FIREWALL: Playing With Fire

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FOUR

Mike's Apartment

Louis and Oscar rushed into Mike's apartment just as Darren appeared on the screen, "what was that? Did everyone hear that?" Oscar panted, he turned around and looked at Louis, "well, I know that you heard it, you were with me, so if I heard it you must've heard it. Unless you're deaf, are you?"

Louis gave him a stare that could kill. Oscar turned back around to Mike, "did you?"

Mike nodded then pointed to the computer screen where Oscar realised that Darren had been waiting to explain the situation to them.

"Now that we know more, we can tell you why the Firewall officers have been able to leave the facility. Earlier this week, the Firewall Project personnel received an untraceable anonymous message stating: that they are a new terrorist group, that they know of the existence of the Firewall Project, that they were going to display their knowledge and power soon and then they listed certain places all over the world. This is where the Director has sent all of the Firewall sub-units, like you," Darren explained thoroughly, "turn on the TV."

Mike turned on the TV and on screen, was the President of the United States, in a press conference. "I can now reveal the true nature of the attack on the First Republic Bank of America just minutes ago, it is not a bank robbery. It is a terrorist attack from an unidentified terrorist group." The President explained, the press murmured wildly at the news of a terrorist attack in Los Angeles. "But even though this new terrorist group has managed to attack several sites all over America in synchronisation, they are nothing but a group of children as they revealed their plans earlier this week, which has allowed the correct authorities to set up, ready to fight back."

"Several places were attacked at the same time?" Mike asked Darren.

"Correct. Everywhere around the world, at 3:18pm, various sites were attacked. It seems that the terrorist group wants us to know the vast size of its organisation." Darren looked down at the piece of paper he is now reading, "this is your first mission: You are to capture the three men 'robbing' the bank, but you must do so without catching the attention of anybody. You are able to use your powers, but not in front of anybody, and you must not let the normal authorities know about the presence of the Firewall Project. So that means, you need to capture the terrorists before they do. Is that understood?"

"Does this mean we throw all of that assimilation crap?" Oscar asked excitedly.

"Class." Mike corrected him, Darren glared at Oscar.

Oscar sighed, "Fine...assimilation class..."

"Yes, this is where all you use all that you've learnt in your fighting classes." Darren answered before the computer screen blacked out and Mike's normal screen background reappeared.

"Let's have some fun!" Oscar exclaimed.

XXX

First Republic Bank of America

Charley watched the President's address really closely, noting that the three guys that are now holding her and several members of staff and civilians are part of a terrorist group, but what are they doing robbing a bank? Wouldn't it be more logical to attack a government building? And when the address came on, the terrorists watched it with the hostages!

They didn't like it though, when the President called the terrorists a bunch of kids as they stared at the screens and stopped joking around.

They sent one of the group to start raiding some safes with the help of a staff member. Charley noticed that she can't hear the other two chatter amongst themselves while pointing machine guns at everyone, so she started to get closer. She saw some of the looks that she was getting from some of the other hostages, a look of disapproval, as if they were telling her to get as far away from the terrorists as possible, but she just needed to know.

She managed to get closer to the terrorists and decided to lean on a podium holding up a vase facing away from them, she was only about five ten to fifteen metres away from them so she could hear a majority of what they were talking about.

"Are you sure that we're supposed to keep everyone alive?" Terrorist One asked the other.

"You know what the whole point of this is; this is just to capture their attention." Terrorist Two answered, "Anyway, it won't last long. In about five minutes, they should be here to chase us. That's when we leave, and then we can try to kill people."

"Okay, but if any of these hostages try to do something, we can kill them?" Terrorist One continued.

"Of course!" Terrorist Two answered with a chuckle.

The two terrorists turn around to make sure that the hostages haven't moved. "It's a shame that our objective is not to actually rob this bank. We could have stolen so much money, we would have been rich at the end of this."

Terrorist Two nodded. He decided to creep up to the hole the explosion created and peeked out, sirens were starting to fill the air, "hey, it's about show time. There's a black van waiting for us outside, and the feds are starting to swarm in, should we get set up?"

Terrorist One nodded and started to unzip his duffel bag. "Keep watch of the hostages while I put this on." He then took out what looked like a metallic chest plate. He puts it on quickly, tightening straps around his waist and shoulders; he then slipped on two gauntlets onto his hands. Charley noted that the gauntlets covered the forearms as well as the hands. Next, he put on a backpack-looking thing, with tubing that connected to the gauntlets. When he made sure that everything was put on properly, Terrorist Two carefully handed his machine gun to Terrorist One before putting on his set of what looked like armour.

Terrorist Three came out from the safes, and ordered the staff member to place the money bags in the black van that they parked right near the hole in the wall. Once she had done that, the terrorist let her go and started to put on his armour while Terrorist Two just finished putting on his.

Terrorist Three finally finished putting on his armour and grouped up with the other two, they talked quietly, too quietly for Charley to listen in but Terrorist Three exclaimed just loud enough for her to hear: "Can't wait to be using this!"

Terrorist One finally said as they turned around to watch the hostages, "let's scare the shit out of them all."