Fandom: Houston Knights
Rating: PG
Spoilers: None.
Category:
Title: Line of Duty
Author: Lynn
Detective Sargent Levon Lundy pulled his red Jimmy
to a stop across the street from their suspect's house. Armed with an arrest
warrant for one Arnold Melbourne he and his partner, Sargent Joseph La
Fiamma, prepared to cross the rain-soaked street. La Fiamma pulled the
collar of his coat up tighter in a vain attempt to keep some of the down-pour
from running down his back. Lundy clamped his plastic covered brown cowboy
hat down tighter on his blond head. Suddenly he cut loose with a sneeze
that threatened to knock the hat back off.
"Guisenteit," La Fiamma said.
"Thanks," Lundy replied, his voice sounding muffled
with a cold. "Look, you cover the back, I'll take the front."
"Lundy -"
"Hey, you can go first...right around to th' back
door." He looked evenly at the other man. "La Fiamma, I feel like hell
and I don't feel like trompin' through this stuff any more'n I have to."
Acknowledging the red-rimmed eyes and general
haggard appearance of his partner, La Fiamma relented. With a nod he left
the vehicle and sprinted around the side of the little frame house. Levon
followed, moving up the front walk. Knocking at the door, he listened for
signs of life inside.
A second knock brought a response, scuffing footsteps
and a muffled, "Yeah, yeah. I'm comin'." The door was opened by a small,
rumpled, skinny man rubbing the sleep from his eyes. "Yeah," he said as
way of greeting.
"Are you Arnold Melbourne?" Lundy asked conversationally.
"Yeah," the man replied. Levon was beginning to
wonder if the man had vocabulary capabilities beyond the level of a three-year
old.
"Mr. Melbourne, I have here a warrant - " that
was as far as he got. Caught off-guard, the Texan wasn't prepared when
the other man shoved him in the chest with the force of a bull. The detective
flew backwards a few feet, landing hard on his backside. He looked up to
see that the man had disappeared back inside.
"La Fiamma, he's a-runnin!" Lundy yelled through
clenched teeth.
Behind the house, the Italian stood at the alert.
He held both side arms at the ready, waiting for the suspect to come through
the back door...
Melbourne came through the window.
La Fiamma registered the sounds of breaking glass, cracking wood and tearing cloth just before the remnants of the window above and behind him came raining down. Their quarry flew out, his foot catching the detective's shoulder and sending him sprawling to the ground along with the window debris. Joe found himself tangled up in the mess.
Melbourne ran free.
Levon chose that moment to come limping around
the house. He was making a concerted effort not to massage the part of
his anatomy that had made contact with the cement walk. "La Fiamma?" he
called.
"Yeah," came the disgruntled reply from beneath
the ruined drapes.
"You okay?" Lundy asked.
"Just go get the guy, okay?" La Fiamma sounded
more exasperated by the second.
The Texan stifled a laugh and limped after their
man. He managed to stretch the bruised muscles enough to move a bit quicker,
but even his top speed was little more than an awkward trot. The blond
watched as Arnold ran in and out of foot traffic, easily keeping his distance.
Still, Levon followed, bent on getting their man.
Back at Melbourne's house, La Fiamma had finally
managed to untangle himself from the drapes and wooden fragments of the
window. Pulling himself up, he started after the other men. The ex-Chicagoan
didn't realize that one shoe had been knocked off until he stepped on a
large and particularly jagged piece of glass.
"OW! Shit!" the detective cursed loudly as he
hopped free of the debris and sat down on the wet ground. Gingerly he pulled
the glass shard from his foot. Grabbing his handkerchief from his pocket,
La Fiamma quickly wrapped it around his foot. Easing back up, he hobbled
over and retrieved the errant shoe. Limping painfully, the brunette returned
to the Jimmy. He grimaced as he felt blood collecting inside his imported
shoe.
Several blocks away, Lundy was still tracking
their suspect. From the increased number of times the man looked over his
shoulder, the Texan knew that he was starting to get nervous. A knot of
people, waiting out the rain under an awning, blocked the detective's path
and he quickly dodged around them. Just as he reached curbside, a pick-up
truck passed, splashing through a huge puddle. The murky water shot over
the already soaked man in an elegant wave, drenching him even more.
