The Demolition Expert

To defuse the bomb strapped to the hostage, I had to cut away every shred of her clothing.
But my sweet, naive new wife decided to post about it online.
She called me, sobbing, demanding to know why I couldn’t have at least left her underwear on.
“I know you were saving her life, but doesn’t a girl’s dignity matter?”
“There were so many cameras on her! How is she supposed to live with that? Couldn’t you have just found a blanket to cover her?”
The story blew up. To control the public outrage, the department suspended me.
Fine. I decided to clock out mentally. From now on, I would follow procedure to the letter. No more improvisation. No more going above and beyond.
Then my wife’s mother was taken hostage in the city’s busiest downtown mall, strapped to the latest compound series bomb.
And suddenly, my entire squad was in a panic.
…
“Ethan! Look what you’ve done!”
The moment I walked through the door, my new wife, Lily, shoved her phone in my face, her eyes brimming with tears.
On the screen was a picture of me at the bomb scene, tearing the clothes off the hostage. The angle was intentionally provocative, pure clickbait.
“All my friends are asking me how my husband could strip a girl naked in front of everyone! What am I supposed to say? You’ve completely humiliated me!” she choked out, her voice thick with self-pity.
I shrugged off my jacket, heavy with the smell of sweat and cordite, and tried to explain patiently. “That wasn’t a standard device, Lily. The trigger wires and pressure sensors were woven into the fabric, all over her body. If I didn’t get the clothes off, I couldn’t even start.”
“But couldn’t you have left her underwear on?!” Lily’s composure shattered, and she started screaming. “I know you were saving her, but what about her dignity? With all those cameras, how is she supposed to face the world? Couldn’t you have found a blanket? Did you have to be so brutal, so crude?”
I looked at her, and a weariness so profound it settled in my bones washed over me. I had no energy left to argue. It was pointless.
The next day at the station, the atmosphere was thick with tension.
Captain Miller called me into his office. He slammed a stack of printed-out online comments on his desk, his face a mask of barely suppressed fury.
“Look at this! The entire internet is calling us brutes, saying we have no respect for hostage privacy!” He lit a cigarette, taking a long, angry drag. “Ethan, I know your style. You do things your own way. But we’re in the middle of a media firestorm. I need you to show some remorse, to give the public something.”
He pushed a blank incident report form in front of me.
“Write a formal apology. Admit that your handling of the situation was inappropriate, that your methods were excessive. Then you’re on temporary suspension, pending an investigation. We’ll let you back when this blows over.”
I stared at the form, making no move to take it.
I knew this was the golden opportunity my deputy, Mark Davis, had been waiting for. He’d always despised my unorthodox, “field-expedient” methods, constantly championing the “standardized procedures” he’d learned at some overseas seminar.
Sure enough, a few days later, the official suspension order came down. I was temporarily reassigned from frontline duty.
I went back to my office—which was more of a workshop, really, cluttered with my modified tools and research on non-standard explosives. I sat down at my computer and, in silence, began to permanently delete every file. All my personal research notes, my custom schematics, my insights on tool modification—gone, one by one.
The only thing I left on the hard drive was the department-issued, standard-issue bomb disposal manual.
A week later, at a mandatory all-hands meeting, the mood was somber.
Captain Miller stood at the podium, his voice booming as he announced my suspension, repeatedly emphasizing the importance of “procedural integrity” and “humanitarian concern.”
I sat in the corner, my face a blank slate.
Then, his tone shifted. “And now, I’m pleased to announce that Lieutenant Mark Davis will be acting as interim squad leader!”
Mark stood up, smoothing down his crisp uniform and clearing his throat. He walked to the stage, his eyes flicking in my direction.
“Thank you for this vote of confidence,” he began, his voice oozing false humility. “I believe that every operation must be conducted within a framework of rules and humanity. We are a disciplined force, not savages. We save lives at all costs, but that cost should never be a hostage’s dignity.”
His words were sanctimonious and aimed directly at me.
A few of the newer guys looked indignant on my behalf. The veterans, the ones who’d walked through fire with me, said nothing.
Mark’s first official act was to walk over to my workstation. He tapped on the desk, his chin tilted up in a gesture of superiority. “Ethan, per regulations, you need to turn over all specialized personal tools from your locker for the duration of your suspension. Here’s the key. Clean it out. Now.”
His voice dripped with undisguised contempt.
