It was slow for a Saturday evening around the First to Know Newsroom. The six o’clock news had gone well, despite a football game running ten minutes over, and Jeff had gone half nuts trying to truncate the news to fit. Seated at the anchor desk, Sally had no idea of what was coming next until she saw it on the teleprompter, but Dave’s long experience sitting next to her was a stabilizing effect, and they made it through without any fluffs on her part to her vast relief.

After the newscast, Brett, who was working the assignment desk this evening, sent out for subs.

Brett had been a full-time cameraman for some years, until the weird hours started to get to him, and finally hung up the news business for a job at Owens-Corning. But the dullness of his new office job and some outstanding credit card bills had brought him back to the station part-time, just on weekends, sometimes as a cameraman, sometimes as an assignment director.

One of the responsibilities of the assignment director was to monitor the police, fire, and EMS scanners, trying to find potential stories. Sometimes that could be a little tricky, given that there were limited numbers of people to chase after them. It was all too easy to assign a truck and a cameraman to a minor holdup, only to have a major house fire break out across town.

But tonight was a relatively quiet evening, and in the newsroom a couple hours before the late news broadcast, Brett was really more interested in the ESPN coverage of the closing moments of a football game on the west coast. Carl, who was anchoring the sports desk tonight, sat in the second chair on the podium. He already had most of his part of the newscast worked out, though there’d be a mention of the score on this game. He could have gotten it off the Internet and usually did, but watching the game was something to do when it was slow like this.

As it turned out, Brett almost missed the first emergency call, since the UCLA quarterback had launched a “Hail-Mary” from far down the field in a desperate attempt to come from behind. The scanners went off with a call: “Car 317, caller reports domestic disturbance, shots fired, Glenwood south of Bancroft.”

“Shit,” he said, turning down the volume on the ESPN game. It didn’t matter as the long bomb missed by a country mile, and the time ran out while the ball was still in the air. “Wonder what that’s all about?”

“Somebody caught somebody in bed with the wrong somebody else, probably,” Carl said with a grimace.

“Maybe,” Brett replied, flicking on a second scanner and locking out the patrol car frequency. If there’d been any hits from the shots, there’d be a call for EMS within a few seconds. This was one of those tough calls for an assignment director. Only one cameraman was available, Keri again, and the EMS squad usually didn’t respond to this sort of thing unless someone had gotten hit with a bullet or whatever.

Several seconds went by. The patrol car acknowledged the call, but the EMS frequency stayed silent. “Well, that probably kicks UCLA out of the top ten,” Carl commented, thinking that this call probably wasn’t going to turn into anything.

“Might be,” Brett said, holding up a finger to keep his attention on the scanner, but knowing that it would take a while for the unit to get to the scene and find out what was going on. He glanced up at the TV screen that had been carrying the game, now silent. The scene was a couple of sportscasters, obviously recapping the game. “Yeah, that might shake up the rankings a bit,” he agreed finally, still keeping his attention on the scanner.

The numbers kept flashing by on the LED for a minute or more, then it lit up again: “Central, 321 out on a traffic stop, Bancroft near Woodhaven.” Sally’s ears perked up when she heard the number for Rick and Janice’s squad car mentioned but she didn’t say anything.

Before Central could acknowledge the call, the scanner lit up again: “Central, 317 needs backup and Signal six five Charlie, Glenwood south of Bancroft.”

“Car 317, Central, confirm backup and Signal six five Charlie, Glenwood south of Bancroft. Car 321, assist 317, Glenwood south of Bancroft.”

“Well, someone got out of a ticket,” Carl said. “What’s a sixty-five Charlie?”

Brett didn’t reply right away. He knew most of the call codes, but a sixty-five Charlie was a new one on him. He ran his finger down the list of codes pasted to the desk, paused for a second, then yelled, “Keri! Get in here!” He glanced up at the newsroom. Both Sally and Jason were there, working at their computers, but both looked up at his yell.

Brett knew, of course, that Sally had taken over the police beat, but she was anchoring tonight. There was no telling what this was all about, and it could still turn into nothing. Channel 5 wasn’t above sending an anchor to a good news scene if there was no one else available—but tonight, there was.

