Not a happy ending story. Major character death.
Chapter One
Herrera and Hughes make their way out of the aid car and to the scene where they saw a young black man being restrained by a white cop, they looked at each other, knowing that this was bad.
They heard the officer on Jamal yelling, "Stay still!"
"Get off! Ow." Andy and Vic looked at each other and began to move closer to the sobbing young man.
"Keep him down." Another officer was yelling. "Stop moving!"
"Get off me!" The young man pleaded.
"About time you showed up." A cop with a gun trained on the young man had said, turning back briefly to look at them. Meanwhile, the young man was having trouble breathing and his breaths were coming out short and heavy.
Andy and Vic finally shook themselves out of the shock and moved closer. "Okay, let's just take a second."
"W-W-What's going on?" Andy asked.
"We got a call from the neighbor reporting suspicious activity near the home." The cop with the gun answered.
"You gotta calm down, son. Okay? Please calm down!" the black female cop on the young man's legs begged when he wouldn't stop groaning and moving.
"Stop moving!" The cop with the gun yelled.
"Hey! Hey! What if we put the gun down? I don't think we need the gun." Andy tried to reason, arm up, trying to deescalate the situation.
"We came across him looking pretty sketchy, hood covering his face, walking fast with a backpack. And when we tried to question him, he wouldn't stop. Just started running." The officer on the man's back rushed out, pushing the man into the ground even more.
"We got him down on the ground in the ties. Called you to sedate him."
"Okay, how long have you had him down?" Vic asked, worried.
"I don't know. How long did it take you to get here?" The cop on the mans back asked.
"Okay." Vic was in disbelieif, they weren't strangers to police brutiality but it was still a sad sight to see.
The young man continued to grunt and groan. "Calm down."
"Can you just put the gun down? Let's just put the gun down, all right?" Vic asked, hoping they would see season.
"He's not stable." The cop with the gun argued.
"In order for us to help and do our jobs, we can't have you pointing a gun at him, or at us. Okay?" Vic told the cop.
"She's right, Smith." The officer on the young man's legs said.
The man continued to groan, barely able to breathe with the way his head was positioned.
"Thank you, thank you." Vic said and rushed towards the man, the two cops still on top of him.
"What's he saying? I can't even-" a cop tried to ask and Andy cut in.
"He's- He's- He's speaking Spanish. All right, he's not erratic, he's just scared. All right, he doesn't
need to be pinned down" Andy said, trying to reason with the officers. "If you want us to give him a sedative, we need to get him off the ground and out of those ties." Andy paused and looked at the officer who had the gun out, a look of fear on her face. "Your move."
Jamal was still breathing heavily. "It's okay."
"Um, he's... he's calm. He's not gonna go anywhere. So, can you get off of him so we can do a medical assessment?" Andy asked the two cops on Jamal.
None of the cops moved.
Vic looked at the cops. "Please?"
The cops got off him a couple seconds later. "Thank you." Andy said.
"And the zip ties?" Vic pointed to and looked to one of the officers.
"You should keep them on." The cop tried to advise but Vic didn't listen to him.
"Well, we need them off to treat him properly, so..." Vic told them and cut off the ties.
"If he makes one move, I've already called for backup." The officer said and Andy and Vic just glared at him.
Andy spoke some Spanish to Jamal, carefully helping him up into a sitting position. "Okay. Okay, careful, careful. All right."
"I'm just gonna take a look at you and make sure you're okay." Vic looked at Andy for a second. "All right, can you translate?" Vic asked Andy but before Andy could ask Jamal anything he spoke.
"Uh, i-it's okay. I understand you." There was a pause. "Thanks for getting them off me."
"Of course. Can you tell us what happened?" Andy asked, checking him over.
"I was just, uh, making pound cake when I-I realized we were out of butter, so I-I went to the corner store to grab some, and my mom, she always tells me if I ever get stopped by the police... H-hands up, be respectful, never make any sudden movements. But... I-I get really anxious easily." Jamal told them, breathing picking up again.
"Okay." Vic encouraged him on.
"And I-I was s-scared and they... they just kept getting closer to me, and closer to me..."
"Okay. It's okay. It's okay. Just breathe. Breathe. Um, uh... you... you said you were making pound cake? Is that your favourite?" Andy asked Jamal, trying to keep him calm.
