Reaper (14 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY SIX

Their next stop was right down the street, Almaden Lake.  Contents wise, the disaster storage container there was almost an exact duplicate of the storage container at the substation.  Between the two vehicles, they were able to get all fifty cots loaded and strapped down.

Looking like a caravan of gypsies on vacation, they cut over to Santa Teresa Boulevard and turned south, where they picked up a residential street named Curie that traced the foothills.  It was their plan to follow this street all the way to San Ignacio and from there to Great Oaks Boulevard, which would take them back to the substation.  As they drove, without any particular plan or purpose on their part, Max and Steve were in the front truck, with Frank and Will following.

Approaching the intersection with Applegate, Max noticed a lone man standing in the street.  The man turned to his right and waved his hand but continued to stand where he was.  When they were about half a block away, Max could see he was a Hispanic male wearing a blue shirt, long baggie shorts, white socks pulled up to his knees, and white tennis shoes.

Even though it had to be obvious to this person he was standing directly in Max’s path of travel, he wasn’t moving.  That’s when Max got that first little twinge that something wasn’t right.  So he slowed down, finally stopping in the middle of the street, about sixty feet away.  At the same time, both he and Steve started looking left, right, and behind them.

“What the hell?” Steve said.

No sooner did those words leave Steve’s mouth, than a blue Chevy Monte Carlo pulled out into the intersection from Applegate, blocking the road.

Max immediately backed up, signaling Frank out his open driver’s window, to do the same.  Frank got the message and started backing rapidly, but after only a short distance, came to a stop.  In his side view mirror, Max could see a second vehicle blocking the street behind them and the doors on both sides of that vehicle opening.

Looking front again, Max saw the male who had been standing in the street, walking rapidly toward him, gripping a pistol in his hand, pointing it gangster style right at them.  Behind that suspect were two others, also armed, trotting to catch up.

“I got front, you take back,” Max said with a degree of calm that didn’t fit the circumstances.

In the next instant, both he and Steve were out of the truck. Given the circumstances, Max dispensed with the usual BS demands for surrender. Instead, he just unloaded on them.  His first round caught the nearest suspect ten X, right in the chest, putting him out of the fight …and out of everything else for that matter.  This caused the other two to scatter, but it didn’t dissuade them from taking shots as they ran.  They were moving, though, and Max wasn’t.  He had a nice, firm, well-planted, two-handed stance.

He hit the next one in the hip or thigh as he presented a side view, spinning him around and causing him to go down to one knee.  The third shooter, in the meantime, threw his gun arm backwards as he ran, and fired wildly, three or four times, as he moved toward a parked car. One of his bullets went through the truck’s windshield at such an angle that it skimmed Max’s back, high up, just below the base of his neck.

Max shifted his attention back to the wounded shooter, the closest threat, but he’d already discarded his weapon and was limping away.  Turning back to the guy behind the car, Max saw him pop up, fire a shot that went up into the trees, and drop back down again.  In response, Max fired twice, just over the top of the parked car’s hood, and then dropped down onto the asphalt. Laying on his left side and sighting under the truck, he shot the third suspect in his left knee as it rested in the gutter just behind the front wheels of the parked car.

The third suspect screamed, swore, shoved his pistol over the top of the car he was hiding behind, and fired again.

As all this was going on, Max could hear gunfire behind him, a great deal of gunfire in fact, that suddenly went silent.

At this point, Max went to a squat and yelled at the third suspect, telling him to stand up with his hands showing.  This got another round of cuss words in response.  Max was just about to try the bullet under the parked car trick again, when he heard two very loud gunshots.  He looked over the hood of the truck and saw Frank standing near the right rear corner of the parked car, pointing his magnum.

Frank was soon joined by Steve who said, “Dude, I gotta get me one of them things,” referencing Frank’s .357 revolver.  “How’d you ….”

Max yelled, “Hey you guys, I know that was fun and all, but I don’t particularly want to stand around and get shot at anymore.”

“Now, what kind of an attitude is that?” Steve said shaking his head.  “You gotta learn to enjoy life, man.  You know, live a little, drink the wine, dance to the music, and all that sort of stuff.”

They took a few seconds to snap some cell phone photos and collect the firearms before everyone piled into the trucks, drove up onto the curb and around the Monte Carlo, and gassed it out of there.  In his side-view mirrors, Max saw two bodies in the street in front of a lowered SUV, apparently the ones who had attacked from the rear.  The image sparked the thought, we killed two yesterday and four today.  Most cops go thirty years without even shooting at anyone.  Never in a million years would I have imagined things could get this bad.

It wasn’t until they were just about to the substation when the adrenaline wore off enough that Max began to feel the pain along the back of his shoulders.  Steve, seeing him squirm in the seat in an attempt to get comfortable, looked over and saw the blood on his back.

“Hey dude, you’re bleeding.  Pull over a sec so I can check it out.”

“I’m okay.  It can wait ‘til we get home.”

Steve used his phone to call Myra, who was at the substation, and let her know Max had been injured. She and Dr. Patel were waiting for him when they arrived.