I didn’t say a word. I just silently opened the locker and placed my custom-milled tweezers, my specialized wire cutters, and my micro-endoscope on the desk.
He watched with a smug grin. “From now on, this squad is going fully standardized. Your little ‘homemade’ toys are obsolete.”
I looked up at him. “A question for you, Lieutenant. You encounter a device made with ball bearings suspended in industrial epoxy, glued directly to a hostage’s carotid artery. The manual says to use a chemical solvent, but the solvent will cause severe chemical burns and secondary injuries. What do you do?”
Mark’s face froze. He stammered for a moment. “Well… then… then you follow the procedure in the manual! The manual is the result of countless proven cases. It’s the most scientific approach!”
He had just exposed his total lack of adaptability, falling back on the only thing he knew: the rules.
I thought of my mentor, years ago, the legendary EOD tech they called “Ghost Hand.” When he took me on against all regulations, he’d slapped my shoulder and said, “Kid, rules are dead things. People are alive. What I see in you is a spark that doesn't fit in a box. That’s what matters.”
Thinking of it now felt like a bitter joke.
My new life of malicious compliance had begun.
A few days later, a bank reported a standard-issue “Thor” model timed explosive. I was assigned to logistical support.
When the on-site photos came through, I calmly opened my laptop, pulled up the standard-issue takedown schematic for the “Thor,” and emailed it to the tech on scene.
An old teammate called me, his voice urgent. “Ethan, isn’t there a booby trap on the B2 wire in this thing? I swear you mentioned something about it once.”
I spoke into the receiver, my voice flat and detached. “Report: according to the standard manual, the B2 line is a standard high-explosive detonator circuit. There are no special notations. Please proceed according to manual protocol.”
I hung up.
That day, for the first time in my career, I left the office the second the clock hit five. I didn’t go to my workshop to tinker with deadly devices. I went to a shooting range and burned through five full magazines.
Meanwhile, Mark instituted an absurdly complex “Deployment Equipment Checklist.” It was over thirty pages long and required three separate cross-checks by two different people before and after every mission, with signed forms filed in triplicate.
This new procedure added a solid fifteen minutes to our response time.
The grumbling started quietly.
“Is this guy nuts? By the time we finish his checklist, the hostage will be a crater.”
“That chemical plant alarm last week? We were five minutes late because he insisted on procedure. It was almost a catastrophe.”
“Armchair quarterback. He doesn’t know the first thing about the field.”
One of the veterans came to me, venting his frustration, hoping I’d offer a solution.
I just poured him a glass of water and said calmly, “Mark is the acting squad leader. We follow his orders. Everything by the book.”
My complete disengagement, combined with Mark’s inept leadership, caused our squad’s efficiency and success rate to plummet. Simple calls that would have been routine were now turning into near-disasters.
I knew they were waiting. Waiting for a real crisis to prove themselves.
I filled out a request for my accumulated vacation time and placed it on Captain Miller’s desk.
Thirty full days.
His face darkened the moment he saw it. “Ethan, what the hell is this?” He snatched the form and threw it at me. The edge of the paper caught my cheek, stinging. “The department is short-staffed as it is. Are you taking this much time off just to spite me?”
He lowered his voice, his words laced with threat. “Don’t think I don’t know what you’re doing! This is a temper tantrum. You’re trying to blackmail the department! Well, let me tell you, we’ll get along just fine without you!”
I didn’t speak. I just reached into my pocket and pulled out the officially sanctioned Post-Critical Incident Psychological Health Assessment Report.
I spread it open on his desk and pointed to the final recommendation.
“Captain, the official psych report concludes: ‘Subject is advised to take extended leave for rest and psychological counseling.’ This is a medically-advised, regulation-compliant leave request.”
Miller’s face cycled through shades of red and white. He glared at me, utterly speechless. Finally, with a snort of contempt, he snatched up a pen and scribbled his signature on the form.
As I turned to leave, the office door opened.
My wife, Lily, walked in, arm-in-arm with Mark Davis, a dazzling smile on her face.
When she saw me, her voice dripped with sarcasm. “Well, if it isn’t our great hero, Ethan. What’s the matter? Can’t handle a little criticism, so you’re running away? With a fragile ego like that, how are you supposed to protect the public?”
Mark added with a smug look, “You don’t understand, Lily. Some guys come up the hard way, all instinct and no discipline. They crack under pressure. Not like us. We’ve had the best, most systematic training. We value stability.”
