Jack's no demolition expert, and he knows moving anything in the pile of rubble Mac's trapped under is damned unsafe—but just standing around waiting for backup from base to arrive isn't a great option either. Not when the whole rickety pile of tumbled blocks could collapse on itself at any time, with Mac underneath.
He busies himself organizing his volunteer labor crew, making sure the dozen locals who've come to lend a hand know exactly which part of the rubble pile they need to dig out, and exactly how important it is to move with extreme caution.
All the while, Mac is in his ear, making messy sniffling noises through the comms that Jack knows better than address. The kid is usually squirrely about asking for a band-aid, so the fact that he hasn't even tried to muffle the comms says a lot about his mental state right now. Jack's more than a little worried about that, and he knows that the longer Mac's trapped, the worse it will get. The best thing he can do is dig him out as fast as possible.
Jack pulls out his long-range radio. It's been an hour since the IED went off in the alley, bringing down the building on top of Mac. At least fifty minutes since he called in the first time and was promised priority assistance. Fifteen since Mac defused the second bomb.
Nevermind that it took him and Mac just over ninety minutes to get here this morning, crawling down an unpaved track that was more ruts and holes than road. But then, they weren't in much of a hurry. He's sure he could cut that time down significantly if he'd had a reason to.
"Where's our backup?" Jack snarls into the radio.
After a pause, Sergeant Alvarez comes over the line. "We're about twenty minutes out from your position, Dalton."
Jack grinds his teeth a little more, both because twenty minutes more is twenty minutes too long, and because he's not really a fan of Alvarez. The other sergeant is a good ten years younger than Jack, and radiates an attitude about it.
He paces down the street, kicking aside fist-sized chunks of cement flung loose when the building collapsed. He doesn't need to pass his frustration on to Mac. The kid has things bad enough already. He rolls his shoulders to loosen them up, takes a deep breath, and softens his voice. "You hear that, Mac? Help is only twenty minutes away."
"I heard." The quiet words do nothing to assuage Jack's worry.
"They'll be here before we know it. You sit tight in there."
"It's not like I'm going anywhere," Mac replies after a moment, his tone a hollow imitation of his usual snark.
It raises Jack's spirits a little to hear him trying, even though the attempt falls flat.
The precarious state of the building and the equally precarious state of Mac's emotions are only two-thirds of Jack's worries. He's not forgetting how someone planted a second bomb after he and Mac went into the building and found the first one. That person, whoever they are, clearly wanted to kill some Americans today. It's a little surprising they haven't given it another go already.
Maybe they're thinking killing just one American is enough. If Mac wasn't Mac, if he hadn't been able to defuse a bomb blind, they'd have acomplished that already.
Maybe they're enjoying watching the drama play out—Jack pacing and snarling into the radio, trying to watch everything and everyone at once while keeping up enough chatter to anchor Mac.
Maybe they're waiting for the backup to arrive and that's when they'll strike.
Or maybe they planted that second bomb and got the heck out of dodge and he's snapping at shadows.
There's really no way of knowing until something does or does not happen.
Any of the numerous spectators loitering in the vicinity of the collapsed building could be the person who planted that second bomb. That's why he's standing off to the side, keeping his eyes on who's approaching the pile instead of helping dig out Mac himself. This makes him the world's biggest unprotected target right now, but there isn't much he can do about it, because he can't stick himself up in a sniper nest and still keep a close enough watch on the digging. If somebody wants to shoot him, he'll be dead.
He really could use that backup. He feels like he needs a dozen hands and a dozen eyes right now.
He can't complain about the way the locals are working to dig out the building. He also can't really tell what they're saying to each other because he doesn't speak the language, but hey, that's how a lot of his career has gone.
On the comms, Mac's calmed down and gone quiet, just giving an occasional clipped, single-word response to whatever Jack says to him. Wallowing, Jack imagines. The kid is sort of prone to that. He's been strung tight as a coiled spring ever since that first day Jack caught him messing with Jack's stuff and instead of apologizing, he made some smart-ass comment that made Jack's blood boil. Admittedly, it wasn't Jack's best moment either.
Jack's seen plenty of guys like Mac in the service before, who joined up because they were lost and flailing. In hindsight, that fight wasn't Mac being a brat, it was Mac lashing out because he was lonely and hurting after his mentor's death, and Jack overreacting to an attempted kindness because Jack's spent too much of his life being suspicious about everything.
He and Mac are quite the pair, really. Neither one of them gets along with their bunkmates, but they get along with each other well enough.
