"Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed is more important than any other."
~ Abraham Lincoln
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"Are we absolutely sure about this?" Lex asked.
Jake began to explain, "Think about it. Max takes Lezebnik's uniform, he walks out, fooling everybody into thinking he's just another officer. He's on his own, he's got no where to go, by now, everybody has his picture. But he still as the transit tubes beneath ground,"
"Cameras are down, no patrols, but if you take one wrong turn, you get lost in the tunnels," Jenna said.
"And Tate's drones aren't going to detect the virus from underground," Jake added.
Lex started to nod as he thought it through, then he went right for the iPad and started tapping away, "Here's the district map. Here's the fun house," he made a large red circle over Plucky's Pennywhistle's, "Here's the plaza, and here's Rooney's," he made two more circles on the map.
"Once he's out of the fun house, he just slips inside a man hole and disappears," Jenna said.
"Which means that Max is somewhere within this triangle," Lex then drew a thick black triangle over the map, tagging each location.
"Do we pour officers down there?" Jenna asked.
"It's still too much ground to cover. We need to narrow this down," Jake replied.
"Well, where's the nearest man hole to the fun house?" she asked.
"Here," Lex made a dot only centimeters away from the fun house, "That's another block away,"
"He's going to release the virus," Jake said, "He needs a place where he can work freely, he needs somewhere with a lot of ventilation, power supply, and an easy introduction route,"
Lex suddenly had a pained look on his face, "Wait a minute," he zoomed in on another area of the map, bordering just along the triangle. Jake and Jenna saw it too.
"Isn't that..."
"The shelter," Jake said.
"That damned son of a bitch," Lex cursed.
"It would make sense though. The tunnels run right alongside the basement wing, and there's an old operator's room on the other side," Jake said.
"There is?" Jenna asked.
"Yeah. The bordered it up after they opened the MARTA lines in 79. Too many conduct offices, not enough operators. This way, they could put more eggs in one basket," Lex replied.
"And aid in a man's conquest for revenge against the government," Jake said.
"We've got to evacuate the shelter then, he could already be exposing everybody in that building!" Jenna exclaimed.
"We can't just yet, Max is going to know we're onto him, and he'll probably bolt," Jake said.
"Where's he going to go in a blocked-off tunnel?" she asked.
"If he's prepared, then he could probably hide out for weeks and we'll be chasing our tails," Lex replied.
"So then what do we do?" she asked.
"We need to get back to the base and assemble another strike team," he said.
"We need to get you out too," Jake told Jenna.
"I know, I get it. You need to keep me safe," she said.
"No. Well... yes, actually, but you also have an important job,"
"Then clue a girl in, would you?"
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Jake was once again zipped into his thick standard-issued jacket, locking his helmet strap under his chin and changing the magazine in his gun, all in less than twelve hours since the last time. He then took out his wallet, and he pulled out his photo of Katie and Quentin. He held that photo close to his heart, saying another prayer, hoping that Katie would be with him through this trek.
Meanwhile, Jenna peaked into the change room, which was once the men's room of the restaurant. She watched him stare at the photo, not saying a word as she snuck inside. She peered over his shoulder, and she saw Quentin, and another woman. That had to be his mother, this had to be the girl who made Jake Riley so cold and closed off to begin with.
"She's beautiful," she said softly. Jake looked up at her, then he put the photo back into his wallet, stuffing the material into his pocket.
"Yeah, she was," he said.
"That was Quentin's mom, right?" she asked.
"Yeah. You would've really liked her," he replied.
Jenna felt a pang of sadness overcome her, the memory of their kiss quickly fading away as she sighed lightly, and she took his hand into hers, "You know that you can't keep living in the past, right? You know that even you have to move on," she said.
"I have," he said.
"I don't think you have," she said, "I think that maybe you're still trying to hold onto your past to try to get through the day, but while you do so, you miss all the amazing opportunities that life has to offer you. Like say... just off the top of my head... meeting somebody new," she said.
Jake smiled as he cocked his head to the side, giving Jenna the side-eye, "You seriously dropped out after one semester?" he asked.
"It was interesting, but it made my head hurt," she replied. Jake leaned in, about to kiss her, but the plexiglass shield of his helmet knocked against her forehead.
"Ouch!"
"Oh. Sorry," he quickly undid the strap and pulled off his helmet. Jenna just chuckled as she rubbed her head, then placed her hands in both sides of his neck as she leaned up to kiss him.
"I don't care if you catch Max or not. Just promise me you'll come back in one piece, okay?" she pleaded.
"I promise," he kissed her again, "Do you know what to do?" he asked.
