Hendricks Chemicals Detasheet

Hendricks Chemicals Detasheet is a rubberized explosive whose discovery among a large weapons cache connects the cache to the bomb attack on Hodges’s car. The link is made through the lead-azide detonators already associated with that attack, although chemical analysis of the explosive itself has not yet confirmed the identification.

Identification and Properties

During a discussion of the cache found at King Virtue Pawn & Loan, Pete Huntley tells Hodges that it contains at least four dozen crates of Hendricks Chemicals Detasheet, alongside rifles, machine guns, grenades, pistols, and other weapons. Hodges identifies Detasheet as rubberized explosive. The quantity and placement among the weapons make it a substantial part of the cache, rather than an incidental item.

Connection to the Car Bomb

Huntley explains that Detasheet is set off with lead-azide detonators, the same kind already known to have been used in the bomb that destroyed Hodges’s car. The explosive itself has not yet undergone chemical analysis, so Huntley’s conclusion remains a prediction rather than a laboratory-confirmed result. Nevertheless, he expects the analysis to identify the material as Detasheet, giving investigators a direct technical lead between the cache and the earlier attack.

Narrative Significance

The Detasheet discovery changes the meaning of the raid on King Virtue: it may provide material evidence connecting the stockpile to the car bomb, which Hodges has understood as an act of revenge. The explosives therefore turn a cache of weapons into a potential link in the investigation, while the pending chemical analysis leaves a distinction between a strong inference and confirmed proof. The scene also underscores the scale of the threat: the cache contains not just firearms but dozens of crates of explosive material.