The Runners: Chapter 27
Chapter 27
‘BOOM’, a thundering explosion shook the restaurant from an upper section of the Manchurian Inn. Instantaneously, the detonation silenced every conversation and chatter that used to fill every corner of the dining hall. Smoke and dust spewed out from the upper corridors, sending gray and black particles down to the main dining area. Reflexively, the patrons dug down under their tables, covering their heads and ears as if to shield their senses from the ominous aftershocks that were sure to follow after an initial earth quake.
Loud sounds of discharging firearms followed soon after from the upstairs of the restaurant. Highly disoriented and hysterical, the patrons began fleeing the dining hall in every which way, anticipating aftershocks that would surely rattle them once again. The patrons got up, grabbing any belongings that they could manage to hold. In a matter of a few seconds, chaos broke loose as people began rushing for the door, screaming and yelling.
It was every man and woman for oneself. There was a family of four, mom, dad and two little girls who were enjoying their dinner when the explosion went off. The girls began screaming and they froze as all the pandemonium shook the dining room. The father grabbed both girls and having placed each one under his arms, he began running towards the door. As he neared the steps that were leading up to the exit, the lights in the dining room went dark and caused him to lose his footing. He tripped over the stairs, inevitably falling and dropping both his daughters. He knew that waves of people were running towards the door from behind him. The father quickly got on to his knees and elbows, shielding both his girls with his body so that, he could protect them from getting trampled upon by the mad stampede of the patrons.
Another explosion ensued upstairs. Consequently, people ducked, freezing their motions once again. Then, the girls’ father heard his wife screaming for help by the dining table, where they were enjoying what used to be a quiet 40th birthday dinner for his wife. His wife was being pushed by other patrons who were only trying to find their own safe passage out of the dining hall. In the process, his wife lost her balance, fell on to the floor, and was being run over by the men and women who were wildly dashing towards the exit.
With his daughters to protect, he could not help his wife. He heard his wife’s desperate yelling for help, but he could not visually locate her as the restaurant dimmed down to complete darkness. Even if he had located his wife, he couldn’t possibly move towards her. He was shielding his daughters by putting himself over them, so that they wouldn’t be trampled upon.
“Shannon! Shannon!” He could only shout out his wife’s name as he held on to his girls.
After emitting a flash of light, the signal transponder morphed into a powerful bomb. It had exploded and as quickly, it had incinerated the wall separating the two groups. From the force of the explosion, smaller pieces of the device flew into various directions. Some of them embedded into the walls in the hall way. These pieces, then, went off with ‘BANGS’ in the secondary explosions, which wreaked further havoc to the people downstairs. The subsequent bangs that people downstairs heard were caused by these secondary explosions from the smaller particles.
As the wall dividing the two rooms exploded, its strong force had thrown David and Robin from their seats. Robin went flying and hit her head against the other side of the wall, temporarily impairing her movements. There was bleeding on her head while David, as he was thrown forward, had fallen onto the floor. When he looked over to Robin, he noticed streaks of blood from Robin’s forehead, reaching down to her chin. Robin reached out for David. But, her hand would only extend out to just inches away from her head.
David hit the floor with his hands then he rolled over his shoulders several times as he could not withstand the force of the explosion. Executing the protective falling techniques that he had learned from the academy, he had managed to absorb the shocks, avoiding major injuries. He felt that he would never exercise these maneuvers in real life situations when he had graduated from the academy. But, here he was, using his instincts and applying the survival skills to prolong his life for the second time in the short span of two days.
David was shook up, but felt unhurt. Smoke and dust quickly filled the room as David could not discern any objects.
“Robin!” David heard himself yell out for his colleague. He put the palms of his hands on to the floor and tried to leverage himself to get up onto his knees. But, he felt an object on his back preventing him from raising himself up off the floor. He reached behind his back and found parts of the wall and the buffet table, pinning him down. He could not move his legs. He managed to turn his upper body just half way. Then, he harnessed every bit of strength in him to lift the heavy debris off of him.
“Come on! Ye—ah!” He screamed as he pushed them up. Bit by bit, the object lifted up off of him, although extremely slowly. Then, with one final push upwards, David quickly rolled away from the debris to free himself, before the debris could land back on top of him again.
