The Great Invasion | 2023

The Firing Line

Word Count: 1855 (completed, May 26, 2019)

[[Market Street - San Francisco, CA | August 19, 2021 - 7:15 PM]]

The police trio makes its way at the start of the Market Street after making a U-Turn from The Embarcadero and they were only just 2.8 kilometers away from the control center. But due to severely congested traffic in Market Street with the large traffic of trams running along the street and with the reconstruction of the Market Street beginning from 2020, they were literally wasting time and traffic is second nature, but frustrating.

As they were slowly traversing through the street, they turned on the news segment of the radio.

CBS News: This is CBS Tonight Live in San Francisco bringing out a tonight's current report of a large explosion just occurred at the Embarcadero right below the Bay Bridge. The devastation was unprecedented with the resulting explosion having the local authorities, especially Caltrans and Highway Patrol to secure and close down the stretch of The Embarcadero and closing down parts of the sole link to Oakland and the Eastern part of the Bay Area, iconically, the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge itself. The bridge had suffered the most damage equal to the Pier 26 Building that was obliterated as the lower decks had suffered severe gashes and structural damage by the debris and the resulting fires, and as many as several tens to hundreds of motorists were either killed or injured. As of right now, the potential suspect, whom according to the Lieutenant is appeared to be a flame-cloaked figure, is still in-large and remains unidentified...

(Ross): "This looks bad. What about the people living on Treasure Island and Yerba Island?"

(Rick): "Don't worry, Caltrans is doing a great job to redirect those residing in these islands to Oakland and they might take detour routes for motorists coming from outer cities such as Sacramento, Berkeley, and Oakland going inbound to San Francisco."

(Natalie): "But at the cost of travel times?"

(Rick): "They got no choice. Either just limp there and wait for the bridge to reopen, or they have to deal with it, the long way round is better than nothing."

(Ross): "But what about the bridge? Will it collapse?"

(Rick): *sighs* "I don't know. Damage assessment of the bridge should be done shortly. But all we have to do is to review the footage of the explosion at the control center and grab the copy of the DVR, and send it to our labs and we can store this as evidence."

[[7:18 PM]]

As they are still driving on the road, Rick still couldn't stop wondering about the explosion that happened in front of his eyes and how he narrowly missed his ordeal. Then suddenly, Rick sees a baby stroller rolling right in front of Rick's police car coming from the right. He jolted and applied his brakes as he took a sharp swerve to the left, narrowly missing the stroller as it was stopped by the side of his bumper.

Then, a split second later...

**BANG** **windshield crack**

Something or someone shot a bullet straight through Rick's windshield, causing the entire crowd of Market Street to panic as they ran for safety and trams started to run wild and sped away from the site, out of fear of anyone being shot next. Rick and Ross were unhurt... but... except for one.

(Natalie): "Agh! Nghhhh..."

(Rick & Ross): "Oh my god! Natalie!"

(Ross): "She got shot!"

Many people feared for the worst and they ran for their lives in fear. But Rick knew something about what was going on.

(Rick): "Ross, Natalie! Fasten your seatbelts!"