I didn’t even bother to look at them. I walked out.
At the end of the hall, one of the rookies caught up to me and pressed a bottle of water into my hand.
“Ethan, man… I don’t know if I should be saying this,” he hesitated, then pushed on. “That girl you rescued? I heard she’s the only daughter of the CEO of Titan Microelectronics. Her family tried to find you, wanted to give you a huge reward, but Miller and Davis shut it all down. They blocked everything.”
I nodded. I already knew.
They couldn’t handle that kind of gratitude.
I got on a bus headed for the reservoir out of town. We’d just cleared the city limits when my department-issued emergency comm crackled to life, buzzing frantically.
It was Miller’s voice, distorted with panic. “All units, emergency alert! Major explosive threat at the Metroplex Mall downtown! Multiple hostages taken! All personnel, active and on leave, report for duty immediately!”
I switched the comm off.
A few seconds later, my personal cell phone rang. It was Miller.
“Ethan! Get your ass back here right now!” he screamed.
I replied calmly, “Captain, first, I am on approved medical leave. Second, per regulations, suspended personnel are prohibited from entering a Class-A hazardous scene.”
I hung up the phone.
I had just cast my line into the reservoir when Lily called. The second I answered, I was met with a torrent of hysterical sobs.
“Ethan! You have to come back! My mom… my mom’s at the mall! The bomber strapped a device to her!”
My blood ran cold. “Calm down. Tell me what happened.”
“It’s her birthday! We were all supposed to meet there for dinner! Some psycho rushed in and grabbed her! Ethan, you have to save her! You’re the best bomb tech there is!”
In the background, I could hear a cacophony of sirens and screaming.
Meanwhile, in the temporary command post downtown, the tension was suffocating.
Captain Miller stared at the bomb schematics being fed to the screen, his face ashen. It was a compound series bomb, unlike anything he’d ever seen. The structure was a bizarre, intricate nightmare, and the red numbers on the timer were counting down relentlessly.
Mark stood beside him, clutching a tablet, his forehead beaded with sweat. His so-called “standard procedures” were now a pathetic joke.
Trying to deflect blame, Miller hinted to the senior commanders who had arrived on scene, “This device’s structure is… highly irregular. Ethan Cole has done a lot of personal research into non-standard explosives. It’s possible… he might know something about this. But he’s always been a loner, keeps his cards close to his chest, never reports his findings.”
Just then, another urgent report came in. “Command, we’ve found a secondary device in the mall’s central ventilation system! It’s linked to the primary bomb on the hostage!”
A collective gasp went through the command post. It meant that disabling one would likely trigger the other.
Desperate to prove himself, Mark stepped forward. “I can do it! I can use standard procedure to jam the secondary device’s signal transmitter!”
Ignoring the warnings of the veteran techs, he went to work.
His efforts were not only a failure, but they also tripped a hidden trap set by the bomb maker.
The timer on the main bomb suddenly skipped ahead, its countdown speed doubling instantly.
The color drained from Mark’s face.
As a dead silence fell over the command post, a young technician’s eyes suddenly lit up.
“I remember! Ethan designed a custom jammer, the ‘Ghost.’ He said it could sever the base logic connection between any two linked electronic devices! The prototype should be in our gear truck!”
It was their last hope.
Mark, seeing a chance to redeem himself, sprinted to the truck and found the silver briefcase. Ignoring the technician’s guidance, he booted up the Ghost jammer himself.
“These connectors aren’t up to the latest international standards,” he muttered, “The frequency should be set to this band.”
He manually input the frequency parameters he believed were correct.
CRACKLE—
A wisp of blue smoke curled up from the briefcase. The core chip was fried.
Their last hope was gone.
The timer was running out. The link couldn't be broken. The only specialized tool that could have worked was destroyed.
The command post was plunged into absolute despair.
The on-scene commander made a split-second decision. He used a secure line to contact the most legendary EOD expert in the military, the old man known only by the callsign “Ghost Hand,” begging for remote technical assistance.
The situation was relayed in a frantic rush.
On the other end of the line, the old man was silent for a long moment. Then he spoke one sentence.
“With standard methods, the hostage is dead. That Wild Fox Cascade… I only ever taught it to one man.”
“He should be on your team. His name is Ethan Cole.”

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