Other links:
Sapphire Angel, Superheroine (Book 1)
Power Play (Book 2)
Deconstruction (Book 3)
Savage Dawn (Book 4)
Savage Vengeance (Book 5 - this story)
VIOLENCE WARNING: The two stories in the Savage Gang saga, and especially the second story, involve a gang practicing extreme violence toward everyone — women, the elderly, the protagonist, etc. The stories contain mature sexual content and violence as well. I am placing this warning on all chapters, including those without such violence, so you can choose whether to continue.
CHAPTER 11
As the ground shook, Savage turned to Edison.
“Count to thirty to give the people inside some time,” he said. “The cops inside will go investigate the noise out front. Everyone else will take cover. That should leave the back clear.”
Edison nodded, and stood still as the seconds ticked by. After thirty seconds, Savage spoke.
“Do it,” he said.
Edison gave a curt nod and held out a small rectangular device, no bigger than a smartphone, and pressed a red button on the top. The gangsters held their hands over their ears.
A split second later, a burst of light exploded from the steel door down the alley. Bricks and mortar flew outward, pulverizing the side of the adjacent building, and a few seconds later the metal door toppled inward. The explosion echoed in the still air, but was quiet compared to the earlier explosion on the other side of the building.
“Go!” Savage barked, jumping to his feet.
Barnes and Edison didn’t need to be told. As the gang leader sprinted down the alley, they were at his heels.
They reached the open doorway, and Savage and the two men rushed inside, stepping across the fallen door. Savage and Barnes turned right toward a stairwell and leapt down the stairs, three at a time. Edison waited at the top of the stairs.
When Savage and Barnes came to a door at the bottom of the stairwell, Barnes rushed forward, strapping another bundle to the door. The two men retreated up the stairs as Barnes pressed another detonator button. A concussive thump filled the air, and the two men spun around and retraced their steps, knifing through a cloud of dust before coming to the door, which hung askew in the frame.
Savage kicked it off its hinges and stepped through the opening. A hallway extended into darkness to his left, and elevator doors stood closed to his right. The place felt like a dungeon, with narrow walls hewn from rough rock, and a floor of patchwork brick and stone. Light fixtures, their bulbs blown out from the explosion, dangled and swayed from the craggy ceiling. Dust hung in the air and clung to the damp walls.
With only the light from the stairway to guide them, Savage and Barnes sprinted down the hall, their footsteps echoing in the narrow passage. Halfway down the hall, two uniformed officers came into view, revolvers held out in front of them.
“Halt!” one officer shouted.
When Savage and Barnes kept coming, the officers fired. A few of the bullets hit body armor, and the rest missed their mark, thanks to the officers' trembling hands. Savage got to the officers first, rage fueling him. Weeks ago, before Sapphire Angel had emboldened the people of this city, these officers would have stepped aside and let him carry on his business. Now they would pay.
As the officers fumbled to holster their guns and grab their batons, Savage drilled a fist into the chest of the first man. The crunching of splintering ribs filled the air, and the officer screamed. He collapsed. Savage’s free arm swung out, catching the other man by the throat and whipping him into the wall. The gang leader held him with one arm and seized the man’s forearm with the other. Savage pulled.
The officer howled in agony as tendons and ligaments in his shoulder shredded, leaving his arm dangling from the socket. Savage finished him with a haymaker punch to the side of his face, disintegrating his cheek in a shower of blood and bone fragments. The man fell in a heap next to his partner.
With the officers out of the way, Savage and Barnes continued down the hall, reaching a thick metal door with a desk in front of it. A middle-aged officer with a pot belly stood behind the desk, pounding the buttons of a phone on the desk. Terror filled his face.
“That phone isn’t working, and neither is your radio,” Savage snarled. “So now you can choose — live or die.”
The man held up his hands. “Whatever you want!” he stammered.
“Unlock the door,” Savage said with a nod toward the metal door.
The officer didn’t need any encouragement. He turned to the door, slid a key into the lock, and turned a large handle. He pushed the door open.
“Come with us,” Savage ordered, and the officer gave a rapid nod.
Savage walked through the doorway, with Barnes and the officer following. A dark hall stretched before them, and the bars of seven cell doors loomed on each side. The passageway ended at a stone wall straight ahead. Cameras hung high on the walls, covering the area.
“Where’s Lynch?” Savage asked.
“Lynch?” the officer replied in a trembling voice.
“The leader of some of my men!” Savage barked. “You rounded him up at Italian Lake after his fight with Sapphire Angel.”
“He… he’s not here,” the man answered with a cringe.
“What the fuck do you mean, he’s not here?” Savage asked, nearly frothing at the mouth.
“He’s with the FBI woman and her partner. They’re questioning him upstairs.”
Savage’s face tightened.
“Where upstairs? Tell me how to get there!”
“Elevator to the third floor. Then take a right. Or you can take the stairs, which opens onto the same hallway. Last door on the left!”
Savage and Barnes exchanged glances before the gang leader threw a fist forward, crushing the officer’s nose. The man crumpled to the floor and didn’t move.
The two gangsters spun, darting back toward the stairs at a full sprint. A grin crossed Savage’s face. This might be even better — he could handle Lynch and the FBI lady in one fell swoop.