“Metheny!” he yelled, no less loudly, as Keri came rushing in from the break room. “Action on Glenwood south of Bancroft. This could go on for a while, better take Unit One just in case you have to do a remote.”

“Action?” Metheny snorted. “I heard that call, Brett. Just a domestic disturbance.”

“It’s a little more than that,” Brett replied. “They called the SWAT team.”

First to Know News led with the remote from the scene—all the stations did, for that matter, even though there wasn’t any real news yet. At the station, they had a fair idea of what was going on.

Some sort of domestic argument had taken place, and a woman had taken a couple of poorly aimed shots at a boyfriend, who ran out of the house. A neighbor had called the cops, but the woman wouldn’t let the cops into the house. There were a couple kids inside with her, according to the boyfriend, and it had degenerated into a hostage situation. It was a standoff, the remote reported, and nothing much was happening. It looked like it would take hours to settle.

The remote scene was actually quite dull, but these things could change to pure chaos in the blink of an eye. Metheny was doing nothing more than standing before the camera lights and giving an occasional recap of what was happening—nothing much at at all—against a background of flashing patrol car lights. There was a short clip of the boyfriend with some of his friends in the background, but he said he didn’t know what got into the woman and that he’d been lucky to make it out of the house alive. He said she’d just gone all psycho all of a sudden and he was really worried about those kids, stressing that the cops needed to get them out of there soon.

Jeff had programmed a minute for the first remote, and that was longer than it needed. The scene switched back to the studio, and Dave said, “Thanks for your report from the scene, Jason. We’ll stand by here if there are any new developments.”

The camera switched to Sally, who started a report on a bad traffic accident that had happened earlier in the afternoon. She and Dave traded off the next few stories in the first segment. It was a slow news night, except for the business at the remote. After they went to break, she commented, “That standoff will probably go all night.”

“Might happen,” Dave commented. “On the other hand, the cops could just be waiting until after the late news is off before they take the place down. On the other hand, with a couple kids inside, who knows?”

“I suppose I can sleep in tomorrow morning,” Sally sighed. “I heard them call 321 early on, and that’s Rick and Janice’s car.”

“That’s gonna happen when you’ve got a cop for a boyfriend.”

“Don’t I know it. I mean, I grew up with it, I should know by now.”

Mandy’s voice came over the earbug from the control room. “We’re gonna cut the second segment a little short so we got time to go back to the remote at the end. Ten seconds.”

The second segment was pretty routine, a rerun of a couple packages from earlier, some national news off the satellite. Lydia Hutchison, a part-timer who did weekend weather sometimes, announced the weather was going to be nice tomorrow, and Carl noted that Michigan State had won over Michigan, and Ohio State had lost to Northwestern, along with a brief look at the pennant race. Sally relaxed, a few more seconds on camera, a debrief that usually went pretty quickly on Saturday night since a lot of the regulars were gone, and she could go home and get some sleep. It had been a long day.

The remote came back up, and Dave did the lead-in, as before. “Police are still in a standoff with an armed woman on Glenwood south of Bancroft. It’s been going on for several hours now, and two children are being held hostage,” Jason reported. “Just a minute ago, we had this statement from Lieutenant William Turner of the Toledo Police Department.”

Sally smiled to herself as the scene shifted. Maybe Jason wasn’t striking as many sparks off of Bill, now that he didn’t have to confront him on a daily basis.

Turner’s face came up on the screen, lit by the camera lights. “We have been in contact with the woman by telephone,” he said to the camera. “She refuses to surrender to police, but she says she will surrender to Hippolyta.”

Sally felt her stomach drop like a leaden weight down to somewhere around her ankles as Turner’s recorded voice continued. “We’ve been trying to get into contact with her, but the only person who knows how to reach her hasn’t yet been able to. We think there’s a good chance she could solve this peacefully if we can get in touch with her.”

Oh, shit, Sally thought hard as the scene switched back to Jason. Oh shit, oh shit shit shit. Pull yourself together, you’ll have to be back on camera in a second.

