Rating: PG
Disclaimer: This short story is solely for the entertainment of the readership. No infringement intended.
This story logically follows these stories: "Sharpshooter," "Keys to a Killer," and "Everlasting Love."
It's Da Bomb!
The Bomb Squad had found and defused three improvised explosive devices (IED) found in the drug lab. They were booby traps – set for the DEA or other policing agencies that may stumble across it. The cooks and dealers had been carted off hours ago by Miami-Dade PD. The lab, or more correctly labs, was set in the middle of a mangrove swamp.
Shucking his gloves and face shield, Sergeant Chuck Taylor, the senior member of the squad, approached Horatio and his team.
"How's it going, Horatio?" Chuck extended his hand, "Long time, no see…not since we said 'Good-bye' to Al."
He then extended his hand to Calleigh, "I'm awful sorry about missing y'all's wedding. I was the duty 'It' that Saturday," he smiled, "Nice going on the collar y'all made on those Al Qaeda guys six months ago. You made us proud."
"Well, it wasn't exactly us," returned Horatio with a smile.
"I'd say the Marines made a pretty good showing," Calleigh added. "Fireworks and everything, if I recall," she smiled up at Horatio and chuckled.
"Inside joke," he nodded to Chuck.
Horatio looked at the lab, "So what did you find?"
"We took out three IEDs. Pretty sophisticated, too. Each about 200 pounds worth of bang. They had them interconnected and wired to blow at least, oh, I'd say half the building, "Chuck nodded, "These guys were pros. What did not tumble down would have burned. They worked in incendiaries with the explosive. My guys were pretty impressed with their work."
"One bomb guy to another," teased Horatio.
Chuck gave him a big grin and a wink, "You bet," he paused, "Anyhow, it's all clear now. Y'all can process it to your hearts' content."
"Thanks," Eric added even as Speed headed for the concrete block building.
Horatio shook Chuck's hand, and he and Calleigh followed the team. Once inside, eyes adjusted to lower light than the bright South Florida noon. Each room was its own self-contained lab. The quartet of criminalists plus Ron from the DEA, walked through, figuring out strategy in their heads. Gloves were put on and collection boxes were opened in preparation for one long day's work.
"Let's do this systematically. We've got four rooms here plus the bath. Calleigh, you shoot the photos; Eric, you tag and bag the drugs along with Ron; Speed, you and I will process for other physical evidence," Horatio went through his game plan, "Any questions?"
They shook their heads. Calleigh returned to the vehicle to drop off her collection kit and pick up the camera bag and markers. She took a sketchpad with her to provide a rough outline of the rooms and their placement within the structure.
"Horatio, since each of these rooms seems to be an independent lab, I'm going to give each one a designation, if that's okay with you?" Calleigh offered.
Looking up from his work, he nodded, "Sounds good."
Horatio and Speed began to search for fingerprints and DNA evidence left on bottles and cans of soda and beer. After doing the initial sketch of floor plan and likely deadly product of each room, Calleigh dropped the finished sketches in the vehicle. She returned to begin her part of the processing in the back room, away from the others in the team. The flash and winder whispered her presence. Eric and Ron tagged ten packaged kilos of coke in the other back room. The two front rooms seemed to be where "designer" drugs were being produced. Eric began moving tagged sets of bricks out to the van.
"You know, Speed," began Horatio, "Not only were these guys good at their booby traps, but they also seem to have been first rate chemists, too," he admired the glassware and clean set-up.
"You think they were professionals?" Speed wondered.
"They way they set the labs up, I'd say they were moonlighting from a chemical plant, yes," nodded Horatio. "They are just too neat to be wannabes or junkies themselves."
A strange sound came from the room that Eric and Ron had been processing. It sounded like the ting of metal hitting concrete plus a distinctive click. Horatio's ears stopped his heart.
"Grenade!" he screamed.
There was no time to run. Five-second fuses seldom are that long. He turned around to see his wife in the doorway. He shoved Speed to the floor and motioned for Calleigh to get back.