‘Boom’ ‘Bang’, the debris fell back on to the floor as he slid away from it in a nick of time. David got up to his knees as quickly as he could and then on his fours, he began crawling towards where he saw Robin last. He searched for Robin, but could not locate her. Then, he heard some noises of people moving in the adjacent room and a woman’s callous voice ordering to “find them!”
The explosion of the walls was felt equally in the room occupied by the three assailants, who were listening in on David and Robin. The flying debris of the wall knocked the table from behind where they were shielding themselves. They became briefly disoriented when the table was blown off the floor and flew over them. The two men though, instinctively went into protective mode by putting themselves between the table and their leader. They took the initial impact from the catapulting table, taking the bulk of the damage, leaving the woman nearly unharmed. The table took the men with it as they crashed into the other side of the wall their heads and shoulders first.
“Damn!” One of the men yelled out in agony as he was not expecting this kind of impact to reach their side of the wall.
“Ma’am, are you all right?” The second man yelled out to check on their leader. Without a reply, the woman stood up in the midst of the thick smoke and dust. She took out a pistol equipped with a laser guide from its holster. The two men, seeing the silhouette of their leader, recomposed themselves and stood up as quickly as they could, bringing their weapons ready as well. One armed with a long high powered shot gun and the other with two pieces of high powered pistols, they were ready to engage in a battle.
‘Clank, Clink, Clunk’. The men kicked away the debris from the explosion which had landed between the two rooms. Dust rose up from the ground and rapidly spread like thick fog, inhibiting their vision.
“Damn! I can’t see a thing…,” the man with the pistols quickly covered his nose and mouth with his right forearm. Then, he quickly readjusted the guns and pointed them outward into the room where David and Robin were struggling to find each other.
“David…!” Robin called out as loud as she could. But, her voice was extremely suppressed and hardly any sound was made. She put her hand on her forehead where immediately, she came in contact with warm gooey substance on her head. With blood, sweat and dust from the explosion all co-mingled into a foamy liquid, it was trickling down from Robin’s head like slowly streaming lava.
“Shoot!” Robin felt a pounding headache. She tried to right herself onto the floor as she was thrown on her back after smashing her head against the wall behind her. A Large piece of wall flew in her direction and had struck her right leg which severely incapacitated her. She tried to move her lower body. But, she wasn’t able to get her legs to move at all at her will.
She knew that something was wrong with her right leg as she felt it numb and dangling on the floor. She put weight on her left leg and set her foot onto the floor. With all her might that she could muster, she pushed her upper body up with her hands and quickly turned herself over onto her abdomen.
“Ahh…!” She felt a sharp pain on the right leg as it slammed down hard against the floor.
She let out a reflexive scream, only to realize that the sound died out before any volume had left her vocal cords. Then, she crawled in the direction of the door inch by inch and called out for her colleague.
“David…!” Robin hollered as loud as she could. But, once again, the sound regressed inside her vocal cord. She attempted to crawl again, but she felt her arms loosening followed by her vision darkening. She stopped for a second, took what seemingly was a weak breath that her body demanded before finally falling flat on her abdomen.
Meanwhile, David continued to search for Robin in the midst of the chaos.
“Robin! Can you hear me?” Then, he heard a low voice that sounded like Robin’s whisper calling for him. He did his best in moving towards where he believed the sound came from. It felt like hours for him. Strength and balance were slowly being restored, he thought as he was able to move more swiftly. Crawling on his hands and knees now, he chased after the sound with determination.
When David caught up with Robin, he found himself and Robin about a foot away from what used to be the door of the Crane room. The door fell along with the parts of the wall that was housing it and were set on its edge. He found Robin lying unconscious next to it.
“Robin!” There was no response from her. He turned Robin over and felt blood steadily flowing from her forehead. He found her pulse and felt somewhat relieved in learning that she was still alive. He moved to drag her as fast as he could towards the door and out into the hallway.
“Stay with me! Hang on! “I will get you out of this, Robin.” David assured her with rapid words of encouragement.