“There you have it, Dave,” Jason said live from the scene. “The police are looking for Hippolyta’s assistance with this standoff. Hippolyta, if you’re watching this newscast, your presence is needed. This is Jason Metheny, reporting live from the scene for Channel 5 First to Know News.”

“We’ll keep monitoring the story at Glenwood south of Bancroft,” Dave read off the teleprompter. “If there are new developments, we’ll break into the scheduled programming. This is Dave Wells …”

“And I’m Sally Parker, filling in for Vicky Roney …” Sally said professionally into the camera as it switched to her for sign-off then returned to Dave.

“And this is Channel 5 First to Know News,” he said before the camera was switched off.

The camera lights blinked out and Sally gratefully if silently gave thanks to the fact that Jeff had cut the ending to the second, and no casual byplay was needed with Dave. Damn it, what was she going to do?

Fortunately, the critique after the late news was brief. The discussion was mostly aimed at how to cover the breaking news than on the newscast just past. “No telling how long this will go on,” Jeff said as Dave and Sally still sat in their anchor chairs. “Or, even if they’ll manage to contact Hippolyta.”

“If they’re looking for her, it’s not likely that they’ll try to take the place down for a while,” Dave commented. “It could go on most of the night.”

“My reading, exactly,” Jeff agreed. “I don’t see any need for you to stick around. If we have to do a break-in, let’s just do it live from the scene. Mandy, let’s just you and I hang around in case we have to go live again. No point in keeping everybody here late, and then having Ben bitch about overtime. Odds are nothing much will happen, anyway.”

“Probably a good idea,” Dave yawned. “If I thought anything was going to happen soon, I’d be willing to stick around, but it’s your call, Jeff.”

“Oh, go on, get out of here,” he said. “Brett, can you stick around?”

“I suppose,” the assignment editor replied.

“I know Keri’s getting tight on hours, too,” the producer nodded. “I’m thinking that, in an hour or so, if this looks like it’s going to drag on all night, maybe you ought to head out there and relieve her. You know how to run the remote unit, don’t you?”

“I’ve done it a few dozen times,” Brett said.

“If it gets real late, we’ll just shut down here and call it good enough,” Jeff said. “But if something happens, we’ll still have it for tomorrow night. Good job, everybody. See most of you tomorrow afternoon.”

Well, damn, Sally thought as she gathered up her paperwork and got up from the anchor desk. I can’t even use work for an excuse not to do it. I sure wish the hell I knew more than we got from Jason about what was going on out there.

A couple things were pretty clear. If Bill thought that there was a good chance that Hippolyta could settle it peacefully, then perhaps he was right. Bill was pretty conservative about getting outsiders involved in police business. And, at the same time, there were kids involved as hostages. God knew what would happen if the SWAT team went charging in with guns and tear gas. The team was pretty good, but she’d grown up around cops and knew that bad things could happen in a confused situation.

She was still thinking about it as she headed back out to her desk. She dumped the papers on it, and was wondering what she should do when the phone rang. Automatically she answered it: “Newsroom, Parker.”

“You heard?” Charlie’s voice came to her.

“Yeah,” she replied.

“Look, I’m on a cell phone, and this isn’t real secure. I take it there’s people around your end too, right?”

“Yeah.”

“We gotta talk. How’s about we meet in the parking lot where we had a drink the last time?”

That meant Sluggy’s, she remembered. It seemed likely to her that Charlie knew a hell of a lot more about what was going on than Jason had said on the air. “Works for me,. Give me ten.”

“Make it fifteen, it’ll take me that long,” he said, with an immediate blast of static as he switched off.

Sally took her time leaving the newsroom, not that she wanted to hurry, anyway. In ten days, she’d managed to get Hippolyta behind her, put the Amazon mostly out of her mind. There was no doubt that her alter ego had done some good, but she’d proved to be more of a hassle for Sally every time she appeared. If anyone other than Charlie were to find out who Hippolyta was, well, she could forget about a career in the news business. Or as a cop for that matter. And she was well aware that she’d left more clues connecting her to Hippolyta than she should have, and whatever was happening, this appearance in costume could just make it worse. But still, the Amazon was in her, and Hippolyta wasn’t going to easily turn her back on a cry for help. Again, she wished she knew more about what was happening, but rationalized that she didn’t have to make up her mind just yet.

