Grand Ambition

Tim dropped his spoon, and his porridge splattered all over the cloth.

"Bloody hell!"

He heard the words come out of his mouth before he could stop them.

"Language!"

His mum was not impressed. "...and at the breakfast table as well." She tutted as she scrubbed at the mess with a cloth, "What prompted that outburst?"

"Erm nothing," replied Tim sheepishly, "I've had enough anyway. I'm going to be late."

Before she could argue, he grabbed his rucksack and phone and ran out of the door, dialling his friends number before he was out of the gate.

"Have you got the message?"

"Yeah, great news, I should have had double maths today. I'm off back to bed, what about you? Fancy meeting at the park later?"

"The park? Did you even read the message John?"

"Course I did, 'School will be closed for unexpected essential repairs today. Students should attend as usual tomorrow unless they hear differently.'" John parroted the message back as he remembered it.

"And the rest?" Tim prompted.

"I didn’t read any more," admitted John, "why what's up?"

"Just read it all idiot! Meet me at the playing fields in half an hour."

Tim rang off and re-read the second part of the message, sent from the school office that morning.

'The Gas Board are currently investigating the cause of an explosion on the school grounds. They are working on the assumption that a gas pipe has been struck by lightening. All works are predicted to be completed by the end of today.'

A few weeks earlier, Tim had been messing about with his sister's chemistry set. He was gutted that she had thought of asking for the set last Christmas and not him; it looked really cool but she wouldn't let him anywhere near it.

She had a boyfriend now though, and the test tubes and little vials of chemicals had taken a back seat. Tim had taken to messing about with it when she was out; he enjoyed watching the reactions as he mixed things together and heated them up with the little bunsen burner.

One day though, she had come home early and caught him redhanded - they both had - as the film they had planned to see at the cinema was full.

Lucy went ballistic and ranted at him for wasting her precious chemicals. Marcus, however, just stood in the background and smirked, and later managed to corner him for a quick chat.

Marcus was clever, and was really into science. He was going to go to university and study Biochemistry, but his real interest was explosives; not in a scary way - he wasn't crazy - he just enjoyed fiddling about in the back yard and seeing what happened.

Tim remembered Marcus telling him about a bomb he had made. He and his friends had detonated a mixture of chemicals in the back entry by taking turns to throw lit matches at it. The result, when one of them eventually landed, was a massive explosion and clouds of black smoke which they ran away from, coughing and choking, their eyes streaming - right into a couple of bobbies who marched them home in disgrace.

Not to be deterred, they had taken to using a friends garage as their lab space. That had worked out really well until they blew the doors off one weekend. Now, banned from his friends house and after receiving a ticking off from his parents, (but probably really due to his new relationship status with Lucy), Marcus had restricted his chemistry adventures to the school science lab, where he had built up quite a good relationship with the lab technician, Sully.

Marcus offered to walk down to the corner shop with Tim whilst Lucy was watching TV with her parents. This wasn't the sort of chat you have in public.

"What were you trying to do?" Marcus asked, referring back to Tim's earlier exposure and the subsequent ear-bashing from his sister.

"Oh, you know, nothing really. I was just messing about, seeing what happened when I mixed stuff together."

Marcus replied thoughtfully, "It's dangerous stuff you know, chemistry. You can't just 'mess about', you need to know what you're doing or you could hurt yourself."

"And how do you find out about that sort of stuff?" asked Tim, "They're hardly going to tell you how to make bombs at school, in chemistry, are they?"

"I've got some books from the library," offered Marcus, "I can show you a few bits and bobs if you like, but you have to promise to be careful - I don't want you accidentally blowing up your whole family or turning into some sort of terrorist."

"Don't be daft, I'm just interested - same as you are. It's only a bit if fun."

"OK. Well you're never going to do anything interesting with that chemistry set - its for kids. I'll get you some stuff and photocopy a few pages for you. Give me a few days."

"Great!" Said Tim, rubbing his hands together and grinning from ear to ear, "and don't worry, I'm not going to do anything stupid. Where will you get the stuff from?"

"You ask too many questions." Replied Marcus.

True to his promise, when he arrived to pick Lucy up at the weekend, Marcus passed him a carrier bag. "Hope you have a banging weekend," he quipped, "and if you can't be good, be careful."

The two of them strolled off, hand in hand, and Tim raced down to the shed.

Monday morning, and Tim was sitting at the back of the bus nursing his rucksack. John sat down heavily next to him and dug him in the ribs.

"Pack it in!" Tim scowled, hugging the bag even closer.

"What's up with you misery guts?" asked John, delivering another hard dig in the ribs.

"You"ll see soon enough. Too bloody soon if you keep poking me." He opened his bag a crack and let John look inside.

