Long A/N sorry, but please read! A special "thank you" to fbob who has been with me as my weapons expert, fight sequence expert, and scenerio advisor from the beginning. I have no expertise at all in these areas! Without him all the technical stuff would be a bunch of BS. and the story much less exciting. I'm grateful for his help in making me a better writer! Check out his stories here on fanfic. More special thanks to my two betas who choose to remain anonymous. They fix my crazy grammar mix ups, (Spanish is my first language), my spelling and tenses mistakes. They always seem to find mistakes the other one misses. I hope I'm getting better at it! Thank you for all you guys do, you make me look good! A huge thanks to all of you that read, review, fav and follow, because if you didn't do all of the above I probably wouldn't write. You give me the incentive to be better at this! Thank you all!
My entry in the 2014 Castle Hiatus Ficathon!
Beckett was pinned helpless between the wall and her assailants body, her movements severely limited by his hold on her position between him and the wall. Her feet flailed futilely for purchase just inches off the floor, but the hand clamped over her mouth didn't budge. She struggled as she felt his hot breath at her neck, and the grunt as he forced her tight against the wall. Her mind reeled with the possible outcomes, none of which ended with freeing Castle. She felt the panic start to rise from her stomach, just before reasonable thought took over. Something about this scenario wasn't quite right. The terrorists wouldn't have hesitated to take her out. Why wasn't she dead yet? That's when her captors voice whispered harshly against her ear. "I'm not here to hurt you. We can get him out, together, or you can leave and I can do it alone, but you've got to stop making noise before they hear you."
The sound of Jackson Hunt's voice stilled her immediately, her loathing for the man still coursed through every vein in her body, but the simple truth was he had the skills and expertise she desperately needed at this moment. She knew her chances of rescuing Castle had just greatly improved so she nodded And waited for him to loosen his grip.
Hunt slowly eased her down onto her feet and gently removed his hand from her mouth. He stepped away from her as she turned around and glared at him. She despised the man and what he stood for, but respected his ability to do his job. After so many years as an operative he was still alive, that said something.
He motioned in the direction of the the stairs and she reluctantly followed him, down two flights and into the first empty room.
Beckett turned on him the instant they entered the room, her voice strained with anger, but just barely aabove a whisper. Her eyes communicated the fire in her soul as she spoke, her hands clenched and unclenched at her sides.
"You knew he was here? And said nothing?" She hissed between her teeth. Only Bracken had ever incited such ravenous anger and hate in her.
"I wanted to do recon before bringing you all in, so we had an actual chance of saving my son. I arrived about two hours before you did. They know you're here. The gunshots alerted them and they will be doing everything they can to move Richard to a new location."
"So what do you have?" She didn't want to waste time arguing if he had a good plan already in place to save Castle. Her feelings for the man had to be put aside for Castle's sake.
"Richard was being held on the seventh floor towards the front of the building. The two brothers were with him at all times. Two more men stayed on the same floor, they alternated walking the corridor and standing guard outside of his door. There was one man at the back of the building and the one you took out at the front. I haven't seen anyone else, doesn't mean there aren't more." He looked at her holster and the gun tucked in her belt.
"What are you carrying?"
"I have my Glock nineteen service weapon and my backup Glock twenty six along with the Glock 17 with a silencer, the silencer is in my pocket, along with two spare magazines and a knife that I took from the guy who attacked me." She offered as she lifted the leg of her pants to expose the backup piece.
"Spare magazines for the nineteen and twenty six?"
"No, but the magazines for the seventeen will work in the other two."
"That's it?"
"Yes." She rolled her eyes at him in frustration and she wondered what the hell he expected. Then he finally gave her the information she desperately craved, so she remained quiet and took it all in.
"The fact that they know you're here and that they are going to move him, can work in our favor if we are quick and we work as a team."
"Just tell me what you think we should do."
"We'll split up. You go to their vehicle, I'll follow them down through the building and force them into a rear guard action. With a little luck I'll get one or two of them before they try to exit the building. You set up to flank them where they will leave the building. They'll be trapped between us. If nothing else that will buy us time until backup arrives. If worse comes to worst you kill them when they try to leave the building. They aren't wearing vests so shoot to kill."