She cut the timing pretty close. She was just pulling into the parking lot behind Sluggy’s when she saw Charlie pull in after her. She hopped out of the car and opened the door of his sport-ute as he pulled to a stop beside her. “All right. What’s the deal?”

“Something is damn goofy,” Charlie told her. “Bill can’t figure it out, and neither can I. The boyfriend and his buddies are all eager for the SWAT team to take the place down, and they keep bugging Bill about it. The guy says he’s concerned about the kids, but he makes my bullshit detector go off big time.”

“Why does this woman want to talk to Hippolyta?”

“Not real sure. I don’t think she trusts the cops not to just grab the kids. Like I said, there’s something we think is a bit smelly. She’s not hysterical, just insistent. And, right now with the kids, she holds the cards. Sally, you don’t have to do this.”

“I know. Did you tell them Hippolyta was coming or anything?”

“Not really. I told them I had a lead on the person I knew who could contact her, like there’s a second cutout. In a way, I guess there is.”

“Yeah,” she said. “What do you think?”

“If I knew what to think, I’d tell you,” he replied. “Bill thinks it’s a good bet, but he’s guessing. In the beginning, she wanted to talk live to a TV reporter, but Panty Raid was the only one on the scene just then, and Bill wasn’t about to ask him just on general principles. Now, all four stations are there, and Bill can’t pick out just one of them without pissing off the other three.”

“Shit. I almost wound up going out there instead of him, and if I had, I’d have been in the same boat, wouldn’t I?”

“Probably,” Charlie conceded. “You’d have done it too, wouldn’t you?”

“Hell. I don’t know, I’d have to have been there, I guess. I think I’d rather do it as Sally than as Hippolyta.”

“I don’t want to ask you to do it either way. Bill and I both think there’s something goofy going on, not with the woman, but with her boyfriend and his buddies. I think she’s more scared of them than she is of the cops. If I didn’t think they’re trying to get the cops to do their dirty work for them, I’d feel a little differently about it. This woman wants to talk to someone she trusts who isn’t a cop, and apparently there aren’t many people who qualify.”

“I just don’t know,” she said, trying to rationalize things. This was a big risk, and she knew it. On the other hand, it was hard to ignore the cry for help, and when another came from Bill, who she considered a good friend, it was even harder. “Look, give me a few minutes to make up my mind. The Hippolyta stuff is out at the house. Follow me out there, and I’ll think about it while I’m driving.”

“At the house?” Charlie frowned. “I don’t know how we get you in and out of there without Mom and Dad finding out.”

“No problem. They took the woodie and the deuce to some car show down around Indianapolis and are staying over.” She shook her head again. “You realize that if I get the Hippolyta outfit out, it just means I’m going to do it, don’t you?”

“Yeah, I know. You really do turn into an Amazon once you have it on, too.”

“Let’s get moving,” she said, realizing she was already ninety percent convinced that she was going to pull on the garb. “I’ll go out, get dressed up as Goth Girl, and bring the rest of the Hippolyta stuff. We can talk about it on the way in. If I decide yes, we don’t want anyone getting a look at my license plate, so we’ll have to use your car again. We’ll stash the Mustang someplace, like we did the other night.”

It wasn’t exactly the nicest neighborhood in Toledo, Jason thought, but it wasn’t real bad, either, and there were plenty of cops around.

He’d been in the neighborhood earlier in the summer, in fact, several times. There was an abandoned house not far up the street that had had the reputation as a crack house, and it had “accidentally” caught fire three times in one week. Everyone figured the arsonist was some neighbor who obviously didn’t like crack heads, so no one was looking for him too hard. The last time the place caught fire, the fire department took their sweet time putting it out. It was now a burned-out pile of rubble, and the city was dawdling over cleaning it up. Have to look into that again later, he thought. Abe’s so damn interested in his waterfront development that he doesn’t care much about the neighborhoods … might make a story, even though it had been done before. A slightly different tack so something to keep in mind.

