Opening
As the investigation breaks open, K. William Hodges, Holly Gibney, and Jerome Robinson uncover the true target of Brady Hartsfield’s next attack, even as he rolls his bomb into place. Technology both empowers the killer and blocks the heroes at every turn, escalating the story into a sprint against time where human intuition and courage must outpace automated systems and bureaucratic dead ends.
What Happens
Chapter 131: The Wild Bunch
In Brady’s basement, Holly positions Jerome at the computers and prompts him to use the voice command that will wake the system. Jerome says “chaos,” and a suicide countdown explodes across the screens. He stumbles through a few mumbled retries, his voice too low to register. Then he hits it clean: “darkness.” The countdown vanishes.
In its place, the monitors stream clips from The Wild Bunch—blood-drenched Western violence that makes Holly flinch. Hodges, rubbing a nagging ache under his collarbone, watches from the cellar steps and mutters that the imagery feels like a window into Brady’s head. Holly and Jerome split the bank of machines to search from opposite ends, agreeing to meet in the middle—an improvised formation that snaps them into a cohesive, if unlikely, investigative unit.
Chapter 132: Happy Confusion
Brady arrives at the Mingo Auditorium in a wheelchair with a bald cap and a placid, wounded look. Security proves more methodical than he expects, especially with attendees in wheelchairs. Thing Two—the bomb—sits in the chair’s pockets; the trigger lies under a framed photo of his dead brother. He calculates the worst-case option: if discovered, he can detonate here in the lobby and still slaughter dozens.
Then the main doors blow open and a wave of teenage girls surges into the lobby, singing along to a ’Round Here track. Guards are redeployed to stem the tide, leaving one harried young woman at the handicapped entrance. Brady spins out a performance as a bereaved father whose “son” died in the crash that “crippled” him, and her sympathy overrides protocol. Inside, he studies the bowl-shaped seating, pleased that the concave space will concentrate the blast. He parks in the handicapped section beside a bubbly girl and waits—an embodiment of The Banality of Evil, weaponized by a smile.
Chapter 133: The First Good One
Elsewhere in the auditorium, Tanya Robinson settles in with Barbara and her friends. Barbara nudges her, whispering about the “crippled man” in the handicapped section. Tanya gently corrects her for staring, then drifts into a warm memory of her first concert and first real kiss.
As the house lights dim, Tanya hands the girls their phones back for photos. She feels a mother’s contentment, oblivious to the threat parked yards away. The chapter holds on the sweetness of anticipation while the reader knows catastrophe is already in the room.
Chapter 134: Oh Shit and Piss
Back in the basement, Holly opens a folder and recoils: provocative photos of Deborah Ann Hartsfield confirm the warped core of Brady’s home life, spotlighting the family’s Dysfunctional Family Dynamics. On another machine, Jerome locates Brady’s main drive: archived news clippings from the City Center massacre and meticulous how-tos on explosives, including a download of The Anarchist Cookbook.
Hodges’s shoulder pain deepens. He idly pockets a heavy steel ball bearing, then crawls under the stairs and hauls out a garbage bag. Inside is a stripped hiker’s vest—an empty suicide rig. The shift in hardware tells him Brady abandoned the idea of a personal martyrdom for something far larger. Then Jerome and Holly shout: on Brady’s email, a printable receipt surfaces—tickets for tonight’s ’Round Here show. Jerome calls his mother and sister; both go straight to voicemail. Holly, steadying the panic, deduces the obvious: with thousands of teens in one place, the cell circuits choke. Hodges makes the call—literally and figuratively. They’re going to the MAC.
Chapter 135: Human Fucking Beings
They gun Olivia Trelawney’s Mercedes toward the venue, Jerome driving hard, his terror for his family turning yellow lights into challenges. Technology fails them in sequence. Hodges’s phone is dead. He borrows Holly’s, calls the police department for Larry Windom’s extension, and hits a locked office—the records clerk has gone home. There’s no cavalry. They have to stop Brady themselves, pushing them squarely into Vigilantism and Justice Outside the Law.
Hodges pivots, orders a back route to the MAC, and tries the venue directly. An automated “fembot” chirps about season passes while seconds bleed away. Jerome threads a dangerous traffic cutover; Hodges finally claws out the security extension—only to land on the exact same recording. He’s trapped inside a menu as the bomb ticks down, a modern maze designed for convenience that, here, becomes a wall.
Character Development
In crisis, the trio clarifies into their sharpest selves—and their most human flaws. Brady, meanwhile, sinks deeper into calculated performance, proving that cruelty can be disarmingly ordinary.
- Hodges: Intuitive and dogged, he spots the ball bearing and empty vest, deducing the plan’s pivot. His chest pain and fury at automated systems expose physical limits and impatience he must push through.
- Holly: Methodical under pressure, she cracks Brady’s system, reads the network overload, and keeps the team focused. Her sensitivity doesn’t slow her; it guides her attention to what matters.
- Jerome: The moment he realizes his family is in the blast zone, confidence flips to urgency. His risky driving and frantic calls channel fear into action rather than paralysis.
- Brady: He remains cold, adaptive, and contemptuous, slipping past security by preying on empathy. His disguise, props, and story are rehearsed, and he’s ready to kill in the lobby if forced—whatever it takes.
Themes & Symbols
Technology and Modern Crime: Brady’s toolkit—encrypted folders, tutorials, and voice-activated systems—enables a mass-casualty plot, while the heroes run headfirst into dead batteries, clogged cell towers, and automated phone trees. The same networks that promise connection fracture under scale and protocol, turning help lines into cul-de-sacs and making the heroes’ knowledge functionally useless until they can act in person.
The Banality of Evil: Brady’s entrance works because he looks like someone who needs help. Sympathy becomes a loophole, not a virtue, as he weaponizes courtesy, grief, and accessibility accommodations. The smiling girl beside him and the bowl-shaped seating underscore the sinister ordinariness—the architecture of shared joy doubles as an amplifier for harm.
The automated “fembot” as symbol: The chirpy recording that loops Hodges mirrors a broader bureaucratic glaze—systems designed to streamline service but incapable of recognizing emergency. When seconds matter, only a human can reroute the script; the absence of one turns convenience into hazard.
Key Quotes
“chaos.”
Jerome’s voice command reveals the death clock buried in Brady’s system. The single word embodies Brady’s planned outcome and the hair-trigger nature of his tech—one syllable away from catastrophe.
“darkness.”
The counter-command erases the countdown and unveils The Wild Bunch carnage. It’s a switch from imminent suicide to cinematic violence, mapping Brady’s mind from method to fantasy and giving the team access without detonating the trap.
“crippled man.”
Barbara’s phrase, echoed by Tanya’s gentle correction, captures how Brady’s disguise leans on social labels to deflect scrutiny. Language itself becomes part of the camouflage that invites people to look away.
Human fucking beings.
The chapter’s title doubles as a plea for real, responsive help in a world of menus and scripts. It distills Hodges’s fury at systems that can’t think, reminding us that only people can improvise when rules break.
Why This Matters and Section Significance
These chapters pivot the novel from detection to prevention. The team identifies the real target, the personal stakes spike with the Robinsons in the blast zone, and every institutional pathway collapses—no working phones, no live operators, no time. The result is a raw, human race to the MAC, where courage and speed must replace procedure. As Brady settles into the auditorium’s heart, the narrative tightens into a countdown that fuses intimate fear with public danger, setting the fuse for the climax.