At this moment, Finch emerged from the building, sweating profusely, his phone still clutched. "Jack! I intercepted a call recording from Kara Stanton's phone. She seems to be nearby."
Jack and Jubal frowned, checking their watches or phones for the time. Kara Stanton was remotely controlling Reese and Mark Snow using her phone, thereby controlling the detonation sequence of their bulletproof vests.
Reese knew the phone number she used, and immediately informed Alice and Finch after everyone reunited, so they could track her.
However, the key now wasn't finding Kara Stanton, but determining the location of Mark Snow's mobile bomb.
While the two standard packs of C4 he carried without additional fragmentation had limited power (a little over a kilogram in total), it was unlikely to cause a catastrophic destruction of a building.
But Mark Snow, though a CIA agent, wasn't the type to risk his life protecting innocents like Reese.
Ever since Reese and Kara Stanton became partners, they'd been working under him. But Mark Snow easily sold out two of his loyal subordinates simply because the mission required it.
Jack still couldn't understand why Kara Stanton wanted to kill Reese as well. After all, even though Reese accepted the order that essentially meant they would kill each other, she ultimately hesitated out of complacency and nearly shot him dead.
But her revenge on Mark Snow was only natural. Jack suspected that if Reese hadn't been so worried about breaking into the secret lab on the 21st floor, Kara Stanton would have tortured him to death long ago.
"Kara Stanton's phone's GPS shows she's currently in an alley across the street from the building," Finch said anxiously.
"Should we go check?" Jack looked at Jubal.
He didn't think a professional agent would make such a crude mistake. He'd probably already thrown the phone into the trash can in the alley and driven away.
But considering the time, since Finch had just intercepted a call, it meant Kara Stanton had been there at least a few minutes earlier. Going over to check was better than just waiting.
"Let's listen first," Jubal said with a distressed expression. Over a kilogram of C4 would make a ton of noise when it exploded. Now all he could do was pray that jerk Mark Snow didn't wander into the crowd.
"5, 4, 3, 2," Jack had barely finished counting down when a deafening explosion erupted from the other side of the building. Flames shot up into the sky, and thick smoke billowed.
Damn, so close?
Jack was startled. He pulled Finch out of the street to protect him from falling glass and turned to look in the direction of the explosion.
Unfortunately, the building stood between them and the blast site. All they could see were people panicking and fleeing towards the intersection, but they couldn't make out anything.
Alarms blared from the cars parked along the street, and nearby, fire trucks, standing by, blared their sirens.
Jack rushed forward, and as he turned the corner, he was met with a cloud of smoke and flames. Across the street, in the dark alley, a car, whose make and model was no longer discernible, lay ablaze.
At the intersection, about ten meters from the explosion, two NYPD police cars blocking traffic were overturned. Several officers, bleeding from their heads, stood nearby, their eyes wide open, seemingly still recovering from the shock.
A head, completely disfigured, rolled on the ground, its nearly charred scalp still clinging to a few strands of half-grown, singed hair.
Dragged along by Jubal, Finch, breathless, ran again to see Jack halted in front of him. As soon as he stopped, he was startled by the horrifying scene before him.
"This, this is..."
"That should be Kara Stanton, right?" Jack said uncertainly. After all, he had never seen the real person. Of course, even if he had, he probably wouldn't recognize her for a while.
It was unknown how the head had managed to survive such a violent explosion, but aside from a few strands of charred hair that could barely help determine the gender, DNA testing was the only hope.
Two fire trucks, standing by nearby, quickly extinguished the remaining flames. Judging by the remains of the vehicle in the back seat and on the driver's side, there were two people in the vehicle at the time of the explosion.
Two
days later, at the dining table in the base building, Reese pored over the medical examiner's report and muttered to himself, "Looks like Snow has finally 'retired.'"
"The ATF issue is resolved, too." Jubal, sitting across from him, looked at his bandaged figure and, after a moment's thought, swallowed his words.
The ATF issue was actually quite easy to resolve. Reese and Mark Snow had parked the stolen Ford Explorer downstairs, along with the two agents' service weapons.
As for the documents, since one was on Mark Snow's person and had been destroyed in the explosion, Jack simply disposed of the other and compiled a closing report.
Two rogue CIA agents, Mark Snow and Kara Stanton, for unknown reasons, armed themselves with explosive vests and attacked a secret Pentagon facility in Manhattan.
Fortunately, the FBI had been keeping Mark Snow under surveillance for a recent, bizarre drug case, preventing further escalation at the critical moment.
In a desperate attempt, two CIA agents detonated their explosives, injuring three nearby NYPD officers and several innocent civilians. The explosion also left an annex of the New York University Law School dormitories across from 780 Mercer Street in a state of emergency.
Having retrieved his agents' service weapons, Director Powell, the head of the ATF's New York office, returned to his usual cheerful demeanor.
Since the CIA remained silent about the incident of a high-ranking agent deserting without permission and the subsequent death of an already certified agent,
the idea of an ATF agent being attacked by an unknown individual and impersonating an NYPD officer was naturally out of the question.
True to their reputation as a "brother agency," the lead agent in charge of the investigation omitted any mention of the incident in his report, simply brushing it off.
Perhaps the only person injured in the incident was Reese, who had broken three ribs in a previous car accident. While the fractures were minor, he still needed some time to recover.
Meanwhile, Jessica and Reese began to exchange cold words.
Although the superficial reason was that this guy was in danger but did not immediately choose to ask for help, everyone knew that she was jealous.
(End of this chapter)