Chapter 29

Chapter 29 Two Deadly Lunges

After pulling the safety pin, Xia Pazi didn’t immediately throw the grenade, because people have legs — the moment he raised his arm, the officers would definitely scatter to avoid it, and once it went off they’d close in again right away, so throwing it wouldn’t do much good. Instead, he gripped the pin in his right hand and charged like a madman straight toward the densest cluster of officers.

That charge threw the officers into confusion. Nobody knew whether Xia Pazi had pulled the pin or was still holding it down, and they could only fall back in a hurry.

“Spread out!”

“He’s got a grenade!”

“……!”

The officers scattered and cleared a path, while Xia Pazi snarled with a twisted expression: “Break through!”

“Bang, bang……!”

Ang Su raised his hand and fired four shots at Xia Pazi, but the target was moving fast and was wearing a bulletproof vest — the bullets hit his chest and only kicked up puffs of white smoke.

“He’s got a vest!” Ang Su shouted, then watched as Xia Pazi, after taking four rounds, had already closed to within five steps of the driver.

“Boss, go now!” Xia Pazi raised the pin without a moment’s hesitation, and the grenade instantly began hissing.

“He pulled it, he pulled the pin!” Ang Su turned and ran.

At that moment, A Long and the others had already drawn their weapons and were turning to shoot their way out. Qin Yu saw that Xia Pazi had scared a gap in the perimeter, and with almost no hesitation his mind was made up — he skidded to a stop, pivoted, and in his thick steel-plated blast suit lunged straight at Xia Pazi, deliberately angling his head toward Xia Pazi’s waist.

“Thud!”

The two went down together, and Qin Yu instinctively slammed a big hand over Xia Pazi’s head.

“Boom!”

The explosion tore through the quiet night. A shattered arm flew into the air, and the bulletproof glass visor on Qin Yu’s face was instantly drenched red.

“Team leader, team leader!” Zhu Wei shouted, eyes wide.

“Stay calm, stick to the plan!” Qin Yu shook his head, wiped the blood off his visor with his left hand, and looked down to find Xia Pazi had passed out cold — half his right arm blown off, white bone splinters tangled with flesh and skin, blood pouring freely.

“Damn it!”

A Long saw Xia Pazi go down and roared, opening fire to the left.

“Whoosh!”

Qin Yu got up and charged forward.

“Bang bang bang……!”

A burst of bullets struck Qin Yu across his body — head, legs, every critical spot — sending sparks flying.

Seeing that his shots couldn’t penetrate Qin Yu’s suit, A Long hastily stepped back and lowered his head to change magazines.

“Slam!”

Qin Yu hit him twice in quick succession, using the combined weight of his body and suit to headbutt A Long square on the chin.

With a crack, A Long staggered back two steps.

Qin Yu suddenly bent down, wrapped both arms tight around A Long’s shins, and heaved upward with a sharp thrust of his core — A Long flew up more than half a body’s height before crashing back to the ground.

“Don’t move, don’t move……!”

Those moves looked simple, and the total distance Qin Yu had sprinted back and forth was barely fifty meters, but he’d been doing it in full gear and hand-to-hand combat, relying entirely on explosive bursts of strength. He now felt himself on the verge of total exhaustion, his legs as heavy as lead, and could only pin the man down and keep shouting.

The moment the grenade threat was gone, the officers had nothing holding them back. Over forty of them surged forward together, riot shields in hand, sandwiching the remaining suspects. The whole thing was over in under ten seconds.

“Pin him down, pin him down.” Zhu Wei pointed at A Long on the ground and called out.

Seven or eight people piled on at once, and without even bothering with handcuffs, they clamped a 70-jin iron shackle straight onto A Long.

Qin Yu sat in the snow for nearly a full minute before he finally took off his helmet, turned his head, and spat: “Damn, thank god for the steel plate armor — even the best bulletproof vest wouldn’t have saved me today.”

“You alright?” Ang Su rushed over and asked.

“Fine. I tackled at a good angle — the grenade went off in front of me.” Qin Yu wiped the sweat from his face and deliberately said to Ang Su and the others: “You all say Yuan’s team leader just flatters me — but I’m out here risking my life for his numbers. You think he can’t see that? If he doesn’t promote me, are you all happy about it?”

“Yes yes yes!” Ang Su nodded right away, giving a thumbs up: “Without your two tackles today, who knows how it would’ve ended.”

“Drinks later to calm the nerves!” Qin Yu heaved himself up off the ground: “Let’s go, get everyone back.”

……

11:30 at night.

Qin Yu stood by the corridor with his phone: “Zhu Wei, make sure the doctors do everything they can to keep the one who had the grenade alive. Right, right — the more people we have, the easier the evidence chain is to build……yeah yeah, I’m about to grab a bite, then I’ll start the interrogation right away. Good, talk later!”

Footsteps echoed down the corridor, and Qi Lin came toward him carrying a meal box, smiling: “Hey, you’re back?”

Qin Yu turned at the sound: “Coming to eat?”

“Yeah, nothing going on, just came to grab some food.” Qi Lin asked with a relaxed expression: “How’d it go, smooth?”

“Yeah, got them all.”

“Our people okay?”

“We moved fast — they hadn’t even figured out what was happening before we wrapped it up. Everyone’s fine.”

“Good!” Qi Lin grinned and casually asked: “Hey, I heard you were doing a joint operation with the garrison troops? How come I haven’t seen any military personnel come through?”

Qin Yu paused: “Who told you that?”

“Wasn’t that the case? I just heard people in the department chatting.” Qi Lin was also caught off guard.

“You’re listening to their nonsense — there were no military people.” Since the case was already cracked, Qin Yu didn’t bother hiding the details: “It was drug dealers again. A Long — the one who killed our four guys last time!”

“Clang!”

A sharp sound rang out as the metal meal box slipped from Qi Lin’s hand and hit the floor. He stood there frozen, his face drained of color.

“What’s wrong?” Qin Yu frowned.

Qi Lin’s mind went blank, his ears ringing.

Qin Yu reached out and tapped Qi Lin on the arm: “Hey, you okay?”

The touch snapped Qi Lin back. He looked at Qin Yu: “It’s… it’s… that A Long?”

“Yeah. Yuan’s team dug up the lead, we went and made the arrest.” Qin Yu nodded and asked: “You seem a little off — what’s going on?”

“Nothing… nothing, I just thought of Lao Hei… didn’t Lao Hei die at his hands?” Qi Lin forced a smile: “I ran into him that day. That guy scares me.”

“You sure you’re okay?”

“I’m fine.” Qi Lin bent down and picked up the meal box: “Go eat!”

“Aren’t you eating too? Come on!”

“I forgot my chili sauce, I’ll go get it.” Qi Lin smiled.

“Oh, I’ll go ahead then.”

“Sure!” Qi Lin answered, turned, and walked away with the meal box.

In the corridor, Qin Yu watched his retreating figure with a strange feeling, not buying a word of what Qi Lin had just said, yet unable to figure out why the man was acting so out of character.

“Team leader, come eat.” Guan Qi called from the cafeteria doorway.

“Coming!” Qin Yu stopped overthinking and walked over.

……

Two minutes later, the logistics storeroom.

Qi Lin shut the door and dropped to the floor with a thud, grabbing his hair with both hands and shouting: “Damn it, wasn’t this supposed to be a joint operation with the garrison? Hasn’t it already been half a month? Why haven’t they left yet? How the hell did this happen……!”