The others paused to consider this, before Ponch said "Now that you mention I haven't heard any radio chatter." Jon tensed up, his brilliant blue eyes showing that a troubling thought had entered in his mind. "Officer Malloy," he said, "I know you're in charge, but I don't think we should split up at all. My gut is telling me this isn't the only riot or emergency currently going on, and there is safety in numbers."
"I agree with you. Now we just have to find a way to get past that mob." "We could act as an escort and then when we get to the building go inside with them." Jim replied. "Anyone got any better ideas?" Pete asked. When none of the others present volunteered another thought he sighed and said, "I was afraid of that. Okay grab some of their gear and maybe we can get by on the pretense of helping them.
All the officers grabbed some of the equipment, and with the paramedics once again being flanked by them, they headed towards the crowd. The leader, spotting them said, "Hey whats all this? We said they could go through, not all of you." "They needed help carrying all of their medical gear. They have no idea what they are going to find in there, so they brought everything." Pete said. "We'll just help them carry it in and be right back out, okay?"
The leader considered that for a minute before finally saying, "Okay, but hurry up and no funny stuff." Inwardly all of the men relaxed, but outwardly acted like they didn't suspect a thing. Once inside, they headed quickly to another room and unloaded their supplies. "We can't leave it here." Roy said, "Once they realize you aren't coming out they are going to be mad, and more than likely break in here. If they do they will take our medical equipment for sure."
"Alright, let's get it better situated and see if we can find a place to store it while we look into what we have here." Jon replied. Roy and Johnny quickly set to work putting practically everything in a pile on the stokes as they had done numerous times. It took longer than the officers would have liked, as time was of the essence, but they knew that in the end having everything handy would save time and hopefully lives.
Roy and Johnny each grabbed a side of stokes, the officers Jim and Ponch each taking one of the two remaining places to ease the carrying. Than with Malloy in the lead and Jon taking the rear, they headed to the elevators. However once they got there they found the power had been cut to them. "Guess it's the stairs for us, come on lets move." Pete ordered.
They hurried as quickly as they could, encumbered by the stokes as they were, up two flights of stairs. They knew by now the rioters, or whatever they were, must be looking for the officers. In fact just as the door to the third floor was closing behind, they heard the sounds of voices as the bottom door was opened. "We don't have much time, we need to find a place to stash this equipment." Ponch said.
Jim spotted a door to their left up ahead and he said, "How about that janitor's closet?" "Perfect, we can cover it with supplies until we can get back to it." Johnny said. They hurried to follow through with Jim and Johnny's plan, quickly getting the job done. "Now the questions is, what do we do? Any room we enter is essentially a dead end and it would be stupid to stand out here in the hallway." Roy asked the group. If they were all honest, none of them wanted to think of how this could play out, for all they could currently see was it ending badly for the officers.