The concussion knocked Horatio off his feet. He was pushed backward across the room. His body crashed into the concrete wall knocking him out cold. The blast deafened Speed and made his ears ring unceasingly. Calleigh was tucked up in a ball in the back room, away from the blast and its effects. Glass sprayed across the room as the blast wave made its way across the room and out the door.
Eric was on his way to the door with the next batch of evidence when the grenade went off. He was catapulted across the threshold – tail over teacup. He skidded across the gravel on his hands and chest. Ron was not so lucky. He'd been in the room when the grenade went off and bore the brunt of the explosion even though he tried to run.
The concrete wall that separated the rooms shielded Speed and Calleigh from real injury. Calleigh could see debris raining down on her teammates.
Somewhat dazed, Eric scrambled to his feet, dropping the cocaine that he'd been carrying to the vehicle. "No!" he screamed. "'H,' Calleigh, Speed!"
Speed was trying his best to shake off the effects of having just been blown up when he saw Calleigh heading his way. Speed rolled over and wavered against the wall. Horatio lay still in a pile of rubble.
"I'm okay," he hollered. "Can't hear a damned thing, but I'm okay," he waved off Calleigh.
Calleigh approached him anyway, "Where's Horatio?"
"I can't hear you," Speed shouted back.
Motioning for him to sit down before he fell down, she yelled again only slowly, hoping that Speed could lip-read, "Where is my husband?"
Speed still unaware that he was yelling, told Calleigh, "Eric was heading out with evidence, Ron was still in the back room, and 'H' was here with me."
She spotted Horatio's arm on the other side of the pile of broken blocks and roofing material. Calleigh's heart stopped until she reached his side. Finding a strong pulse restored her hope. Horatio coughed softly.
"Stay still!" Calleigh directed. "Let me get the med kit."
Chuck and his squad had not finished packing up when the grenade went off. They raced back in to find their colleagues. Chuck helped Eric to his feet and over to the open door of the Bomb Squad's van. The doorway was, however, blocked with parts of the roof and other debris. Chuck tore at it calling for Horatio.
One of Chuck's squad members began to treat Eric's road rash after having called for an ambulance. Eric's hands were torn by the sharpness of the coral gravel. His chest was also abraded by the roughness. Another of the DEA agents secured the evidence before lending a hand.
Chuck squeezed past the larger pieces of concrete to get inside. He found Speed sitting, nursing his head, which was spinning. He kept trying to clear his ears by sticking a finger in and shaking. Still no sound… Calleigh was digging Horatio out of the debris pile. Roofing material surrounded Ron, who lay prone and lifeless on the floor. His blood pooled around him. After finding no signs of life, Chuck moved to help Calleigh get to Horatio.
"Don't move him until the paramedics get here," she ordered Chuck.
"I know the drill, Cal," he responded.
"I'm sorry, Chuck…" she started.
He touched her arm, "It's okay. I understand."
They heard sirens approaching.
"Ambulance," Chuck muttered. "Let me get them on in here."
One paramedic took a look at Eric while the other negotiated the obstacles to get inside.
"Over here," Chuck called out. Pointing to Ron's body, "He's gone. Got an officer down over here."
Horatio was beginning to stir. His arms flailed from the elbow to fingertips in the air until Calleigh took one hand and held him. He took a staggered deep breath and let it out carefully and lost consciousness again.
"Shh, Horatio," Calleigh cautioned. "Don't move around, my love."
The other paramedic entered the blown out building with a backboard. Together, they extracted Horatio and escorted Speed out to the ambulance. Using his fingers alone, Eric drove Calleigh and himself to the hospital, right behind the ambulance. Alexx and her crew arrived as they pulled away. Chuck told her what had occurred. He and his crew were left to guard the drugs with the remaining DEA agent until the next group of CSIs got there. Chuck made another sweep of the building to ensure there was no more ordnance to surprise the called up night shift.
Horatio regained consciousness again in the back of the ambulance. Speed reached out to his boss. He patted his shoulder carefully.
