Disclaimer: If you recognize them, they belong to Janet.

Starting to Unravel

Stephanie was working in her office at Elizabeth Fry. She heard a loud commotion in the main office. She peeked out her door. A man was standing in the main office with a gun in his hand. He was pointing it at Abby. Abby was holding her hands in the air. She was shaking and crying.

He was getting more and more agitated. Quietly, Stephanie backed away. She quickly got her purse and opened it up. Ranger had added a panic button one morning. She figured that he had put at least one more tracker into her purse again. She pushed the button.

Rangeman was a hive of activity. Men were just coming on for shift change. All of a sudden, Marty said. "What the hell?" He was looking at a monitor. There was a red flashing light. Bobby was in the control room putting up the schedule for re-testing. He moved over to the board. He looked at it and yelled. Ranger and Manny flew out of their offices and headed for Bobby. He silently pointed at the board. Ranger blanched. Manny had already raced back into his office. He was gearing up. Ranger started to bark orders. He was grabbing more weapons as he moved. "Bobby, get your bag. Mitch, Dan, and Harry, gear up. Marty, I need the two closest units to head to Elizabeth Fry. Wait for me. Do not , I repeat, do not engage."

They raced down the stairs. Tim was already opening the garage door for them. They jumped into their trucks and sped out of the garage. Ranger was driving one vehicle and Manny and Dan were driving the others. Each had a partner.

Bobby was with Ranger. He thought back to his conversation with Stephanie only yesterday. He hoped he would not be needing his Bomber bandaids.

Stephanie took a quick breath. Abby was in the office by herself and she he was hyperventilating from fear. Stephanie had to take some of the heat off her. She picked up some papers and headed out her door. She looked like she was reading notes.

She looked up in surprise as she saw the man with the gun. He had now pointed the gun at her. She squeaked and put her hands up in surrender. He motioned for her to come and stand by Abby. Stephanie moved slowly never taking her eyes off the gunman. She stood by Abby. Talking very soothingly, Stephanie said."What do you want? We have no money here. If you leave now, nothing will happen to you. "

He narrowed his eyes and glared at Stephanie. "I don't want money, bitch. I am looking for my girlfriend, Heddy. You're hiding her from me and I want to know where she is. We belong together and you're poisoning her against me."

Stephanie remembered the staff meeting a few days ago. One of the counsellors had brought up Heddy. She was hiding from her abusive boyfriend. He had threatened her a number of times and she was afraid he would try to abduct her and take her away.

Stephanie tried to calm down the situation. She spoke soothingly to him. "I don't know where Heddy is. How about you put that gun down and we can go into an office and discuss this. You don't want to hurt anybody. I know you are missing her. Maybe we can call her and she can talk to you. "

He growled in frustration. Stephanie could see he was under the influence of some drug. His eyes had that vacant look and were not tracking well. This was a very dangerous situation. She could hear Patricia on the phone with the police.

He started to vibrate and the gun shook in his hand. He pointed it at Abby again and screamed. "Tell me where she is right now!" Stephanie moved a bit closer to him. He turned the gun on her again. She edged in front of Abby. She continued to talk softly. "Come on, you don't want to do this. Give me the gun. Heddy would not like it if she heard you wanted to hurt someone. Give me the gun, please. "

Stephanie could see movement out of the corner of her eye. A flash of black by a window. She tried again. "We can call Heddy. She can talk to you. Maybe she can come down here and we can meet. I know that she loves you but you have to give me the gun first."

He screamed in rage. There was a flurry of activity. Stephanie leaped and grabbed for the gun. A gunshot was heard. The door burst open and a sea of men in black poured through the front door. The back door had opened too and more men ran in. There was someone screaming in the background and the sound of sirens could be heard getting closer.

Manny had the man on the ground with his knee in the man's back and his hands cuffed behind him. Abby was still screaming. Ranger looked for his Babe. She was laying on the floor and he raced over to her. Bobby was right behind him. Ranger fell on his knees and touched her. She didn't move. He gently turned her over. There was a dark stain on her shirt. Bobby had pushed his way in and took one look. He ripped open her shirt. He already had his bag open. She was bleeding heavily. He took a compression bandage and pressed it over the wound. He felt her pulse then he looked at Ranger. "She's alive, man. She took one near her shoulder. We'll get her patched up good as new."

Patricia was hugging Abby. The other women had come into the room. They were clustered around Patricia and Abby. Most of them were weeping. They had all dreaded the day this would happen. They had tried to be careful not to let anyone know where their offices were, but somehow he had found out.

Manny stepped over to Patricia. He looked at all the women. "She will be fine. Bomber's been hurt a bunch of times. Bobby knows what she needs. Just watch. She'll try to convince him that she doesn't need to go to the hospital. She'll whine that he can treat her better back at Rangeman. They have always had this agreement that if she can walk, she doesn't need to go to the hospital. They will argue back and forth. The clincher will be that Ranger says, Please. She can never refuse him if he says that word."

Almost on cue, Stephanie could be heard. She tried to convince Bobby it was a scratch and a bandaid would work. She said that he could stitch her up. She even argued that if he did, she would stay at Rangeman for the day so he could check on her.

Bobby was gently arguing the point that she needed to go to the hospital. He wanted her to have a full set of x rays to make sure there was no underlying damage. He wanted her to see a doctor. She had lost a lot of blood. Back and forth the discussion continued.

Finally, Ranger stepped in. "Babe, please do this. The infirmary at Boston is not as extensive as Trenton."

Stephanie looked in his eyes. She slowly nodded. She would go. He had said the magic word. She was loaded in the ambulance. Ranger jumped in with her. Bobby headed out the door to a truck. He would follow the ambulance to the hospital.

Manny and his men handed over the attacker to the police. He was taking the lead answering their questions. Manny agreed that he would escort Abby to the police station for her statement. He gave Stephanie's name to the arresting officers. They would head to the hospital later for her statement.

Manny looked around. Now he knew how Tank felt. He had handled the situation with Ranger out of the way. He would write up his report on the incident. For the very first time he now believed he could handle the job. It felt good.