Dying For LA

by Ian Jones

  More shots, again from different guns, this time seeming to be aimed toward the van.

  John quickly checked the gun and then keeping his head down twisted around so his back was to the wing next to where the windscreen pillar meets the panel. He raised the weapon, which was fitted with a tactical sight and slowly edged it up then peered over the bonnet right next to the pillar, keeping as hidden as possible. He could see now there were people on the bridge, at the opposite end from the building next to the large warehouses. He could see heads ducking up and down. Guns were visible resting on the top of the sides which were steel panels. A rifle and then a head appeared, slowly looking from side to side. It was some distance away but John breathed deeply, aimed and fired. A short burst and the head shot backwards. John ducked down again.

  A shout, and then nothing at all.

  John slowly moved so he could see the bridge again, he saw a man stand and at the same time a large gun barrel was pushed up and pointed toward him.

  ‘Machine gun!’ he shouted, shrinking down as small as he could behind the cover, and then heavy rapid fire began, bullets hitting metal and more glass breaking. But it ended quickly, followed by a couple of random shots and then there was silence.

  John stayed where he was, waiting then started counting the seconds, but there were no more shots fired. Reed raised his head and looked at him. Carefully he sighted over the bonnet again and checked the bridge.

  He couldn’t see anyone at all, but then heard some muted gunfire from somewhere inside a building.

  There were no incoming rounds so he moved around the car, using the cover to see if he could spot any movement anywhere in the yard but there was nobody there. Reed had moved up so he was lying on his elbows next to him.

  ‘Anything?’ he asked.

  ‘No.’

  John had another sweep.

  ‘Clear!’ he called out and he and Reed stood up slowly, surveying the scene.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  It was bad, but it could definitely have been a lot worse.

  There were three dead SWAT officers, including Oakes, and two injured, one of which was the young man driving the car. He had ducked into the footwell and been hit twice in the arm and the shoulder, but he would live.

  The remaining officers tended to the injured and got on the radio. Louisa and the corporal hurried across, they had got behind the car as soon as the shooting started, amazingly there were no more casualties. The men working over at the tyre place had gathered at the front, staring,

  Still carrying the gun John walked fast over to the gates and looked in, pulling on the chain. Reed joined him and gently pulled him away.

  ‘You know we can’t go in right John?’

  John looked at him but pulled on the chain again.

  ‘We can’t do it John. This is LAPD business now. We are gonna be on the unwanted list real soon.’

  Reed was right and led John away. Within minutes the cavalry arrived. Three more SWAT vans along with a massive armoured truck with heavy bull bars across the front. Several cruisers and a couple of ambulances. The SWAT officers secured the scene, parking a van across the gates and monitoring it constantly. John, Reed, Louisa and the corporal sat on the ground across the road watching.

  Eventually the chain was cut and the armoured truck rolled through and parked inside. After a while officers streamed in but there was no opposition, just a lot of police everywhere. John stood up when to his dismay he saw Captain Truman stalking toward him, Chief Brady following. Truman stopped and sneered.

  ‘Well, trouble just follows you around Mr Smith. Now I got to talk to three families, tell them their loved ones ain’t coming home.’

  Reed leapt to his feet indignantly and towered over Truman.

  ‘You know what, it was fucked from the start. Your man Oakes was the biggest asshole I ever saw. He did not listen to anyone. So blaming this on John is all bullshit. We tried to stop it. But he just carried on anyway, and he had no idea what he was doing.’

  Truman stared up at him speechless and was clearly relieved when Chief Brady steered him away.

  ‘I think Dennis, that it will be me doing the talking. Why don’t you go and see if we’ve got the all clear to go inside?’

  Truman glared angrily at John then stormed off.

  Brady turned to John.

  ‘Feels like I’m forever apologising for him. But I am sorry John, he had no call to speak to you like that. None of this is your doing.’