"Tate and the CSIs are setting up the switch board right now," she replied.
"Okay. You know what to say?"
"Not remotely, but if it keeps him from blowing himself and you guys up, I think I can figure it out," she said.
"You're going to do great," he forced himself to smile. Jenna glared back at him.
"It's a good thing you're cute, Riley," she said as she turned, then she left. Jake suddenly then had a new confidence, he snapped on his helmet, strapped in his gun, and he took a final look in the vanity mirror. He pushed down his fear, he let his old memories fade away, now turning into Jake Riley, SWAT officer, "pro" basketball player, and sort-of father.
He was ready.
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Lex and Jake led their team down to the shelter. Officers were posted at every exit, over every man hole, while more poured into the building.
"Fellas, are we sure this is going to work?" Will asked as he pulled out a three-dimensional blueprint of the warehouse.
"It's better than nothing, right?" Lex replied.
"Where's the service entrance?" Jake asked.
"Right here," he pointed to a mark on the map labelled SE, "From there, you take the stairs into the basement, and there's a slab of drywall here. You cut through it, and you find yourself in the old operator's office," he said.
"What's the fastest way out of there?" Lex asked.
"Probably the emergency exit, it was designed in the 50s during the Cold War, you know, when the threat of the atomic bomb was still a possibility. People wanted to be prepared for the apocalypse," he replied.
"Fascinating, Willy. Where does that exit go?" Lex asked.
"I don't know. It just runs through a tunnel heading East. I don't have the transit plans," he said.
"We'll call Reynolds, she can probably get a hold of 'em and send them to us," Jake said.
"You get on that, I'll prep tactile," he said. Jake took out his phone, but before he remembered to use the landline, he saw he had full bars. His heart dropped.
"Lex," he showed him the phone, "You better make it fast. We don't have much time,"
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Meanwhile, Tate had finished his masterpiece; his on-the-fly dispatch radio, capable of reaching as many as fifty satellite radios within the district.
"Are you ready, Ms. Desmond?" he asked.
"As ready as I'll ever be," she replied as she sat at the computer.
"We're going to wait for Officer Carnahan's call. Until then, just remember, empathize with Mr. Ridley at much as possible, connect with him," he said.
"I think we already did that when he threw me in a fridge yesterday," she said.
"And don't bring up any of his... shall we say... achievements," he said.
Jenna scoffed back, "You call them achievements, I call 'em death-by-Riley. Because I know that when Jake finds him, he's going to break his scrawny little neck," she said.
"... Right," Tate nodded.
"Well, how do I work this doohickey?" she asked.
"Once Lex gives us the go-ahead, just press the X key and start talking," he said. Jenna looked down at the keyboard, then at the microphone, then back at Tate.
"It's that simple?" she asked.
"I designed specifically to be simple for the average mind," he replied. Jenna scowled back.
"I'm going to make like that wasn't a blatant insult,"
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The head of the strike team had a go-pro attached to his helmet, showing a live feed of where he and his team were heading down in the tunnels. Jake and Lex watched with Will in his office, while at the same time, trying to figure out where the emergency tunnels led out to.
"Strike One, what's your status?" Lex asked through the radio.
"Approaching operator's office. Ceals and Cross are drilling through the wall right now, Ridley's got nowhere to run," the lead replied. Lex and Will watched the monitor screen, while Jake was trying to trace where the emergency tunnels lead. It was kind of hard to do on the iPad, he kept getting lost.
"It'd be easier if this damn thing was on paper," he mumbled.
The strike team surrounded both exits of the old operator's room, while the second team continued to drill through the drywall in the basement. Dust and sparks flew everywhere, nearly blinding the officers while they worked. But they finally managed to cut a decent hole into the wall, leading right into the office. Officer Ceals tossed a smoke bomb into the dark room, and it went off with a loud bang. The first strike team busted through both doors, filling the room with their bright lights and trying to adjust to their dark surroundings. There, they found a table, crowded with syringes, pill bottles, canisters, and a large container marked DANGER.
"I think we found the virus, Lex," the lead said.
"Is it in the box?" he asked.
"We'll find out," the officers stepped aside and stood back as another officer in a hazmat suit marched in with a radiation detector. He scanned the box, immediately getting a positive reading.
"It's positive for viral signature," he reported, but he sounded unsure of himself.
"What's the matter?" Lex asked.
"The readings should be off the charts. This just makes the radial speedometer," the officer reported, "I don't think the virus is inside,"
"What about these air canisters?" another officer asked, going to pick up the spray can.
