Long Arm of the Law 5
$20 dollars stolen. A mumbled complaint followed up by a phone call saying there was no emergency. It was no great mystery that they hadn't been called to the scene, It wasn't a terrible neighborhood; but it was on the edge of one. There were probably a dozen emergencies going on in the Gnu York at any one time. If you were going to get sloppy with procedure, this neighborhood on that call would be the choice to make.
Back on the street, Brown looked to the left and to the right. He could hear the ticking of an imaginary clock. The cheapest crank on the street was $40. Twenty short. And that was just for one rock. You could share that; but there were two of them. Luka and some gutter-monkey, in the words of Mrs. Alma. They'd be looking for a bigger hit, more of a sure thing.
"Where to, now?" Hewitt asked, closing the front door behind him.
To the right was the route they'd left. It was a nicer neighborhood. Richer. More secure. Their street lamps were already on.
To the left was a rougher neighborhood. Poorer. Still had at least one deli or market on every corner. Some of streetlamps were lit yet. A few would not come on for months.
"Less video cameras down this way," Brown said and strutted off to the left. Hewitt followed. "They obviously thought the Almas would be at work and that they had some cash lying around. Didn't reckon they'd be home with the flu."
"They won't have the time or patience to case something on the nicer side of town, either." Hewitt said breaking into an easy trot. He had picked up on Brown's sense of urgency coming down the stairwell, with no explaining on Browns part. The reptile appreciated that. An officer of the law had very few opportunities to prevent a violent crime from happening. In real life, people just didn't call in a lot of actionable tips to the police. But events had handed them this one chance.
"Subway's too far," Brown said, turning on the heater in his uniform. It would help him move a little faster in a few minutes. "He grew up here. He'll look for a place they don't know him. New owners maybe, or a new second shift employee." There were not a lot of new stores down this way. If pressed, Brown would have guessed none.
"Call ahead?" Hewitt asked. They were technically about to hit another team's beat. Procedure didn't mandate them reaching out to another pair of cops, but it might be nice to have back-up.
"We got the All Points." Brown said after a thought. "There's every chance Luka and his friend had more cash on them when they tossed the Almas' apartment.. They could be somewhere right now holed up and putting that shit into their bodies. They already have an hour's headstart..."
They came to the corner. There were maybe a third of the people on this street, but it was still too busy for a stick up. They trotted to the next corner, the warmed blood now hitting Brown's brain, making him more alert. Left and right, there were maybe ten people on the street, some of these homeless. Half of these were reptiles and would have no interest in talking to the police and the other half would be incoherent to begin with.
In a car chase, if you lost the suspect, you assumed that he turned rights. Because it was easier.
On foot, it was harder to say. But Brown assumed that unless you were being chased, you'd stay on your sidewalk. To the left. There were more stores that way, in any case. In his mind, he pictured a little mini-mart that insisted on covering their windows with posters, top to bottom, despite police safety reminders. He gestured that way.
They started to the left. "Maybe if we're lucky," Hewitt said, "They're shut up some where, shooting up the insulin. Two less scumbags on the street."
Brown felt something turn heavily in his stomach. He chose to ignore it.
They'd passed only one storefront when they heard the gun shot.
They squatted down and drew their weapons, trying to find the source of the sound.
A dirty cream colored cat in a hoodie and a fat lemur hustled out of a record store across the street, and Brown cursed himself for not being faster... or smarter.
"Call it in!" He shouted and pushed across the street, stopping traffic with his blue uniform and a huge throwback bifurcated claw. Hewitt called in back-up and an ambulance before he was across the street. He mentally willed the rookie to check on the store staff at the record store. There could be injured people in there. Someone had to secure the crime scene.
But he also hoped Hewitt followed him. It was easier to be brave when you had a three hundred pound bear backing you up.
Brown was already heated up, so he moved with ease. It was eating up his endurance, but if he didn't get them in the next five minutes, he wouldn't get them. He wasn't 20 yards away from Luka, when he decided to sprint and tackle the tom with a burst of speed he found within himself. The cat was laughing obliviously as Brown closed the gap. At ten feet, the lemur took one of their weird side running jump steps, saw Brown sprinting towards Luka and called out a warning just as Brown leaped.
Brown got a claw full of off white tail as Luka jerked to the left, but lost it on impact with the sidewalk. His uniform took a beating in the skid, but the heater pads saved his skin from being ripped up. Brown clambered back onto his feet and pulled his weapon.
"Freeze!" he screamed, "Police!" but they ignored him. He wasn't the type to shoot anyone in the back. Especially, when he hadn't seen a weapon. The gunshot was just as likely the store clerk's. Cursing, he ran after the addicts in a beat.
He chased them another block and he was beginning to feel his age, when some... mass... passed him from overhead. It was hard to look at, a blur that seemed to move pass instantly and yet linger as an afterimage of a tube a shattered air. It arched towards the suspects and when they dodged down an alley, it followed them. It took a moment for all of the thing to slip into the alley mouth.
Huffing, Brown got at the Alley a moment later. He paused his gun up, as he collected himself to look into the alley where some sort of storm seemed to rage. Gunshots were fired... 1, 2, 3, and then 4 bullets fired.
Hewitt catches up to him as Brown is listening at the raging storm a few feet away. He thinks he can hear screams now. "Backup is coming," Hewitt said, his weapon out, and ready to follow Brown's lead into the alley. "Clerk's dead."
That made Brown move into the alley. But he was in no hurry. A real monster had already found them. A monster he suspected had no appetite for cops. Still, it was only a suspicion.
Brown moved cautiously down the twisting alley as if it was a dead end, although he knew better. Hewitt followed his partner's lead, not speaking, except to softly call in their location. Brown wanted to know if he'd seen what he had seen, too, or better yet, got a better look at what he couldn't look at. Brown wanted to know if Hewit had counted the bullets, too. Four plus one for the clerk.
There was at least one bullet left.
The wind died down just before they came around the final corner. "Police! Freeze!"
Luka and his "gutter-monkey" friend were on top of each other in a painfully unconscious pile. Standing over them at a humble five foot tall was a blue-green turtle with futuristic goggles that made his eyes seem too blue and too white and impossibly huge all at the same time. An amazingly flexible beak smiled. "I hope you fellows don't mind that I stepped in."
Brown bobbed his head three times, and flicked out his tongue out.
Fastback smiled back, showing, impossibly a few white teeth. Brown flicked out his tongue and held his gun aimed at the super-powered creatures chest. ""Step away from the suspects," Brown snapped.
Fastback made a show of stepping back at normal turtle speed. Maybe even more slowly. "Brother, they are all yours. I don't mean to show you up. You can put me in your report... or not... it's totally up to you."
Hewitt went to check the suspects. "They're alive." He slapped handcuffs on Luka.
"Of course, they're alive. I only spun them around long enough to suck the oxygen away and make them pass out."
Brown kept the gun centered on Fastback's chest. Without looking away, he handed the rookie his set of handcuffs. "I'm going to need you to come back to the station with us. Fill out a report."
Hewitt called out, "Come on, Brown. That's Fastback. One of the Zoo Crew."
The creature shrugged, his shell seeming to stretch with his shoulders in a way that made Brown's neck muscles flinch in kindred protest. "You know I could just catch any bullet you shot at me, right?"
Brown's tongue shot out again, tasting the air. They stared at one another for a moment. "Actually, I don't know that at all." Brown said.
"Well," Fastback said, "Look at the hour. I've got to run."
And with that, Fastback turned and blurred, a cyclonic rush of wind pouring into the alley. Newspaper and little went everywhere. The was a blur up the side of a building and Fastback was gone.