"What the hell is that? Why have you brought a jar of jam to school?"

"It's not jam, you idiot, it's a bomb."

"Christ!" yelped John, leaping out if his seat. "What the hell are you doing with a bomb?"

"Calm down and shut up!" growled Tim, "Everyone's looking. Sit down."

John sat down again but there were no more digs. "Explain yourself." He said sharply. "I know you don't like school, but I didn't think you were a nutter. What are you planning to do with that?"

John was sweating profusely and looked very nervous.

"I'm not planning anything. I'm not a madman! It probably won't even work. I just thought we could test it together."

"What, in school! Are you mental?"

"No, not in school, stupid. I thought we could bunk off maths this morning and go down to the bunker. If it works we can make fireworks and sell them for bonfire night - we could make a fortune!"

John's ears pricked up at the thought of making some easy cash, and he visibly relaxed now that he knew Tim hadn't completely flipped. "Oh, that's OK then. Count me in. I could do with earning a few quid, I need a new gear set for my bike."

Exiting the bus, the two boys slipped away from the crowd and made their way down the banks of the playing field to the old bunker, normally unofficially reserved for seniors smoking.

Tim took the jar of powder out of his bag, carefully perching it on the ground on a pile of soil.

They both sat and looked at it for a moment.

"What now?" Asked John.

"Now, we need to ignite it." Said Tim and produced a box of matches procured from his dad's shed.

"Well, bags not doing that," said John, "I'm quite fond of my eyebrows - and all my limbs!"

"You're right, we can't get too close. I don't know how powerful it is."

"We could just throw the matches." Suggested John.

Tim agreed. "You took the words right out of my mouth."

The next half hour was spent lighting and throwing matches at the jar. Most went out before they reached their target and the rest hit the side of the jar. None went in.

"Right, a different approach is needed," said Tim, determined that this experiment was going to work. "Have you got PE today?"

"Erm, yes. Why?"

"Give me the cord out of your rugby shorts, I can use it as a fuse."

John didn't look sure. "Then my shorts will fall down! I get the piss taken out of me enough in rugby as it is."

"Do you want a share of the firework cash or not?" Asked Tim. "We need to do this now, before everyone comes out for break."

It worked! The flame travelled down the cotton cord and into the jar, which exploded magnificently, throwing shards of glass in every direction.

"Bloody hell!" Shouted Tim dancing about behind the bunker.

"Run!" Shouted John. In the distance he could see four teachers running towards the billowing smoke that was now drifting across the playing fields.

The two boys climbed on top of the bunker and leapt over the wall, racing away out of sight and quickly losing their pursuers. There was no way they could go into school late now - they would be prime suspects and probably get suspended. They'd have to think up a reason why they hadn't been in - a really good one that wouldn't get back to their parents.

On Tuesday morning, whilst everyone else was enjoying a rare lie-in, Tim and John were making their way up the lane towards the school playing fields, and as they turned the corner they could see a huge white tent over the bunker and two police cars blocking off the road from each end. As casually as they could, they strolled up to the policeman standing in front of the first car.

"You cant be here lads, go home. Didn't you get the message? Thought you'd have been glad of an extra day off school."

" My phone's not charged," lied Tim. "What's happened?"

"I can't discuss an open case, I'm afraid. Now do as you're told and go home. Unexpected days off don't come around too often, make the most of it."

Open case!

The boys glanced at each other uneasily as they made their way back down the lane towards the bus stop. "Trust you to get something right for a change." Said John, obviously concerned.

"Cheeky sod." Replied Tim, elbowing his friend in the ribs and sprinting off, with John in quick pursuit, bent on revenge.

The next day Tim came downstairs for breakfast, later than usual and rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. He hadn’t slept well, as he couldn't get the previous days events out of his head. He couldn't think of a believable excuse for not being in school either, and was certain that someone would put two and two together.

"You're going to be late! Cereal or toast?" his mum asked, plonking down a glass of milk in front of him.

Tim didn't answer. He was listening intently to the radio. His mouth was wide open and he had gone a strange colour, as though all of the blood had drained out of his face.

'A man has been arrested following a suspicious explosion at a local school.

Jack Sullivan, previously a pupil at the school and currently employed in the chemistry department , has issued a statement via his solicitor proclaiming his innocence. He informed officers that he has no idea how chemicals from his lab were used to make the bomb that ended up behind the old air raid shelter on the school grounds.

The event is being treated as suspicious - and possibly as a failed terrorist attack.

Luckily, the bomb was crudely made and lacked power, otherwise the consequences could have been a lot worse.

Nobody was hurt in the incident, but police are asking anyone with information to come forward, particularly two boys seen fleeing the scene.'

One thing was certain, Tim had no appetite for breakfast.

How on earth were they going to get out of this one?