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With the perps in custody or lying in a pool of blood,
Millburger called for assistance while O'Hanlan called in Big Dave who turned
up in minutes. He smiled thinly at the two cops and recovered the mobile
he had lent to Miles who palmed the 200 euro bucks the bodyguard passed him
when taking the mobile back. The little man was gone with his drugs by the
time the cops arrived to clean up. Forensics were still going over the site
when the partners left and headed back into town.
They thought that the night was over but a cop is always on duty. As they
passed out of the zone and into the city a scream drew the pairs attention
to a side street. Running down it they both drew weapons and reached the
corner in time to see a man in a big pair of red shoes wearing a green baggy
boiler suit with yellow stripes and big black buttons. His face was made
up like a clown and he was dragging a struggling woman into a tenement
building.
They gave chase and soon lost the clown in the dark disused building. Listening
for the slapping of his feet soon put them on his trail and nearly got their
feet cut off in a stair trap, which was barely noticed in time. Eventually
the pair found a concealed door, heat traces showed someone passed here recently.
The long corridor ended in a small door with a big red handle. After spending
several minutes looking for any possible traps, Millburger opened it and
they both entered a huge room, this whole floor had been hollowed out and
in the centre hanging above an inflatable swimming pool of liquid was the
bound and gagged form of a woman. Infrared picked up a candle high in the
rafters slowly burning down towards the rope, which held her. Millburger
began pulling up a long floorboard while Miles ran to the stairs that led
to a balcony that ran around the upper levels of this floor. As O'Hanlan
reached just passed the pool, the clown stepped out with a large something
whirring in his large hands; a minigun. Miles hit the deck not really expecting
to live but taking cover from reflex if nothing else. Twelve shells slammed
into him a further 4 hitting Millburger who couldn't believe life could be
this unfair. The clown cackled hideously, dropped the minigun and howled
with laughter. Both cops felt bruised and battered but were still alive,
although they were covered in luminous green and orange paint. Bruised, and
humiliated at being made a fool of O'Hanlan got to his feet and walked towards
the clown. His pistol pointed at the clown and very tempted to pull the trigger
anyway. "Hands up Mr Happy, we'll see how funny you feel after an hour in
the cells with me"
The clown continued giggling and put his hands up surreptitiously dropping
a small box that escaped the cops notice. As Miles pulled the cuffs out he
barely spotted the clowns shift in demeanor and managed to leap sideways
as a jet of acid squirted out of the clowns lapel flower. Giggling inanely
he ran off towards the stairs. Millburger began to run after him as O'Hanlan
got up only to be hit with an explosion from the mini claymore that the clown
had dropped and now remote triggered. The floor was covered in ballbearings
and Miles had barely got to his feet bleeding from several flesh wounds when
Matt came steaming in skidding over the floor and lost some ground as he
tried to jump the affected area.
Miles ran after the clown as well but his objective was to grab the rope
before it burnt through. Matt pounded after the psycho clown being wary of
traps but in the dark he almost missed another dropped bomb, which he leapt
to avoid, but was still nearly blown off the balcony, taking shrapnel wounds
to the legs. As he continued the pursuit the clown turned and put up his
fists, which were now covered with oversized purple boxing gloves. Shuffling
his oversized feet back and forth he shouted "Put em up, put em up, Bobo
will show you a thing or two"
"Ok smart boy lets go" growled Millburger as he prepared to kick the clown
in the head ending this farce once and for all.
Officer Millburger sent a high, hard kick that would have taken the Clowns
head off had it connected but luck was not with him, he slipped on a stray
ball bearing and was sent crashing to the floor. The Clown burst into hysterics
and ran off through another concealed door, Matt in hot pursuit. He crashed
through the door and paused observing a laundry shoot with a cover that was
swinging and some rubbish. After ensuring the room was truly empty he dived
feet first down the shoot, arms to the sides to slow the decent, which ended
in a laundry basket. Despite a search of the passages downstairs and various
rooms he could not find Bobo which pissed him off mightily. Crawling back
up the chute though he discovered by accident a hole in the chute 2 feet
from the top which when stood up in led to a ladder which he climbed and
came out onto the roof. Running to the edge he was just in time to see a
gaily coloured ice cream van tootling away into the combat zone; Millburger
cursed as he walked back to the access hatch.
