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                                       The Trigger

"Thank you.  From one operative to another, I appreciate it."  She answered from a part of her.  The rest was really more intent on following that intricate little interplay of timing taking place before her eyes; Bradley, already in his car, waiting for Selene; and Ryland almost at his car, trying to catch Selene.  It was all so logical, so routine, so very normal.

But something happened then, and, from that instant, nothing else made sense.  She was conscious of the sound first; a violent rumbling; sounds of ground exploding up, straight and high just in front of her.  She could only watch, frozen without knowing it, as Crenshaw shoved the seat next to her hard against the dash and broke out, running at top speed toward the explosion...chunks of pavement, metal, and glass, wrapped in flame, spewed up and out on belching fireballs all around the car Selene was sitting in...and Ryland.  He had almost reached the car, just...just as thunder began booming out in quick, successive roars like detonating mines; the wide curl of windshield already shattered in a million steely shards, death in every one of them; and hellish rolls of white heat carried on the seething torrents of the fire.

Ryland's body jackknifed, lifting up and flipping, as the cataclysm's savage percussion first blew him back, then dropped him forty feet beyond the fiery blast, slammed headfirst against a car parked along the street.  His body crumpled to the sidewalk, flaccid in the strangest way.  His legs were bent, unnaturally.  One shoe was off.  Shredded clothing was draped in disarray, and crimson rivers flowed from several gaping wounds in Ryland's scalp and face.  Torn and scorched skin revealed blood, mixed with dirt and debris, baking in the heat of Houston's blistering sun where, a moment ago, there had been impeccable suiting.  His head rolled down along his shoulder blade.  Rag doll!

Suddenly driven by the most primal of instincts, Jess leaped out of the Volks, running toward him and screaming his name with her arms extended, as if to pick him up; to undo this most cowardly and despicable act; to protect him and make everything all right again.  A hideous cloud of ground heat wrapped her legs and feet.  The fire was surging up now, far beyond some roofs, in a blazing pyre, a boiling wall of heat; unholy elements of Hell and stench and death.