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Chapter Eighteen
“What are you doing?” Jynx asks curiously.
“I’m copying the entire computer system onto my USB stick so that we have it, just in case there’s a failsafe in place and the system deletes anything that might have been useful on it,” Pete explains as he then carries on typing.
“Smart,” Jynx replies.
“Huh,” Peter exclaims as he clicks on a few more things.
“Did you guys find anything?” Rip asks from behind us, and I turn to see a few of the others coming into the room.
“I think so,” Pete says, “the whole system is completely cleared. There’s nothing on it, not even any of the preloaded programs that all computers come with, apart from this one file.”
“It could be a virus, or trigger some sort of security measures?” Ace suggests as Jynx, and I move out of the way to allow Ace to get closer to the computer.
Atlas turns to Jensen, “Tell Trick to make his way out of here, just in case the place gets locked down or something.”
Jensen turns to leave the room, but before he does, I ask Peter, “Wait, didn’t you copy the entire thing onto your USB?”
“Yeah,” Pete replies.
“Smart move man,” Ace compliments, “that means that we don’t need to risk triggering any security measures and can just do it at home, on one of our secured laptops. Even if there’s a tracker that’s somehow been transferred, our secured laptops will be safe.”
“Thank fuck for that,” Riot comments from behind, “I really thought we were going to have to evacuate the building or some shit.”
“Erm, guys,” Trick calls up, trying to sound calm, but the edge of panic in his voice instantly has us alert and moving toward the door as Pete stands up, too. “We need to get out of here now.”
“Why?” Atlas questions as we start moving down the stairs and can’t see anything different.
Well, at least I can’t.
Rome’s in front of me and suddenly whistles, “Oh okay, yeah, we need to get out of here. Come on, guys, let's move.”
It’s not until we get to the bottom of the stairs that I can see the open panel close to the floor, next to where Trick is standing. What’s inside the tiny space is what has me concerned; there’s no doubt in my mind that it’s a bomb, and the little teal blue numbers counting down are also a dead giveaway.
And even if we didn’t know already, Ace’s exclamation of, “Ooo, now that’s a fucking fancy bomb.”
“Can you disable it?” Jynx asks him seriously.
We all watch as he bends down and pulls a little tool set out of his pocket; before he can even touch it though, the numbers suddenly drop, so when we had five minutes before, it's now dropped to two. That can't be good.
“Out now,” Ace exclaims, and that’s enough for the rest of us as we all rush for the door. We keep running, Trick keeping up surprisingly fucking well as we duck behind the SUV that the guys parked far enough away that we deem it a safe space.
My heart is pounding as we all crouch behind it, but nothing happens; we share a look and then start to stand up, looking back at the building.
Ace shrugs and grins, “Sorry, guys, I might have . . .”
Boom!
We’re thrown to the floor as the heat of the explosion hits us, the car rocking as the ground shakes, and my hearing goes momentarily thanks to the loud and unexpected sound. As soon as everything stills, I look around at the others, doing a headcount and checking that they’re all okay. I’m immediately filled with relief when everyone seems to be okay, and I release another breath when I realise that Trick hadn’t bothered to get up from the first time, which means he wasn’t thrown to the floor and didn’t potentially damage himself further.
“Is everyone okay?” he demands.
Everyone sounds off that they’re good as we all slowly start to stand, and Atlas and Rage help Trick up.
“What the fuck,” Riot questions staring at the smoldering mess in front of us. The explosion was massive but it was clearly intended to burn quickly before burning out completely.
“We were being watched,” Ace’s words send a shiver of apprehension down my spine.
