1St. Mary's, now.
The first thing she felt was wet along her temple. Reaching up with her fingers, running them through her hair, her hand came away with blood on her fingertips. Next she felt the strong arm across her shoulder, holding her tight to the ground next to, and covering her daughter. Looking down Erin saw that Nicki was okay; bodily shielded by Rick Castle.
The next thing was the sound. The low drone of car engines running, and dull roar of a crowd. She heard police shouting orders into radios, teachers trying to calm students, and in the background the media trying to make sense of it all.
"Everyone alright here?" Erin heard someone ask.
"Hey," the voice said again.
Erin felt herself being shaken from above. She reached for Nicki, and moved to push Richard off of them.
"Ricky! You and the girls alright?" the voice asked again.
"We're fine… I think," Erin heard her new friend Kate Beckett say from the other side of her daughter, also being held by Rick.
"Ricky, you can stand up now. The douche bags are to hell and gone with some pissed off cops on their tail,." Maurice Boscorelli said.
Erin looked up to Bosco's voice. She flashed him a smile. With a light push from Erin and Kate taking his elbow, the girls got Rick to his feet. Castle stood slowly, swaying this way and that.
"Whoa," said Bosco, while reaching to steady Castle. Kate took a tighter grip on his arm.
"Just lean on me," Kate whispered in his ear.
Rick looked down to Nicki, Erin kneeling beside her.
"You alright kid?" Castle asked.
"I'll be fine," Nicki said with a groan, rolling over and sitting up.
"Looks like you knocked your head, counselor," Bosco said.
"I'm sure it's just a scratch," Erin replied.
"Still," Bosco said. "You should get checked out by the paramedics when they get here."
"What about the girl?" Castle asked.
"The kid with Grace and Carlos?"
"Farthing," Castle said. "Yeah."
"It'll have to wait for the ME's van to get here. We might need the bus for the living, after the triage is done."
"So what was with the car chase?" Kate asked the Sergeant.
"Anti-Crime and the oh-eight were running an op a few blocks away, I got pulled away to respond to the girl in the stairwell. Shit clearly went sideways. Lt Davis didn't give me an answer yet."
"No kidding," Castle bit out, as he rotated his left shoulder.
"Ricky!" Captain Miller shouted from by the hood of one of the shot up squad cars. "Get over here!"
Looking back to Erin and Nicki he asked. "Will you two be alright for a minute?"
Taking a step away, he leaned in to Kate and kissed her forehead. "Stay with them, please?"
With her nod, Rick let go of Kate and took a few more steps with Bosco, and headed towards the car where the Captain and Lieutenant were situated with Kevin Ryan and Jamie Reagan.
"The hell happened man?" Bosco asked Davis again.
"They rabbited," the young Lieutenant replied. "Patrol gave chase, then the people we were expecting for the meet showed up. Firefight, then…" Davis gestured to the tv cameras, reporters, and shot up school front.
"That was some pretty hefty firepower they were throwing your way when the cars went by," Castle said. "Was this drugs, gang turf dispute?"
"Both," Captain John Miller said.
"Who were they under?" Ryan asked. "I mean, you gotta be pretty ballsy to do a drive by in a school zone. There are rules."
Pointing at the map rolled out over the hood of the patrol car, Sgt Finney gestured to colour coded lines running in not so easy to understand directions. It resembled something Alexis would have drawn when she was in kindergarten, Rick thought.
"We're near the edge of Sanfino territory," Finney said. "But they've been pretty quiet since some of their top guys went up. Power vacuum might be letting the underlings think they can run amok. But, Bobby S out of Staten Island has a crew around here. The Irish are pretty nasty when it comes to payback if you touch a kid. Detective's right. There are rules."
Rick leaned over to Bosco, asking him quietly. "What about the fallout from Hollis? He was a piece of work, but he was smart."
"Got something to share, Rick?" Captain Miller asked. "What's this about a guy been dead for years?"
"He was smart, right? Smart enough to organize a meet and wipe out the heads of his direct competition, right? Had the balls to introduce himself to a police sergeant in their own precinct, and start offering terms. Not a payoff, not trying to get them in his pocket; terms of how the streets can be made peaceful. With him at the top, but a certain kind of peace."
"And that sort of leadership would leave an impression," Jamie Reagan followed. "Yeah."
Jamie leaned over the map, sorting out streets, checking of ingress and egress. "If I'm organizing a meet, or a buy, and I want to be sure the cops aren't gonna interfere,"
"You send them someplace else." Ryan said.