  John shrugged, he didn’t want Brady to feel any worse than he would be right now, with three officer’s bodies being taken away right in front of their eyes.

  ‘I’m sorry but Tom is right Chief, I don’t like to say it considering what’s happened here but Oakes was just not the right man for the job.’

  Brady looked sadly at him, then slowly shook his head.

  ‘Yeah, I already heard that. But it’s kinda hard to take in. These guys are supposed to be the best.’

  John looked across the road, surveying the scene, watching the hive of activity

  ‘I’m sorry for the lost men Chief. And the guys that got hurt. And I’m sorry that this keeps happening whenever I am involved. But we had no idea who was in there. We tried to make that clear. All we had was just one definite name; and we saw him with four other men go into that yard. They must have set up a lookout, I saw men on that bridge. They just started shooting,’ John said.

  ‘This is one hell of a mess. And one thing we all know for sure is they are long gone,’ Brady replied.

  ‘Yeah. And they will have got rid of the mobiles, so it’s back to square one,’ John told him, looking at all the police officers everywhere.

  ‘Come on. I’ll get you inside. Take a look for yourselves. But watch where you walk, there will be the CSI guys in there and they don’t like it when we trample all over.’

  Brady led the way, and the four of them walked into the yard. If anything, it was even bigger inside the gates, and they made their way across to a narrow brick building.

  Truman was standing outside and John studiously ignored him as they approached. A young uniformed officer was watching and walked over to Brady.

  ‘This is where they were living Chief,’ he told them, gesturing at the open door.

  They followed him in.

  They had walked into a grubby, simple reception area, with a door open at the back behind a filthy beige counter and stairs to their left.

  There were two men in white suits with masks working, examining the floors and the walls, poking into drawers. There didn’t seem to be any clear distinction to where anyone could walk so John wandered over behind the counter and looked into the room. It was bathroom, with urinals, toilet cubicles and some showers. Everything looked tired and well worn and John saw a damp towel hanging on a peg just inside the door. So they had been recently used, which made sense if the men had been living here.

  He walked out and then went up the stairs. Now he was in an open space, more stairs directly in front of him. There was dust everywhere, battered furniture dotted around and an old television on a table. Toward the back was a glass-partitioned wall, which looked like an office. There was more activity here, and John looked closely at some open trunks on the floor.

  Guns, in two of the trunks.

  Mostly assault rifles, a few handguns. Different makes and ages, none were new. They were all being carefully examined and dusted with fingerprint powder.

  There was one more trunk, and this contained ammo. Boxes of a variety of shells and many magazines, which he could see were loaded.

  ‘John!’

  He looked up. Reed was standing with Brady next to something, and there were more CSIs there. He walked over.

  On the floor was a body. A man. A big man. No actually a huge man. Not like Reed, this one was fat, with a massive head. His eyes were open, staring accusingly up at them. He had been shot in the head. There wasn’t a lot of blood, the bullet had clearly not gone all the way through,
which John found surprising. He was lying almost comically flat, hands at his side, as if he was out in the sun.

  John crouched down to see if he knew the face, but he had never seen him before. He stood up and looked at Brady, who gave a small shrug.

  ‘No ID so far. But they are still looking.’

  The CSIs were meticulously going through the weird vast robe type outfit the body was wearing. He didn’t envy them that task he decided. He looked at the man again. Big round face, no colour which was to be expected, thin lips. Maybe mid to late forties, but that was just a guess. Greasy light brown hair. But very distinctive.

  ‘Anybody recognise him?’ he asked Brady, who shook his head.

  ‘Not so far. But he could be from anywhere in the world, this could take some time. They found this on him though, which we are checking right now.’

  He held up an elderly mobile phone.

  ‘Ok.’

  ‘Not a lot else on this floor,’ Brady resumed, ‘other than this.’

  He pointed out a suitcase, which had money in. Stacks of hundred-dollar bills, with a lot of loose notes dotted around.

