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As the stranger’s gun boomed, Crowley was already moving. He dived over the tied man he had been interrogating, snatching up the bedside lamp as he moved. He’d cut the cord off to tie up Jerkwad, and now the lamp was easily thrown. He twisted and launched it through the window above the bed, shattering glass raining over the fire escape and no small amount all over the bedclothes. He knew the shooter would be tracking him, so the moment he had let go of the lamp, he flipped back over, enjoying the crack of his knee into the tied man’s cheek as he went, an unexpected bonus. The gun boomed again and the carpet where Crowley had been burst upward. Crowley grabbed the laundry basket as he went over and swung it hard at arm’s length directly as the shooter. The basket itself tipped over and a shower of clothes filled the air between him and his assailant. The man grunted more in annoyance than anything else, but he was momentarily blocked and blinded.
Crowley was unlikely to have any more luck when it came to not getting shot, but that moment of distraction was all he needed. He stamped onto Jerkwad’s lap, savoring the man’s grunt of pain, and launched himself up over the bed and through the window, landing in a forward roll on the fire escape outside. He huffed air out as the hard metal impacted him, praying he didn’t get any bad cuts from the broken glass, but didn’t pause. He twisted and slid on his side down the first few steps as another bullet spanged! into the metal railing behind where he’d been a moment before. The guy was a good shot, but a target moving as erratically as Crowley was hard to hit. But his good fortune wouldn’t last for long.
“Get him, Blackwell!” he heard Jerkwad yell, then he bolted.
As Crowley swung around the narrow black metal steps he heard the shooter land on them outside Jazz’s window. Hunched against potential shots, he held onto the central railing and leaped down the stairs three at a time, then jump over onto the next landing every time he was close enough. The clang of shoes on metal above told him Blackwell was close behind. And he assumed Jerkwad would cut himself free before too long and make chase as well. He needed to get away, he would lose a fight if even one of them caught up. Only the element of surprise had kept him alive this long, and that never lasted long.
Crowley didn’t have time to lower the ladder at the end of the fire escape, so simply dropped off the last landing, caught the edge with both hands for a second to slow his fall, then let go. He hit a dank alleyway floor with considerable impact, grunting as his knees sank and absorbed the shock. He let the momentum continue, ducking forward and tucking one shoulder, chin to his chest, and rolled before his legs snapped. Then he was up and running. He zigged and zagged as he went and two more bullets chipped up pavement with inches of his feet, but he managed to avoid getting shot and ducked out of the alley into a busy street. Surely they wouldn’t shoot blindly into crowds of pedestrians.
He didn’t pause to think about where he was or where to go. He knew Blackwell would be on auto-pilot, intent only on running him down, so he simply sprinted along the sidewalk, ducking left and right around surprised people.
Shouts of “Hey, slow down!” and “Where’s the fire, buddy?” and the like followed him. He risked a glance back and saw the crowded footpath separating like water around a rock, faces wide with shock, as Blackwell came charging through, gun held up in plain sight. He wasn’t shooting, but he was making no secret of his intent either.
The man was fast, and while he might not shoot through these crowds, he clearly wasn’t worried about being seen and obviously had no intention of giving up. And the man was plainly athletic enough to not only keep up, but actually gain on Crowley. He was tall and thin rather than bulky, but with a wiry strength apparent even through his tailored suit. And a long stride, despite the crowds. He had close-cropped dark hair, a narrow face with dark eyes a little too close together, and a look of steely determination. Crowley was briefly reminded of the T1000 in Terminator 2 as Blackwell pumped his arms in resolved pursuit.
All this Crowley took in during the half-second that he spent looking back, then he focused on nothing but flight. He ducked sideways down the next street, and almost immediately into the front doors of a large department store. He ran between displays of dresses and silk blouses, vibrant colors all around as his shoes squeaked on the polished marble floors. He’d barely made it twenty paces inside before he heard shouts and screams that must be in response to Blackwell barreling in behind, gun in hand. Damn, the man was relentless.
Crowley ran to the left around a sales counter, then immediately dropped to the ground. A shocked woman looked over at him, and Crowley winked. Blackwell was barely ten paces behind and as the tall man leaned into the corner in pursuit, Crowley was there, crouched low. He shot out a leg and took Blackwell’s feet from under him. The tall man was immediately airborne, mouth falling open in surprise for one stretched moment of hang-time in mid-air, then he hit the hard floor with a slap and slid along, crashing into a display rack of light cotton jackets that came down over him like a collapsing tent.