“I’m all right,” Max said.

“I’m not looking for your opinion,” Myra said, cutting his shirt off.

Max smiled and kept his mouth shut until Will, who was looking over Myra’s shoulder as she examined Max’s wound, said, “Hey, if I’m going to hang out with you guys, you’re going to have to teach me to shoot.  It was definitely no fun just sitting there and not being able to shoot back.”

Max started to turn to answer him, but was stopped when Myra slapped the back of his head and said, “Hold still.”

Will’s comment was worth consideration, though, Max thought.  Here I am, asking some of the residents to help out with security, which puts them in danger, as the shootout at the gate proved, but not equipping them to defend themselves.  That wasn’t fair or smart.  People have the right to protect themselves.

From the conversation that was going on between Dr. Patel and Myra, he got the impression they weren’t particularly worried about his wound.

Eventually, Myra told Will to get up, he was sitting on the tailgate of his truck, and walk with her to the prisoner processing center, which she’d converted into the infirmary.  As he stood and she hefted her trauma bag onto her shoulder, she said, “You’ll survive your wound, but I’m not so sure you’ll survive the treatment.  Don’t you know how to duck?”

“Hey, there were five of ‘em, and it went down fast.”

She took his arm and pulled him close.  “That really wasn’t a question.”

To his back, Steve said he’d call it in to the department.

CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN

June 23
rd

The bullet had cut a groove in the skin over the muscle above Max’s right shoulder blade, just missing his spinal column, a point Myra felt worth mentioning to him at least ten times already.  But he did have to admit, he was lucky once again, though the pain was no small matter.  It made some simple hand and arm movements a very unpleasant experience.

He found Steve, Beth, and Gavin at one of the tables in the break room, eating breakfast.

“Well here he is,” Beth said.  “I hear that bullet almost hit your spine.”

Max shook his head and wondered if he was gonna hear this shit all damn day.  “It wasn’t that close,” he muttered.

He pulled out a chair, winced at the pain, gingerly sat down, and turned his attention to Steve.  “I want to start training some of the non-sworn to shoot …and when to shoot.”

“You’re gonna get some pushback on that from Godfrey; city liability and all that stuff.”

“I’ll just have to deal with it is all.  It’s just that, well, think about it a second. In a short period of time we’ve been involved in two shootings, three if you count the mall, no, wait, four if you count the deal at Raha’s house.  Close by we’ve had a bombing that took out a power station, a firebombing that destroyed a federal office building, and a shootout between rival gangs in a shopping center parking lot, injuring bystanders and a cop who was just looking for a damn cup of coffee.  The way I see it, we can put bulletproof barriers all over the place, fences, cameras, all that stuff, but it still comes down to we’re not going to be able to keep people completely safe.  And it seems to be getting worse.  Plus, we’re asking non-sworn to supplement sworn, trained personnel on security details so we have twenty-four hour coverage.  It’s not fair to the non-sworn they can’t protect themselves.”

“Hey, you don’t have to convince me.  I’m just saying Godfrey is going to use it to try and get to you.”

“I know.  You up for taking the lead on it?”

“You know me and shooting.  Sure I am.”

“In that case, I want to be in the first class,” Beth said.

Steve looked at his wife, covered Gavin’s ears, and said, “Babe, that’s just about the sexiest thing you’ve ever said.  I think I’m getting a woody.”

She shook her head.  “Sometimes I don’t understand how your mind works.  How do you put sex and shooting together in the same thought?”

“If you were a man, you’d understand.”

To get things back on track, Max said, “The first thing is, we have to pick, say five to ten people who we can trust to act rationally.  Will already expressed an interest, and we can certainly trust him. Louis clearly knows his way around firearms, so won’t need much more than a tune-up. Jessica says she’s gotten some hands-on from her husband.  And Frank, he could probably teach the class. So with Beth, that’s five already.”

“We’ve got the indoor range, too.  We could do everything right here.  Maybe even throw in some building-search training.”

“Worth a try.”

Over the PA system; “Max Calloway, if you’re in the building, they need you at the front gate.  Max Calloway, please respond to the front gate.”

As Max and Steve approached the front of the property, they could see half a dozen people on the inside of the fence facing an equal number on the outside.  The only thing was, the people on the outside arrived in marked DHS vehicles and wore uniforms.

As they neared, Max could hear one of the uniformed visitors saying, “I don’t see what the big deal is.  We just want to look around.  We didn’t even know anybody was here.”

Maureen Cooney, who again was one of the on-duty — off-duty sworn officers working security, and who had a carbine on a single point sling hanging at her side, said, “If you didn’t think anyone was here, how’d you expect to get in?”

“Well, I don’t know, I guess we just figured the gate would be open.  I still don’t see what the big deal is.  We’re cops, just like you.”

Walt Briggs, who was standing off to the side, said, “You ain’t
anything
like us, man.”

The uniformed DHS officer who was doing all the talking, a short man in his early fifties, who had very close-cropped hair, and was built like a whiskey barrel on steroids, squinted at Walt and asked, “And who exactly are you?”

