holding down.

Hughes curled his lip, and shifted to block Shea's view. "You're not exactly subtle, are you, cop?"

Shea sighed. "Again, really not a cop, Hughes."

"Sure you are. Why else would you be here? You could have run yourself, when you saw that open door, but you came after me instead. A con wouldn't do that."

Shea shook his head. "He would if he had good reason." He narrowed his eyes. "And it's one you and I got in common."

"Oh yeah? What's that?"

"We both got someone in that hospital we don't want to die." Shea took another step closer, and Hughes shifted more in front of the bomb. "See, here's the thing. Marshals told me you were given nine bombs by Peter's guy. They found seven, including two at the hospital. That one in front of you makes eight. So where's the last bomb?"

Hughes just stared at him, the smiled fixed on his face.

"Look," Shea said, "I'm not gonna try to stop you from blowing this place sky high. It creeps the hell out of me, and, frankly, the fewer police and courtrooms in the world, the better. But I do want to know if there's a third bomb at that hospital, and I want to know now."

Hughes's eyes narrowed. "And if I tell you," he said, "what do I get in return?"

"I'll help you escape."

Hughes snorted. "Sure. Tell me another."

"I'm serious. You know how fucked you are. You want to escape, but there's gonna be cops at every exit, just waiting for you to try. You know you're trapped. But I can make a hole."

Hughes studied him briefly. "How?"

"See this radio?" Shea slipped it out of his pocket. "I call my friend who works for the marshals. You probably remember him from when he almost shot you a couple nights ago in that house, and you knifed him in the leg."

Hughes smiled at that, like it was a fond memory. Then his eyebrows perked and he grinned, looking at Shea with widened eyes.

"That's how I know you," he said, triumphantly. "You were there! I hit you."

"You elbowed me in the face when you stumbled down the stairs. Not the same thing."

Hughes' grin just widened maniacally.

"As I was saying," Shea continued, "I call my friend in the marshals, tell him that I found you, and that I'm bringing you out the back entrance. He'll believe me, 'cause my deal with the marshals is, every fugitive I help bring in, I get time off my sentence. Plus, I already told him you propped open that doorway—he'll be expecting me to use it, since it's the quickest way out. He'll send all the cops back there."

"But instead of the back entrance we'll—"

"He's cutting through the bars to the stairs below the police station to get to the cop you knocked out, and so that I had another way out in case I needed it. We send everyone around back, tell Ray to get out, and then you and me'll just go out through the door he cuts and find a nice quiet side exit that we can use."

Hughes was smiling again. "And all that, just so I'll tell you where the last bomb is."

"Pretty much."

"What if they find out you helped me?"

"I'll tell 'em you got the drop on me." Shea shook his head. "Look, all I care about is my friend at the hospital. And if you want son to live, you'll tell me if the last bomb is there."

Hughes smile drooped, until all that was left was sneer. "You spin a good story, cop, but it's not going to work. Soon as I tell you, you're going to screw me."

Shea arched an eyebrow. "What'll it take to prove that I'm not lying?"

Hughes stared at him a moment, and then looked down at the gun on the ground. When he looked up at Shea again, the smile was back.

"Kick me the gun."

Shea breathed out heavily. He'd been waiting for that. After a long enough moment, he gave a nod and kicked the gun across the floor. Hughes watched it, fixed on the gun the whole time. When it hit his foot, he bent down and picked up the gun with his free hand.

"Way I see it," Hughes said, hefting the gun in his hand, "if you lie to me…." He pointed the gun at Shea…and fired.

It blasted away a half empty paint can a few inches to the left of Shea's head.

Shea had closed his eyes, but he opened them again to look at the paint can—which, ironically, was filled with red paint—before looking back at Hughes. A set of shiny yellow teeth greeted him—Christ, white people had ugly teeth.

"So," Shea said, attempting to draw in a calming breath despite the painful ringing in his ears, "we got a deal?"

Hughes continued to point the gun at him. "We have a deal."

"Then tell me where the last bomb is."

"You only found two at the hospital."

Shea grimaced. "Yes."

"There's another."

"Where?"

"Which two did they find?"

Shea's eyes narrowed, "I don't know. You tell me."

Hughes stared at him a moment, then shrugged. "I put one in that quack Madison's office, one in the basement where they held me—horrible pastels down there, drive any man insane—and…one in pediatrics."

Shea's eyes pinched. "Kids?"

Hughes' answering smile was ice cold. "I hit a school, remember?"

Shea's lips curled, too disgusted to speak. He lifted the radio to his lips, and then stopped. Lowering it, he frowned at Hughes.

"One more thing," Shea said, pointing at the bomb with the radio, "why are you still holding that thing? Seems to me you could have let go and hightailed it long before I got here."

Hughes laughed again, that same hysterical sounding laugh from earlier, like someone who was just about to completely lose his mind.

"You really want to know?"