  ‘Drugs?’ John asked.

  Again, Brady shrugged.

  They walked up to the next floor. Same layout, apart from a basic kitchen area where the office had been on the first floor. Some bits of battered furniture and not much else, but everything being examined. Then it was up another flight. This floor had mattresses dotted around, with sleeping bags here and there and a door with steps outside which led to the flat roof, and the bridge across to the warehouses. John made his way over. There was another body on the far side, which he had expected. Lying propped against the panels was a man, no more than thirty at the most, black hair and a big bushy beard. Another head shot. This was the man John had killed when he was behind the car. Reed was examining a machine gun which John had passed as he walked over.

  ‘M60. But prehistoric. The army keeps these guns forever, but this thing must be one of the first,’ Reed told him as John walked across.

  The gun had been thrown to the floor, there was a bandolier of bullets still sticking out the side.

  ‘Right shells wrong links,’ Reed explained. ‘We got lucky. This thing would have killed a lot more of us if it had kept firing, but this is for another gun altogether, looks Chinese. Everything looks a lot closer together, this baby must have jammed. Like I said, that was lucky.’

  ‘I suppose this could have come from anywhere right?’ John asked.

  ‘Yeah, pretty much. They’ve been around a long time. Bad guys all over use these things, they turn up pretty much everywhere. Rebel armies someplace, pirates, tiny guerrilla armies in Africa, they all use them, and I guess they must be easy to find if you know where to look. I don’t think these guys struggle to find weapons.’

  There were three more assault rifles lying along the section of the bridge, and they looked at them all. AK-47, Steyr, M16. All the guns had 1-Too burned into the stocks.

  John shook his head and looked over the bridge to the road. The van and the squad car were right there in clear sight. If Oakes had pulled up where they suggested they would have all been out of sight. Such a waste. He leaned on the railing, and Reed joined him.

  ‘Made it real easy for them,’ he commented.

  John nodded and then turned, to look at the end of the bridge. There was a single rusty door which was standing open, he could see the gloom of the warehouse beyond, so he walked over and looked inside at a simple metal platform with a guard rail. They were close to the roof, and it was a long drop to the floor below. The platform ran off to the right then a long flight of steel stairs which ran all the way to the bottom. There were several police officers moving around, and he could see some vehicles parked up but other than that it was just a huge empty space. There were massive double sliding doors open, presumably into the warehouse next door. He turned and looked at Brady.

  ‘Are we ok to go down?’ he asked.

  Brady nodded.

  ‘Sure. Why not.’

  They made their way over to the stairs and walked all the way down then across to the sliding doors into an identical warehouse next door, this one being completely empty. Then they crossed over through another set, into the same again but this one had massive doors open at the side so was well lit in comparison.

  There were more police here, gathered around outside. They walked across and John stood in the wide-open doorway looking across a deep concrete loading bay and then a dozen railway tracks nestled close to each other. Every now and then a train would clatter across loudly in either direction. On the far side was a chain link fence and then a stretch of wasteland where more police were moving until a line of office and apartment buildings. A freeway ran across high above to the right.

  Brady started talking to the officers who were here, who basically confirmed what they had already guessed. The men had run across the railway tracks and then through the fence. There were visible signs and markings which disappeared once they reached the buildings.

  ‘So, they could be anywhere now,’ Reed said flatly.

  ‘Anywhere. It’s been nearly two hours. Could be out the city by now, if they had any kind of escape plan,’ John replied, staring across at the far side.

  ‘We’ll find them,’ Brady told them, unconvincingly.

  Chapter Forty

  Rico dropped onto the bed and rubbed his head fiercely with both hands.

  This was absolutely not what he had signed up for.

  Sal was standing staring out the window, while Pinsky stalked around the room with the mobile phone he had just purchased glued to his ear, muttering to himself.

