Chapter 23

So much for surprise!

I hear gunfire from two or three handguns in front and above me. I quickly glanced while bringing my rifle upward to ensure I was not being shot at. There were no bullet impacts, and I could only see large windows in the upper wall. It was an observation room. I heard and sensed the movement in front of me and quickly brought the rifle and my eyes to my front. The two nurses were moving away toward the far corners and the doctor was turning around. I heard automatic fire through the wall and knew Dove was firing at whoever was in the observation room; they must have fired at her first. I heard a shot along with glass breaking and pressure in my chest as I was kicked backward through the door.

I hear a voice say, “Continue Doctor!”

I knew I had been shot but didn’t know if I was wounded or if my vest stopped the bullet. I just did a couple of backward rolls to make sure I was out of the line of fire before checking to see how bad I was hit. Dee was checking me before I had stopped my rolls, she looked scared but laughed saying, ‘you’re going to have a big bruise and you’ll need two new magazines.’ Holding up two of my magazines I could see they were bent, and bullets were falling out of one since the bottom was broken out. I was lucking the bullet hit my magazines and spread the energy out instead of impacting into my vest which would have broken ribs. “Grenade!” I heard Dove yelling as she came diving down the stairs into a forward summersault. She did a beautiful rolling round-off into a cartwheel to a backflip running backward into the elevator. Dee and I had already jumped into the elevator and Dee turned the key closing the doors. The boom was loud, and the doors looked like they bulged a little. Dee turned the key to open the doors again and they were slow to open. I slide a flash bang through as soon as there was room and we waited for the doors to finish opening as the flash bang went off. There was nobody in the area, so Dee and Dove moved to the stairs to check it out. I moved to the door and carefully looked inside.