Meanwhile O'Hanlan was rushing towards the rope as it parted; he leapt for
it and grabbed it while trying to retain balance on the beam. Slowly he tried
to pull the woman up but occasionally she would drop a little further. As
he gained a better purchase though he began to win the battle and finally
pulled her to safety. When untied she collapsed into his arms sobbing, unlike
most rescued damsel though she was no beauty, the badly reset broken nose
in the plain face did her no favours but then Miles was no dashing hero either.
The two met Officer Millburger on the way downstairs; this encounter had
not been a total failure and they headed for home.
The next days interrogation brought some interesting results. They had one
of the guards from the drugs lab in for interrogation and the pleasant approach
just wasn't working so Millburger went to get some synthi caff while O'Hanlan
tried some more 'persuasive' tactics. The guard was a tough nut though and
refused to budge an inch saying that he would be out of here in no time etc.
Within a few hours though, between them the cops had managed to break the
guy down somewhat. He was beginning to crack and was about to relate some
info to them when he went into convulsions and his head exploded showering
O'Hanlan and Millburger with brain and skull fragments. Both cops were unarmoured
at the time and were close enough to take injuries, with alarms and sprinklers
going off though it wasn't long before a med team and other cops arrived.
"I don't believe it cobber, you've managed to injure yourself inside the
station and your pal to, amazing. Must be some kind of record, eh?"
Both cops groaned inwardly as Speed came in with his apprentice med tech.
Medical section revealed that the remaining two guards had cortex bombs implanted
in them as well which would probably go off if they broke under interrogation.
While mulling this over O'Hanlan realised that the weaponry the guards were
using wasn't standard stuff you would find on the street. The weapons were
H&K's; good quality, newish and well maintained. The serials numbers
had been filed of course but this led him to believe the suppliers were being
financed by a heavy hitter possibly a corp. This combined with implantation
of cortex bombs almost made it certain a corp was behind this drug op, but
why? The answer lie in the forensics report; the drugs were being cut with
a new combat drug. The lab boys had not seen it before but it was worse than
black lace and unstable to. Some corp had obviously been field testing this
new combat drug in the field as it were but as the scientists from the raid
had been bailed and taken out by some suit, hard evidence was in small
proportion. The guards would go down of course but the corp would keep its
hands clean. The tech boys suspected Petrochem but NCPD caseload was such
that it couldn't waste resources on going after such a big target. Matt and
Miles had to be satisfied that they had closed down the operation and hopefully
saved some lives in the process, such were the gray successes in Night
City.
The Sarge was pleased with the overall success of the assignment he had given
the two rookies explaining that it was a feather in their cap and would look
good on any promotion chances. Also as a personal reward he was going to
allow them to move onto patrol cars.
"On a personal note Millburger, about that kid you adopted I checked around
and there are no funds for that sort of kid even in corporate coffers, especially
these days." The Sarge confirmed Matts worst fears.
"Damn it" breathed Millburger
"Hey it's not all bad, I found a freelance school that charges a standard
600 per month but the Dean owes me a favour so I called it in. Timmy can
run there for 200 per month for the first two years."
"Thanks Sarge, I owe ya" replied Matt
"Yea whatever, that cyberpsycho you brought in was an army vet from a unit
that was attached to mine in the corp wars over 10 years ago, so I'm grateful
you didn't kill him. Although I would have been surprised if you could, Clive
was always a hard bastard" Called the Sarge as he retreated behind some
paperwork.
"Now hit the streets" he called, tossing Matt a set of car keys.
Millburger drove the well-used patrol car out of the vehicle bay and headed
for their assigned route. O'Hanlan sat looking over the combat shotgun that
came with the car, he glanced up to see a car suddenly jerk out of its parking
position
"Look out" he yelled, but Millburger had already seen the car but could only
manage a partial swerve. They came to a grinding halt, the offside wing slightly
crumpled. O'Hanlan climbed out of the car and headed towards the smoked glass
sedan that had hit them. Suddenly the door jerked open and something jumped
out, puddles of water splashing as it passed. Miles drew his gun and gave
chase; a bloody thief in a stealth suit he thought as he pounded into the
alley. "Stop or I fire" he yelled, shortly before loosing off several shells,
which ricochet off the tarmac into the night. Matt reversed the patrol car
out and drove around the other side of the building to cut off the perps
escape route.
Around a corner O'Hanlan came to a halt; scanning the alley which was filled
with rubbish and garbage dumpsters he moved towards the refuse gun extended.
The patrol car screeched to a halt at the end of the dark alley, its flashing
lights glowing through the rain.
"Get back here now, we've got a code red" yelled Millburger.
"Frag it" grunted Miles as he ran through the rain to the car holstering
his pistol.
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