"Where are their vehicles hidden?"
"They have one black Jeep Rubicon backed into the brush at the back of the building in the Northeast corner, not far from what used to be the ambulance entrance. I spotted the Jeep from in here, but it probably can't be seen from above. The closest exit to the Jeep is about 50 yards from it. When you get to the main floor follow the corridor to your right to the end. There are two doors there, one ahead leads to the ambulance bay, it's rusted shut. The one to the left leads to an outside entrance used when one ambulance was in the bay and another arrived. That's the exit they will probably use. That corridor has no other exits, so once they're in there, if you are outside, we'll have them trapped.
"If you move the Jeep so it's pointed toward that door and then disable it, that would be great. Just make sure the lights work, you can use the lights to pin them in that foyer - the lights become a third man for us. Check for any other vehicle out there. Once they move Richard we will have them trapped between us. Call your people and let them know. We don't have a lot of time."
"Got it. How will we coordinate?"
"We'll keep in contact by phone."
"Alert me when they're at the door and I'll turn the Jeep lights on, blinding them and exposing their exit route to the Jeep. That ought to make them think twice about leaving. You have plenty of ammo?"
"More than enough. Besides, I can take the weapons from them if I manage to disable one or more. Hopefully, I'll have more than I can carry." He paused a moment then said, "Detective, forget arresting anybody. You see one, you kill him. Put a bullet in their brain. Use that suppressed pistol. We're out numbered, they have submachine guns and a hostage. If you can't do that, I need to know now."
"That won't be a problem." She met his eyes and he saw her steel determination.
Beckett moved away from Hunt to the door. She peeked around the door frame, slid out the door and turned towards the stairwell without another word. She could hear yelling from the floors above as she quietly scurried down the stairs. As she passed each floor she looked to make sure it was clear and continued. Her eyes were well enough adjusted to the dark so that she could navigate the halls by what little light leaked in from the night sky. For the moment at least, her hearing was finely attuned to the noises around her. She could feel the adrenaline as it coursed through her and the steady beat of her heart as it thumped loudly in her chest. Thankfully her hands were still steady. The suppressor made the pistol quite muzzle heavy but she was grateful to see it wasn't shaking.
She moved away from the stairs as she arrived on the main floor of the building. It gave her a good view of the brush out to the back of the building complex where the Jeep was hidden. She spotted it right away exactly where Hunt had said it would be. Following his directions, she took a right and walked down the long corridor until she arrived at the doors.
Outside the crescent moon gave little light, but that made it easier for her to stay hidden while she made her way to the Jeep. She stayed close to the building. Used the shadows cast by the trees to keep her hidden from the terrorists. As she approached the Jeep she noticed one of their men asleep at the wheel.
After a second of thought, she doubled back into the woods so she approached the car from the rear. Out of habit she swept her trigger finger over the extractor on the Glock. It protruded which indicated a round in the chamber. She approached the Jeep with the pistol gripped tightly in both hands at the low and ready. Beckett crouched low in case the terrorist woke up and looked back using the side mirror. The radio suddenly crackled to life when she was within reach of the door, and startled the man awake.
Beckett took advantage of his sleepy confused state, opened the door and put two bullets into his temple before he knew what had happened. The suppressed Glock wasn't silent but she didn't hear it go off either. Blood and brains exploded on the far side of the man's head. He slumped across the center console. The gun slipped from his hand onto the ground by her feet. She quickly placed two fingers to the artery at his throat and felt no pulse. She didn't expect one. Quickly she laid the gun on the roof of the Jeep, grabbed the man by the collar and tumbled him out of the Jeep and onto the ground.
A quick check showed the keys hung loosely in the ignition. She grabbed the gun off the roof, slid into the seat, ignored the blood and gore in the passenger's seat, started the Jeep and drove it forward with the front wheels turned hard left so that the Jeep was pointed right at the door she expected them to exit from. Later, she would learn, that she had driven the rear wheel right over the body of the dead man, and she never felt it. She noted the over grown bushes to the left of the door facing the building and decided that was where she would to go stage her ambush if they decided to leave.
