Another huge explosion filled the room as the flare shot out of the BearBanger like a red laser beam and exploded on the wall-or on Luther.

It didn't matter if I hit him or not because by now everyone was half blind, deaf, and definitely fucked up.

I spun around and lunged across the floor where I saw Carl lying on his back. I reached around for his shotgun but couldn't find it.

Then Kate shouted something, but I couldn't hear her.

I looked at her and saw she already had the shotgun.

There were small fires on the carpet from the BearBanger flares, and I also noticed a couch blazing.

I caught a glimpse of Carl's face-or what used to be his face-then I got into a crouch and charged at Madox, whom I could now see on the floor near his swivel chair, moving around, obviously disoriented, but nowhere near out of action. I took too long a stride for the shackle chain, and I fell forward, then scrambled on my hands and knees toward him.

Before I could get to Madox, Luther stood and brought his rifle up to his shoulder and was about to fill me with holes when a shotgun blast filled the room, and Luther seemed to defy gravity as he lifted off his feet and slammed into the wall.

Before he dropped, Kate fired a second time, and Luther's lower jaw disappeared.

I again lunged at Madox, who was now on one knee, facing me with his Colt .45 in his hand.

He started to raise his gun, and Kate shouted, "Freeze! Freeze! Drop it! Drop it or you're dead!"

There was this long moment while Bain Madox considered his options. Kate helped him decide by blowing a hole in the ceiling above his head. Before the plaster even hit him, he dropped his gun.

Time sort of hung there for a while, with Madox and I both on our knees facing each other from about five feet away. Kate was standing about ten feet away, the shotgun pointing at Madox's head.

The room smelled of burned explosives, and a blue smoke hung in the air. My eyesight was returning, but black specks danced around wherever I looked. As for my hearing, I'd heard the shotgun blasts, but they'd sounded far away, and if there was any other noise in the room, I couldn't detect it.

I stood slowly and got my footing, then grabbed Madox's .45 off the carpet and went over to Luther, who was sitting against the wall near the door. He was not dead but would wish he was if he survived without a lower jaw. Kate's first shot had shredded his arm, but his rifle was still hanging by its sling across his chest, so I pulled it away from him and set the selector switch from full automatic to safety, then I slung the rifle over my shoulder.

Kate had motioned Madox onto the rug, where he was lying with his face buried in the thick, blue plush carpet, which I could tell him firsthand was not comfortable.

I glanced at the countdown clock and saw we had two full minutes before 00:00.

I needed to do this by the book, to be sure there was no one left who presented a danger to Kate or me. So I went over to Carl, who was still alive, and who also had some parts of his face where they didn't belong.

I started to frisk him, but amazingly, he sat up, like Frankenstein on the laboratory table, and I backed off.

I watched him get to his feet. Clearly he was blind-not temporarily blinded, but, judging from the burns around his eyes, permanently blind. Nevertheless, he put his hand inside his jacket and brought out a Colt .45 automatic.

I was going to say, "Drop it!" but then he'd know where to fire, so with time running out, I made a difficult decision and put a .45 bullet through his forehead.

He was too big to be lifted off his feet, and he fell backward, like a huge tree toppling.

Kate said, "Fifty-eight seconds."

I walked over to Madox, who was staring at Carl's body, and asked him, "How do I stop this?"

He turned his head toward me and replied, "Fuck you."

"Do you have anything intelligent to say? Come on, Bain. Help me. How do I stop this?"

"You can't. And why do you want to? John, think about this."

I have to be honest and admit that I had been thinking about it. I mean, God help me, but I did think about letting it happen.

Kate called out, "Forty seconds."

I got my head back on straight and remembered what Madox had said about the ELF signal, and I seemed to recall something about a continuous signal, and a lock-in period, so I thought that if I stopped the ELF wave, right here at the transmitter, the receivers wouldn't or couldn't lock in and send a signal to the nuclear detonators. Electronics is not one of my strong points, but destruction is, and there was nothing to lose, except two cities, so I stepped back and told Kate to do the same.

The countdown clock read :15 seconds, but I recalled from Bain that the ELF wave and the decoding could be a minute or two faster or slower in reaching the receivers, and for all I knew, the two-minute lock-in time was already running-or finished.

I glanced at the three flat screen TVs, but there was nothing unusual happening in San Francisco, Los Angeles, or Washington.

Kate said, "John."

I looked where she was staring and saw that the countdown clock read 00:00, and the black LED box was now flashing "GOD-GOD-GOD."

I raised the Colt .45 and pointed it at the ELF transmitter.

Madox had gotten up and was on his knees now, in front of the transmitter, as though he were protecting it. He held his hands up and shouted, "John! Don't do it! Let it happen. I beg you. Save the world. Save America-"

I fired three rounds over Madox's head into the transmitter, and three more into the rest of the electronic console, just to be sure. Then Kate blasted the last two shotgun rounds into the smoking electronics.

The lights, dials, and instruments blinked off, and the big metal console smoked and sparked. The word "GOD" blinked out.

Madox had turned his head and was looking at the dying ELF transmitter, then he turned to me, then Kate, then back to me, and said in almost a whisper, "You ruined everything. You could have let it happen. Why are you so stupid?"

I had a few good replies for him about duty, honor, and country, and also about "If I'm so stupid, why do I have your gun?" but I got right to the point and said, "This is for Harry Muller," and fired my last bullet into his brain.

CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

We found the key in Carl's pocket and removed our shackles. We also found his Colt .45 on the floor, and Kate stuck it in her waistband.

Kate and I stood side by side in the smoky room, as mute as the three televisions that we were watching. My heart, and I'm sure hers, was thumping.

After a few minutes of commercials-with no urgent bulletins or screens going black in LA or San Francisco-I said to Kate, "I guess everything is okay."

She nodded.

I asked her, "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine ... I'm just ... stunned."