The first punch Bruce landed was against the man's nose, staggering him backwards and making him drop the newspaper and Bruce's keys. Charging into the apartment, Bruce continued a relentless assault, delivering punches to the man's face and stomach in an alternating pattern to keep his foe from effectively defending. Dropping to the floor, Bruce landed on his side and kicked out with his right leg, connecting hard with the man's ankle and sweeping his legs out from under him.

Rolling back to his feet, Bruce seized an ashtray from the coffee table in the dingy living room and threw it out the window, shattering the glass and creating a shower of glittering fragments down to the street.

Gordon grabbed the radio in his car and put in a call to the station.

"Possible domestic disturbance at Beckman Hotel at Fifth and Drake. Officer on scene," Gordon reported, knowing with almost complete certainty it had been the signal from Bruce.

"Understood," the dispatcher replied from the radio. "Backup en route."

Leaving the car behind, Gordon rushed past a clearly irritated Cunningham and into the hotel. He took the stairs two at a time, reaching the second floor and heading in the direction of a commotion down the hall. He reached room 204 in time to watch the criminal he recognized as Harris throw a punch at Bruce. The teenager blocked the attack, seized Harris by the wrist, and flipped him over to land on his back atop the coffee table. The wood furniture broke under the impact, collapsing under Harris, and the criminal stayed down, groaning.

"I'll keep an eye on Harris," Gordon told Bruce. "Find the girl."

Bruce didn't have to be told twice, leaving the criminal in Gordon's charge and departing for the bedroom in the back of the apartment. He opened the closet but didn't find the girl, only empty hangars on a bare metal rod crossing the storage space. Checking under the bed, Bruce discovered a large suitcase. Dragging the heavy container out, he unzipped it and threw back the lid. The girl, no older than ten, was curled up inside, shaking with fear. Staying in his kneeling position beside the suitcase, Bruce held out a hand, letting the girl reach to him rather than feel threatened by an attempt to pull her out.

"It's okay," Bruce coaxed. "I'm here with the police. We're going to take you home."

The young Hispanic girl hesitantly reached out and accepted Bruce's hand, and he slowly helped her out of the suitcase, picking her up and carrying her back into the living room. The girl cringed when she saw Harris handcuffed on the floor.

"It's alright," Bruce soothed, stroking her black hair with his free hand. "He can't hurt you anymore."

Harris opened his mouth to say something, but Bruce didn't want him threatening the child. Bruce slammed a foot down on the back of Harris' shoulder, pinning him to the carpet.

"Not one word," Bruce growled.

The look Harris glared toward Bruce showed he wanted to curse or threaten him. Since Harris had been beaten by the teenager in a fight only minutes ago, being handcuffed on the floor would make Harris a punching bag for Bruce, so the criminal wisely kept his mouth shut and continued his murderous glare.

"Does the girl have any family we need to contact?" Bruce asked.

"Her mother's been practically living at the station since the kidnapping," Gordon explained. He pulled a slip of paper from his pocket and handed it to Bruce, keeping his gun hand aimed at their prisoner. "Here's the number for my office. The secretary can relay the good news to her mother. Backup is already on the way, but I think you should make a discreet exit before they get here."

"Understood," Bruce accepted. He knew full well if the crooked cop, Cunningham, was still around, he might try to arrest Bruce for interfering in a police investigation, assault and battery, as well as trespassing when he entered Harris' room.  Considering Bruce had actually done those things, he was slightly relieved he'd actually attacked the right man.  Things could have gone very badly if he'd been wrong.

Bruce made a quick call to Gordon's secretary at the police station to have her contact the girl's mother, wiping down the phone afterward to remove his prints.

"Something about all of this doesn't add up," Bruce told Gordon, glancing out the window to be sure the other police officers hadn't arrived yet. "How did the other cop get here so fast to block your entrance with legalities? In order to reach the judge and get here first, he must have known where Harris was hiding before the tip came in."

"Harris was arrested for killing three people during an armed robbery," Gordon reminded. "Perhaps he didn't work alone, and his partners are protecting him out of self-preservation by pulling strings."

"If someone else was behind the robbery, they could be buying cops and judges to keep their stooge out of trouble," Bruce suggested. "Either way, his associates or employers may try to silence him if you take him in. They wouldn't want him talking."

