Чак Хоган: The Standoff

Banish held his open hands out toward her. “No,” he said. He said it simply, extending his arms, trying to stop her with sheer will. “No,” he said. “Don’t do this.”

The marshals were all backing off, giving her a wide berth as she walked with the baby and the gun from the trees in toward the burning cabin. The girl was crying. Tears rolled in two clean streaks down her face. She wore a plain, frayed cotton dress and sandals with broken straps.

“Let him go,” she said.

Banish moved between her and her father. His arms were out. “Don’t do this to me,” he said.

“Becca—” said Ables behind him, followed by a grunting noise, Fagin shutting him up.

Tears rolled liberally down the girl’s face. “Let my daddy go!” she screamed, the gun shaking.

She stopped a few yards in front of Banish. The baby was waking in her other arm. Marshals moved in slowly around her.

“No, no, no,” said Banish. His arms were out and he was simultaneously holding off the marshals and pleading with the girl. “No,” he said, trying to stop time, trying to hold everything.

The marshals slowed, remaining close. Banish slipped his gun out of his belt and tossed it away. He started forward toward her. He was shaking his head. If he could not talk her down, he would jump her himself. She was aiming fully at him now.

“Give me the gun,” he said. He reached one open hand out to her. “Give me the gun. It’s all over.”

She shook her head wildly. “You let him go!”

Banish moved again closer. His hands were out in front of him. He was pleading. “I don’t want you to get hurt,” he said.

“Don’t touch me.”

“Give me the gun.” He was walking forward, close to her. He was shaking his head sadly. “It’s all over now,” he said. “It’s over. It’s over.”

The corners of her eyes crinkled, then fresh tears squeezed out. One lip came up to comfort the other. The siege had taken its toll. He saw now that she was looking at her father standing there in custody. She was fighting reason. She shuddered twice, two small, silent sobs. A revolution going on within her. The baby boy, Amos, held in a sitting position, looked blankly at Banish.

“It’s over now,” Banish said. He was getting through to her. Her lower lip quivered as her face crumbled inward. The baby and the gun both heavy. She was fighting hard to hold her composure. He was convincing her. She was only fourteen years old.

Banish shook his head again, nearly crying himself. He was reaching out to her plaintively. “Don’t do this to me,” he said.

She was lowering the gun. She was putting the gun down. Her shoulders were shaking and the tears were washing her face, and the gun was going down. Two marshals, one on either side of her, started forward. Banish let them. He dared not move. The gun was pointed at about his knees now. He made ready to step forward and take it away from her.

The girl looked once more at her father. Her quivering shoulders stopped then and held still, as though in one final swallow of compliance. But the gun had stopped too. Stopped at about Banish’s feet, and now she was staring hard at her father. Only Banish was close enough to see the burning in her eyes, her face changing before him, the burning overcoming all else. It was fierce in her eyes, the flames, reflected from the cabin and not reflected, and Banish saw in a moment of flaring intuition that she was not looking at her father at all now, she was looking at the man standing behind her father, the man who was holding her father in handcuffs, and seeing the black color of that man’s skin. He saw it happening as it was just about to happen, a moment of pure vision, and as he rushed at her all at once, propelling himself forward, her gun came back up and she got one shot past him before he threw himself upon her and the infant boy and went crashing down on top of them hard to the ground.

It all happened at once. Blood saw the girl’s arm stop going down, and then that look she got on her face, like wind blowing sand off a sundial, and Banish leaping forward and the gun going up and her firing off one shot and Fagin pitching back behind Ables, hit, his head snapping back, blown off his feet by a shot to the chest and his body dropping fast and the gun kicking back in her small white hand and the non look on her face — it was pure instinct — and the marshals’ rifles beside her coming up in their hands, and Banish leaping in the air with his arms out and landing on the girl and the boy, tackling them, smothering them underneath him and falling to the ground, the marshals’ guns kicking back and puffing smoke, all happening at once, Banish coming down hard on top of the girl with the baby and the gun and Ables falling forward from the act of Fagin being blown back off his feet and settling still on the ground.

He saw the night sky. He struggled up dizzily to sit. Screaming fucking pain in his chest. Fagin said viciously, “Jesus fucking Christ!” and looked down and saw the hole in his jacket and ripped it open and saw the fabric torn apart. He saw the shotglass punch mark in his Kevlar vest. Christ, it hurt. Right in the fucking sternum. He looked up fast, the pain shooting to his waist and neck. Did they get the gun? And why wasn’t anybody fucking helping him?

He got to his knees, then his feet. Christ, it fucking hurt. Ables was lying on his stomach near him, hands cuffed behind, unable to move. Fagin stumbled forward, standing on his own. He had to. Everyone else was away from him. He looked over and saw that Banish had taken down the girl himself. He was body-blanketing her and the infant, holding them still on the ground, and the gun was lying clear. The marshals and agents were all moving in around them. Blood reached Banish first and touched his shoulder. Fagin saw then for the first time the two holes in Banish’s back. He saw the blood soaking like red ink into Banish’s white shirt. Blood rolled him off the children, who were hysterical. Banish’s half-burnt face was fixed. His eyes searched the night sky, mouth mumbling.

Blood was the first to reach him. Banish wasn’t moving. Blood called his name and touched his shoulder, the girl and the baby boy screaming beneath him. Then he saw the holes in Banish’s back. Two distinct holes filling up red. Blood grasped Banish’s shoulder and rolled him off them and stood back fast. Banish was staring up. His blue eyes were glazed, blinking for comprehension. His face seemed lazy, half-ashen, lips opening and closing without sense. Hands grabbing lightly at the ground. Blood took a full, terrified step backward, then rushed forward and down. The blood was pooling on the dry earth beneath Banish’s back, spreading. His head lolled to one side. He was looking at the children. Blood reached for Banish’s head and turned it so that he was looking up at him. Blood could say nothing. He tried. Then Banish’s weak neck failed again and his head dropped the other way and blood spilled like red syrup out of his mouth. Blood righted him, holding his head with both hands now. Banish was mumbling, incomprehensibly at first. Then, wheezing: “Call my wife.” Blood could hear Fagin saying behind him, “Somebody get a fucking EMT!” and sensed the people suddenly rushing around him, the weight of their collective realization. The girl and boy being pulled away, screaming. Banish was looking up past Blood. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry.” He was apologizing over and over again. Blood was yelling down at him, something, holding his head up, watching the red life spill from his mouth.

They rolled him over and he was looking up at the last of the shooting flames and the black tower of smoke running up into the night sky. A buzzing helicopter slowly crossed his view. Banish’s eyes fell left and he saw Rebecca and he saw Amos and his blood was on their dirty clothes but the gun was knocked away and they were crying and they were both fine. They were fine.