"How you doin' in there, Mac?"
"'M okay," comes the reply after a hesitation.
It's not convincing, although it's still far better than right after the first explosion, when Mac wasn't responding at all and Jack was sure he was dead. That ten-minute stretch of time is so fresh and terrifying in Jack's memory that he has to shove it away to think about later. He maybe hadn't realized how attached he's gotten to the kid until that moment. He's not sure he'll ever be able to let him out of his sight after this.
#
The sounds coming from the rubble pile are beginning to worry Mac. While he was working on the bomb, the rubble pile was silent, but now he can hear debris moving against itself: blocks scraping, bits falling, the occasional weird thump.
He can't sit comfortably with his leg pinned down sideways against the ground, so he's stuck lying down, curled up tight as he can under the table. He's been lying here so long, held so firmly down by the weight on his foot, that his hip feels like one big bruise. The rest of him is getting stiff, too, but his foot is the worst. When he first came to, it felt unpleasantly squeezed, but now it hurts. The sole of his boot and whatever else have kept it from being crushed in the first place are just not holding up.
Jack's been keeping up a steady stream of chatter, most of it directed not at Mac, but at the locals he's got digging out the corner of the building nearest Mac. Every few minutes he gives Mac a progress report, and it's always something positive, something selected with the intention of keeping Mac's spirits up. "Backup from base ought to be here pretty soon," he says now. "Don't know what's taking so long. The road sucks, but they all suck, and who cares about a few bumps?"
Mac is trying to go along with it, but the more the pile shifts, the more likely it is that the table won't be able to support the load. He really doesn't want to do the math on that. His nerves are shot, and the darkness feels like an enemy bearing down on him.
"What time is it?" he asks.
"Twelve hundred fifty-three," Jack says after a pause.
Great. Twelve minutes since the last time he asked. The lack of light is really screwing with his sense of time. Mac rubs his forehead and then swipes his hand across his eyes, as if brushing the dust off them once more will somehow prevent him from being consumed by the darkness.
"You still doin' okay in there?" Jack asks, a frown in his voice.
"No worse than last time you asked." It's an evasive answer but what else is there to say? There really isn't anything anyone can do for him that they're not already doing. It's up to Mac to get himself together, and it doesn't seem like that should be so hard, does it? All he has to do is lay calmly on the ground and wait. That sounds easier than what Jack's doing out there under the blazing midday sun, trying to move the bulky remains of an entire broken building.
He's got it so, so easy, here in the cool darkness, just waiting and waiting and waiting and waiting.
Waiting to see if the table holds up.
Waiting to see if his foot holds up.
The rubble shifts ominously again, sending bits of grit tumbling between larger blocks. Fresh dust puffs into Mac's space. He covers his face with his sleeve before he can breathe in a fresh lungful—not that his sleeve is all that clean.
He was wrong earlier about his brain not taking seriously the threat of being crushed. By the time the tumble of grit stops, his heart is thumping in his ears and he feels sick with helplessness. He doesn't want to think about how bad it's going to be if the block on top of his foot moves even fractionally, or if some other chunk of building slides between that block and the table, and lands on his leg or his other foot.
Jack's been on open comms all this time, even though he's mostly busy moving debris or directing other people. But now and then he launches into some lengthy complaint about something, most recently the nutritional qualities of the meal they can expect to receive when they get back to base. "Well, maybe not you," Jack tells him after going on about it for several minutes. "You might be awfully busy in the infirmary. But at least they have better food in there—"
Mac isn't even remotely hungry, although he has gotten pretty thirsty. The air is stale with freshly-loosened dust, and his water bottle was in a pouch on his vest. "Nevermind that, I need some water and a nap." The thought of food makes him a little queasy.
Jack's reply is stern enough to snap him out of his thoughts. "Just 'cause it's dark in there doesn't mean you should be sleeping."
"I didn't hit my head. I've still got my helmet on. It's just tedious. And dark."
"Still seems like a bad idea." Some shuffling noises come over the line. "And I'm thinking you could be wrong about your head. Took you a long time to start talking to me."
Mac swallows. "Sorry for scaring you like that."
"Are you apologizing for being knocked unconscious?"
"I—no?" He pauses, feeling silly, but that doesn't quite erase the lingering sense of guilt. He can tell Jack's worried, even though he's not the one under a collapsed building, so it doesn't seem like Jack has much to worry about. Although it does seem worrisome that Jack's all alone without any backup at all. "You're keeping an eye out for trouble up there, right?"