Sputtering, the blond picked up his decidedly
worse for wear hat, knocked off by the water. He struggled on, wiping the
crude out of his eyes with the back of one smudged hand. Ahead, Melbourne
turned into an alley. Lundy picked up as much sped as possible. He was
tired and determined to end the chase. Just as the Texan reached the alley
entrance a siren blast caught his attention. Turning, he saw La Fiamma
speeding up the street in his Jimmy. Lundy waved the Italian on, motioning
for him to circle around the block. Hitting the lights, his partner signaled
his agreement. Levon barreled into the alley...
And directly into a group of trash cans. Cans
that had just recently been set out for collection. Very full trash cans.
Arnold Melbourne looked down from his perch, on
the lowest platform of a fire escape, to see the police officer lying face
down in a pile of refuge. Laughing, the man lowered himself to the ground
and, seeing no one else around, sprinted away from the fallen man. Just
as Albert reached the far end of the alley, a red Jimmy pulled across the
opening. Skidding to a halt, the man started to re-trace his steps. He
changed his mind when he saw a handgun pointing in his direction.
"Police. You're under arrest," La Fiamma said
with no small amount of relief.
As Joe was reading the man his rights, Lundy shuffled
up to them. Still pulling eggshell and other things that he would rather
not identify from his clothing, and carrying a very battered cowboy hat,
the Texan was uttering more curse words than even he realized he
knew.
"You okay?" La Fiamma asked, trying very hard
not to laugh out loud.
"Oh, just fine," Lundy replied with no small amount
of sarcasm. Taking in the way Joe was favoring one foot and leaning against
his vehicle, he asked, "you?"
"I'm just great," the Italian replied. "You ready
to take this jack rabbit in?"
Lundy looked down at his soaked, grit and garbage
encrusted clothing. He looked at his partner's equally disheveled appearance.
He looked at his Jimmy, thinking of what they were about to inflict upon
it. He sighed. The sigh tuned into a series of sneezes. "Oh, hell...why
not?" He said with resignation when he could finally speak.
La Fiamma pushed the handcuffed man into the backseat
and climbed into the truck beside him. Lundy scuffed around the front of
his vehicle and crawled behind the wheel. As soon as he closed the door
he realized that not only did he look awful, he did not smell like
a spring morning either. Nearly gagging, he quickly rolled down the window.
The wind chose that moment to whip the rain into the open window.
"Yeah...that's just what I's missin'," he mumbled
as he started the Jimmy up and pulled away from the curb.
It was the end of their shift. They had made quite
a sight, stomping into the station with Arnold Melbourne in tow. They had
booked him and left before they could be thrown out by the other officers.
A large part of the remainder of their shift had been spent getting La
Fiamma stitched up and both men showered and changed. Despite Joe's arguments,
Levon declined having his own injury tended to, insisting that he was only
bruised.
Now they were at their desks, filling out reports.
La Fiamma had his bandaged foot propped up on a chair, a pair of crutches
close at hand. Lundy sat gingerly on a thick cushion. There was a half-used
box of tissues on the desk at his elbow. Neither man spoke, concentrating
only on the reports at hand.
Just as another series of sneezes overtook the
Texan, Lieutenant Joanne Beaumont entered the room. She looked decidedly
unhappy; her brow was creased in a frown and he pretty face flushed. Taking
a deep breath, she seemed to be steeling herself for a confrontation. She
squared her shoulders, strode purposefully across the room and stopped
at the occupied tandem desks. Beaumont looked at first one man and then
the other, gauging their moods. "I've got some news that you're just going
to love," she said in her soft, throaty voice.
The two men looked at one another, their faces
unreadable. "Let's have it, Lieutenant," La Fiamma said with a tone of
resignation in his voice.
"They're gonna cut Melbourne a deal. They'll let
him walk in exchange for names and information that they deem more important,"
Joanne finished, anger ringing in her voice.
La Fiamma sighed and looked across at his partner.
Lundy's face mirrored his own feelings of frustration and impotence. Without
a word the two men eased stiffly from their chairs. Handing Joanne their
reports, Joe grabbed the crutches and Levon picked up his cushion and ever-dwindling
tissue supply. Together they moved slowly toward the door.
Exasperated, Joanne Beaumont called after them,
"aren't you two even going to get mad?!"
With a shrug, Lundy turned back to her, "hell,
Joanne, it's all part a th' job...all in th' line a duty." He turned toward
his partner. "Chicken's?"
"Yeah," Joe La Fiamma agreed. "I'll even buy the
first round."