The masked man made his way to the vault, with Greg walking before him. They expected to find police officers coming in from a back door, but instead found two armed men trying to get out through the small windows.

"Hey, you!" he yelled, pointing his gun towards them.

They rose their hands quickly. "Please don't shoot!"

"Who the hell are you?"

"We... we wanted to rob the bank..." one of them said, sounding real scared.

"How did you get in here?" the masked man asked.

"Through these windows." The men both were slender. "When we noticed that a robbery was already in progress, we tried to get out! But we couldn't... We didn't fit through the windows anymore... Please, don't hurt us."

A weird silent moment followed.

The masked man rolled his eyes. "You got to be kidding me... Alright, give me your guns."

"Sure... sure..." they said, slowly putting their hands on their guns. Instead of handing them over, they both pointed their gun at him.

The masked man pulled Greg closer to him, with his arm around Greg's chest. "Don't you dare! I'll shoot him!" he yelled threatening.

"You're not gonna hurt him. We won't let you do that. Put your gun down!"

The masked man put his gun down. "You'll regret this..."

One of the other guys took the gun and pointed it at him. "Yeah well, I'm not so sure about that." He grinned. "How many are out there?" he said, looking at Greg.

"Just one," Greg said quietly. He was confused. The masked man gave in pretty quickly.

The two wannabe robbers laughed. "Cool. Let's meet him." One of them grabbed Greg, his partner grabbed the masked man and all four men walked back into the lobby.

"Reed!" Catherine was walking up to her. "How are they?"

"I talked to Greg on the phone. We're doing our best to get everyone out there safe," she replied.

"Can I talk to him?"

Reed shook her head. "We don't have a connection to them at the moment."

Nick ran up to them a few minutes later. "Are they okay?"

"We don't know," Catherine said with sadness in her voice. "Where's Sara?"

"On her way. What can I do to help?"

"Right now, I think it's best for us not to stand in the way and let them do their job..."

The masked man entered, with one of the wannabe robbers behind him, his partner walking next to him with Greg.

"What the hell...?" Ray said confused. He was able to disarm the one robber and was just about to start releasing the hostages. Some of them had bruises on their faces. When Greg and the other robber left, his partner beat some of the hostages for no obvious reason. It was when he covered up the security cameras that Ray was able to overpower him.

"Who the hell's this guy?" the man behind Greg asked angrily.

"He's my colleague..." he replied sheepishly.

"You didn't say anything about any colleagues!" he said annoyed.

Ray pointed his gun at him. "Who are you?"

"Let's just say we're the ones in charge now. Hand me the money!" he yelled, pointing his gun at Ray.

Still pointing the gun in their direction, Ray took the bag with the money and threw it to them.

He picked up the bag. "Nice. Now put your gun down."

Ray hesitated for a moment, but put his gun down, after all, seeing that there was no chance to overpower them, and kicked it towards them.

They tied up the masked robbers and pushed Greg to the other hostages. "Don't try anything, alright?" When they noticed that Ray and Greg were sitting together, one of them said, "No! I don't want you two together!"

"...Excuse me?" Greg asked confused.

"I don't want you two to... plan something or anything like that. No!" He grabbed Greg's arm and walked him a few feet away from Ray. "And I don't want to see you two communicate in ANY way, you got that?"

He nodded.

The clerks and customers of the bank were all cowering behind the counter, but Greg and Ray were both in front of it, as well as the masked men. Just now the hostage takers noticed Mr. Peyton, who was lying on the floor, bleeding. "What happened to him?"

"He got shot. He needs medical attention, there's not much we can do for him here," Ray replied. "Can I please take care of him?"

"But no tricks..."

Ray walked over to him and applied pressure to the wound. "We need to get him to a hospital, he lost a lot of blood..."

"Too bad for him," he said, looking pitiful.

"You're not gonna get him out of here?" Greg asked astonished.

"We can't risk that. The police will storm in once these doors open!"

Greg shook his head. "They won't if we tell them to stay out. But he needs to get to a hospital, or else he'll die."

The robbers looked at each other.

"Alright, you two." The robber pointed at two male hostages. "It's your lucky day."

Reed's phone rang. "Hello? Alright, we're ready..."

"Who was that?" Catherine asked nervously.

"Greg. One of the hostages is injured, two other hostages are bringing him out."

Catherine nodded. "Is there any way to use this opportunity to get them all out?"

"No, we have no idea what we're dealing with right now. It's too risky."

Several police officers were in position, with their guns pointing towards the doors to the bank. They were all wearing bullet proof vests.

"It's taking too long!" Nick said annoyed. "We have to get them out of there!"

"I know that," Reed replied. "There's nothing we can do at the moment. We don't even know with how many we're dealing with, we don't know enough yet. At least they're getting a hostage out."

"Yeah, an injured one. Who knows what's happening in there."

"Okay, get him out. Go!" The two hostages carried Mr. Peyton out, and the robbers told Ray and Greg to quickly close the doors again. "Alright, now that we dealt with this, it's time they do something for us." One of them dialed Reed's number with Greg's phone.

"He's on his way to the hospital," she said over the phone.

"That's nice to hear. And now that you got three hostages, we want something from you," the robber said cocky.

"Alright. What do you want?"

"We're getting hungry."

Ray, Greg and the other hostages were in that bank for five hours now. The two hostage takers were sitting with the hostages eating pizza while Ray and Greg had to sit several feet away. They had no idea why they were separated while the masked men were with the others, but the hostage takers made sure to always keep an eye on them.

"I don't think it'll last too long now," one of the hostage takers said to the hostages. "We're really sorry you all have to go through this, but we didn't know what else to do." He went on to explain why they tried to rob the bank. "I was in jail, you know... For something I didn't do. They had evidence proving my innocence, but it was dismissed in court, due to some formalities..." He was close to tears now. "I was released a few years later when they found the guy who really did it. But do you think I find work after I've been to jail, whether or not I did it? Of course not! Nobody cares that I have to take care of my three children."

Some of the hostages nodded sympathetically.

"The cops who arrested me beat me up... They didn't even ask any questions. I fit the description, so I did it, they thought. Just like him." He pointed at Ray. "Points his gun at us without knowing who we are."

The other hostage taker told the hostages the story about how the police killed his four year old daughter. "They were chasing after some bad guys when they ran over my wife and kid... My wife survived injured, but my daughter..." he said, fighting back tears.

Neither Greg nor Ray knew if these stories were true, but Ray knew what they were up to.

They kept talking with the hostages for another hour. Some of the hostages shared their stories about how the police did them wrong and they seemed to bond with the hostage takers.

After one of them came back with a bunch of the hostages after they were allowed to use the bathroom, he picked up the phone. "Detective, we're going to need a car. Tinted windows."

"Alright, but you need to give me another hostage."

"I'm offering you two."