"I'm keeping two eyes out." Jack huffs a laugh. "Hey, do you have a headache? Your ears still ringing?"
"No, and no," Mac says, and is glad Jack doesn't ask about nausea. Although he's pretty sure that's related to the increasing level of pain in his foot. Or possibly the adrenaline crash plus the amount of anxiety clawing at his belly. "You know," he says after a while. "I think I might have a serious problem with the dark after this."
Jack grunts. "There are worse things."
"Yeah," Mac agrees, but he runs his hands over his arms, squeezing himself until it hurts because he needs a distraction. He's never been good at doing nothing, but just sitting here, waiting to find out if he's going to be rescued or crushed to death? It's a special kind of awful. If he didn't have comms, he's not sure how he'd be handling it at all.
It's beginning to feel worse than sitting here with a bomb. At least then he could tell time was passing.
"What time is it?" he asks. It feels like it's been hours since he disarmed the IED, days since he walked into the building and found it there. It's been a century or so since he tucked Bozer's letter under his pillow before breakfast.
"Thirteen hundred four," Jack tells him. "And I've got great news. We've got two trucks arriving with help. That should speed things up."
#
Wary of leaving the rubble pile unwatched, Jack doesn't move to greet the new arrivals. He waves one arm and keeps his feet planted right where he is. Their backup is six soldiers in two vehicles, including a medic. They hustle over to his position with an amount of energy Jack hasn't possessed in hours.
Sergeant Alvarez doesn't win any favors when he reaches Jack. "Should've guessed it would be your little bomb nerd who'd get himself in this mess, Dalton."
Jack bristles immediately. "Not hardly his fault that somebody placed a second bomb after we cleared the alley," he snaps. "That would be my fault, actually, but if you want to start something, keep talking'"
Alvarez looks startled, and he narrows his eyes. "Jesus, Dalton. We're here to get him out for you. Just tell us what we need to know."
Jack swipes his hand across his face, wiping away sweat mixed with the perpetual layer of dust that covers everything here. He takes a deep breath and gets them all on the same comms channel and answers the medic's questions about Mac's status before he takes them on a tour. They circle the rubble and he points out what they most need to know: the location of the explosion, Mac's approximate location, details on the progress his volunteers have made so far. "He's in a pocket under a table, near a cabinet and a wall. But his foot is trapped under some of the rubble. We need to minimize movement of the blocks."
"That's going to be hard when we get closer to him," Alvarez says. He sents his squad to work and then turns to Jack and claps a hand on Jack's shoulder. "Hey, take a break, Dalton. Get some water. You're looking hot."
Jack wipes his sleeve across his face again. In this season, it's always an oven at midday, and today is no exception. It's only gotten hotter since they arrived on site mid-morning. He drained his water bottle awhile ago, and he hasn't been back to the truck for more because he didn't want to leave the area unwatched. But he won't do Mac any good if he ends up dehydrated. "Yeah," he agrees. "But listen, Alvarez, I want everyone keeping an eye out. Those IEDs didn't plant themselves, you know?"
Alvarez stands a little straighter at that, and gives Jack a clipped nod.
Jack hovers a few moments longer, and then turns to trudge back to his and Mac's truck. They've got a cooler in the back seat with bottled water. He opens the back door on the driver's side, grabs a bottle out of it, and leans against the truck to open it. Chugging cool water is never a good idea, but he downs it at a steady pace and ignores the way it lands like a block of ice in his stomach. When he's done, he tosses the empty bottle on the floor in the back seat and grabs two more fresh bottles, one for himself, and one to offer to Mac as soon as they dig him out. It's probably cooler in the shady spaces under the rubble, but the kid probably hasn't had a sip since they arrived, maybe even since they left base.
He frowns, wondering if it really is cooler under there after a couple hours of the sun beating down, or if the kid's sweltering in the heat, too, and just hasn't mentioned it. There really isn't much Jack can do, but he hates to think that the kid's worse off than he was imagining. Because what he's been imaging isn't pretty.
Long experience tells him that Mac's going to be worse off after this. He's going to have a whole new fresh set of traumas to process after this. This is the sort of thing that would break some men. And even though the kid usually tries to hide it under a dry wit and a smirk, he's already carrying plenty of emotional scars. That bomb down there might be the last IED the kid ends up defusing, depending on his emotional state, and that's not even taking physical injury into account.