"Yes," Shea said, "I do."

"I'm holding this button down because there are no damned clocks in this room."

Huh? "What?"

"I don't have a watch. I don't know what time it is. And since I don't know how to set this thing to a countdown, I have to set it to a time, but I only have a vague idea of what hour it is. And the only reason I even know the hour is because I saw the watch on the cop's wrist that I knocked out. But what if I read it wrong? Or if it's slow?"

"You're holding that button down because you don't know what time it is."

"Got it in one, Sherlock." He glanced at Shea's bare wrist. "And you don't have one either."

"Prisoners don't need or want watches. You know that. I'd go crazy with one."

Hughes's sick, fixed smile dropped slightly, and he really looked at Shea for what felt like the first time.

"You really are a con?"

"Yeah. Which is why I'm not too broken up if you escape."

Hughes's smile fell away completely then, and he looked down at the bomb.

"When did you reset it to?" Shea asked.

"10:00." He looked up. "What time is it?"

Shea shook his head. He wasn't sure. When he went in to talk to Hughes that first time, back in his cell, it was about 9:00. Had it been an hour?

"Hell," Hughes said then, and released the button. Shea instantly rocked back, hands going up, but nothing happened. Hughes just hit the button he'd been pressing again, looked down at the timer, and gave a nod. "It's done. Guess it's not ten yet." He turned back the Shea, stepping closer, pointing the gun at the radio in Shea's hand. "So make the call."

Shea sighed, trying to calm his nerves, then flipped the switch on the radio, not taking his eyes off Hughes. "Ray. You there?"

"Yeah," Ray replied, his voice relieved. "What's going on?"

"I found Hughes, and the eighth bomb. He won't disarm it, but he'll leave with me." Hughes watched Shea with equal intensity, his eyes still too bright, lips curled in a creepy smile.

"Leave with you?" Ray repeated. "You mean, you're bringing him out?"

"Yeah. By the back entrance. You and Lloyd should meet us out there with the cuffs."

Ray hesitated briefly at Shea's words, then said, "Right."

"He also told me that there's another bomb in the hospital. It's in pediatrics."

That earned a longer pause. Then, "Pediatrics, huh? That's not what I expected."

"Oh?"

"Yeah. I thought it would be in oncology."

Hughes' squinted. It was only brief, but it was enough for Shea to know that, not only had he been lied to…but that they'd already found the last bomb. Which meant he really didn't have to talk to this asshole anymore.

Quick as a snake, Hughes had the gun up, pointed at Shea's chest, pulling the trigger and clicking on empty. Eyes widening in surprise, he looked down at the gun in confusion.

And Shea clocked him in the side of his face with a right hook.

Hughes went down, and Shea followed him, slamming his fists into the man's face and chest, hammering away until his features were nothing more than a bloody pulp. Each punch felt like a catharsis, like a vindication.

"That's for knocking me out earlier, asshole," he snarled, rising back up in order to kick the man in the side. "That's for Lloyd." He kicked again, even harder. "And that's for everyone else." He delivered a final kick, to which Hughes didn't even groan—he was that out of it.

Shaking now, Shea finally backed up, certain that Hughes wasn't going to be regaining consciousness anytime soon, and fumbled for the radio.

"Ray!"

"Shea? What happened? You okay?"

"Yeah. He's out. What time is it?"

"Time?"

"Yeah. He set the bomb here to go off at 10:00. What time is it?"

"Christ, Shea, it's 9:50."

"Are you shitting me?"

"No."

"Can I reset it?"

"Not without his passcode. The guys upstairs already tried that."

"Then get them down here to disarm this thing."

"No go. They've been working on the ones upstairs for nearly fifteen minutes. They think they've got the connection severed, but actually disarming the bomb? It's just not that easy."

"Well…look, I'm in a really bad room. There's all sorts of shit that can make this bomb go a lot bigger than it should. I don't think we'd get away fast enough. I think it could take out the whole block."

Ray hissed over the radio. "Okay, okay…where is it?"

"Boiler room."

"Okay, we'll figure something out. You just run, okay? Me and Charlie will think of something."

Shea looked down at Hughes, and then over at the bomb. Sergeant Vega had said it could be moved, just "very, very carefully." He spun around and ran to grab one of the janitorial carts, dumping the toilet paper and chemical cleaners on the floor.

"I can move it," he said then, into the radio, wheeling the cart back to the bomb. "Tell me where to take it that'll do the least damage."

"Are you kidding?"

"I don't have a lot of time here! Where can I take it?"

"Hang on."

Shea growled, but as he waited, he carefully lifted the bomb onto the cart, resting it on top next to the radio. With one last look at Hughes, he slowly pushed the cart past the shelves and out the door.

No question, this was his dumbest idea yet.

"Shea, we've got something."

Shea closed the door to the boiler room behind him, squinting a little at the now almost pitch black hallway. He flipped on the flashlight and picked up the radio.

