After instructing Sara to hide the truck in the garage, Owen carefully helped Swagger into the house.
He laid him on the bed and took a pair of scissors to cut open Swagger's blood-soaked shirt. The gauze wrapped around his upper body had long been saturated with blood.
Peeling it away, Owen saw that both wounds were on the shoulder—no vital organs hit. It was a miracle he was still alive. The self-applied field dressings had slowed the bleeding enough for him to survive the night.
When Sara returned from parking the truck, Swagger had already regained consciousness—though that was hardly good news. Owen was about to clean his wounds.
From his pack, Owen unrolled a military-issue field medical kit. It was the standard U.S. Army battlefield trauma pack—complete with blood coagulants, antiseptics, and minor surgical tools.
He pulled out a small compressed-air canister.
"Sorry—I couldn't get any anesthetic. This is all I've got," Owen said.
"What is it?" Swagger asked weakly.
"Carbon monoxide," Owen replied.
"Then make it fast. And try not to screw up the stitching."
"I'll do my best."
Swagger inhaled from the canister and passed out completely. Owen got to work immediately. Sara, with nothing to do, crouched quietly near the doorway and watched.
With practiced precision, Owen worked a pair of forceps through the wound while dabbing away blood with alcohol-soaked gauze in the other hand. The field surgery required intense concentration, and Swagger's body twitched in unconscious pain—carbon monoxide dulled the mind, but it didn't kill pain like real anesthesia.
Soon, the floor was littered with blood-soaked cotton balls, stacked like a small red mountain. Sara quietly swapped out two full bowls of bloodied water before Owen finally found what he was looking for.
Clink.Clink.
Two bullets dropped into a metal basin.
Owen double-checked the wounds to make sure no fragments remained. Then came the suturing.
The curved surgical needle danced between the edges of the torn skin, guided with expert skill. Slowly, the wounds closed, the bleeding stopped, and the deep gashes became sealed behind rows of ugly but clean stitches.
Luckily, Swagger's earlier field treatment had prevented massive blood loss. If he'd needed a transfusion, Owen wouldn't have been able to help.
Once the wounds were closed, Owen hooked up a bag of saline and antibiotics and finally collapsed onto a nearby couch, completely exhausted. Field surgery required intense focus—mentally, it was like running a high-stakes CQB raid.
That evening, Swagger finally awoke. The carbon monoxide should've worn off earlier, but his body had put itself into recovery mode.
"…The FBI has released new information," said the news anchor on TV. "Surveillance footage shows the suspect, Gunnery Sergeant Bob Lee Swagger, scouting potential sniper locations and recording wind data. Authorities are continuing a nationwide manhunt…"
Sara noticed Swagger stir first.
"You're awake?" she asked gently.
Swagger groaned. "Not feeling great."
"Well, that's normal," Owen said, chuckling. "No anesthetic, remember?"
He leaned in and felt Swagger's forehead. "No fever—great. First field surgery of my life, and I didn't botch it. You're already recovering."
Swagger looked at Owen. "I remember you. You're a cop, right?"
"Yeah. Zhongchen Tower. You saved my ass. I'm not with the LAPD anymore—now I work for CTU."
Swagger nodded. "Thanks for trusting me."
"If I didn't, you'd either be dead or cuffed in the back of a transport van right now," Owen replied with a shrug. "But seriously, man… what the hell happened?"
Swagger's lips were dry and cracked. Sara handed him a straw, and he sipped slowly before speaking.
"A few days ago, a man named Colonel Isaac Johnson came to me. African American, U.S. Army. Said there was a credible threat that someone would try to assassinate David Palmer during a public speech. They wanted me as a consultant to identify possible sniper vantage points."
"Palmer had three scheduled public speeches—one each in Washington D.C., Los Angeles, and Baltimore. The attack, they claimed, would likely happen during one of the broadcasts."
"I scouted all three locations. Baltimore's streets were too narrow. D.C. was way too secure—anyone trying to shoot there would be committing suicide. That left Los Angeles."
Swagger's voice grew steadier as he spoke about something he knew intimately—his domain.
"To pull off a shot, they'd need to be at least 1,800 meters out. The bullet would be airborne for five to six seconds. So the best time to shoot would be when the target was standing still at the podium."
"And since he'd be wearing body armor, the only option would be a headshot. You'd need a high-caliber rifle, likely with hand-loaded rounds."
"Wait—why hand-loaded?" Owen asked, clueless about sniping.
"Factory ammo's not precise enough. Hand-loaded rounds have a lower ballistic coefficient, meaning less drag. Even after flying 1,800 meters, they'd still hit harder than a .44 Magnum. Lethal."
Owen whistled softly. "Jesus."
"But that's not even the hard part. Wind is your worst enemy. Even a mild breeze can throw you off. So you have to set up wind indicators between you and the target. Adjusting for speed is one thing—but adjusting for angle? That takes trigonometry. You've got seconds to calculate everything. No computer. Just you and your brain."
Owen was stunned. "So even with the perfect setup, there are maybe what—five people in the entire U.S. who could actually pull it off?"
"Less," Swagger replied flatly. "And even fewer who could guarantee a headshot at 2,200 yards."
"Wait—2,200?" Owen blinked. "I thought you said 1,800."
"In theory, yes. But the actual shot was made from the church bell tower—2,200 yards from the podium."
"If we can figure out who had the skill to hit a head-sized target at that range, and from that exact location… then we'll have our real shooter."
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