All in all, this remote had been pretty boring. There had been a flurry of activity around news time, when Turner had gone to all the reporters and cameramen, who were being kept back from the scene a ways, and gave them the statement about trying to contact Hippolyta. Hell, for once even that asshole Parker couldn’t find her! It looked like this would go on the rest of the night, unless the SWAT team decided to take the place down. If that happened, then there’d be some interesting footage, if they could get anything at all at this distance when it was this dark. At least he’d gotten the lead on the remote, and his face and voice covering it counted for something. Andrea was closing tonight anyway, so they’d decided to meet in the morning for breakfast and then get to some fun and games …

He glanced down the street. Nothing was happening. There were several police cars between the news crews and the scene, light bars going continuously, for what reason, Jason couldn’t tell, unless it was to make the woman inside nervous. It sure was doing it for him. The flashing lights were giving him a headache.

“Hey, shit!” one of the cameramen said—not Keri, probably Baker from NBC-24. “There she is!”

Jason immediately glanced at the lighted front porch that had been the only scene of interest so far. “Who, the woman?” he asked.

“No, Hippolyta,” Baker said. “Back behind the squad cars!”

Jason looked down the street. It was pretty dark behind the patrol cars even with their flashing lights, but he picked the black-clad Amazon out immediately—if only for the fact that she was standing upright, out in the open, while the cops were all crouched behind their vehicles. He couldn’t make it out clearly, but one of the cops stood up to talk to her—Turner, he guessed. Of course, the Amazon would be standing brazenly out in the open without any cover while the cops hid behind their cars. It was much too far to hear what they were saying, but they stood there and talked for a couple minutes before Hippolyta turned, walked slowly and calmly around the prowl car, and up the sidewalk to the lighted porch, as four TV cameras with lenses zoomed all the way out followed to capture the scene.

Hippolyta walked up the stairs to the porch like she wasn’t in any hurry and knocked on the door. She looked like a black ghost standing there on the porch, but even at that distance, Jason could see the sword slung over her shoulder like it had been when he’d last seen her at that check passing a couple weeks ago, and he could see the gun on her hip. Damn, that was brave, walking up to a house where the woman inside had driven her boyfriend out by firing shots at him from a gun. The door opened and Jason got glimpses of a dark-colored woman standing in it. The two talked for a minute, then the woman opened the door wide, inviting the Amazon in.

“Just as cool as if she was selling magazine subscriptions,” Mingus from NBC-24 said.

“Yeah, and at one in the morning,” Jason agreed. “Now what, I wonder.”

“Guess we wait some more,” one of the other reporters said—it sounded like the new guy from Channel 13, Jason wasn’t sure and couldn’t remember the name.

“Yo, Jason,” he heard Koser’s voice in his earbug. “Good feed, but tell Keri to get a white balance again.”

“There’s not much white out here to balance on,” Jason told the producer. “It’s about as dark as the inside of a cow.”

“Tell her to do the best she can. Tell Brett, too. I sent him out there a few minutes ago; he should be there by now. Unless something starts happening, have Keri come back in, she’s getting a little wasted on hours.”

“Just guessing. Either something’s gonna happen soon, or not at all. With Hippolyta here, I’ll bet on soon.”

“Okay, tell ’em both to hang loose for a few. If something happens, don’t have them both on the same scene, try for a few reaction shots or something.”

“Will do, Jeff,” Jason replied, keeping his attention on the house. No telling what was going on there.

“Kinda chilly out here tonight,” Jason heard Brett say in the dark behind him. “Brought you and Keri some coffee.”

“Thanks, Brett,” Jason replied, turning around to look at the second cameraman in the gloom. Sure enough, somehow he was holding three large cups of coffee in one hand and a camera in the other. “Good thinking,” he continued, helping Brett out by taking two of the cups of coffee and handing one to Keri. “There’s a good chance something may be happening soon, so Jeff says for both of you to stick around for a bit.”