  They were in a cheap hotel room close to Long Beach. Since leaving the hotel bar things had disintegrated into madness. They had got back to base with everything seeming exactly the same as when they had left, but Pinsky had been edgy, unsettled. He instructed Rolf to get up on the bridge and keep watch, make sure he could see as much of the road as possible and then told the others to make sure the guns were all ready.

  They might have to leave in a hurry was the only explanation he gave.

  They busied themselves doing as they were told, the beer buzz fading and the body of Voorhees a constant reminder of the precariousness of their position. Pinsky watched, tensely holding his mobile, which rang suddenly and he jerked it to his ear. He talked fast in Russian, and then, suddenly, he relaxed. He smiled. He hung up the call.

  ‘Is ok. We wait, but is ok,’ he said, and turned on the TV.

  The others all looked at each other and then joined him watching a show which had a pretend judge admonishing a woman who hadn’t paid her rent. But just as everything seemed to finally calm down there was a loud shout from Rolf, who breathlessly appeared on the stairs and told them the police were outside.

  Pinsky grabbed a Steyr from a case with a couple of clips and ran fast up the stairs.

  ‘Move! Now!’ he ordered as he reached the top.

  Greg picked up and AK-47 and Sal an M16 and followed. Rico looked all round, wishing he had the balls to just run out the building but instead he walked up the stairs, dread in every step.

  On the bridge Pinsky was staring down, and as he crossed Rico could see a patrol car and a SWAT van. He ducked down, as all the others had. The bridge had sides of solid steel about a metre high, with a railing a few centimetres above which ran across the top.

  ‘Get the machine gun. Now,’ Pinsky hissed to Greg, who gave the AK to Rolf and keeping low ran back into the building.

  Rico dared to peek over the side.

  The police were talking to two men, one a huge motherfucker, presumably plain clothes. Both men were agitated, looked like they were trying to explain something. They kept looking at the gates and into the yard. Pinsky was aiming the Steyr through the gap between the railing and the side panels.

  ‘Do it,’ he ordered. ‘Do it.’

  Rolf did the same, and Sal also lifted his gun.

  Pinsky started
firing. The shots caught everyone out. Rico ducked down as low as he could and Sal did too, but Rolf joined in.

  There was no return fire.

  Pinsky had ducked and was now looking through the gap over the side like before, and started shooting again. His clip emptied, so he ducked down to refit another. Sal and Rico were just watching, they had no idea what they were supposed to be doing. Rolf was still firing, but short bursts, then he stopped and ducked down, looking back at the others.

  ‘Now!’ Pinsky ordered, and he and Rolf started firing again.

  Greg appeared, hustling as fast as he could with the heavy M60 and trying to keep down as he crossed the bridge. Pinsky and Rolf were out of ammo and Greg slid the M60 toward Pinsky, who forced the end of the clip into the breech and slammed the cover down.

  ‘Look, tell me what you see,’ he told Rolf, grinning like a child.

  He’s enjoying this. Rico thought to himself. He wants to kill.

  Rolf peered through the gap, moving his head around, he lifted it higher when there was a sudden burst of gunfire, and red mist sprayed from his head. He fell back with a thump. Ignoring it Pinsky pushed the M60 onto the top of the railing, angled it down and began firing blindly, but he only got a few shots loose before the gun jammed. Cursing in several languages he threw it down and then ran for the door into the warehouse, pulling it open.

  ‘Go!’ called out Sal and everyone followed the Russian as fast as they could.

  The doors between the warehouses were already open which was fortunate, and the huge opening to the loading bay was secured by a heavy bar inside. They lifted it off, threw the doors wide and then ran as fast as they could, oblivious to the railroad traffic, forcing their way through the fence on the far side and across the wasteland.

  Once they had reached the buildings Pinsky ran into a car park in an apartment building and they hunkered down in a corner, wild eyed.

  ‘How?’ cried out Pinsky. ‘Which one is the fucking rat? Is you?’ he shoved Sal hard.