The shooter, slightly bigger than the first but dressed in dark clothing carrying a similar backpack, lay dead in front of him. Clearly dead, unlike the one he had shot, because he hadn’t shot his suspect in the face and left a gruesome hole where the nose had been. Just as he reached out an instinctive hand to check for a pulse, an autonomous reaction he made in shock as missing a part of your brain to a bullet nearly always resulted in death, another sound grabbed his attention.
“Motherf-uuuugh…” came a hissing grunt from in the street.
Rising back into action, Jake scanned the street and laid eyes on his worst nightmare. He threw himself down next to a man dressed as he was, of roughly the same age, and in obvious agony.
“Where are you hit?” Jake asked as he tried to roll the cop onto his back to see the wound.
“Groin,” the man growled through gritted teeth and eyes screwed tightly shut, “and in the vest.”
Jake pulled up his uniform shirt to see that the shooter’s burst had raked across at gut level and the rounds had caught the bottom of his vest, but one lucky round had dropped and impacted low on his hip.
“Keep pressure on it,” Jake told him, as the man opened one eye to look at him.
“One-Three?” he gasped, seeing the metal badges on Jake’s uniform collar. “The hell are you doing up here?” he asked, meaning that he wouldn’t often see a member of the 13th precinct in his native One-Seven.
“Chased the shooters,” he told him, adding, “one killed, one unconscious.”
“Good,” gasped the wounded cop.
“Look, we need to get you inside and get a bus,” Jake told him, not knowing how he would do that when there was no cell coverage, no phone lines, and no radio to use to call for an ambulance. “Secure them,” the cop said, fluttering a weak hand toward the shooters. Jake glanced in that direction, and only saw one.
“Fuck!” he cursed aloud, releasing the pressure on the bullet wound and drawing his gun again. He stalked three paces forwards, seeing the one he had bashed in the face crawling on the sidewalk. No warnings, no verbal commands to comply, Jake stepped over and kicked the shooter full in the ribs before dropping a knee into his back and hauling hands to his back where he applied the cuffs far tighter than he would with any normal suspect. The gasp which came from under the ski mask gave him pause, and he pulled it off to see the angry, defiant, and bloodied face of a woman. Before he could say anything, she spat at him, and tried to flip on her back to use her feet as weapons. Jake stepped quickly back and raised his gun at her.
She didn’t seem to care, pulling back her foot and spinning on her back to deliver a brutal stamp at his knees intent on crippling him. He stepped aside, drew back his own boot, and kicked her in the chest like he was sending up a field goal.
He had gained the desired effect, and her attempts to fight back stopped. He dragged her back toward his wounded colleague, thinking that treating a suspect like he just had and brutalizing them in cuffs, would probably cost him his badge and his life’s ambition on any other day.
He found the cop weak and pale, his lips fluttering as he tried to speak. Looking up and around for the nearest refuge, Jake saw the lights of the Waldorf up ahead.
Sebastian had regained his composure and got all the guests upstairs or back to their rooms, amidst ridiculous questions of such ludicrous natures as to warrant an unkind response.
“No sir, I don’t know if the cable TV is working. No madam, I do not think the kitchens will be providing room service at this time,” he said calmly, even though he wanted to yell at them all to stop being so self-centered and entitled for five minutes and do as they were goddamned told. He doubted if many of them fully understood the neck-deep level of shit they were in now, and how surviving the night was not a guaranteed prospect at this time.
He turned to find Cal and Louise still with him. “You two need to get upstairs too, please.” Cal opened his mouth to protest but Sebastian cut him off. “Cal, you’re pretty beat up. You need to rest, hell you probably need to spend at least a night in hospital, but something tells me that’s not going to happen.”
Cal went to speak again but another sound cut him off.
“NYPD!” came the familiar but unexpected shout. All eyes turned to the street to see Jake, sweating, and breathing hard, outside the glass front with another cop over one shoulder in a fireman’s carry and a dark shape dragging on the ground in his right hand.
“Jake?” Cal said as Sebastian moved forwards to open the bolts and let him in.
“Help Tromans,” he gasped, short of breath. He knew only three things about the now-unconscious brother he carried; he knew he was a cop from the 17th precinct as dictated by the numbers on his collar, he knew he was called Tromans thanks to the name badge on his chest, and he was badly hurt—probably dying.
Sebastian lifted the burden off Jake, carrying the man further inside the lobby and laying him down as he called out the names of staff to help him. Cal helped Jake drag his other burden inside, his shock registering with a single curse word.
“What the hell happened?” Louise asked.
Jake dropped to his knees, exhausted at having carried the dead weight of two people the short distance. “Shooters. Terrorists probably. One is dead and this one’s unconscious. The other one got Tromans just as he got him. I need to get back out there…” he said, climbing to his feet and reapplying the handcuffs to the unconscious woman to lock her arms around a pillar.
“Are you joking?” Cal said, putting a hand on his shoulder.
“The other one. I need to bring him in. His equipment…” Jake gasped in between deep breaths as he sucked in oxygen.
“I’m coming with you,” Cal told him, forgetting his own physical state in worry that Jake would go back out alone.
“Okay,” Jake said surprising Cal by not arguing. “Stay close and do as I say. It’s not far.”
As they left, Louise picked up the large pistol from where Sebastian had left it while tending to Tromans. She stood guard by the door with the nervous remaining members of the paid security staff.
Three minutes later, Jake appeared at the door with his gun in both hands and eyes darting everywhere. Screams and shouts erupted in the street outside and the flickering orange light told Louise there was a fire nearby. Cal dragged in a body dressed in dark clothing and streaking blood from where the head scraped along the ground. The lobby was locked up, and the lights dimmed to leave the security guards watching the glass front. Jake’s first priority was Tromans, and he walked over to see that his uniform had been cut away and gauze was being packed onto the hole in his hip. His skin looked gray.
Sebastian looked up at Jake and shook his head slightly before returning his attention to the wound. Jake swallowed, and walked back to his two suspects; one dead and one unconscious.
“Tromans is likely…” he told Cal and Louise, confusing them. Neither knew what he meant, and it pained him to explain it. “Likely to die from his injuries,” he told them. He pushed past the devastating news and knelt by the dead suspect. He peeled off the face mask, showing the gore of where the bullet had made his features seem less human. Stripping off his backpack he emptied the contents and sat back on his boots with his mouth wide open.
The backpack contained a stack of spare magazines which he laid out next to the gun, a bullpup design none of them had ever seen anything like before. Its fat, oversized barrel had a built-in suppressor, and a red-tinted holographic sight sat above the carry handle.