Jack almost kind of hopes Mac's hurt bad enough to get shipped home, though the thought of being stuck in this desert without the kid for most of another year, of being assigned to some other bomb nerd, sounds like torture. If Mac goes home, Jack's getting out of here as quick as he can manage, even if he has to pull some strings he'd rather forget he knew about.
He slams the door of the truck, thinking about who owes him favors and who he's willing to owe favors to, and notices the cap of the bottle he finished is on the ground. Mac would pick it up; he's got a real thing about not littering. With a sigh, Jack leans down to pick it up, and that's when he spots a box sitting, incongruous, under the truck near the front wheel.
"Shit," he mutters, getting down on his hands and knees for a better look. It's a little bigger than a box of boots, and it definitely wasn't here earlier. It appeared sometime between their arrival—probably sometime after he came back to the truck to fetch those flashlights and the med kit—and now.
"Dalton?" Alvarez asks.
At the same time, Mac comes over the line. "What's wrong?"
"Someone's left a present under our truck and I'm pretty sure it's the kind that goes ka-boom," Jack says. "Can't see any wires or a timer or anything, but can't think of any other reason somebody would've shoved something under here."
"Don't touch it, Jack." Mac's voice is tense.
"Yeah, I know the drill," Jack says, sitting back on his knees. "I know moving it isn't the greatest idea. But we don't have any EODs here who aren't trapped under collapsed buildings. Those other two IEDs were on timers. What are the odds this one isn't the same?"
"Jack, seriously, don't touch that thing," Mac says, his voice tighter than before. "You can't disarm a bomb with odds."
Jack scoots backward and gets up. "Okay, fine. I'm not touching it. I'm moving back, okay?"
"None of my team has the right experience for this," Alvarez agrees after a moment's thought. "We call in for EOD if we find a suspicious package." But he shuffles his people to leave one of the others watching the site and jogs out to join Jack by the truck. "We could move the truck," he suggests. "A hard right turn will keep the rear wheels from running over it."
"What do you think, Mac?" Jack asks.
"The air or vibration of the engine could set it off if it's motion sensitive. Probably won't, but it could." He pauses. "There's another truck up there now, though, isn't there? You could tow it."
"Not a bad idea," Alvarez says, sounding surprised.
They get one of the other trucks into position in front of Jack and Mac's truck, and attach the tow cable. Jack's sweating from every pore when he climbs gingerly into the driver's seat, turns the steering wheel all the way to the right, shifts into neutral, and signals Alvarez. Outside his window, one of the other soldiers is crouched down, eyes locked on the location of the box versus the wheels to make sure they don't miscalculate. But the truck moves slowly in a tight turn and then pulls a few feet forward, and when Jack gets out, they have full access to the box.
After some debate and more input from Mac, Jack crouches down next to it and lifts the lid as slowly as he can manage, squinting under it, looking for anything that will suggest that opening the box will set off the device. But the lid isn't itself wired. He pulls it off the box and drops it to the side, releasing a breath. "Okay, I can see what's in here. It's definitely another bomb. Seems like this town doesn't do anything halfway. That's all the good news. The bad news is that it's set to go off in about five minutes."
"I could try to walk you through disarming it," Mac says. He sounds hesitant. "But it's probably better if you just clear the area."
Alvarez, who's been listening in without commentary, nods and stands up.
Jack shakes his head and doesn't move. "Nope. It's way too close to the collapsed building. If it's as powerful as the last one, it could cause more collapsing." He pushes himself up from the ground. "I'm going to move it away."
Mac's voice is sharp. "It could have a motion trigger."
"And what would that look like? All I see's a bunch of wires and this clock."
"Probably like a tube filled with liquid mercury."
"There's nothing like that here. And before you ask about a pressure trigger, nothing on this thing looks like moving parts, either." Jack looks up at Alvarez. "Unless you've got a better idea, you better move away."
Alvarez hesitates, gives Jack a long look, and seems to realize that arguing is a lost cause. "There's a drainage ditch off that way," he says, pointing. They're on the edge of town, and Jack can see the shadow of the ditch snaking along a field a hundred or so feet away. It's not as far as he'd like to move the thing, but probably as far as it's feasible to move it in three minutes.
"That'll have to do," he says.
Mac comes back on the line, his voice tight. "Jack, you should not be touching that thing—"
Gritting his teeth, Jack grabs the box in both hands and lifts it from the ground. He can't help cringing as he does it, but nothing explodes. "Too late," he tells Mac, and heads toward the ditch at a run.