He didn’t know how long it would be before the shooter in the theater would move out to them, so he wasted no time. “Stay three feet behind me, and then do exactly as I tell you.”
Maddie barely had time to nod in acknowledgement before Zavier stepped from the alcove with his shotgun shouldered and fired across the hall. He was rewarded with a splatter of blood misting into the air from a shooter waiting for them across the hall. “Into the corner to my right.”
Maddie dashed from the alcove over to the corner near the exit doors. She pressed herself into a little ball, being careful to not touch the bombs on the door. To avoid being seen and becoming a sitting duck, Zavier positioned himself across the hall parallel to where the shooter he had just killed had been standing.
Sure enough, a shooter exited the theater he was just in and turned toward the hallway. He took two steps before Zavier swung around and fired. The angle was bad, so his first shot missed, but his second blast cut the shooter down at the legs.
Zavier moved from his hiding spot, sighting down the shotgun’s barrel. “Maddie, stay to the wall opposite me. Move now.” He pulled the trigger again.
Click. He was out of shells.
Without pausing, he flipped the barrel toward him in the air, caught it, and then swung it down like he was chopping wood. There was an audible crunch as the gun stock connected into the side of the shooter’s neck.
Three seasoned police officers, four counterterrorism experts, a parent, and three teenage boys stared at the monitor with collective astonishment. Their mouths were open and jaws slack as they watched the figure on screen swing the shotgun down on the shooter.
“That dude is totally Spec Ops,” said Mako.
“A special operator would never toss a shotgun around like that. Takes too much time, and they’d burn their hands.” The words came from the CTCEU lead agent. The tone was questioning, rather than a correction of facts.
“Well he did it, and it doesn’t look like he’s slowing down to blow on his hands and fingers,” said Dale as they all watched the man and little girl run down the hall. “If he gets out of this, he’s totally going to get a video game named after him.”
The comment was totally out of place, causing everyone to look at him askance. Dale, for his part, never noticed. His eyes were locked on to the monitor. “I think he shot some more terrorists, or whatever these fuckers are. They made it to the concession area.”
Basava was the first to look away from the sandy-haired teenager. “We gotta get them some help, otherwise this is just a sad sideshow with an ending we all know. George, keep one screen on the area where they’re hiding, but bring all the other camera feeds you can from other areas. SWAT needs to see what their options are.”
“Not sure there is anything that can be done,” said George.
Basava gave him a grim look. “You figured that out from all your vast experience killing terrorists in video games?”
George’s silence alone was a concession to the point. He started typing commands on his keyboard.
At six foot seven, Orlando SWAT’s tactical commander, Clint “Birdman” Roberts, towered over most people. Weighing in at two hundred and thirty pounds, he could intimidate anyone on most days. Today was not most days, and team member Tracy Tavares was not most people. On her best day she was an alley cat; right now she was like a T-Rex towering over her commanding officer.
“We can’t just sit here. We’ve got to go in. Right now,” said Tavares.
Birdman could feel the heat emanating from the intense hazel eyes of his best sniper. He had no doubt that if he did not give an order to breach, those eyes would scorch him like bread next to the sun. “Tavares, don’t push me. According to regs, I shouldn’t have you here at all.”
Tavares’s eyes glittered like daggers as she glared at her commander. “Order me to leave. Go ahead, but it ain’t happening. Not while Z—” Tavares turned her head as the name stuck in her throat. A will of steel could not stop tears from pooling in her eyes.
Worse, Birdman did not even pretend to ignore them.
“Tavares,” he began, his tone less harsh, “what are we gonna go do? If we just breach, all it gets is yourself and the squad blown to hell.”
“We don’t know that.”
“We don’t know shit other than your ex, a child, and a whole lot of armed assholes are inside behind a wall of bombs. We don’t have any actionable intel—”
“Goddammit!” Tavares yelled. “We got some zit-nosed geek streaming this shit to the world. We got nothing but eyes on.”
“Tavares, Zavier is the best damn firearms trainer I’ve ever seen. He’s already sent many of those terrorists off to Mecca for their virgins. If there is a way out, he will find it.”
Birdman wanted to continue, but he could see he was hitting a wall. Whatever the bad blood between Tavares and her ex, she still cared. It didn’t matter if it was smart or dumb, she wanted to help him, but couldn’t. None of them could. Not right now.
“Morales!” Birdman screamed.
A young baby-faced Spanish male walked over. He stopped in front of Birdman but kept himself as far away from Tavares as possible. Her team name was not TNT for nothing.
“Morales, tell your team member what we got.”
“Based on what’s on the video, we know—”
“Spit it out plain, Morales.”
Morales paused, glanced at Tavares, and then sighed in resignation. “We got shit. The video is too grainy to gauge the yield on those IEDs on the doors. There are no cameras near the exit doors in any of the theaters. There’s no way of knowing if they are rigged as well. I’d bet they are though. We could send in the armored truck to ram through a side exit, but I wouldn’t sign up for that trip.”
Tavares’s nose flared in anger.