‘Click’ ‘Click’ ‘Zing’ “Find them!” David heard more rumblings. It wasn’t a random noise, but somewhat orchestrated with purpose. David then remembered hearing another female voice. Now, cognizant of other people in the area, he switched to his law enforcement persona and had to quickly assess the nature of the people in the vicinity. He kept silent and looked in the direction of the rumbling noise from behind the short wall that was formed by the fallen door and other debris.
Three silhouettes of two men and a woman came into David’s vision in the midst of the dusty fog that still filled the room. Streaks of lasers moved about the room as the assailants were actively seeking for their targets. ‘Crack’ ‘Crack’. The sounds of breaking glasses from their footsteps signaled that they were approaching towards him.
Struggling, David had managed to drag Robin further out into the hallway then to the right. There, he found a pile of debris, waist high, which was formed by the fallen hallway walls and the ceilings. Quickly, David placed Robin on to her back behind that pile. He took out his guns and activated his weapons, readying them to fire. David sat putting his back against the debris and faced the direction of the outer hallway. Far out in to the hallway, he located the main landing area followed by the stairs leading to downstairs main dining hall. But, any sudden movements to go there would put both his and Robin’s lives at risks as the three assailants encroached closer.
“You, go around the room!” With the authority of a commander, yet almost at a whisper, the leader gestured to one of her men to go back into the room and around to cut David off. The man with a rifle took the instruction and began retreating backwards with the rifle still pointing out into the hallway. He walked backwards until he disappeared back into the room while the twosome pointed their weapons in David’s direction. After detecting some crackling noises from behind the pile of debris, the leader discharged her weapon in David’s direction.
‘Click’ ‘Click’ ‘Bang’ ‘Bang’ With the first sounds of the gun, the man standing with the leader also began shooting his pistols out into the hallway. David ducked lower against the debris pile. ‘Zing’, ‘Crank’, ‘Ping’, he felt bullets barraging the makeshift fortress’ wall. With every bullet hitting it, small and large pieces of debris disengaged from the pile and fell onto David’s head. He ducked down and covered his head with both his hands. At the same time, he was covering over Robin’s head with his upper body.
Several bullets penetrated the wall. One zinged by David’s right ear, causing temporary deafness. He couldn’t hear the deathly noises of the assaulting gunfire that he was under. Perhaps, that was fine with him as everything now seemed to be in slow motion, too. One more bullet struck David in his left clavicle thru his back.
“Augh!” letting out a painful gasp and his left arm falling from covering his head, David lost his grip on the gun. Instinctively, he hunched down even lower against the wall. It seemed to him like hours have passed when there came a break in the assault.
Cautiously, the assailants moved in closer to the wall. David was able to hold onto one of his two weapons in his right hand. As he heard them moving and finding no projectiles heading in his direction, David dove to the outer edge of the one end of the wall, landing on his right side. It sent painful shock waves from his clavicle, “Ahh!”
David couldn’t contain himself from screaming in pain. At the same time, he had to locate his targets. He could not afford to miss once he had located them. As his pistol pointed to the middle of the hallway, he fired his gun, bullet after bullet, in rapid series.
“Get down!” The man pushed the woman out of harm’s way as he saw the blue laser from David’s gun steadying on her. In the process, he took one bullet in his right thigh and another in his right shoulder. Falling onto his side, he had managed to release several rounds in random fashion towards the wall. But, he was unable to lock an accurate aim on David. He had managed to damage the wall even more, but failed to hit David. Uncontrollably, he directed his weapon into the ceiling and sent hurling bullets directly up above him as he fell onto his back.
‘Pop’ ‘Zee’ ‘Zing’, loud pops and metal shattering noises ricocheted off the pipes inside the ceiling. Then, the hallway went pitch black as large amount of water was being released and fell down on to David from the sprinklers. Rubbing his face to dry off the moisture, David retreated back to behind the makeshift wall.
“Shit!” At the same time, the leader cursed at her subordinate for pushing her onto the floor. Somewhat shook up at the unanticipated fall, she was in agony from the hard body slam that she took against the opposite wall. She had managed to protect her head by landing on her hands and knees, which sent delayed pain signal up her spine from the kneecap. She stayed immobile for a brief moment. Then, she slowly got up on her two feet, oblivious to active bleeding and pain. Feeling gooey material from her hair down to her neck, she wiped her face down with her bare hands and flung her head back and forward quickly to throw the foreign material off of her hair.