"Calleigh's okay. Not even a bruise...at least not that I could see," he shouted.
"You don't have to shout, Speed, I can hear you fine," Horatio remarked.
Speed saw his lips move but could not make out what he'd said.
"Sorry, 'H', I can't hear a thing," Speed shook his head and tried to move his jaw to open his ears.
With his head secured to the backboard, all Horatio could do was raise his "OK" sign to let Speed know that he understood.
X-rays revealed no broken bones for Horatio. The doctor's trained hands could feel no internal injuries either.
"You are one lucky man," the ER physician told Horatio who was sitting up, half naked on the exam table. "You have a concussion, and that's about it. I want to keep you here for overnight – just to be on the safe side."
Horatio nodded his still woozy and aching head. A preventive IV ran down his left arm, just above the wrist, thumb side up.
"You got anything for this pounding headache?" he wanted to know.
Eric had his wounds tended. First the doctor gave Eric a valium injection to let him relax for what could turn out to be a lengthy procedure. Then he sprayed on a local anesthetic to deaden the screaming nerve endings. Carefully, he injected more local where he planned to remove chucks of gravel in the debriding process. One by one, each bit of coral came out and was put into a tray. As small sections of Eric's skin were removed, the doctor cleaned and applied anti-biotic ointment to the affected area. The whole process took well over an hour. The bandages made Eric look like a movie monster since they covered much of his hands and chest with one just above his right eye.
Speed sat on the edge of a gurney in a cubicle, staring at the wall in another cubicle. His feet swung absentmindedly under him. His ears were ringing, much to his irritation. Periodically Speed shook his head which served to aggravate the pain his left ear was already experiencing. A doctor had done a preliminary examination and found that he had one ruptured eardrum on that side when the shock wave hit. The other ear was technically fine. He was waiting for a specialist to arrive.
Calleigh had avoided serious injury, but she also sat on the edge of a gurney, waiting her turn. She knew that Horatio was awake and that his back was not broken. However, beyond that, she knew little else of the condition of her husband. Quietly, she slipped off the gurney and peeked around the corner. The ER was an exceptionally busy place. Her eyes scoured the floor looking for familiar clothing bits. She knew where Eric was. His tattered shirt was scooted off to one side in a cubicle across from hers. She spotted Horatio's jacket sleeve down the row, three over from her spot. Carefully, she went over to the edge of the curtain. She could see Horatio sitting up on the edge of the gurney, much as she had done a few moments ago. Figuring it was safe; she eased the curtain back and entered.
Horatio greeted her with a large smile.
"Sweetheart," he began with a smile and a touch to her cheek, wiping away her tears. "I'm fine."
"I'm okay, too," Calleigh recovered composure and continued. "But you need to know that we are also pregnant, which is probably why I was feeling a little funny of late."
"We are?" Horatio said as his grin widened even further.
Horatio's shout of jubilation was the first thing that Speed heard, albeit not clearly. He knew it was "H's" voice. Since Horatio rarely raised his voice above soft conversational levels, Speed took it for a bad sign. He jumped down from his perch and began to seek out his boss.
Speed found Horatio with Calleigh lifted off the ground by six inches.
"You're okay?" Speed said; this time at a more normal volume.
"More than okay!" Horatio indicated as he let Calleigh touch down. "I'm going to be a Dad," he said with delight.
"Huh?" Speed tilted his head, still unable to make out distinct words, "Busted eardrum, 'H.' I've got a busted eardrum."
Horatio touched Calleigh's tummy with a smile from both parents-to-be. Speed broke out a huge grin and hugged Calleigh and slapped Horatio on the back.
"Party?" Eric remarked as he came around the corner.
"Not for the next 18 or so years," laughed Calleigh.
Eric had a puzzled look on his face for just half a breath, "Cool!" he grinned. "I get a new little brother out of this."
Horatio gave a funny look.
"Hey, we're family, all right?" Eric declared to laughter.