"You send them someplace else…," the captain said. "Shit. Who's got a working car? Davis, you stay here. Get the tapes from the newsies. Finney, start rounding up car keys; we need to get back to that block. Reagan make sure the ME gets out of here with the just the one body. Bosco, you and-,"
The captain was cut off by the sound of more gunfire coming from down the street, the sound moving closer along with the roar of revving engines, and the faint sound of police sirens, and ambulance horns.
As the gunshots got closer, the students began to crouch to the ground and get behind the stone planters that lined the front walk and steps of the school, some screaming.
The news cameras swung towards the sound, moving away from the shots of ambulances and stand ups with the reporters present.
"Get Down!" Detective Curratola could be heard yelling back to the students as she moved to cover Lt Nyetto, the paramedic, by the shot up ambulance. "Perlmutter, get that body out of here!"
The writer watched as 3 of the cops split off from around the hood of the squad car. Ryan and Bosco made to push him down behind the front of the car, expecting the speeding cars and gunfire to come back around the bend any second.
It did.
Flashes of light, were seen reflected in the windows of the buildings on the corner before the sound of the latest round of blasts were heard. They echoed against the front of the school, as they were accompanied by the screech of tires, 5 cars rocketing through the intersection, and splitting off from each other. Some went straight through, 2 others turned and went careening up the street past the front of the school. The back window of the rear car opened, and more bullets smashed through the parked police cars, stuck the ME van, flattened tires of the news trucks, and broke windows in the façade of the school. The students screams were drowned out by the sharp rat-tat-tat of the automatic fire.
News cameras capturing it all, live.
Rick moved to get up, Bosco tried to hold his shoulder to keep him down. Castle shrugged him off.
"Enough of this," Castle said. "Which one of you has keys?"
"Car's shot up," Bosco said. "What? You think you can go after them? This isn't one of your stories Ricky."
Castle looked over the Kate, Erin and Nicky. Erin looked up for a moment, from tending to her daughter. She nodded to him, letting him know they were alright. "Go," she mouthed to him.
Sparing another moment, Castle held his look to the girls. He wanted to see Kate.
Ryan tugged on Castle's jacket arm. "They're alright, Castle." Ryan said, seeing the look in Rick's eyes. He'd seen it before, in the parking lot of a shabby motel while leaning against the fence surrounding the pool.
Ryan had seen Rick happy, he' seem him scared, he'd seen him sullen. Now he'd seen him angry.
Reaching in to his jacket pocket Castle pulled out the keys to his car.
"Stay here," he said. "I'll be back in a sec."
"Ricky-," Bosco started.
Castle didn't hear the rest. He was already off at a sprint to the staff/visitor parking lot around the corner by the quad. Thankful, now, that Kate had asked him to show him around the old stomping grounds that stared in the drama department by the back of the school.
Hoping the low fence that surrounded the parking lot, Castle dodged around the bike rack, and jumped over the hood of the principal's Chrysler Dynasty, skidding along his right hip. Landing on his feet he skipped the last few steps to the trunk of his car. Rooting around, Castle took out three duffle bags. Throwing 2 in the back, and one in the front passenger seat, Rick got in and turned the ignition. Looking behind him, he tossed the car in reverse and hit the gas.
The Buick Grand National turned out of the parking lot onto the street slowly. Rick changes gears, and maneuvered around the TV trucks.
Leaving the car running, Rick reached behind him into one of the duffles in the back seat, and pulled out vests. Strapping on the vest as he exited the car, Castle threw one at Ryan.
"Get in the car." Castle said.
Ryan looked at Castle, he looked at Bosco.
"You better go get my car," Ryan told the patrol sergeant handing him the keys. "Take someone with you. Shotguns are in the trunk."
Ryan got in the car.
"Hey Ricky!" Captain Miller called from the ambulances, near Kate and Erin, with a wave of his hand. "What are you doing?"
This caught Kate's attention.
Rick didn't hear him. He rounded the back of the car and sat in the front seat.
"Castle?" Kate said, looking up when she heard the captain. Looking over she saw him get in his Buick, with a pissed and slightly worried looking Kevin Ryan. She saw Castle look over to Ryan and say something. Kevin nodded and did up his seatbelt.
"Castle?!," Kate raised her voice.
Rick slammed his door shut, leaned over to the dash, turning up the stereo; and 80s guitar sliding the opening bars of Stan Bush blarred out from the rolled down windows catching the attention of the news cameras. The Buick Grand National spun its tires, and rocketed up the street after the 2 cars. Bosco in Ryan's cruiser close behind.
"No!" Kate's shout was heard by the TV camera's.