Gunfire, just beyond the door. He stopped in the stairwell, his left foot raised above the rough concrete. It was running blood, the pain intensifying. Tomorrow he wouldn't be able to stand on either foot. He could feel the anger filling up in him again.He put both feet on the concrete, took his breaths, and pulled open the door.
The lights were on. The sound of the door opening made the girl in the middle of the room turn around, but she was too slow and startled by Leland's appearance, and a single short burst lifted her over the desk behind her.
Another automatic weapon went off, and the ceiling panels to Leland's left jumped and shattered. Leland had safety in the stairwell only if someone did not come upon him from above or below. He scrambled on his hands and knees across the floor to a position behind a desk. More fire, scattering items inches above his head. Leland knew where it was coming from, near his own fortress in the northeast corner. He moved to the next desk westward, poked his head up, and fired the Thompson as the other guy leaped over Leland's traffic jam of desks.
He was the only other one? Leland's feet were planted in puddles of blood. The lumps of plastic and detonators he had molded around the emergency lights were off to his right, not even in view. He moved over again, fired another burst at his fortress, and got down again. While the guy returned the fire, Leland got the last packet of plastic out of the kit bag and molded it around a detonator into a ball. In another moment, the guy was going to wake up, give his position on the radio, and call for help.
Leland worked his way around a little more. He'd killed four of them now, which wasn't bad, given the odds. This plastic was potent stuff, more than they needed for the safe, probably wrong for it, too. Now the guy was on the radio. Leland poked his head up and fired again, trying to penetrate his own defenses. He moved three or four desks closer to the northwest corner, until he could see the emergency lights to which he had molded the other packets. The other guy shot again, stitching the glass behind Leland. The cops downstairs were loving every minute of this. Cops everywhere liked to be in charge of the gunplay, and when guns were going off and they weren't in on it, it made them more than a little bit crazy.
"Hey, creep! Do you speak English?"
"Yes I do, you human filth!"
"Take a good look at those emergency lights by the elevators!"
He laughed. "I saw that movie, Sergeant York!Gary Cooper made a birdcall!"
Leland hadn't had that in mind; but then he remembered that the old man downstairs had made him think of Sergeant Yorknow what filled his thoughts was what these people had probably done to that old man.
"Look again, dummy!"
Leland saw his head coming up. "Wait!" he shouted "Don't shoot at it!"
Leland had the Thompson trained on him. The first rounds hit the guy in the neck and high in the chest, driving him back and passing through him to shatter the window beyond. Leland stood up and emptied the clip into him, keeping him upright and driving him back against the glass and then through it, three hundred and forty feet above the ground. Leland glanced again at the plastic on the emergency lights. He'd thought he knew what it was. It had certainly scared hell out of Skeezix's new friend. Later first, Leland had to tend to his feet. No, first he had to figure out how.
On his way out, he discarded the Thompson and picked up the girl's machine gun a Kalashnikov at last and three full clips of ammunition.
He went down to the thirty-third floor, looking for an office similar to his daughter's, hoping to find something besides paper, towels, and toilet tissue. He could walk, but walking made him bleed. He was on the south side of the building, on the assumption that the gang would have its attention turned to Wilshire Boulevard, where the black-and-white had been spotted.
He picked the last of the glass out of his right foot, then studied the left. The gash was in the pad behind the smallest two toes, a good three-eights of an inch deep, jagged, almost an inch and a half long. It had been a long time since he had seen his own meat like this. If it could be treated properly, the cut would give him no problems. But he didn't know if he would even find something to tie around it temporarily. Finally he remembered that the best offices had the corner views.
He found a Turkish hand towel, and he folded it once lengthwise and then tried to tie it, but it wasn't long enough. His temper started to flare again. He wanted to kill them all? Now it crossed his mind that he was glad he still had most of them left.
He caught himself. First he had to bind his foot. He sat up where the hell was he, anyway? This was a business office. He hopped across the room to the desk and got a handful of rubber bands. Good. In fact, it was pretty slick. The thickness of the towel cushioned the pressure of the rubber bands.
He wanted to see what was playing on the radio. Twenty-six was quiet. He dialed to nine.
"Come in," a voice whispered. It was a young, black voice, deep, with no trace of ghetto. "If the person who radioed for help can hear me, acknowledge this transmission if you can."
Leland pressed the "Talk" button. "You got him. Listen: you've got seven foreign nationals armed with automatic weapons and high explosive, perhaps a lot more, holding approximately seventy-five civilians hostage on the thirty-second floor. They've killed one. He's on the fortieth floor. In addition to the two birds who took the short way down. I've killed three others, including two women..."
There was a pause. "You want to identify yourself, fella?"
"Not possible. If I get the chance, I'll throw my wallet out to you."
"What else can you tell us?"
"The leader of the gang is a German named Anton Gruber, a.k.a. Antonino Rojas, Little Tony the Red, with a call on him in the German Federal Republic. He has enough explosive in here to flatten the place, which may be what he has in mind if he doesn't get what he wants, whatever that is. On the other hand, I've got the detonators, or at least some of them..."
"Throw them out."
"Can't right now, and I don't think it's a good move. As long as he thinks he can get me and make me tell him where the detonators are, he won't play his last card, the hostages."
"You talk like a man who knows something, if you understand me. I want you to throw the detonators out. The first objective is to reduce the chance of disaster."
"I already have, until they catch me. Let me talk. From what I can tell, they have the elevators locked up on the thirty-second floor. You try to shoot your way in, from above or below, and they're going to start killing women and children. Call your boss and ask him if he wants children shot on Christmas in his town."
"I want you to listen to me..."
"No, you listen: I'm wounded and I left a trail of blood to where I am now. They're still after me. I won't be leaving a trail anymore; let me protect myself and I'll get back to you."
Leland turned the radio off. He had been in one place long enough. He had to get himself together and understand how the situation had changed. He wanted to talk some more with the police.
He was limping, but he could move. It was like walking on loaves of bread. His left foot felt as though it had been sliced in half. He would know if he started bleeding badly again. He went upstairs, taking the southeast staircase, hurrying the first flight to get past the thirty-fourth floor, then slowing and feeling the pain the next two. Good enough. He was tired anyway. He wanted to rest.
Of all the aircraft he'd owned after the war, the best had been his Cessna 310. During the war he had flown all sorts of things, of course, from training planes up through the Thunderbolt, a heavy-handling, evil-looking brute, to the Mustang, the best single-engine piston aircraft ever built, bar none. He had been happiest thinking about airplanes and flying. On the day he'd checked out in the 310, he'd dropped the salesman off at the office and taxied back out to the runway again. The kid in the tower had told him to keep the wings on he'd know how good Leland was feeling that day...