"Don't touch that!" the lead exclaimed, and just in time too. The younger officer immediately jumped back, "Call in the hazmat team, Lex. We need to bring this all back to Tate for analysis,"
"What about Max Ridley?" Lex asked.
"If he was here, he's gone now,"
Just as the lead spoke, Jake's trail then came to an end, and he didn't like the destination.
Lex took out his phone and sent his go-ahead to Reynolds for Jenna to take her cue, "Any indication of which way he went?" he asked.
"Took the emergency exit, I'll bet," Will replied.
"You son of a bitch!" Jake suddenly swore.
"Oh, thanks Jake. Screw you too," Will replied.
"Not you!" Jake exclaimed as he held up the iPad, "You're never going to believe where the tunnel leads to,"
Lex took the iPad, scanning the tunnel route, then he slammed it back down on the table, "We got to go,"
"How far do you think he is by now?"
"Depends on how much explosive he's carrying if he's going by foot. We can probably beat him there,"
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Vicki's phone beeped, and she immediately read the text from Lex, "Lex gave us the go-ahead. It's your cue, Jenna," she said.
"Ready?" Tate asked her. Jenna took a deep breath and nodded.
"I suppose so," she pressed down on the X key, and she started speaking into the microphone.
"Uh... hi Max," her voice wavered from word to word, "I don't know if you can hear me, or if you even care to hear, but... um..." she looked at Tate and Vicki, who nodded for her to go on, "I uh... I just wanted to talk to you about giving yourself up. I'm not going to berate you for all the men you've lost or, or the damage you've done to this city or... ugh. Okay, look. You know that I'm not a negotiator, in fact, I hate anything that has to do with debating. But, I know how you feel, I've been where you are, once. You felt alone, helpless, scared even..."
While she continued to talk, Jake and Lex were making a beeline back to the base in their jeep, kicking up pounds of dust behind them; they could hear Jenna over the radio.
"I know what happened to you, and even I know that it wasn't fair. Your family didn't deserve to be treated that way; and it just makes me so... it's just not fair. And no one no one can make that better. I wish I could. I do. I wish I could go back in time to when you were twelve-years-old and make what was happening to you stop, if I could just... you know, pick you up and just tell you that it'll all be okay. Humans are social creatures, we lean onto each other for support, because that's what we should be doing. We're supposed to be the shoulder for you to cry on, not create the reason for you to cry. They're supposed to make you laugh when you're upset and distract you from the stress of mid-terms and pull hilarious pranks with you and just be there. They're supposed to say it's okay to be afraid and not be the thing you're afraid of. But most importantly, they're supposed to love you no matter what. What happened to you isn't fair. It's not right. But, um I'm supposed to empathize with you. Sympathize. Understand. But I can't... because that would be a lie," she took a breath to collect herself, tears welling up in her eyes as she began to think back to her own past.
"The truth is I don't understand what you've done, Max. I don't sympathize with you terrorizing millions of people, and I especially don't understand you taking it out on people who've never done a thing to you, people who are innocent, just like you were. I get it, you had a void, you had no love to fill it, so you filled it with hate instead. I can't make it all go away. But what I can do, as a human being, and as a friend, is tell you that you can't take away your pain by hurting someone else. That it doesn't make all the nights you went to bed scared and alone any better if you scare someone else the way you're scaring your own God damned neighbors!"
The jeep skidded to a harsh halt outside the base, and Jake and Lex bolted inside, nearly shattering the car windows as they shut the doors.
"What happened to you, it isn't fair. But what you're doing to her isn't fair, either, and if anyone should understand what that feels like, it's you. You have the power. You can do what you want to do," she said, "But for once, you can choose to use that power to do what should've been done for you. You can choose to stop scaring people, to stop feeding off of fear. You can choose to teach others that yes, there are monsters, and it's okay to be afraid of them. But it's not okay to let them win. And it's not okay to be one,"
That had to do it, it should've, anyway. Jenna became as empathetic and sweet as she possibly could. As she pushed the microphone away, Jake and Lex came bursting inside.
"What the hell is going on?" Vicki asked.
"Max is coming here," Jake said. Jenna immediately shot up form her seat.
"What?"
"What makes you say that?" Slater asked.
"There's an emergency exit that runs from the operator's office under the shelter. That tunnel runs right under here," Lex said.
"And we're thinking he's going to blow us all up?" Jenna asked.
"We need to cover all man covers," Lex said.
"Like now," Jake added.
They suddenly heard the squeal from a rusty door hinge, "I think it's a little late for that, guys,"
Everybody whipped around, drawing their guns at Max, who stood at the kitchen doors... with a bomb strapped to his chest, "Did I interrupt?"