“Don’t give me that look,” Morales said to her. “I’ve been to Iraq. The only thing worse than an IED is one where you don’t know the yield on the device. Maybe the new truck, which we don’t have, could take it, but not the one we got on scene.” He turned back to Birdman. “I had Tactical call the cop on scene at the kid’s house to get him to bring up the cameras in the lobby. There are bombs on the door and some sort of . . . looks like a pressure wire on the glass. If we snip them, the bombs will probably blow.”
“Any recommendations for your teammate?” asked Birdman.
Morales took a moment to consider and then squared his shoulders, his eyes narrowed. “To her nothing. To you, I say we show our buddy Z that we know how to use what he fucking taught us, and shoot the fuckers in front. Do it now, while they are not near the lobby.”
Birdman did a double take, looking at Morales with surprise.
Morales shrugged. “That’s what I would do. He’s running out of time. He and that girl are dead if something doesn’t change real soon. But that’s not my call.”
Without waiting to be dismissed, Morales stepped away. Tavares had a triumphant and hopeful look on her face. Birdman would have to crush it. “I know what you want, and I know why. But it’s the wrong play, and I’m not doing it,” said Birdman. “We stay put until we have more options or actionable intel.”
I’m running out of time, thought Zavier. A combination of shooting skill, poor training on the shooters’ part, and luck had kept him and Maddie alive so far. He knew the tide would turn soon if he could not figure a way out of the building.
He could not remember how many he had shot or killed, but the shooters seemed like roaches. More and more kept popping up. They seemed determined to protect the exits in the various theaters. That meant they did not have nearly as many people looking for them as they could, but it also meant he and Maddie could not get out. At least not through those exits.
At last, they found a good temporary hiding place behind one of the closed concession areas. They had a wall to their back and exits to either side of them. If anyone came behind the counter, he could shoot them and move to the other exit. The fact that there were no bodie
s in the hallways was a plus. Stepping over bodies was bad, but at least you could move past them. If they had to sit three feet from one, he did not think Maddie would recover from that . . . assuming she could recover from the present trauma.
Of course, if the shooters entered through both exits, he and Maddie were screwed. The AR he picked up was out of bullets, leaving him with just the bullets in his CZ. That was not enough to win a shooting war. He needed another weapon and a way out. Fast.
They were crouched behind a popcorn machine, the smell of burnt kernels, salt, and butter overwhelming them. Maddie had one hand knotted in his shirt and the other covering her mouth, desperately trying to cover her whimpering. Zavier leaned over and kissed her on the forehead. She looked up at him as he reached over and grabbed a handful of popcorn, then popped it into his mouth.
Maddie wrinkled her nose. “Gross. That probably has bullets in it.”
“Maybe, but at least no blood.”
A muffled gagging sound emanated from her throat before she spoke. “Uncle Z, don’t lie to me. Are we gonna get out? ‘Cause if not, I want to say my prayers now.”
The earnestness of the question choked Zavier deep in his gut. He turned his head away from Maddie. Silently, he cursed the world and God for not allowing children like her to grow up without seeing the nasty bits of life. He turned back to her, but before he could speak, he heard running footsteps from the main hall.
He brought his finger to his lips to signal Maddie to be quiet and pointed toward the space under a refrigerator unit. Fear flowed over her face, but wordless, she crawled to the indicated hiding space. A feeling of warm pride filtered through Zavier. His eight-year-old buddy was holding it together better than many adults would.
Satisfied that she was hidden as well as possible, he began crawling deeper in back of the concession area. Once he reached the back wall, he got up to a kneeling crouch and began moving along the wall. Ahead of him stood a door that led to the main concession area. The closer he got to the door, he could hear people talking.
He needed to move into the area, but the volume of the voices told him a group of shooters were close. He could not risk sneaking the door open while they were near it. Reaching the door, Zavier moved to its left side and slowly slid his back against the wall as he stood up. He stopped when his eyes reached the bottom level of the window.
He could see four males of Arabic descent twenty feet away. A tall and gangly one, who looked no more than seventeen or eighteen years old, seemed to be in charge.
“Have you checked the projection rooms?”
“They cannot get into them without shooting the locks. We didn’t see any—”
The young, skinny leader glared the speaker into silence. “They could have taken keys from other employees. They are hiding somewhere. Check the rooms, bathrooms, and kitchens.”
“Rashid, let them hide. They will die in the final sacrifice all the same.”
The one called Rashid struck the speaker in the face, while the others turned their heads away. “We have a message to send. It would not be good for that message to be interrupted with our deaths first. The explosives are not strong enough to bring down the whole complex. We want no survivors. Find them.”
Without another word, Rashid stalked away while the other three turned and moved quickly back down the main hallway. Zavier quickly slipped through the door. Looking around the concession area, he tried to spy a good vantage point where he could see the lobby.
He did not have many options. The front concession area was a wide open space, perfect for movie patrons to see busy little workers rushing to-and-fro making their high-priced food and drinks. There were plenty of kitchen units, fryers, refrigerators, popcorn cookers, and beverage dispensers to crouch behind, but Zavier could not see the lobby beyond the concession counter if he hid there.
