Thursday Drabble: Homemade Weapons
"We believe," the suited man finally admitted, "that the stolen materials will be used to create a small bomb -"
"Ridiculous," Thea interrupted, causing Silas, who had been staring intently at their debriefer as he absorbed the magnitude of this assignment, to turn sharply to her.
The agent gave the consultant a thin, brittle smile. "And why, professor, do you claim that the predictions of the Agency are 'ridiculous?'"
"Because," she replied, "the amount of risk involved in stealing, hiding, and refining your stolen materials is exorbitant for the purpose. Anyone can make a small bomb: if, as you suspect, the culprits are an organized cell of terrorists, stealing from you is simply unnecessary. Your superiors are wasting my time by expecting me to believe such a patently ridiculous story. Fortunately for you, I know that your concern is not a small terrorism threat with a homemade bomb, dirty or otherwise, but you might want to inform your superiors that feeding me false information is at best an affront to my intelligence and, if I had believed it, likely to prevent you from obtaining fully useful data. You cannot expect a person to draw the correct conclusion from falsified data."
Silas almost felt sorry for the suit. He'd obviously drawn the short straw when he was assigned to debrief Thea. Almost. He'd be more inclined to sympathy if the two of them hadn't been all-but abducted for this debriefing, especially as he suspected that once again, he would be unable to give a straight answer to why he had been out of contact with his students all weekend. The agency would want Thea on the scene, and he'd seen how well that usually went. Thea in an entire building full of suits was a disaster waiting to happen.
The man siezed on the only part of Thea's speech that he could logically refute. "It seems to me something of an exaggeration to say that 'anyone' can make a bomb, professor," he replied, smugly.
"I should have said 'anyone with a high-school graduate's knowlege of chemistry, access to the internet, and a credit card.' They'd also have to be willing to spend several weeks at least in constructing it, if they wished to do it secretly, and be willing to accept the possiblility of injury if there were an accident in their makeshift lab, but for most types of bombs, an abandoned factory or machine shop should be sufficient. I can think of three ways to extract explosive compounds and arm a bomb with materials found in the average office building."
The expression that briefly flickered over the agent's face made Silas want to slam his head against the nearest available surface. He was going to have to have one of those talks with Thea again. And this one would be to explain why you should never tell a hypervigilant government watchdog that you knew how to make a bomb.
"You, professor? By your own estimation, you are not exactly 'anyone.'"
Thea shrugged. "My doctorate is not in chemistry. I'd be willing to bet that most scientists would be able to find out at least one, and your average researcher of chemistry half a dozen or more."
Correction: why you should never tell a hypervigilant government watchdog that every scientist in the world knew how to make a bomb.
AN: Thea needs to stop trying to be helpful. Seriously. Thea's weapon of choice would, of course, be her brain, because she can then figure out how to make other weapons.
"Ridiculous," Thea interrupted, causing Silas, who had been staring intently at their debriefer as he absorbed the magnitude of this assignment, to turn sharply to her.
The agent gave the consultant a thin, brittle smile. "And why, professor, do you claim that the predictions of the Agency are 'ridiculous?'"
"Because," she replied, "the amount of risk involved in stealing, hiding, and refining your stolen materials is exorbitant for the purpose. Anyone can make a small bomb: if, as you suspect, the culprits are an organized cell of terrorists, stealing from you is simply unnecessary. Your superiors are wasting my time by expecting me to believe such a patently ridiculous story. Fortunately for you, I know that your concern is not a small terrorism threat with a homemade bomb, dirty or otherwise, but you might want to inform your superiors that feeding me false information is at best an affront to my intelligence and, if I had believed it, likely to prevent you from obtaining fully useful data. You cannot expect a person to draw the correct conclusion from falsified data."
Silas almost felt sorry for the suit. He'd obviously drawn the short straw when he was assigned to debrief Thea. Almost. He'd be more inclined to sympathy if the two of them hadn't been all-but abducted for this debriefing, especially as he suspected that once again, he would be unable to give a straight answer to why he had been out of contact with his students all weekend. The agency would want Thea on the scene, and he'd seen how well that usually went. Thea in an entire building full of suits was a disaster waiting to happen.
The man siezed on the only part of Thea's speech that he could logically refute. "It seems to me something of an exaggeration to say that 'anyone' can make a bomb, professor," he replied, smugly.
"I should have said 'anyone with a high-school graduate's knowlege of chemistry, access to the internet, and a credit card.' They'd also have to be willing to spend several weeks at least in constructing it, if they wished to do it secretly, and be willing to accept the possiblility of injury if there were an accident in their makeshift lab, but for most types of bombs, an abandoned factory or machine shop should be sufficient. I can think of three ways to extract explosive compounds and arm a bomb with materials found in the average office building."
The expression that briefly flickered over the agent's face made Silas want to slam his head against the nearest available surface. He was going to have to have one of those talks with Thea again. And this one would be to explain why you should never tell a hypervigilant government watchdog that you knew how to make a bomb.
"You, professor? By your own estimation, you are not exactly 'anyone.'"
Thea shrugged. "My doctorate is not in chemistry. I'd be willing to bet that most scientists would be able to find out at least one, and your average researcher of chemistry half a dozen or more."
Correction: why you should never tell a hypervigilant government watchdog that every scientist in the world knew how to make a bomb.
AN: Thea needs to stop trying to be helpful. Seriously. Thea's weapon of choice would, of course, be her brain, because she can then figure out how to make other weapons.