"What?"

"Building's still got a bomb shelter built into it from the fifties. It's back here, not far from where the cells are."

Shea turned the cart back the way he'd come and started pushing. "Bomb shelter?"

"Yeah. We put the bomb in there, the walls may be thick enough to stop it from reaching the other bombs before they're disarmed. At the very least, we know it won't reach the ones at the hospital."

"What about the building?"

"It should contain most of the blast. Figure, if it can protect people from a nuclear blast from the outside, it should contain a lesser bomb inside."

Shea snorted. "You really think?"

"Better than the boiler room."

Shea just nodded, and then frowned. "Wait, if it's back the way I came…all those doors were locked, Ray. And I don't have a lockpicking kit."

"It's okay, we're through the gate back here. I'll make sure it'll be unlocked. Just get it here."

Shea sighed, but continued to push, flinching every time the wheels caught something on the cement floor. At least it was smooth—if it had been wood or anything other than cement….

The cart wobbled slightly as it hit a crack, and Shea blew out a breath. He could see the timer on the front, exposed still, with 10:00 on it, the colon between the numbers slowly blinking down the time. Damn…he really wished he'd had a watch.

"Time, Ray?"

"9:54. You're doing great, Shea."

"You're watch isn't slow, is it, Ray?"

"Hell no. If anything, it's fast. Just keep it coming."

Shea reached the propped open door to the exit, and looked at it longingly. Five minutes would be enough time to get away, if there was a car waiting for him out there….

He kept pushing, his heart hammering in his chest, his head swimming again. The headache from earlier had receded while he'd been talking to Hughes, but now it was back in full force, as if berating him for his stupidity.

He rounded the first corner, still in total darkness.

"Ray?"

"9:55. It's only been a minute. Calm down."

"You push a literal ticking time bomb through the basement of hell, and then tell me to calm down!"

He saw the next corner ahead. Not far to go now.

And then he saw the light, pale and ghostly, brightening the corner. He couldn't help it, he sped up.

"Who's there?"

And, like that, Ray appeared around the corner, flashlight in hand. "Me. This way, come on."

Shea actually grinned, and pushed the cart a little faster, trying not to notice that the bomb was being jostled. Hopefully not too much.

Ray met him and quickly limped alongside, looking down at the bomb.

"That's it?"

"Yeah."

"Small."

"Yeah."

Ray grimaced, limping with him as they turned the final corner into the corridor with the cells. The first door on the right was open. Shea frowned.

"How did you…?"

Ray lifted the keys and jangled them. "Cops here were more than happy to let me have them. Friendliest I've ever seen them."

Shea smiled thinly, and pushed the cart into the room. Like the room they'd been in, it was filled with files. The only real difference was the walls on either side of the entranceway looked to be about a foot thick, versus just a few inches.

"More cold cases?" he asked, looking at the shelves as he pushed the cart to the center.

Ray just shrugged. "Who cares. Come on. You gotta help me up the stairs. My leg is killing me."

Shea nodded, let the cart go and jogged out of the room with Ray a step behind him. Ray turned, shut the metal door, and pushed Shea towards the stairs.

"Time?" Shea demanded as they pulled open the door Shea had propped earlier next to the cells.

"9:57."

"This is going to suck," Shea said. Reaching behind him, he grabbed Ray's arm and threw it over his shoulder. "You gotta move faster."

Ray said nothing, just smiled thinly as Shea propelled them towards the second barred doorway, the one that still smelled like burnt metal. He could see where they'd cut through the lock, the ends were still smoldering.

Samuels and the other cop were already gone, evac'd. But Ray hadn't left with them. Even though he should have.

One more door.

Shea shoved the doorway on the stairs open, and all but hauled Ray up the steps. He was breathing hard, his head was splitting, but, damn it, he was getting them both out of here. Ray gasped in pain at the first landing, pulling Shea down a little as the weight on Shea's shoulders increased.

"Maybe…" Ray gasped, "maybe you should leave me…."

"Shut up, Zancanelli," Shea snapped, pulling them up the next set of steps. "What's the time?"

"9…" Ray wheezed slightly. "9:58."

Shea focused on the last set of stairs, propelling them both up them and onto the main floor of the police station. He dragged Ray through the empty hallway, and through to the completely silent marble entranceway. The stairs were just ahead, and he could see flashing lights beyond, shimmering through the glass doors. In all his life, he'd never ever been happy to see flashing lights.

"There's always a first time," he muttered, pulling Ray down the steps towards the doors to the outside.

"What?" Ray grunted.

"Nothing," Shea said, reaching the doors and slamming them open with a hard shove. "HELP!" he shouted. "Someone help me!"

Instantly, someone ran forward. He didn't need to see the man's face to know it was Charlie.

And then there was a sound like a mountain had just crashed into the earth, and the ground rose up to meet them in a wave of noise and pain….

To be concluded in Chapter 12