Chapter 2563: Raining Down (11)

Gordon knew this damn robber was implying that the hostages he released might have bombs on them. The veteran detective knew this was a tactic commonly employed by robbers.

Many professional robbers would not take all the people in a bank as hostages at once, because too many people are hard to manage and would require more manpower to watch over. The scenes in movies and TV shows with dozens of hostages tied up and sitting on the floor are not realistic.

In reality, the number of hostages usually ranges from around 5 to 12, depending on the size of the bank and the local police force, as well as the intensity of media coverage. The more coverage there is, the fewer hostages are necessary; after all, media would still portray it as a disaster for five families to pressure the police.

Police pressure leads to better cooperation with their demands. As long as the hostages are eventually rescued, their job is considered satisfactory; whether the money is recovered is a secondary concern, which increases the robbers' chances of escape.

How to release these unnecessary excess hostages is also a technique in itself; these hostages can hold police attention for a while. Robbers typically release one after a certain period.

First, authorities must interrogate the released hostage to understand the situation inside the bank. Questioning is essential, and it distracts them. Second, they do not entirely trust the released individual and must check them for hazardous materials.

That's because some particularly cruel robbers make these people into human bombs. An explosion in a crowd would inevitably create massive chaos and further distract law enforcement.

Even just the possibility of a bomb on a person coming out could cause panic, and the police would have to put effort into calming people down, achieving the robbers' goal.

So, Gordon's response was very professional. He immediately blocked the exit for the released hostages and took those who had come out for isolation and inspection, keeping quiet about the possibility of bombs on them to prevent panic.

But this certainly caused troubles for the police, as hostages who thought they had narrowly escaped death were unwilling to be searched. They saw themselves as victims and questioned why they should be treated with such suspicion. Some, already having broken down under the high-stress situation, would make a fuss, drawing the reporters' cameras, and making it difficult for the police to conduct searches.

In some larger bank robberies, criminals have even slipped in with the hostages, and police, hesitant to conduct thorough searches, inadvertently provide robbers with a good escape route.

Shiller did not have time to plant bombs on people; his only intention was to ensure that not everyone on the second floor ran away. But to be honest, the second floor was not high enough to kill someone by jumping, at worst it might result in a sprained ankle. Removing the air cushion was insufficient to completely prevent hostages from jumping; now it was up to Gordon to act.

Gordon picked up the megaphone and went to the balcony where the employees were. He chose to calm the employees with his words, and to his surprise, it worked.

Mainly because Gordon, the police chief who had been steadfast in Gotham, truly led the Gothamites to a new and better life. He had been diligent in maintaining public order and never erred. The public's trust in him was extraordinarily high, even exceeding the trust level American citizens typically have in the American police, achieving a state of police-community kinship.

When Gordon told them to wait a bit before jumping, they actually waited, mainly because when Shiller broadcasted over the intercom earlier, they heard it too. If someone really had a bomb on them, jumping down and being taken to a crowd wouldn't necessarily be safe either.

After most people had returned to their rooms, Shiller began pondering his strategy. Even if these robbers indeed had a getaway car, it was probably parked far away, and the challenge was getting there.

Asking the police for a car like they did in the movies was unrealistic. Shiller would bet that if he dared to ask, Gordon would dare to load a row of bombs onto it. Then it wouldn't be where Shiller wanted to go; it would be where Gordon told them to go. This city always dealt with special situations in its own way. Journalists were used to it, and there was no public outcry to worry about.

Therefore, running away directly wouldn't work, or at least not by slipping out in plain sight. Shiller thought about it and indeed there was another way to leave the bank, albeit a bit troublesome.

Shiller again manipulated the surveillance footage and spotted two robbers attempting to leave the underground vault, likely noticing movement upstairs and wanting to investigate.

Stupidly reckless, Shiller thought. They didn't even know the position of the snipers, yet they dared to casually go upstairs, where they were likely to get a bullet in the head.

Shiller left the surveillance room and quickly walked through the corridor, waiting at the staircase between the first floor and the basement.

As soon as the two robbers with odd sacks on their heads rounded the corner, Shiller choked one, while the other was knocked down by a comrade who had just been thrown at him.

Shiller knocked out both men on the floor, checking their body types and the tattoos on them. He realized they might have been bottom-rung mob thugs and unlikely professional robbers.

Professional robbers have a few physical characteristics. First, they can't be too strong, or at least not everyone on the team can be exceptionally strong. One or two of them can be the muscle for heavy lifting, but the rest need to be agile for tasks such as picking locks or driving in pursuits. If everyone looked like Schwarzenegger, it'd be impossible to shrink down to avoid gunfire during a getaway, shortening their lifespan significantly.

