Louise went to activate the elevator to retrieve her bag, but as she was waiting a noise erupted in the lobby. A series of bangs and flashes echoed throughout the ground floor, followed by strange coughing noises.
And then screams.
She ran back in, Jake and Cal appearing at her side with guns in hand.
“There a back way out?” Jake asked over his shoulder as they retreated from the noise ahead.
“Yes. Through the kitchen. The delivery entrance,” Sebastian said, walking with them and snatching up the plain black backpacks that Jake was pointing at. He handed one to Cal, which Louise took from him and strapped on.
“Go,” Jake said, hanging back slightly to cover them as the last man out.
Sebastian led the way through the kitchens, turning left and right as the head of the snake escaping the fire.
“I’m assuming a car is out of the question?” Sebastian shouted back.
“It’ll be gridlock,” replied Jake confidently. “We need to go on foot, head through Central Park and cross the Hudson somehow.”
“Shit!” cursed Sebastian, surprising them all and stopping in his tracks.
“What?” Louise asked before any of the others could.
“The keys to my boat,” he said. “They’re on the bunch in my coat pocket,” he said, looking forlornly back the way they had come. As if on cue, a door behind them banged open and shouts in Mandarin could be heard echoing toward them.
“I need my bag,” Louise said, her eyes suddenly wide and her voice distant and desperate.
“You’ll have to leave it—” Cal began to say before she cut him off.
“I need my bag!” she said more loudly, on the verge of tears as the shouts grew louder behind them.
“No time, go, go, go,” Jake whispered, urging them all onwards.
The lobby was secured with ease, and three of the team held positions of cover until the lead agent walked in. He was dressed and equipped similarly to the others: plain black equipment without labels to indicate their point of origin. He glanced down at the bodies of two of his team, a quarter of his fighting strength dead already. Chen, one of his favorites who he also knew had a sister high up in the Ministry at home, lay dead with most of the right side of her skull blown away. That was unfortunate, operationally, politically, and personally as he found himself drawn to her. He barked short orders and two of his remaining team members began to secure the bodies. Making eye contact with his partner, he nodded and the two moved off into the hotel to kill the people who did this.
Sebastian, now stripped of his beautifully tailored jacket and wearing a military backpack strapped on tight over his fitted shirt, led the way. He paused at the door and looked at Jake, then at the spare duty belt he carried, then back to his eyes.
“You know how to use it?” Jake asked him, receiving a curt nod in return. He handed it over and watched as the concierge strapped it on and drew the Glock, chambering a round with a smooth and practiced action after dropping the magazine to check for brass.
He silently counted down on his fingers, three, two, one, then pushed open the door and stepped clear quickly to clear the immediate area. The others pushed out behind him. Jake and Sebastian clearly knew how to handle weapons, a point which Jake made sure to ask about soon, and Cal was holding the liberated hand cannon with some form of familiarity. Only Louise was unarmed, and Jake considered giving her his Glock 26, but decided that the last thing she probably needed right then was another gun in her hand.
Sebastian led the way, checking angles, and sticking to cover like a professional. Jake put Cal and Louise in the middle—Cal because he was injured and slow, and Louise because she was, well because she was a young woman and in a semi state of shock, leaving him to secure the rear of their foot convoy. Dropping to one knee at the north end of the block, Sebastian turned to the others.
“We need to get distance from the building,” he told them, full of a different kind of confidence than before. “Head for the park and up to 79th to get a boat from the basin. Agreed?”
The way he spoke told a story in itself, but for now everyone was happy to agree. Except Jake. He hesitated, holding back, and finally found his voice.
“Those people,” he said, the strain evident on his face, “we can’t just leave them…”
“We can, and we have to,” Sebastian snapped. Cal turned to face the young cop and put his empty left hand on his shoulder.
“Jake,” he said, searching for eye contact in the dark, “don’t you get it? This is beyond fucked up. We need to get the hell out of here before more bombs drop. On us this time.”
Jake’s face fell, and Cal suspected he could see a tear roll down one cheek quickly wiped away lest it betray any sign of weakness. They were all terrified, all shocked to their very cores about how quickly normal life had turned to horror. Jake nodded, whispering, “Okay,” and fighting down his pathological need to go back and help people.
There were just too many people who needed saving, and he had to prioritize. He closed his eyes for the briefest of moments and sent up a silent prayer for forgiveness. He couldn’t save everyone, couldn’t even realistically expect to make it back to his precinct and put himself back under the control of the NYPD command structure. He could, he assured himself, do his best to protect these civilians until they were safe. Which is what he promised himself he would do, and cross the next bridge when he came to it.
They walked together in a tightly formed line, keeping their guns hidden. The streets were in panic, as by now many people had heard of the events elsewhere in the country. Jake had lost his uniform cap in the chase north but his remaining NYPD trappings got suspicious glances from some they saw. The mixture of calm and chaos, of looting and shopkeepers remaining in their stores to protect their livelihoods, had begun to disintegrate.
Their journey took them past departments stores, some resting in the dark as though they were in hibernation and others ravaged with broken windows and stripped displays. A man careered around the corner ahead and almost thumped headfirst into Sebastian at the lead, only he stepped back and went upright against the wall to allow him to pass. His vision was obscured by the box he was holding. Amongst all the fear and chaos, amongst the world-changing events that he may or may not know about, he had chosen this precise moment to help himself to a new coffee machine.
He stumbled, saw Jake still wearing his police uniform, and completed the maneuver to fall flat on his face. The coffee machine, the now dented image of sleek plastic and shiny chrome, skidded away from his grasp as he flew back up to his feet and looked desperately left and right for inspiration and escape. He opened his mouth, stammering for a believable excuse in front of the figure of authority and enforcement. Jake saved him the trouble.
“Get the fuck out of here, asshole,” he said, prompting the opportunistic looter to regard him with surprised confusion. “I said go, fuck off!”
As instructed, he went, stopping only to retrieve the coffee machine box which rattled with the unmistakable sound of broken glass as he ran. Jake holstered his gun, stripped off his uniform jacket and unstrapped his covert holster before wordlessly handing it to Cal to hold. He unbuttoned and folded his uniform shirt and handed that over for it to be stuffed into one of the liberated bags, leaving him wearing the black base layer under his vest. He strapped the rig holding his Glock 26 back on and nodded to the others.
“No judgement,” he said, a plea more than a statement.
“Sensible,” Sebastian said from the front of their line, eyes scanning to the front.