She was covered with mud and there was serious bleeding in her right leg as a sharp piece of water pipe lodged into her thigh thru her leather clothing. She took a step forward only to jerk and fall onto her knee as the sharp object in her thigh made it impossible to walk.
“Ahh, shit!” Madly cursing at the top of her lungs, she moved to pull out the object and slammed the metallic shrapnel down to the floor, all the while leering in David’s direction. She stared at the wall with the eyes of a mad dog as she reloaded her weapons. Pointing to the right edge of the wall with one hand and at the center top of the wall with the other, she slowly approached David.
The shock wave from the explosion and subsequently the ceilings caving down stunned the second man as he was about to make the final turn to enter the hallway from the ‘Moon Room’. He was helplessly pushed back. Reflexively, he lowered his head and sat tight against the adjacent wall, on the opposite side of the hallway.
“Are you alright, ma’am?” The man shouted out to his leader. Unaware that this had alerted his whereabouts to David, he decided to stay behind the wall until the rumblings subsided. He was now positioned at about three car lengths behind of David on the same side of the center hallway debris pile.
Surprised, David quickly determined the direction and distance of the man calling for his leader. At this time, David realized that he was being trapped and was facing oppositions in two fronts at the same time. This placed him at a great disadvantage. On top of this, he had no effective way of shielding himself and Robin from the newest threat.
Removing new debris off of Robin’s face, David moved his head closer to Robin’s nose to check for a sign of her breathing. Feeling warm air through her nostrils, “You will be alright! I’ll be back for you!” David whispered into Robin’s ear. Then, satisfied that Robin was alive, he sat with his back against the wall and looked out into the hallway in search for any sign of motions by the second man.
Taking advantage of the loud noise from the sprinklers, cracking of the walls and squeaking noise from loose lighting fixtures dangerously hanging on wires, David crawled towards the front of the hallway, effectively camouflaging the noise of his own approach. He reached the freshly created opening on the wall to his right. He believed that that was the point where the voice had originated. He crouched down on one knee and had his pistol pointed along the surface of the wall in the direction of the large opening and waited patiently.
As time passed, the noise level dissipated to as near normal as it could be under the circumstances. Although the hissing sounds were being emitted from the sprinkler heads, the most dominating sound was the dripping of water hitting the puddles that were formed all over the hall way. The dust has begun settling with the constant injection of moisture into the air. David took a quick look over to Robin through the falling water drops. He noticed Robin slightly convulsing as she appeared to be coughing to clear her lungs. She drew her right hand to her mouth. She was able to open her eyes for an instant, but immediately closed them again as the falling water entered her eyes.
She turned her head ever so slowly and saw a man’s silhouette crouching at the far end of the hallway. Above that figure, she saw another silhouette appearing from the edge of the wall, hands first and finally forming into a tall man’s figure. Robin could not make out the features of the person that she was observing. Everything appeared blurry to her And Robin was disoriented as her head kept pounding.
She closed her eyes again, this time, as hard and tight as she could. It helped relieve some of the headache. Several feet away from where she was laying, she saw a shiny object on the floor. Focusing on the object more intensely, she recognized it as an UNBI issued pistol, perhaps, the one that David had used earlier. Soon, she came to her senses and remembered where she was with a flash back of the deafening explosion. Immediately, she became greatly concerned for David’s safety as she looked back over at the two silhouettes.
“David! Look out!” Robin hollered to herself as she recognized David, who was now in imminent danger. She stretched her arm towards the gun, but could not reach it. She mustered all her strength to turn herself onto her stomach by leveraging her body with both her arms and legs. But, she fell back as if her body was magnetized to the floor. Her legs were badly damaged and they were too heavy to move. She rolled halfway onto her right side without any support from her lower body. Her body halfway twisted, she began to pull herself towards David’s gun ever so slightly. And, inch by inch at a snail’s pace, she moved towards the pistol.