Feeling like his and Maddie’s life were ticking away like a clock, he opted to crawl across the floor to a space that allowed workers to move from the concession area into the lobby in front. Keeping the counter to his right to hide himself, he eased his head into the empty space. As long as a shooter did not look down, they would not see him.
He could see several shooters in the lobby. Most were to one side near a sitting area, setting up a video camera. Zavier had no doubt what they would film if they managed to kill him and find Maddie. Bombs. They mentioned bombs. Where are they?
Scanning left and right, he could not see any of the bombs, but assumed they were set against the door like at the other exits. The one thing he could see were thin wires extending every five feet or so on the windows. Puzzlement flitted through him as he tried to discern what they were. When an answer came to him, he swallowed a curse.
Pressure sensors.
A summer blockbuster a few years back had used the idea of sensors set against a window and connected to explosives as a way to deter snipers from firing on the bad guys. The bastards in front of him seemed to have remembered the idea and were putting it to use now.
It explained why this group was laconic and why SWAT had not put a bullet into each of their brain pans. The Orlando SWAT team could not possibly know the strength of the set explosives. But I know how strong they are, Zavier thought grimly as a dumb and desperate idea came to him.
He pushed himself backward and then crawled back to the door. He gave the back area another once-over, his eyes settling on a maintenance closet. That could work.
Zavier took another few seconds to run through his plan. It was not perfect. It was risky. He was sure asshole Murphy’s Law would not be on his side, but it was all he had. Mind made up, he slipped through the door and made his way back to Maddie.
She had her eyes scrunched tight and her hands folded. Her mouth was moving rapid-fire, but no sound was coming out.
“Maddie,” Zavier whispered.
Her eyes popped open. He motioned to her, and she crawled from under the refrigerator.
Though he knew the answer, he could not keep from asking, “What were you doing?”
“Final prayers.”
“Stand up.”
Maddie rose to her knees and then her feet. Zavier squared her shoulders and then placed his hands on each side of her face, turning it so he could look right at her.
“Didn’t I promise?”
“Adults promise stuff all the time.”
“I told you I would never make a promise I couldn’t keep, or break one. And I have not.”
“I don’t think you can keep this one, Uncle Z.” She ended the sentence with a croak and tears in her eyes.
Zavier pulled her to him and hugged her tight. “Yes I will. I will get you out of here. I promised your mom, and I’m promising you. You will not die today. I won’t let you.”
Chapter Fourteen
Tavares and three other snipers were stationed atop a roof across from the Palace theater. Normally they would be stationed closer, but the roof gave a better view of what was happening in the main lobby. Through her Hensoldt ZF scope, Tavares had a clear view through the theater’s tinted windows.
If she wanted, a simple tap of the trigger would send a .308 NATO round out of her M24 sniper rifle and into the head of any of the terrorists in her sights. Absently, she reached a hand up to caress her Hensoldt scope. It was the only gift from Zavier she had not returned.
After dating for years, they had officially called it quits. No. You called it quits, echoed Zavier’s voice in her mind. That was five years ago, but they had suffered through the cliché of a turbulent on-again, off-again relationship during those five years. It had finally come to a screeching, bitter end a few months ago when he had accused her of being a gold digger.
Her nostrils flared at the memory. She did not need his money. She had just wanted him to be more . . . ambitious. With his shooting skills he could have his own SWAT command. Or been a top shooting trainer with Homeland or the US Marshals. Instead, he settled on coaching local law enforcement, hunters, and gun enthusiasts, and spen
ding his time running around after other people’s kids.
No, that’s not fair, a seldom listened to voice of reason spoke to her. Not other people’s kids. Your sister’s kids. Your brother’s kids. The kids of his friends, because you didn’t want to give him any.
A hot tear rolled from her eye as she remembered their last argument. She had given, thrown actually, all his gifts back at him. All except the scope he had bought her after training her to become the first female sniper in central Florida.
She blinked away the tears and wiped her eye. In her heart she knew the door was not closed. Not for her. She would open it again. She’d kick it down when this was over. All she needed was a chance to put a bullet in the head of these murderous bastards so Zavier could get to safety.
She looked at the iPad she had propped up next to her. It had moved into rest mode again, causing her to swear. Tapping the screen and sliding across it to unlock it, Tavares studied the video feeds. Two screens showed shooters frantically searching for Zavier and Maddie. Two other feeds showed views of the lobby area—one of the lower level and another of the upper deck. The last view and largest screen was of the concession area. In it Zavier was kneeling in front of the little girl, Maddie.
Tavares switched back to looking through her scope in time to catch one of the shooters jolt up to his feet. He started gesturing wildly. Tavares squinted and decided to adjust the scope for a closer view. When she saw what the terrorist was holding, her blood froze.
In his hands was a smartphone. She had no doubt what he was watching on it.
If George had nails, he would have bitten them off by now. Watching the man and child pictured on the monitor fight, sneak, and hide had sent his heart rate up and down like a rollercoaster. Any moment he thought they would be caught and killed. He looked over at Dale, who was scrunched over his laptop.
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