Seeing Jack's thumbs-up, Kono tossed his long hair and smiled smugly.
"Although there's still a lot I can teach you, you're pretty good at beating people up." Cheng Hao sighed, shaking his head slightly, and signaled the officers following them to handcuff the last female killer.
This was the first time Jack had sat through a trial standing up. When Julie took the witness stand, Allen Bryner's face in the dock paled visibly.
This guy's desperate gamble had clearly infuriated the entire judicial system. The judge denied the defense attorney's request for bail in less than half an hour.
Seeing the guy's legs weaken as he was led out of the courtroom, unable to walk, it was clear he knew what fate awaited him.
Hawaii doesn't have the death penalty, but that was only for the murder Allen Bryner committed a few years ago. With three of the four Baha drug cartel killers still alive, there was enough evidence for federal prosecutors to file charges.
In this converged world, the US federal execution system is quite robust, though the judicial process remains as lengthy and inefficient as ever.
Jack sees this as a positive development. After all, the chaotic society can't be deterred by the death penalty alone. Making a criminal face his execution in agonizing despair is a welcome form of torture, at least for someone like him. "It's nothing serious, just a minor injury. I've booked a flight back to New York in three days. OK, see you then. Goodnight, sweetheart." Jack hung up the video call with Jiejie and went into the bathroom to check the bandage around his waist.
After the trial, at everyone's insistence, he went to the hospital. After a thorough examination, the doctor confirmed nothing serious, cleaned and bandaged the wound, and prescribed some anti-inflammatory medication.
They also took Julie with them to visit veteran Agent Frick Moore, who had just finished surgery.
The surgeon who had performed the surgery was the same doctor who had arrived by helicopter. Upon seeing Jack, he curiously inquired again if he was a military doctor.
According to the doctor, Jack's emergency coconut water infusion bought him precious time.
The veteran agent is recovering well, and as long as he survives the next 48 hours of high-risk infection, he should be fine.
Outside the ICU, the group ran into the head of the local FBI office, a bald, portly man about the veteran agent's age. If Danny hadn't reminded him of Jack's injuries, he would have been so excited he'd have given him a bear hug.
The attack ultimately stemmed from carelessness on all sides. After all, Hawaii's small population couldn't support a large drug market, and beyond a few small gangs, there weren't any significant drug trafficking organizations. Furthermore, the military was the dominant force here, and the DEA's labeling of the Baha Cartel was already a bit overbearing. Its primary operations were in Central America, where it neither produced nor sold drugs, relying on acting as a middleman for other cartels for a small profit.
Hawaii is one of the transit ports for the Baha Cartel, but they're barely a local tyrant here, as evidenced by the weapons worn by several of the gunmen.
One of the four gunmen, the contact, carried an outdated Scorpion submachine gun. The most expensive of the other pistols was the Beretta 21A Lynx, which the assistant attorney hid on his thigh.
Chambered for .22LR ammunition, even with a silencer, it was barely the size of a palm, and its official retail price was over $500.
In short, no one expected the Baha Cartel's assassins, not only so brazen in Central America but also in Hawaii, to be as brazen as ever, killing nearly three people, all of them law enforcement officers.
The Marshals were shorthanded, the DEA was shorthanded, and even the FBI had only sent a single, near-retirement agent. It was clear that in Hawaii, a popular holiday paradise, everyone had lost their vigilance.
After receiving a round of gratitude, Jack took Julie back to the Hilton Hotel and assigned her a room next to his.
Jack's original protection assignment had been canceled; the Marshals would arrive the next day, and Julie had been officially integrated into WPP—not just her, but also her mother and sister.
This was all thanks to a certain meddling FBI agent. With a few words from him, an equally frightened female prosecutor, infuriated, made several phone calls, laying out everything in detail.
Just as someone was standing in front of the bathroom mirror, debating whether to heal the two holes, there was a knock on the door.
Jack, feeling a sense of urgency, opened the door and, as expected, saw Julie appear, her arm bandaged. "I accidentally got this wet in the shower earlier, and then I realized you were injured too, and wondered if showering would be inconvenient."
"So?" Jack let her in, feeling a mixture of laughter and tears. He was thankful he hadn't used his healing spell yet, as it would have been difficult to explain.
"So, let me help you," Julie's voice trailed off, her hand already reaching for his vitals.
—
How do you sit when your back is injured? Find a springy chair, of course, so Jack had to spend the entire night on a sofa by the window.
As expected of a woman known for her surfing and mountaineering aficionados, she was incredibly strong, or perhaps it was the stress of being chased all day and the fear she'd accumulated.
By the time they both fell into a deep sleep, the once sturdy sofa was practically falling apart.
Perhaps due to their injuries, the two slept until the following afternoon, nearly missing Julie's flight.
The Five-O crew, along with two federal marshals from New York, were already waiting in the hotel lobby. Upon seeing the two, they all looked skeptical.
After sending Julie off, Kono, the last one standing, looked suspicious. "Are you really injured?"
"Injured people need more rest. What's the problem?" Jack said matter-of-factly.
Of course, injured people not only need more rest, but also proper nourishment. Dissatisfied with the strange Chinese food in Honolulu's Chinatown, Jack went straight to Chinatown to buy two old hens from a Cantonese immigrant.
He then found Franklin at a Chinese restaurant in Chinatown, borrowed their kitchen and pressure cooker, and made himself a delicious pot of chicken soup.
After he tipped a few dozen dollars, the two young cooks happily helped Jack deliver a large pot of steaming chicken soup to the Five-O offices.
I almost fell asleep halfway through coding. If I could just hold on for another day, school would start soon and I could finally relax.
(End of this chapter)