Crowley was about make good on the surprise attack and hammer the guy before he could regain his focus, but a pair of store security guards came running in from the other side, yelling and demanding to know what was happening. Cursing, Crowley leaped up and ran back the way he’d come. He couldn’t afford to be detained, he needed escape more than answers.
As he ducked through the doors again, out onto the street, he heard a shot and screams. Something told him it was Blackwell who had fired. Hopefully, only a warning shot to get moving again, but that meant he would be back in pursuit.
Sucking in a frustrated breath, Crowley tipped his head and sprinted again. More screams sounded behind him and he glanced back to see Blackwell emerge from the department store, gun leveled and braced in both hands, arms extended straight. Everyone on the street between Blackwell and Crowley dropped as if in practiced synchronization, and Blackwell fired.
Crowley ducked to one side and heard the whine of the bullet as it screamed past his left ear. The fool had resorted to shooting in public. This had got about as bad as it could.
“That was too close!” Crowley yelled to no one in particular, then hurtled down stone steps into a subway station. He had no idea if it was a wise choice or not, but he could only hope the subway would be more crowded than the street, and prevent Blackwell from getting off any more shots. The man couldn’t shoot everyone.
He reached the bottom of the steps, jumped a turnstile, ignoring shocked faces all around him, and ran along the first platform he came to. Muffled shouts and screams echoed down the stairs, indicating Blackwell not far behind. Deciding to take his chances with the dark and machinery over the relentless gunman, Crowley leaped down beside the tracks and sprinted in the tunnel.
Shouts of “Hey, are you crazy?” and “What are you on?” followed him into the gloom, and then he just kept running.
A rumbling began in the distance and air started to rush past him, pushed along by an oncoming train. “Great timing, Jake!” he berated himself, and increased his speed, looking for anywhere to hide. A bright light not far away began to swell around a long bend, glistening off the curved wall of dirty bricks. It got brighter and brighter, the rumbling becoming a hard vibration, the wind a gale.
The train was like a dragon swooping down to swallow him, then the driver must have seen him as brakes began to screech and a horn blared loud enough to make his ears numb. Then an archway of blackness on his right was highlighted by the train’s headlight and Crowley dove into it.
He wasn’t sure what he expected to find in there, but he had imagined it would be a small space. Instead, as the train barreled past in noise and dust and wind, Crowley went head over heels down a narrow flight of steps. He barked out cries of pain as his shoulder, then his knee, cracked painfully into the edges of the stairs, but it was far better than being flattened by a train or shot by Blackwell.
After the train had passed, Crowley lay at the foot of the short stairway, breathing hard and gritting his teeth against a variety of aches and pains. The timing of the train might have been a blessing, it would have stopped Blackwell from following him into the tunnel, at least for a short time. But he couldn’t go back that way and had no idea how far it might be to the next station. He didn’t want to risk playing chicken with another train.
He pulled himself to his feet and felt around in the darkness. He had finished falling in a small brick area at the foot of the steps and a wooden door was closed right in front of him. He didn’t want to risk discovery by making light, so he felt around, hoping for a handle. He found a strip of cold metal and, not expecting much, pushed it down. To his pleasant surprise, the door opened.
“Finally something going my way,” he muttered, and stepped through.
Once he’d closed the door behind him, he fumbled out his cell phone and used the camera flash as a flashlight to see where he was. An arched brick passageway stretched away from him. It was that or go back the way he’d come, so he set off. Hopefully, Blackwell would never find him down here, so Crowley decided to see if there as another way out and, if not, retrace his steps hoping Blackwell would have given up and gone by the time he got back.
At the end of the short passage he came to a T-junction and looked both ways. No particular features drew his attention to either side, so he went left. He’d walked about fifty paces, wondering where he might find himself if he stayed underground for too long, when he heard a sound behind him and stopped. The sound continued a fraction of a second longer, then stopped too. There was a moment of light scraping and shuffling, the sensation of soft breathing. Over his own labored breath and hammering heart it was hard to tell what it might be, but images of Blackwell standing right behind him, gun raised, flashed through Crowley’s mind. But He had nowhere to go and sprinting away seemed foolish.
Slowly, he turned around, lifting his phone up to shine it back the way he’d come. In the passage were five or six people, grimy faces and dirty, tattered clothes in several bulky layers, eyes squinting tightly against the harshness of his light. They were all armed in one way or another, holding knives, lengths of pipe, home-made shivs. They held the weapons out in front of them and their faces were hard and mean. As one, they moved forward.