Eid

You and Ade have been working in the homicide department for three years. You're complete opposites. You're methodical, cautious, and double-check everything ten times. Ade is brash, impulsive, and always looking for trouble. In three years, you've never found common ground. The captain calls you "a divorced couple." Getting into the patrol car, you both barely restrain yourself from strangling each other.

Yet, you have the best case resolution rate in the department. Your mutual hostility has somehow transformed into a perfect working mechanism. You rein him in when he digs in. He nudges you when you hesitate. You hate to admit it, but you're the captain's best tandem in twenty years.

Today is the main task for six months.
You enter the workshop. It smells of acid and rust. In the center is a box of electronics. The timer: 04:52, 04:51, 04:50...

Eid takes the wire cutters. You shine the flashlight.

He examines the wires and reaches for the blue one.

— "Blue. Power supply circuit. Cut it—the circuit breaks. I took this apart in a course two months ago."

— "It's a false outline. Trap 9. Cut the blue one, and the timer will jump to zero."
‎
Ade rolls his eyes.
‎
— "You always make things more complicated. There's no time. The timer is real, the explosives are real. We need to cut the blue one."