The shot made a smoking hole right in Vance’s couch. He leapt to the floor and covered his ears. 

“Damn! Alright! Alright! I believe you now!” 

Cathartes peered out. There was a hole in the cracked window pane. 

Judging by the trajectory of the shot, it was intended to have missed Vance. 

It was not The Hawk who had fired it.

“How d’ya like that?” Haliaeetus said triumphantly through the earphones. “We needed him to believe the threat was legitimate, but we couldn’t let the actual shooter take a shot. Otherwise he’d be dead. So, yeah.” 

Cathartes grinned at that cleverness. 

She continued, ”But the real trouble begins now.”

*

On her end, Haliaeetus readied herself for an attack. 

Richard Tate was started by the shot and immediately lifted his rifle up, scanning the building opposite him. He fired a few shots, but Haliaeetus ducked behind the parapet. The bullet flew past her head. She knew she would have been struck had it not been for the safety that height afforded her. 

The car park was an advantageous position for shooting at Vance’s mansion, but not for striking someone on the roof of that apartment. 

On the other hand, the roof of the apartment was an excellent vantage point for hitting the car park.

She rose and shot in retaliation, but he jumped behind a car. 

The rifle emerged from the roof of the car as The Hawk tried to search for his prey. 

Haliaeetus considered firing through the car, but did not want to shatter the window. She dashed across the concrete floor until the was at an angle where Tate was in view. 

Tate caught her slight movements and fired upwards. She dodged again, with her back against a water tank. The bullets struck a metal railing behind her, ricocheting towards a poorly maintained electrical enclosure which was half open.

She breathed, once, and twice, and fired back. 

The bullets struck the concrete where he once was. He was gone. 

She scanned the car park. There was no sign of him.

The orange light of the sodium vapour lamps flickered above the vehicles.

A shadow emerged in a sudden spurt. 

She dove towards the ground. A bullet whizzed past her hood. 

The bullet struck the electrical cabinet behind. Sparks flew from the damaged circuits.

She didn’t like to cheat at times like this, but she activated her Astra. Her movements were now like fading flashes of film to him, evaporating instantly with his amnesia. 

The Hawk was confused. She located him with certainty.

But he fired a sudden spurt. All the shots missed her. It was deliberate. The electrical enclosure rumbled dangerously. 

Haliaeetus took a peek above the parapet. The Hawk’s rifle crept out from behind a truck. He aimed. She aimed. And she fired.

One strike to the shoulder made him drop his rifle. 

He leapt towards it.

Another shot to his ankle stopped him from running. 

He collapsed onto the ground, alive. 

He pulled a mobile phone out of his pocket and tapped on a few numbers. One last shot from Haliaeetus knocked it out of his hand and shattered it against the concrete.

*

Cathartes cheered mentally at her victory. He glanced at Vance’s phone. Brett Lawyer was still alive. Vance, still crouched on the ground, slowly reached for his phone. He unmuted it to hear Taylor. “Hey! Vance! Do you hear me? So you really are being targeted, huh? Damn.”

“Yes,” Vance replied. “It would seem so.” He spoke with regained composure.

“Now, answer my question. And do not mute the call again.” Taylor looked enraged. His eyes were flaming with vengeance. “That email that was sent to us from your burner account incited a battle between the police and 1564. Carl died in the shootout. For nothing! After speaking with The Hangman, I believe it was a deliberate set up to destroy both sides. I realised it made no sense for you to have done it and harmed your allies. The Hangman believes you have your reasons. I’m not convinced. I think it is someone who stands to benefit from your network crumbling.” 

He held the pistol against Brett Lawyer’s temple. “All I need is a word of confirmation that you did not send that email, and I’ll not bother you any further. And the one behind this will be duly punished. I will execute her here.”

*

Brett Lawyer shivered uncontrollably in the wooden chair she was sitting on. She could not stop herself from clenched her jaw with every bit of energy she had, biting deep into the towel that was gagging her. 

“Look at this.” Taylor held up a black notebook, opened to a page in the middle. Her name and address was scribbled on it. “It’s seldom this convenient, but you’re my prime suspect. I would have figured it out even without this. But it’s just to show you how foolish you were to try at all. Didn’t you see how obvious it was?”

Cold sweat dripped down her forehead. The cold barrel of Matthew Taylor’s pistol was against it.

“We will hear what Vance says, huh?” Taylor raised his eyebrows mockingly. “Jesus, to think that you’d resort to such dirty tactics with utter disregard for human life. Your husband’s death must have impacted you heavily. The psychological effects and all. That’s understandable. But because of you, my partner and so many of my colleagues are dead. You get that? That’s sounding really bad for you.”

He walked over to the windows. “Man, look at how you boarded up your windows. Tsk, tsk, tsk. Kind of an overkill, isn’t it? Speaking of killing, it was a bad idea to turn to that avenue. It’s bad for public safety, you know? And to have so much hate in you is unhealthy, lady. You should have been grieving and resting and sleeping it away.” He shook his head with artificial sadness. 

Then, with sudden energy, he leapt towards her. “Instead, you stir up shit like this? Against us? The police? Wow! Do you know who we are? To think you can simply cross us without consequences?! You killed a man I spent years working with. A brother. You set this up to get us all killed?!”

She tried to scream something in agitated protest, but it was futile.

“Shut up. Don’t you understand what that gag is for? You do not have the right to not remain silent.” He wagged the gun at her. A muffled noise came from upstairs.

“Hey, you have someone else upstairs?” 

Brett Lawyer shook her head frantically. 

“What’s that? That sounds like a lie.” He ascended the stairs slowly, saying a few syllables with each step he took. “Ah, your kid, huh? It was a daughter, was it? I remember. What if she wakes up and comes downstairs? Then I’ll be forced to deal with her. We wouldn’t want that, would we? Having to dispose of additional witnesses, I mean.” He knocked against the door of her daughter’s room using the end of his gun. Brett Lawyer shook her head desperately as tears spilt from her eyes. 

“Good. Good,” he said, and descended the stairs. “He still has me muted. This idiotic Vance.”

That was when a loud shot rang out from the other side of the line. “Damn! He is really getting sniped!”

Then the call was unmuted and Vance spoke again. Taylor suddenly rushed forward to her with a sadistic smile and held the pistol against her temple. He spoke into the phone. “All I need is a word of confirmation that you did not send that email, and I’ll not bother you any further. And the one behind this will be duly punished. I will execute her here.”

She tried to breathe, but she felt the breath sucked out of her.

“Hello, Vance? So, did you send the email?”

A short silence followed, but it felt like forever to her. The world whirred and whirred.

Then the answer came.