Before Walt could answer, Max moved to the front and said, “What’s up?”

Without taking her eyes off Barrel Boy, Maureen said, “They showed up a couple of minutes ago wanting to check the place out.”

“So why do you want to check the place out?” Max asked.  He noticed the name Calhoun stenciled on the man’s uniform shirt, along with the double bars of a captain on his collar.

“And who are you?” Calhoun asked.

“Max Calloway.  Why do you want to check the place out?”

“Max Calloway.  Max Calloway …the ballet dancer, Max Calloway …the short-order cook, Max Calloway who exactly?”

“Max Calloway, the guy who says who can come in and who can’t.  Why do you want to check the place out?”

As he said it, Max became aware of more people crowding in behind him.  At that point, a completely irrational thought came into his head; what if the DHS opened fire on us.  As soon as he thought it, he pushed it aside.

Calhoun stood there for a couple of seconds as if he was trying to decide something, shrugged his shoulders, and said, “Okay, we’re looking for a place we can keep a couple hundred prisoners until they can be moved to a more secure location.  We took them into custody during yesterday’s unlawful assembly.”

Frank, from the back of the crowd said, “You mean a couple hundred American citizens exercising their right to assemble and speak, not a couple hundred terrorists, correct?”

“Make no mistake about it, these people broke the law.”

Max raised his hand to cut off any further comments from the residents behind him. That slight movement, once again, created enough pain to cause him to suck a breath.  As the pain began to subside, he quietly said, “It’s not going to happen, ever.”

Calhoun raised his eyebrows, crossed his arms on his chest, “Ever?”

“That’s right.  You’ll have to find some other place.”

Calhoun’s eyes looked at the crowd and then beyond them to the building.  “You know, if we wanted to, we could take it from you.”

“That’s not going to happen either,” Max said, but as he said those words he was thinking, yeah, you probably can.

“Okay, Max Calloway, the guy who says who comes in and who doesn’t, or whoever the fuck you are, we might or might not be back.  But either way, I’ll remember you and the others.”  His eyes rested briefly on Maureen, Walt, and Frank.  “We’re going to be around for a long time.  I think you better get used to it and become, shall we say, more cooperative.”

At that, he turned around, twirled his index finger in a circle, and said, “Okay, mount up and move to the next location.”

When they were out of earshot, Steve asked, “You don’t think they’ll try anything, do you?”

“I don’t think so, at least as long as there is even a pretense of, ‘we the people.’  But then again, who would have ever dreamed all that’s happened so far.  So maybe just in case the lunatics do escape the asylum, we should continue to prepare.”

Max waved Maureen, Will and Walt over.

“Let’s call a meeting of all sworn and non-sworn working security.  We have to tighten-up our procedures.  I don’t want everyone grouping up at the gate like this again.  One person will approach and make contact, while the others hold back behind the barriers.  When they’re making their rounds checking the perimeter fence, one stays in place behind cover, while the other walks.  And as soon as we have more people trained to use firearms, I’d like someone with a good scoped rifle up on the roof.  We’ve got three or four hunting rifles in the arms room we can use and a couple of the AR’s have optics as well, so we should be able to work something out.”

“I got just the thing for that,” Steve said with a smile.

“I won’t ask,” Max said.  Then he got more serious.  “Look, we just can’t afford to ignore what’s going on.  What’s happened to us so far is only a fraction of what’s happening around the city.  God knows what’s going on in the rest of the country.”

“You can say that again,” Walt commented.  “Narco came into briefing the other night and said that the Mexican drug cartels are actually taking over small towns in the central valley and are supposedly organizing some of the street gangs right here in San Jose.”

“It’s crazy out there Max,” Maureen added.  “We can’t keep up with it.  We’ve got things happening that would normally be major deals, but they’re only getting a two-car response and a report filed, if that.  Hardly anyone is working investigations anymore.  Almost everybody is in uniform responding to calls.  There are officer-involved shootings every single night.”

“How’d all this happen anyway?” Walt asked.

“I don’t know, man,” Max said.  “I think it’s always been there just below the surface. But now, we’ve had these attacks that just seem to keep going on and on, which is making people afraid, killing the economy, and creating the impression there’s no law and order.  Then we have a government that changes all the rules we thought were cast in stone, giving the impression there are no rules, and maybe never have been.  It’s just a big mess.”

Steve said, “I don’t know about all that, but I do know that we’ve got good people,” he pointed toward the building, “and we’ve got assholes,” he pointed outside the gate.  “So we protect the good people and shoot the assholes …ah, only if necessary, and only when all other reasonable means have failed, of course.”

“Of course,” Maureen said.

“How about some razor wire?” Will said.  “We’ve got some at the yard.  And if I can get my hands on something like a front-loader, maybe we can rig up a vehicle of some kind with steel plating to give the people on the outside some protection.  The Israeli’s use ‘em.  Saw a video on one at a trade show.”

“Perfect,” Max said.  “If you need bodies to help with that, let Jessica know.  Okay everyone, let’s meet tonight at twenty-one hundred hours in the briefing room to go over some safety procedures.  Ideas are welcome.”