"It's my mom's favourite," Jamal said, sniffling. "Tomorrow is her birthday. I didn't mean for any of this to happen." Jamal told them, tears in his eyes and looking between the two firefighters.
"No, no, none of this is your fault," Vic told him, looking Jamal in the eyes.
"None of it. You were being profiled. This is not on you." Andy told him, grabbing equipment from the med bag.
"Gracias," Jamal said in a whisper.
Andy spoke some more Spanish, hoping to keep Jamal calm and then turned to Vic "Um, this... this kid does not need to be sedated."
"I know. And there's gonna be more cops here soon and we're gonna be outnumbered." Vic said back, knowing that this situation was getting more serious.
"Yeah." Andy agreed.
"I'm gonna go to the aid car and radio for more backup." Vic told her, getting up and walking past the officers, trying not to look suspicious.
While Vic was walking off Andy looked at the cut on Jamal's face. "Let's take a look at this."
"What're you doing?" the cop who originally had the gun out asked.
"I just forgot something," Vic said, trying to stay calm.
"Okay. All right." Vic tried to control her breathing. "Dispatch, this is Aid Car 19, requesting a Chief to our scene to act as a police liaison. This is now a Crisis One call."
One of the officers was getting antsy. "What's going on with that sedative?"
"Uh, so, officers, he doesn't need to be sedated. He's presenting as calm and stable. So..." Vic told them as Andy took the blanket Vic got and wrapped it around Jamal.
"You weren't here when we first found him. He was erratic, combative, and ran from the scene. He's a threat" he scoffed. "Which is why we restrained him. It's protocol." An officer tried to argue.
"You don't even know if he did anything." Vic tried to fight.
Sirens rang in the distance, signalling that there were more cops coming.
"He ran." Another cop fought.
"Okay, well, that's human instinct. It's fight or flight, and dealing... Look, dealing with the police can be scary." Vic said and the cop took offense to her comment.
"That... That's the problem. See, you think we're the enemy when in actuality it's noncompliance that gets people killed."
"Okay, well, it's not up to him to know that his panic attack might scare you. Look, officers, I-I do not think you're the enemy. I just think your training needs to change, okay? If you... If you took the time to get to the root of the problem instead of defaulting to force, then maybe we could..."
"We don't have to explain ourselves to you."
Andy saw Dixon get out of one of the cars and tried to warn Vic. "Hughes."
"Heard you're giving my guys a hard time. Hughes, Herrera, step aside. We got it from here." Dixon told them,
"No, we're... we're good. We're good. We're just sorting it out. Right, officers?" Vic told him.
"Yeah, well, now I'm here, so let's get this guy down to the station, huh?" Dixon said.
Vic starts walking closer to Dixon "Hughes." Andy tried to stop her.
"All right, Dixon, if you want to get to him, you're gonna have to go through both Herrera and me to do it. Andy had her hands up, trying to stop Vic from moving closer but it didn't stop her, partly glad Vic was brave and standing up for Jamal.
"Hughes, what are...Don't do this." Dixon threatened.
Andy, having walked up behind Vic "Dixon, we've got this covered, okay? You're just coming in and making it worse." Andy told him, pissed off with the situation.
"I'm too tired for the theatrics, 19," Dixon said in a bored tone.
Andy sighed and gave a sarcastic chuckle "Okay." Was about to say more when Chief Ross arrived.
"Hey, what seems to be the problem here?"
"Look, uh... you're new here, so I get that you don't understand how this works..." Dixon started but Ross cut him off.
"You know that I was a spotter in the military, right? 'Cause I see everything. You've got five officers, which means you've got six guns and six Tasers, yours included." Ross walked around Jamal, Andy and Vic. "This guy is trigger-happy, and I know that 'cause he hasn't taken his hand off his Taser since I got here. This guy, he's a little more nervous. New to the job. And I know that because of the way he looks between his fellow officers, trying to figure out what the next steps are. And this guy, he's your right hand, and I know that because he's been slowly creeping forward during this entire exchange, ready to pounce when needed. And Dixon... you're doing damage control because you know that this entire incident makes your team look unsavoury, which is the same reason why none of you have your body cams on."
Dixon scoffed. "What makes you think that?"
"Ask them." Ross said simply. "Like I said, I know how this works, so if you want to play this the hard way, yeah, we can play it the hard way. That's your call."
Dixon looked back at his fellow officers and then back at Ross. "Okay. Let's play this the hard way."