“Okay,” Brett said. “Let me get plugged into the number-two feed.”

Jason turned his attention back to the lighted front porch where the Amazon had disappeared. How long would this take?

Not long, as it turned out. The door opened, and Hippolyta strode out by herself. “Aw, shit,” he heard Mingus say. “Guess she wouldn’t surrender to Hippolyta after all. Likely the SWAT team is up next.”

The NBC-24 reporter no more than had the words out of his mouth when the black-clad Amazon motioned toward the officers behind the patrol car. There was the sound of voices, but again the words weren’t clear. “Maybe not,” Brett commented as one of the officers got up from behind the patrol car and walked up the sidewalk to where Hippolyta stood.

“Who is it, Brett?” Jason said to the cameraman, who had the camera on his shoulder and was studying the scene through the zoom lens.

“Looks like Turner,” the cameraman said, watching intently as the two stood there talking for a minute or so, before Hippolyta turned and walked back to the house, and the police officer returned to the cars along the curb.

“Wonder what that was all about?” Jason commented as the Amazon opened the front door and reentered the house.

“Good question,” Mingus said. “We’ll find out soon I hope.”

Two or three minutes later, the cluster of reporters and cameramen saw a female police officer walking quickly in their direction. As she got close, Jason recognized Corporal Watkins, that hardassed woman officer who had been in on the Missy Spangler rescue and then again at Hippolyta’s news conference at the Women’s Crisis Center a couple weeks ago.

“The woman inside wants to make a live statement to the press,” Watkins said loudly. “Any of you people on live remotes?”

“Yeah, we’re uplinked now,” Jason told her. “We can go on air whenever we need to.”

“Same here,” the loudmouthed reporter from Channel 13 said. The other two stations said they were only taping.

“Okay, good,” Corporal Watkins said. “She wants this live for some reason. Those on remote can come with me. We want just the cameramen up on the porch, but the reporters can come in as close as the cars.”

“Hey, how about us?” the guy from 24 said.

“We don’t want more people in any line of fire than necessary. I don’t think this is going to get violent, but there’s no point in taking chances. She doesn’t want any police closer than the cars when she makes her statement.”

“Aw, shit,” the guy from Channel 11 replied. “How about letting us come in as far as the cars?”

“Well, okay,” Corporal Watkins said after a shrug. “Stay the hell out of the way. Don’t get any closer than the car on the end.”

It took a couple minutes to get set up, and for Jason to explain to Jeff at the station what was happening. “Be careful and watch your ass,” Jeff said. “If anything funny starts, get the hell down and stay down. Tell the cameramen, too. We’re ready to go live when you are.”

In a couple minutes it was all set up, and Jason felt lucky that he had both cameramen there. That didn’t happen very often. At this hour, there would only be a handful of viewers, but this could make a great demo tape! There was a little back and forth about which of the First to Know News cameramen would do the scene on the porch; both of them volunteered. Jason chose Keri, partly because he knew the black camerawoman was a tough son of a gun—and she was black, so might be marginally safer. He and Brett crouched behind a patrol car, and he did a brief lead-in about what was going on.

The timing was just about perfect. Keri and the Channel 13 cameraman were on the porch waiting when the door opened and Hippolyta came out, the dark woman close behind her. Jason kept one ear on the feed from Keri’s camera, although it was now close enough that they could hear what was being said directly.

“Good evening,” Hippolyta said in that dark, husky mezzo-soprano voice he’d had dreams about. “This is Dorothy Cordero. She has a statement for you people.”

“Thank you for coming, Hippolyta,” Mrs. Cordero said. “I know my so-called boyfriend Gerry Rodriguez has been whining all night about the safety of my kids. He couldn’t care less about the kids and proved it when he beat ’em up earlier.” She turned toward the street and raised her voice, just to make sure it could be heard at the patrol cars, and then went on. “All him and his buddies out there are interested in is the five kilos of cocaine that’s hidden in the bedroom.”

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