Shiller removed the sack from one's head, and saw it was just a brown paper bag with a crossed-out face drawn on it, probably swiped from some breakfast shop.

Shiller initially wanted to put on the robbers' mask, but found that the DIY eye holes were entirely unsuitable. He had no choice but to take the gun off the robbers and then wake one of them up.

"Listen to me now, you see that second office in front? Go in and loiter by the window."

The man was somewhat dazed but, seeing the dark muzzle of Shiller's gun, raised his hands and said, "Alright, don't shoot. I'm going."

The person pushed open the door of the second office, which was a large office that originally seemed to be occupied, but because it lacked a balcony, anyone wanting to jump had run to other offices.

The robber walked to the window, while Shiller just stood at the door holding a gun, watching him. The robber walked past several windows, and just as he was about to approach the third window, Shiller yelled, "Stop."

Under Shiller's direction, the robber walked back and forth between the two left-most windows.

"Is this okay?" the robber pleaded. "The sniper will blow my head off!"

"They won't, at least not now," Shiller said. "Don't you even look outside? How can the sniper target you?"

Turning his head, the robber saw a huge plane tree outside the window. Although it was autumn, the leaves had not completely fallen off. The plane tree's leaves were inherently dense, and the bank's hired gardener, who was probably Pamela, had taken meticulous care of it, making the tree both large and lush.

Despite the robber's sheer panic, from the outside, his silhouette was barely visible amidst the leaves. More importantly, because the foliage was so thick, it obscured a clear view of the hostages inside; any stray shot could be problematic—hitting the robber might still be okay, but if a hostage were hit, that would be trouble.

Gordon's sniper orders were conservative, not to kill the robber at all costs. So the snipers also didn't dare act rashly, reporting to Gordon as soon as they saw the shadow of the robber.

Gordon went to the rooftop to assess the situation and found that, indeed, as the snipers had reported, with that tree in the way, it was quite difficult to take aim.

The people who had jumped down gradually began to describe what was happening inside, compiling their information. Adding to that the surveillance footage of the road before the incident, Gordon realized that this group of robbers was unexpectedly large, possibly six to seven people.

Robbers typically keep their group to five or fewer, as that many can fit in a single car for a getaway. Once their number exceeds that, they can't all leave in one vehicle. They had arrived in a group of four in a car and two or three on foot.

However, according to the staff who had jumped down, they had only seen one suspicious figure on the upper floor—in fact, this figure was Shiller, but the employees didn't recognize him and thought he was part of the robber gang.

Moreover, Shiller moved quickly, and the employees couldn't see clearly; they only said the man was quite tall with swift movements.

The robber that Shiller was aiming at happened to be about the same height as Shiller, around 6 feet 1 inch tall. He moved back and forth among the leaves, and both the sniper and Gordon couldn't see his exact build.

Gordon knew if the robbers were using the most traditional cutting method to open the bank's vault door, they would need quite a few people watching on the ground.

Unlike directional blasting, where you just press a button and rush in to grab the money, which requires long preparations, and highly professional skills, cutting is a process that doesn't need much preparation beforehand but takes longer to execute and involves handling more equipment.

Either the robbers had such skilled individuals among them, or they would simply kidnap a technician. Gordon guessed it was the latter, which is why there were so many of them.

And from the images on the surveillance cameras, these individuals didn't seem like professional technicians, but rather like mob goons who had a momentary lapse of judgment, making kidnapping even more likely.

Aside from assisting with the operation, they also had to watch the hostages, meaning that most of their men would be tied up. It was very likely that only one or two people were watching the hostages on the second floor, or maybe even just one.

If it was just one person, then it would be far easier. After the sniper took out the second-floor robber, they could storm in and rescue all the hostages. Without the robbers, the hostages certainly couldn't escape.

The problem now was that Gordon needed to confirm if there was only one robber upstairs because once firing began, they could only take one shot. If not all the enemies were eliminated with that shot, the remaining ones would surely harm the hostages.

At that moment, Shiller's deliberately lowered voice resonated through the broadcast again, still demanding police cooperation, only Shiller wasn't physically there—it was a recording he had left behind.

Gordon didn't know this; he thought there was still one in the surveillance room. That left five of them, plus one kidnapped technician, which meant four remained.

Either two were downstairs and two on the second floor, or three were downstairs and one on the second floor.

Gordon leaned towards the latter since, judging by the timing, they hadn't left yet, indicating that the cutting machine they were using wasn't very advanced and thus required more manpower.

One to watch the technician and two to operate the machine would make sense. If there were one watcher and one operator, the risk of issues was high; thus, it was more likely that only one robber remained upstairs.

Although not entirely certain, Gordon didn't lack the decisiveness to take a gamble at a critical moment. He immediately ordered, "Cut down the tree blocking the view, snipe the second-floor robber!"