The night sky was clear and cloudless above Rutland, the stars and planets sharply bright. Darla could make out the vehicle, too.
“Aren’t we supposed to be on the lookout for big trucks?”
Archie asked.
“Put the flashers on,” Darla said.
Archie hit the button, and red warning lights lit up around the booth.
“He’s still coming,” said Darla.
Archie pointed. “Looks like he’s speeding up.”
“Contact the night supervisor!”
While Archie dialed the number, Darla punched another button on her console. Long, metal spikes popped out of the pavement. If the truck tried to pass through the gates now, its tires would be shredded.
She expected the driver to see the spikes and slow his vehicle, but he didn’t. The truck kept right on coming, its headlights filling the booth. At the last possible instant, the vehicle swerved away from the tire-shredding spikes sticking out of the roadway and crashed right through the security booth.
The flimsy structure exploded into shards of glass and shattered lights; Darla and Archie were killed instantly; and the Dreizehn Trucking vehicle continued on, through the parking lot. Because of the shift change, the lot was jammed with cars and employees. The truck barreled through them, running down those who reacted too slowly.
The big rig rolled right up to the massive steel doors to the plant — and smashed right through them. Then a white flash lit up the night. With a single deafening blast, the General Aviation Electronics plant was leveled. Eight hundred men and women, fully two-thirds of the plant’s workforce, were murdered.
The blast was so powerful, it blew the leaves off trees and turned over cars on Route 4. Miles away, windows in homes and businesses near Rutland’s famed historic district were shattered.
Flames quickly spread to a nearby battery factory, where a half-dozen chemical tanks ruptured, spewing millions of metric tons of poisonous fumes into the air.
As the cloud of toxic death spread, birds fell from the trees, their feathered carcasses dropping onto lawns and streets. Hundreds of people, tucked into their cozy homes for the night, succumbed immediately. Minivans and SUVs ran up into yards and through fences as their drivers instantly perished.
In the next few minutes, many more would die as a hellish orange glow spread out over Rutland, smothering the night sky, extinguishing every last point of light in the clear, cloudless heavens.
17. THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 11:00 P.M. AND 12:00 A.M. EASTERN DAYLIGHT TIME
“God go with you,” the old man said in Spanish.
“
This broken-down neighborhood had been a thriving area once, housing union workers for the nearby industrial section of the city. But the industries were long gone now, along with the well-paid jobs. The buildings around him appeared abandoned, too; but Tony knew, from the amount of discarded hypodermic needles and heroin wrappers scattered around, there had to be a shooting gallery somewhere on this block.
Ahead, in the darkness, he sensed movement — a figure stepped out of a doorway, walked toward him.
“Well, Almeida?” whispered a woman’s voice. “Get anything?”
Judith Foy was still wearing her tracksuit and ball cap.
She’d been hiding in the alley, staying out of sight while Tony conducted a quiet discussion with an old, white-haired priest.
Tony rubbed his soul patch. “Yeah,” he said. “I got something. An address.”
He’d been looking for intel on the Thirteen Gang. CTU
had nothing in their database, but apparently they were still active here in Newark. And since Tony couldn’t simply go to the Newark Police, flash his CTU ID, and ask for a file, he set out to do his own legwork.
He’d noticed fishes painted on the sides of buildings, like graffiti, with Spanish words scrawled inside, and he knew these were markers, leading illegal aliens to a Cath-olic rescue mission, where they could get help if they were in trouble with authorities, the law, or anyone else.
It was late, but Tony figured an underground rescue mission would have someone guarding the door 24/7. Sure enough, after only two sharp knocks, the heavy, battered door had cracked open.
He’d spoken to the priest in street Spanish, telling him he was trying to help his girlfriend, whose son had gotten involved with a gang. “Please, I have to find him. He may be in danger of overdosing on drugs. Can you tell me where the Thirteen Gang hangs out in this area?”
The priest was quiet for a long minute, just staring at Tony. Finally, he said, “I don’t believe your story.”
The priest said he’d heard enough confessions to hear in man’s voice when he was lying. But he said that he felt in Tony’s spirit and saw in his eyes that he was not an evil man.
Tony assured the priest that what he was doing was for the good of many — and he wouldn’t reveal where he’d learned the information. The priest gave him the address, and they’d bid each other good night.
“Sounds like you’re pretty familiar with life on the streets,” Foy observed.
“Yeah, well… talking the talk helps.”
Tony had steered clear of gangs and drugs while grow-ing up on Chicago’s South Side, mostly because his eyes were always fixed on a career in the Marine Corps. But he’d still lived on the streets — and if you wanted to keep on living, you knew whom to trust, whom to avoid, and whom to go to for information without fear of reprisals.
“So what did the man tell you?” Judith asked.
“That the Thirteen Gang has a crib on Crampton Street, three blocks away. An old brick house with a steel door painted red, all the windows boarded up so it looks abandoned.”
Foy nodded. “I remember that location. We passed it half an hour ago. Come on, I know the way…”
Jack Bauer stood on the corner of West Sixty-fourth and Central Park West, staring at the eighth floor of the Beresfield Apartments. The landmark building sat across the street from Central Park, and beside the New York Society for Ethical Culture.
The ornate, terra-cotta trimmed structure had been constructed in the 1930s, according to the bronze plaque set above the cornerstone. The plaque also stated that the Beresfield was the home of the wealthy and influential, but Jack Bauer was interested in only one of the building’s occupants: Erno Tobias, an executive for Rogan Pharmaceuticals.
Jack needed to surprise Tobias if the man was home, or thoroughly search the Albino’s apartment if he wasn’t. But getting inside wasn’t going to be easy. It was close to mid-night, but many of the apartments were still brightly lit.
The Beresfield boasted both a doorman and a desk clerk.
Going through the front door was not an option.
Fortunately, the Beresfield was an old building, with an outmoded security system that relied too heavily on the men at the front door, and not enough on modern technology. Jack saw no cameras or motion detectors outside the lobby door, or at the service entrance on Sixty-sixth Street.
Jack had already decided to enter through the service entrance. It was tucked behind an eight-foot cast-iron fence, in a shadowy alley between the Beresfield and the building behind it. All he had to do was climb the fence,
