Geoffrey Collins, the last case. ~

Geoffrey Collins, the last case ~ Chapter two

                                                           Chapter Two 

                                                             60 hours

  I walked to the parents again, who came into the station looking panicked.   "They - They called!"  The said.  "It's okay."  I said to them.  "What did they say?"  "We didn't answer, but the number is blocked, just like before!"  They said.  We waited to see if the kidnappers would call Mr. and Mrs. Cox.  The phone rung.  One time, two times, three times, I gave them the signal to answer it.   Samantha's mother picked up the phone and asked the kidnappers in her shaky voice: "Wh-wh-what do you want from us?  Plesae give us back our daughter!"  Her hands shook, and her voice cracked.  "Calm down"  Said the kidnappers.  Their voice was very deep, and disguised by a voice changer.  "This call is regarding the terms of our agreement.  Did we, or did we not tell you that if you involved the police your daughter would suffer for it?"  Mrs. Cox was silent.  "Answer!"  Came the voice from the phone, sounding like it was filled with uncontrollable rage.  "Y-Yes you did."  She said.  "You hurt my daughter you die!"  Yelled Samantha's father, Joe.  "Sorry Joe, but that threat is idle, you don't know who we are and even if you did,  you wouldn't be able to track us down."  He hung his head, like an admission that this was true.  "Now, don't worry, we won't kill her, but there is one penalty against you, you have lost five hours off of your deadline.  You now have Fifty-five hours.  Good luck."  The phone then hung up.  The parents had a distraught look on their face.  "This is your fault!"  Yelled Mr. Cox.  "Now calm down."  I said.  "We did get a clue from that call.  Did you catch that part where they said "You don't know who we are"?"  I said.  "It shows that it's a group of people."  I told them.  There was a small spark f hope reflected in Samantha's mother's eyes.  I ran out of the room to tell my partner of this exciting development, but I didn't know where he was, and I wasnt going to waste my time tracking him down, just to tell him something.  I ran down some contacts of mine, Neal Thomas, a real class act.  He's joined (and snitched on) just about every criminal group you can think of.  He doesn't join terrorist groups, but just about everything else he's done.  I went to see if he heard any chatter about a kidnapped girl, but unfortunately he hadn't.  Another hour of my time, and our deadline was wasted.

                                                                   54

                                                                 hours

 My heart was pounding when I walked into the station, I was terrified that the kidnapper might have changed the terms that we had already established.  Thankfully no one had called or changed anything.  However, a huge clue was about to come my way. A janitor who could only speak Japanese came into the police station and said: "warawa  ni-do hitosarai"  which translates loosely as, I need to talk about kidnapping.  I took him into an interrogation room while detective Carpik processed some paperwork.  He said to me:  Warawa was pei rukku atto ofisu.  Which once again translates loosely as I was paid to look at office.  I looked back at him and asked him: doyatsu? meaning, who?  "warawa nain nou!" He told me.  Which means, I no know. He told me.  "wazuka fon"  Meaning, only phone.   He also went on about how guilty and sorry he felt.  Now I knew that someone had hired a janitor (What a cliché, right?) to look around the building and find any weak spots there might be.  The question was, who had done this?  Who had hired this man that sit before me?  This was all seeming much bigger than we had originally believed it was.  No one at all though, could have guessed the strange thing that happened to us after I sat down in my office.

''

                                                             53 hours

I came out and was talking to Det. Carpik when our phone rang. Matthew Daffer, Samantha's boss, was yelling and shouting in his high pitched voice, saying that someone put a bag over his head. He said that someone drove him around in a van shouting at him saying that they were going to kill him. Mr. Daffer heard the door open and was able to escape.  I didn't buy into the story but we had to check it out.  Daffer came over to our office, I noticed a bruise on his face, but I thought it might be self inflicted, even though he had an alibi something about him just didn't feel right.  I didn't like the way  My partner and I talked to him and he said that whoever abducted him disguised their voice.  I asked him what time he was abducted and he said that it was about 3:00 P.M. I asked why he had waited to tell us.  "I was ashamed of the bruises so I made sure no one found out what had happened.  If word of this got out," he said.  "I would be all over the news!  I'd be so ashamed."  At this, I became very angry because there were just over two days left in the deadline, and he waited until 6:00 P.M to contact us!  I lost my temper, as I somewhat often do, and very bitterly yelled at him.  I told Mr. Daffer that if anything happened to the girl because he failed to report this incident I would charge him with 'misprision'.  I said it this way to make him feel worried, really though, this simply meant the failure to report a crime, and concealing it.

                                                        51 hours

  I had to get everyone lunch because I lost a bet with another officer.  Now I know what you're thinking, "Why are you making bets at this point in the case?"  1:  It was a long standing bet. 2: I'm honest, and I lost. 3: at this point in the case, I was not needed for anything, and finally 4:  Somebody had to do it.  Little did I know that he had definitely helped me, maybe even saved my life.  While I was out getting coffee a masked person came into the police station, he had a gun and he opened fire.  I responded to the call immediately. I walked into the station, but just after I stepped out of my car I heard "MAN DOWN!"  Called out on the radio.  I rushed inside,  my heart rate could have been used as a drum beat for a punk rock band.  I rushed inside just to find that the masked man had somehow escaped!  I asked who was down and no one could tell me, I looked through what used to be windows, but were now just shattered glass.  I kept searching, I suddenly realized I couldn't find Detective Carpik or the newbie.  I ran around the building searching frantically as did some of my colleagues.  I finally saw Jay, the other officer, pushing and applying pressure to Det. Carpik's shoulder.  I realized that he had been shot!

                                                              49 hours

  "Ugghh!" Detective Carpik grunted.  "It burns!"  He said.   I noticed that the floor was not very bloody.  Fortunately, it was just a flesh wound.  We had him checked out by a doctor who said that he would be fine and should recover in a day or two. I talked to him.  He told me that he thought the shooting was to distract us from the kidnapping case, a suspicion I shared.  I asked him about the shooter.  "Anything you can tell me.  You know that anything might help."  I told him.  "Well" he said.  "She had decent sized pistol, I think a 45 caliber.  I didn't see her face."  "Her?"  I asked.  "Well, I think whoever did it had a feminine body."  However, I watched some security tapes and asked other witnesses and it appeared the shooter was wearing a bulletproof vest, a helmet, and some sort of body armor on their legs.  I once again looked at the security tapes and saw a woman run past the shooter as Det. Carpik was shot, I concluded that this was who he saw.  And, with this being unreliable, I wasn't sure exactly what of all he said was reliable.  I couldn't believe it.  My partner was shot and I had no idea who it was!  But I did know one thing, this was definitely connected to the kidnapping.