Andy was rubbing Jamal's back, trying to keep him calm. "He's calm now, so no need to sedate him. Which means this is our scene again. And I don't want to be here all night. So, let's go, fellas. Bring him in." Dixon said as officers began to move forward.
"W... Hey, hold on." Ross tried to stop them.
"Hey, hey, hey. Come on." Vic tried and Jamal jumped up, grabbed his bag and started to run when a shot rang out. Andy caught Jamal and held him. Trying to get him to stay still.
"He's running!" the cop who was originally on Jamal's back shouted, prompting the rest of the officers to get their guns out too.
All chaos broke out.
"Hey, hey, hey, hey! Whoa, whoa!"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa!"
"Get on the ground! Get on the ground!"
"Wait, wait, wait, wait!"
"On the ground! Officers, Vic and Ross were shouting.
"No, no, no. Just give him a minute." Ross shouted, putting her body in between Jamal and the officers.
"Hey, hey, listen to me. He's... He's having a-a panic attack. He's overstimulated..." Andy tried to get the cops to listen.
A cop yelled back "He's unstable."
Andy turned around, anger clear on her face, "He's terrified!"
"Do we know if he's armed?" An officer that arrived with Dixon asked.
"We did a quick pat down…" the female officer said.
"Okay, we had this situation handled." Vic told them, pissed off with her hands up, also trying to protect Jamal.
"Dixon, just let us get him home, okay?" Ross tried while Andy tried to get Jamal to calm down, still holding him.
Dixon, not making the situation any better. "Yeah, you try being a cop sometime, Hughes, and then let's see what you say."
"We run into dangerous situations all the time!" Vic tried to fight.
"You run into fires." Dixon shouted.
Andy continued to try to get Jamal calm, holding him, not letting go. "Breathe. I'm gonna need you to breathe." Andy tried while Dixon continued.
"We run into shootings, stabbings, and domestic disputes."
"Just breathe." Andy tried to soothe.
"This is no longer your scene!" Dixon shouted and Jamal tried to break free from Andy's grasp, picked up his backpack and tried to separate himself from everyone but Andy grabbed onto him again while Ross and Vic held the officers back.
"No! No! No! No! No!" Ross shouted over all the officers' yelling. "You are not gonna tase this kid. Not on my watch. Herrera, check his backpack."
"Put your hands up and do not move. Promise me you won't move!" Andy said to Jamal while grabbing his bag while he continued to whimper but he did raise his hands. "Stay right there. I need you to stay right there, okay? I'm just gonna check your bag." Andy unzipped the bag. "Opening the bag." Andy called out, figuring it would be better to let them know what she was doing. Jamal was breathing heavily as Andy started to call out what was in the bag. "Butter, groceries... groceries. Bag's clear." Andy told them, looking up, panic clear on her face.
Ross sighed. "Okay. Okay, all right. So what you're gonna do is you're gonna lower your weapons, you're gonna back up, and you're gonna go back to your station. You're gonna file your report and you're gonna say you stopped a kid who was just trying to get home to his mom. Because you see that window back there? That woman's been standing in there recording us for the past three minutes and she's probably live streaming as we speak. So, either you lower your weapons, or you're gonna be the top story in tomorrow's news. I told you... I see everything." Ross said, looking at Dixon and he caved.
"Officers, stand down."
Andy exhaled loudly but also felt pain in her stomach. She furrowed her eyebrows together but just kept her focus on the cops.
When the cops hesitated, Dixon repeated his order. "Stand down! Stand down!"
Once the weapons were lowered Jamal started to breathe in and out slowly and Andy rested a hand on his shoulder. "That's it, that's it, that's it." Andy said, while in her own shock. Listening as Jamal sobbed.
Ross and Vic turned to face Jamal and Andy. "Hughes, Herrera," Herrera looked up, feeling lightheaded. "Get Jamal home to his mom, okay?" Vic and Andy nodded but when Andy went to take a step she stumbled and Ross saw it. Andy let go of Jamal and tried to take another step but stumbled again.
"Herrera?" Ross asked. "Are you okay?" Ross watched Andy look up at her, fear clear on her face. Andy looked down and pressed a hand to her stomach. When she pulled her hand back she saw blood on her finger tips. Ross and Vic noticed and Vic rushed forward before Andy fell and hit the ground.
"Andy!"
Reminder… not a happily ever after story.