“All right, you two hide. I’m going out to take a look.” After Wang Tian put his watch back on, Qi Zhi had the two of them hide in the changing room and began moving out himself.
“Tiantian, look at her. You’ve got a long way to go.” In the changing room, Wang Tian teased Yang Tian, who looked a little nervous.
“Shut up.” Yang Tian wasn’t about to back down either; she jabbed him with her elbow.
“You’ve got quite a punch.” Wang Tian rubbed his chest and muttered.
“You don’t seem scared at all?” Yang Tian quietly asked as she watched outside through a crack.
“This is nothing. What’s there to be nervous about?” Wang Tian shrugged. He’d been through much more intense situations before.
Yang Tian glanced at Wang Tian’s relaxed expression, then fell silent.
Meanwhile, Qi Zhi quickly surveyed the activity downstairs from various blind spots. Just as he’d expected, the robbers downstairs had begun ransacking the gold shop.
These desperate criminals actually had some brains. With technology so advanced these days, robbing a bank was far too risky, and paper money was numbered now, making it hard to get rid of.
A gold shop was different. Whether they sold the gold as is or melted it down, it was much easier to handle.
Qi Zhi watched as a robber slowly approached his position. With his skills, taking down two men wouldn’t be difficult, but he was afraid the robbers downstairs would hurt the hostages if they lost contact with the two of them.
Qi Zhi decided to hold off and wait until the robbers left. The hostages’ safety came first, after all.
Besides, these men seemed to be after money and nothing else. As long as they were allowed to leave, the hostages should be safe.
He wasn’t some rookie who’d just joined the police force, eager to earn merit. Years of front-line experience had taught him to analyze the overall situation more calmly.
“Buzz, buzz.” Wang Tian’s black phone suddenly rang in the changing room.
“Wang Tian, what’s going on?”
Yang Tian answered the phone in surprise. Before she could ask how it had managed to get through the signal jamming, the Captain’s voice came through.
“Captain, it’s me, Yang Tian.” Yang Tian wasted no time and briefly explained the situation.
“Follow Qi Zhi’s instructions. I’ll contact SWAT and have them come support you,” the Captain said calmly.
“Understood. But, Captain, how does this phone have a signal?” Yang Tian couldn’t help asking.
“It’s specially made.” The Captain answered with just three words, then continued.
“Don’t hang up. I’ll use this phone to connect directly to your earpieces.”
“Qi Zhi, what’s the situation?”
Qi Zhi was doing his best to observe the scene downstairs when the Captain’s voice suddenly came through his earpiece, breaking the silence.
“Six robbers in sight. There are at least one or two more in the control room. The visible weapons are three homemade shotguns and two imitation Type 54 pistols,” Qi Zhi replied calmly.
“Any hostages injured?”
“A few suffered minor injuries at the start. Everyone else is fine. The robbers are ransacking the gold shop, but for the hostages’ safety, I haven’t moved. I’m standing by in a blind spot on the second floor.”
“Good work. Stay where you are. Let them leave. The safety of the hostages and Wang Tian comes first,” the Captain said steadily.
“Understood,” Qi Zhi replied quietly.
Some time later, the two robbers on the second floor finished checking the area and went downstairs. They had come for the gold shop in the first place, and they didn’t really care whether anyone was on the second floor.
“Captain, one of the robbers has come down from upstairs. They’re probably about to leave.”
“Change your angle and see which exit they use. SWAT will be in position in five minutes.”
“If I move, I’ll lose sight of Wang Tian and Yang Tian,” Qi Zhi reported.
“That’s all right. Yang Tian can handle it.”
“I can do it, Captain,” Yang Tian’s voice chimed in at just the right moment.
Qi Zhi said nothing more and continued moving forward until he had a clear view of the entire gold shop on the first floor.
“Damn it, that robber upstairs suddenly turned into our store. He looks like he’s going to take a few pieces of clothing.” Qi Zhi, keeping watch, suddenly heard the tension in Yang Tian’s voice.
“Don’t panic. Let him take them. Stay calm,” the Captain said.
“He’s coming over. He’s going into the changing room.”
“Don’t say anything. Listen to me: if you’re discovered, don’t resist. Just pretend to be an ordinary couple. Whatever you do, don’t fight back. The hostages downstairs must stay safe!” The Captain’s voice came through, grave and serious.
Qi Zhi was a little tense too. His main worry was that Wang Tian would do something rash. Zhang Yang and the others had said Wang Tian was quite skilled, but if he took the robber down, the robbers downstairs would surely hurt the hostages.
After waiting quietly for two minutes, Qi Zhi saw a masked robber shove Wang Tian and Yang Tian out of the room. He then took them downstairs and pushed them into the crowd of hostages.
“Captain, Yang Tian and Wang Tian have been discovered. They’ve been put with the hostages,” Qi Zhi reported.
“It’s all right. I heard. Keep watching.”
Wang Tian felt that “unlucky” didn’t even begin to describe his day. He was having the worst luck imaginable.
The two of them had been hiding just fine. Who could’ve guessed they’d run into a brain-dead robber who, after stealing all that gold, still wanted to take a few pieces of clothing? And the worst part was, he actually wanted to try them on!
If Yang Tian hadn’t held him back, he would’ve taken the guy down right then and there just to see what was in his head.
“Big brother, that’s enough. Time to get out of here,” said a man in a pig-face mask.
“Take two hostages and retreat according to plan,” the man they called big brother replied.
“You two, get up and come with me.” One of the robbers moved to pull up a mother and daughter nearby.
“Please, I’m begging you. Have a heart. She’s just a child. Let her go.” The mother clutched her daughter tightly. Her voice trembled, but she still mustered the courage to speak.
“Why all the damn chatter? Get up!” The robber, growing impatient, struck the mother with his gun butt, then grabbed her by the hair and started dragging her away.
Another robber reached for the child, but just as Yang Tian was about to get up, Wang Tian suddenly tugged at her. Then he stood and bowed obsequiously. “Big brother…”
“Big brother, the child’s too much trouble. She’ll be hard for you to keep an eye on. Take someone else instead.”
“Well, look at that—we’ve got ourselves a hero. What, you want to die?” A robber pressed his gun to Wang Tian’s head and sneered.
“No, no, big brother, don’t scare me. I’m afraid,” Wang Tian said, his legs trembling.
“You’re such a coward, and you still want to play the hero? Fine, you’re coming with us.” Having said that, he stopped trying to grab the little girl. Yang Tian seized the chance to scoop her into her arms.
“Big brother, big brother, let’s talk this out. Don’t get worked up.” Wang Tian hurriedly spoke, then followed him out with a frightened look on his face.
“Big brother, we’re leaving,” one of the other robbers called.
“All of you, get the fuck down and close your eyes!” The last two robbers shouted, guns in hand. The hostages were already scared out of their wits. They hurriedly dropped to the floor and squeezed their eyes shut, afraid those lunatics might shoot them.
“Captain, the robbers are retreating toward the passageway connecting buildings A and B. Wang Tian has been taken as a hostage,” Qi Zhi said helplessly.
The Captain fell silent for a moment. Then Qi Zhi heard a deep breath through his earpiece, followed by the Captain’s reply.
“Yang Tian, observe the robbers’ escape route!”
Lying on the floor, Yang Tian heard the Captain and opened her eyes just a little. After taking a look, she quickly got up and went to the small door the robbers had used to escape. She peered through a crack.
“Captain, the sewers. They’re escaping through the sewer.”
“Understood. SWAT is already here. You don’t need to do anything else. Calm the hostages down. The police will break in soon.”
“Understood.”
“Understood.”