**** AAHH so sorry for the wait guys! The art show is over, I'm home and back to posting! Left poor Reese in a bind again (you know how I love to do that! (evil grin.) Hope you guys like it. Please R&R ****
"There! Finch! There they are!" Carter rolled down her window despite the heavy rain. The big luxury car crested a hill lifting with a momentary floating sensation before heavily testing the suspension on the other side. They could now clearly make out all five ambulances speeding out of the city limits.
Finch listened as Carter called in the plate number of the closest one. "Hang back, but keep them in sight. I'm going to call in a road block."
"Detective, you can't do that! We have to get John out first."
"Finch, there's no way to know which one he's in without stopping them all! How are we going to do that?" She clenched her jaw in frustration. "Why aren't things ever simple with you guys?" She huffed with a shake of her head. "Rhetorical... don't answer that."
The ambulances clung to the city's darker outskirts, blasting through pothole-infested black top to avoid the higher profile highways. Parked and abandoned cars intermittently narrowed the already treacherous and rain-sheeted roads, but the ambulances had no problems. Their weight easily cut through the shedding waters, while dual-wheels bridged the tire swallowing terrain.
"Detective? I'm no expert.., but there seem to be headlights gaining on us at an extreme rate of speed." Finch couldn't keep the alarm from his voice.
Carter looked back at the very moment a massive, black truck collided with the back of their lincoln.
The impact felt like a battering ram, snapping both Finch and Carter in their seats. The truck sent the car lurching forward and into a hydroplaning slide before Finch managed to right its path once again.
"Dammit!" Carter pointed her gun out the window and fired at the vehicle, while bringing her phone to her ear. She yelled between shots. "Fusco! We're heading north..! On the Hutchinson River Parkway..! In pursuit of five Ambulances..! Picked up a tail.. and could use some help!"
The truck pulled back, for a moment; Carter thought her bullets might have hit home and deterring their attackers, but a spray of automatic gunfire, told her it was just a weapon's change.
Their car was instantly riddled with the deadly, metal-shredding rounds causing both of them to reflexively duck.
Finch had this lincoln reenforced against attacks, but it offered little resistance against the Mercenaries' hail of armor-piercing rounds. Bullets penetrated the interior, shooting across the seats.
"Fuck!" Carter yelled, watching as blood seeped through her fingers clutched over a deep gouge on her right shoulder.
"Carter!?" Finch shouted over the howling wind and road noise. "Are you alright?!"
"I'm fine!" She ground out, truly unsure of the damage, but certain she didn't have the time to find out. "Punch it!"
Finch increased their speed, but there was nothing he could do to truly outrun the range of their bullets. None the less, he pushed the design limits of the large car anywhere the road allowed.
Grimacing against the burning pain of her wound, Carter dug through one of Reese's bags she'd grabbed from the library. "Try to hold it steady!" She couldn't believe what she was about to do. She was taking a page right out of John's play book! And yet, she itched to end these assholes.
Harold gripped the steering, not just against the hazardous speeds, but also in anxious anticipation of the weapon he watched Carter withdraw from the bag.
Spinning backwards in her seat, "Lets see how you do blind!" Carter spat, with an M-203 smoke grenade launcher now aimed out her window. Luckily it was a left-handed shot, she thought, while taking aim with her good arm.
A deafening, throaty thunk recoiled up her bones. She had to squint through the downpour to see if she'd hit her mark, but the violently whipping headlights and thick smoke, purring from all four windows of the truck, answered her question. "Got ya!" She snarled.
"Lieutenant? What the hell's going on back there!" The soldier at the wheel yelled.
"It's Roberts. We must have picked up a tail. He and the men are taking care of it."
Reese listened to the distant, but unmistakable pops of automatic gunfire when a couple sudden swerves, suggested the battle was getting closer.
"Get some distance between us - go faster, Harris! We've got our orders! The clinic's not much farther!" The Mercenary, John now knew as Mathison, commanded.
A low resonating blast suddenly made Reese smile. He knew the sound of his grenade launcher anywhere. Carter had found them.
That was his cue - time to move.