A Hiccstrid Story

Chapter 6

3 Years Later

Astrid Hofferson was living the dream in New York. She had everything she could have ever wanted. An excellent job, amazing friends, a wonderful fiancé, and a beautiful apartment in the heart of the city. The past 10 years had been bliss and time had treated her very well. She had excelled at university, studying hard and gaining the highest marks of the year. She had won some awards for her work and some pieces were displayed in the university itself. Her university work had even led her to get the best job possible at one of the best news agencies in the country.

In her third year at university, Astrid had been tasked with writing a news article about a recent event. This work would be submitted as part of her assessment module. The determined blonde wanted to write the best article possible, settling for nothing but the best. She had travelled to LA as a hunch told her that it would be the place with the best story she could write. Her hunch had turned out to be right as he had stumbled onto a story that would end up securing her a job and the best score in the course.

Astrid had been walking around the city when she had passed a policy car with the window slightly open. She was going to continue walking when she heard something over the radio. "All units, move to the mobile command centre set up at the corner of Washington Boulevard and Alameda Street." The woman's hunch perked up again. She had a gut feeling something big was going down. With this in mind, Astrid quickly made her way over to the area mentioned, only to find that a huge area had been cornered off by police. She asked an office what was going on and was told, "SWAT are doing some training Ma'am, nothing to worry about."

Something told her that there was more to the story than what she was just told. She snuck back unto the crowed and managed to slip into the cornered off area unnoticed. Astrid started to take photos and record the scene discreetly with her phone. She could see the SWAT team waiting by the command centre, but they didn't look to be training. Moments later, several other police cars entered the cornered off area and disappeared behind the mobile command centre. Astrid watched as 5 soldiers and a combat dog entered the tent where the SWAT team was. She was confused, if this was SWAT training, then why would the military be there?

She snuck closer and used her phone to record the conversation between the soldiers and the SWAT team. She clearly missed some of the conversation but managed to pick some of it up. "Miller, LAPD SWAT. The building is a fairly standard warehouse. Large open spaces with an upper floor that consists of 2 maybe 3 offices. The building is filled with wooden crates and machinery for making clothing products. The building used to belong to a clothing manufacturer, but this building was shut down a few months ago due to budget cuts."

Astrid was puzzled as several thoughts ran through her mind. What warehouse? Why are soldiers here? Who are these soldiers? She was brought out of her musing when the man called Miller continued, "the building is still owned by the company but they haven't had security here for ages due to budget cuts." Astrid was about to try poke her head around the corner to get a better look when she heard another person speak. "What about cameras? Surely, they saw what was going on" Astrid couldn't tell who was talking from her hiding place, she could only hear what was being discussed. She really hoped her phone was picking this up. "Afraid not, the cameras are fakes. Meant to scare people off, nothing more."

A scary thought crossed Astrid's mind, what if they see me? It was a terrifying thought. Her spot hid her from other police, but if someone exited the tent, they had a chance of spotting her. Again, she was quickly distracted by the conversation in the tent. "Do we know where Unicorn is being held and by how many people?" More questions filled the young woman's mind. Who was unicorn? Was she related to the soldiers? She heard Miller reply "fortunately yes. It appears as though Unicorn is being held in the furthest office on the east side of the building. We have counted around 15 kidnappers. They all appear to be armed with AR-15s and Glock 19s. From what we can tell they appear to be a far right activist group."