With that settled she jumped out of the Jeep and disengaged the hood clamps and pushed the hood up using the metal rod to keep it open. That's when she decided she had no idea how to disable it, but she could take the keys. Hopefully their other set, if they had one, would be in the pocket of one of Hunt's victims. She lowered the hood, engaged the clamps and returned to the drivers seat. Determined that she could reach through the window to turn on the headlights she lowered the window, removed the keys and closed the car door.
As she turned to the dead driver she could hear the radio crackle to life. The foreign speaking voices became increasingly angry, they yelled names and words in a language she didn't understand, then there was silence. She decided they had been calling the dead driver.
Beckett debated whether or not to call Espo. She decided that if Hunt called while she was on with Espo she'd just switch calls. She hit the speed dial for Espo's cell. He answered immediately, "Beckett? You okay?"
"Yeah. I've got company, Hunt's here."
There is a moment of silence as Espo takes that in. He knows Beckett's dislike for the man.
"Situation report?"
"I'm outside the building. I've disabled their getaway vehicle and killed the driver. Hunt is flushing them out of the building in my direction. I'm going to light up the entrance Hunt's flushing them toward with the Jeep's headlights. Then I'll get in position to flank them if they decide to leave. If they hole up, maybe you can get here with the reinforcements. Where are you?"
"We're 10 minutes out. Where are you right now? What door are they expected to leave from?"
"The exit we think they will use is on the Northeast corner of building 93, it's behind the ambulance bay. Building 93 is the tallest building on the property, go around it to the right as you face the building."
"We'll land in the road about a quarter mile away and hump in from there. There are medic choppers in route as well. I'll update them and Shaw. Where do you plan to stage your ambush?"
"I'll be in heavy overgrowth to the right of their exit door as you leave the building. On the left of the door facing the building. Espo, they're heavily armed. Hunt saw sub machine guns."
Just then she heard the phone beep and saw an incoming call. She instantly touched the screen to answer it. She said, "Hunt?"
"Lights, now!"
She jumped onto the driver side running board of the Jeep, reached in and flipped on the high beams, then sprinted away from the car to her planned ambush location just outside the area lit up by the lights. The bright car lights hurt her night vision and she moved a lot slower than she had anticipated. She arrived against the building and found the spill from the headlights a lot brighter than she'd planned on, but there was nothing she could do about that now. She pushed through the thick underbrush and overgrown bushes, some of which had thorns that tore at her skin and grabbed her clothes. She finally arrived at a position where she could lean into a bush, see out the other side and still be able to fire while maintaining concealment. They would figure out where she was quickly enough but every little bit would help. She made sure her service weapon was ready in her shoulder holster but, based on how it shot, the forward weight bias almost stopped muzzle rise, decided to use the suppressed pistol that still had fifteen rounds, maybe sixteen, left in it. She left the backup on her ankle where it was. She could always drop down to get it. The other pieces were tucked into her belt if needed.
She wondered where Hunt was and if he had been able to successfully separate anymore of the gunmen from the group. She tried not to think about the condition Castle would be in, and the risk to his life if she had to start shooting and was badly outnumbered. She decided her priority target would be the one holding Castle. Her only hope was her belief that they had to keep him alive until they had Hunt. After that all bets were off for everyone.
My second longest story has 16 chapters, 348 reviews and 270 fav. It's what I'm shooting for right now with this one. My longest is 26 chapters and 571 reviews...who knows it might happen. So please let me know what you think by reviewing. This story is so out of my comfort zone. It's the second case fic I've ever done and I can't begin to tell you how difficult it is to write. It's so much easier to write romance and smut ;)
Please, let me know what you thought of this chapter. I'm half way to the 50k words required in the ficathon! Don't forget this will continue with weekly updates with longer chapters (hopefully). Thanks again for reading, please review! :) Follow me on Twitter glo1196 - Tumblr: MyCastleObsession and on Pintrest glo11962 where I have a Castle board!