“If I’m going to talk,” Rocco Lynch said as Olivia Lockheed stared at him, “then I need something in return — protection. I need to be sure Savage can’t find me. Ever.”
He folded his arms across his broad chest, as if to signal that his demand wasn’t open to negotiation.
“We —” Lockheed began, but her words were cut off by a deafening boom, as if a powerful stroke of lightning had struck the building. A split second later, a quick tremor rippled under her feet, and the windows of the room rattled. A moment later, the cracking of gunshots came to her ears.
“Shit!” Lynch yelled. “That’s him! You’ve got to get me out of here!”
Lockheed gritted her teeth and stared at Lynch. Would Savage have the gall to launch an attack here at the station? Yes. Yes, he would.
“Damnit,” she muttered. Once again, she thought of the danger she faced in this job, and the meager pay she received. It was ridiculous.
The door opened behind her, and Lockheed’s head whipped around, fearing the worst. But it was only Dave Michaels, the other FBI agent stationed in Harrisburg. Michaels was a stocky man with pale, freckled skin, and short red hair.
“Something’s going on out front,” he said, breathing hard, and his face flush with excitement. “The station is under attack.”
Lockheed’s face turned white. Savage. She imagined what the gang leader would do to her if he got his hands on her. Lockheed glanced between Michaels and Lynch. She needed to make a choice.
At that moment, though, the sound and rumble of another explosion, smaller than the first, shook the room. This one was closer, near the back of the building.
“Olivia!” Michaels shouted. “We need to move!”
She stared at him, frozen. She wanted to flee, leaving Lynch here to die. To hell with this job. Her eyes flickered between the door and the gangster, paralyzed by the choice.
Savage bounded up the stairs, eying the third-floor landing above him like it was a prize. He hoped he had been fast enough — fast enough to find Rocco Lynch and the FBI woman.
The gangster cleared the final step of the stairwell, before darting across the short landing and flinging open the door. He rushed into the third-floor hallway, Crusher Barnes at his heels. He spotted movement at the far end of the hall, thirty yards away.
Three people were exiting a room at the end of the hall. He recognized the FBI woman, Olivia Lockheed, from media reports. She pushed a muscular man in front of her, while another man in an FBI jacket led the way. Lockheed blocked his view of the muscular man’s face, but Savage didn’t need a clear view to know who it was. Rocco Lynch. Savage’s former lieutenant, hands cuffed behind him, glanced over his shoulder, his face coming into view. Lynch glanced past Lockheed, locking eyes with Savage for a moment.
The glance only lasted a moment, but it was enough for Savage to see the sheer terror on the man’s face. Lockheed also looked back, and her face wore the same look of fright.
“This way,” the other FBI agent barked, his words echoing down the hall.
The woman and the two men scrambled away from Savage, toward a door at the opposite end of the hallway. Savage and Barnes broke into a run, sprinting after them.
As the gangsters closed the distance, the terrified trio burst through the far doorway and disappeared from sight. Savage and Barnes reached the doorway a moment later and crashed through it, finding themselves in a stairwell. The sound of footsteps came from below, and Savage saw their prey descending the stairs. Lynch and the FBI agents were almost to the next floor. With Lynch in handcuffs, they were moving slower than Savage and Barnes.
Savage bounded down the stairs, three at a time, with Barnes following. A beep sounded below him, past the landing, and he heard another door open. He hit the landing and turned, as Lynch and the male agent rushed through another doorway, with Lockheed hot on their heels. Savage grinned like a predatory animal. There was no escape for Olivia Lockheed and Rocco Lynch now.
Other links:
Sapphire Angel, Superheroine (Book 1)
Power Play (Book 2)
Deconstruction (Book 3)
Savage Dawn (Book 4)
Savage Vengeance (Book 5 - this story)
I’m, like, 99% sure they (Lockheed and Lynch) are most likely going to get out of this alive, and the most that could happen is that the third FBI agent with them will probably die. But, oh, man… They really weren’t messing around this time. Wouldn’t it be great if Lockheed and Lynch got out of there safely and actually teamed up against Savage? Or, maybe Lynch is faking this entire thing, and he’s still secretly on Savage’ side, having orchestrated the entire escape attempt to deliver Lockheed straight to Savage as attempted “redemption” (though I’m not so sure Savage would take it now).
I forget. Does Wayne Steele have a particularly significant role in this novel? We heard about him a few chapters ago, but up to now, I really haven’t heard of anything else. At any rate, it feels good to have a full-on action sequence without Sapphire Angel present. No superpowers and no fancy stuff, just raw strength (Savage Gang) and quick thinking (FBI & Police Department).
……Or maybe Sapphire hears of the police department assault at the last minute and drops in to fight the Gang while Lockheed, Lynch, AND the third agent escape. But, then again…..handing Savage a second direct defeat so soon after his first one wouldn’t do a lot of favors to establish him as a threat.
This has actually reminded me of something that I need to work on with my own personal writing style, and that’s learning when to split chapters off from each other. ‘Cause here, I would’ve written the entire prison attack in a single chapter and it’d end up being ~6,000 words or something. It’s like the streaming mini-series that are always on Disney+; the ones that are, like, 6 hour-long episodes or something to that effect. Here, though, you do a great job at writing cliffhangers and making me want the next chapters as soon as possible, and wooooo! Commending you for that!
Let’s see what happens next!