"I'll put Harris in protective custody," Gordon stated. "I have a few people on the force I can trust."

Police sirens wailed in the distance, signaling the imminent arrival of reinforcements.

"Stay with the nice policeman," Bruce told the girl holding onto him. "He'll take you home."

It took more encouragement than Bruce expected, but he managed to transfer the rescued girl to Gordon.

"You came up here because of a disturbance," Bruce told Gordon. "You rescued the girl, who had already been released. The criminal was subdued by the time you got here. This is all true. As for his assailant? He must have gone out the window."

Bruce finished giving Gordon a truthful rendition of the events before heading down the hall and ducking out the  bedroom window onto the fire escape. The fire escape was on a different side of the hotel than the window he'd broken out earlier, so Bruce was out of sight of Cunningham.  The police sirens were quite close, only a few blocks away. He slid down the fire escape ladder, wiping the rust and grime off his hands afterwards. Putting his hands in his jacket's pockets, he hurried to the sidewalk and started leisurely strolling down the street. The police cars arrived from the opposing direction, taking no notice of him as they screeched to a stop out front of the hotel. The cops left their vehicles and rushed inside.

As he was walking, a thought occurred to Bruce, making him turn around and go back to the hotel. He took a side street and approached the building from a narrow alley where he could watch the officers from cover, crouching down among the loose papers and garbage as if he was a homeless person innocently watching the activity around the hotel.

When Bruce had helped apprehend Harris, he'd noticed something odd, but with all the excitement of the criminal's capture and the little girl's rescue, he hadn't put it all together in his mind until now. Harris had been involved in the shooting death of the hotel manager, having tracked blood from the crime scene back to his room. However, when Bruce found him in his room, no gun was present. Either Harris wasn't the shooter, or someone had removed it. Although it was possible the gun was simply out of sight, Bruce doubted someone as trigger happy and aggressive as Harris would put a gun away rather than have it nearby where it could be quickly retrieved for use.

The idea of someone absconding with the weapon rested at the forefront of Bruce's mind, and he knew of only one person who'd admitted to being at the hotel before Gordon and Bruce arrived; he even knew the manager wasn't around. Bruce's gaze centered on Cunningham, still sitting on the hood of his car and refusing to assist in the investigation. If the murder weapon was on Cunningham or in his car, Bruce would need Gordon to work that end of the investigation, but Bruce had another idea, and he only needed the police to leave before he could do a little work on his own.

It took hours for the police to wrap things up at the hotel and depart. Once they were gone, Bruce exited the alley, brushing off the trash on his dull green jacket.

Bruce's idea related to the missing murder weapon and its possible location. Since Cunningham was first on scene, almost too early to be plausible, Bruce suspected him of involvement. Whether Cunningham hid the weapon to cover for Harris or took it to protect himself didn't matter. Because Gordon showed up to the hotel, it might've spooked Cunningham into disposing of the gun faster and less efficiently.

Kneeling down at the curb where Cunningham's car had been parked, Bruce took hold of the iron bars of a street drain grating. The concrete around it was old and broken, allowing him to pull the grate out and examine what was underneath. Sitting atop a soggy pile of wet leaves was a nickel plated revolver. He plucked the weapon out of the drain and carefully put it in his pocket with a handkerchief since he couldn't leave it there for someone to walk off with it and do a proper disposal.

Bruce replaced the drainage grate and adopted a leisurely pace home. He couldn't take the gun in directly as walking into a police station with a gun was a quick way to get arrested. Additionally, bringing in a murder weapon could make him into a patsy if crooks like Cunningham had any say in it. He'd have to either meet Gordon privately or send him the gun in an anonymous envelope. No matter what his choice, Bruce realized he'd stumbled into something far bigger than a fugitive kidnapping a girl. The original armed robbery and triple homicide was connected to the criminal Harris and now a corrupt cop named Cunningham and a bribe taking judge named Leeson. Bruce knew he needed to be extremely careful as he didn't know who else might be a part of the conspiracy or how high ranking they might be. He was in uncharted waters, surrounded by unknown predators. He'd trained to fight blind, but this was a different feeling altogether.

Bruce continued walking slowly home, his mind racing as he tried to formulate options and contingency plans. He wanted several in place before he took any further actions as his life might very well depend on it.