Jack's finger was just about to pull the trigger when a militia fighter dashed towards Philip and said something to him.
Philip turned and the two of them exchanged a few words too quick and too clipped to read even through a scope, then Philip suddenly retreated from the wall — ten meters, maybe less, following the man down the street.
Jack tracked him the whole way, patiently, waiting for the angle to open back up, but it didn't as the militia kept blocking his line of sight.
A delivery van sat parked exactly where the two stopped, its bulk swallowing the last clean line Jack had, and for a long, ugly second, he was staring at nothing but sheet metal and peeling paint where the Governor's head should have been.
"You've gotta be kidding me," Jack muttered under his breath.
He held the position a moment longer, scanning the edges of the van for any gap, any window Philip might drift back into. Nothing. For one uncomfortable heartbeat he wondered if the militia man had spotted something — a glint off the scope, a shift in the light — and pulled Philip out of the shot on purpose.
'This has just become troublesome.'
He keyed the radio instead, voice low. "Michael. Copy."
[Go ahead.]
"Lost my angle. Your boy suddenly decided that now's the time to take a walk and now, there's some kind of vehicle blocking my sight. My gut tells me that someone down there noticed me." Jack kept his eye to the scope, watching the van, waiting. "Turn the pressure up. Give them a reason to come back to the wall."
[Copy that.] A pause, and then, distantly through the radio, there was the sound of another explosion behind Michael's voice. [We'll make it really uncomfortable for him.]
He also saw the explosion from his position and figured that they might have used the rocket launcher.
Jack settled back into the rifle and waited, more patiently this time.
South of the settlement, Team Two moved through the last of the residential blocks in a loose line, Shepherd at the front, Andrea a few steps behind her with two of Dawn's officers flanking her — Gareth further on the left, another one of the officers covering the rear, all of them working north through the rows of houses toward the center of town.
They broke off from Rick and the rest and were tasked to secure the area towards the defensive line. It is to avoid getting ambushed when they are in the midst of pincering The Governor's troops from the rear.
A few streets over, Shumpert's team were also pushing south and had reached the eastern edge of their search and very nearly walked straight into them — Andrea and the others had entered and were moving through a small alleyway between the buildings when they heard the rushed footsteps ahead. Shepherd quickly raised a fist and everyone came to a halt.
Not long after, they saw Shumpert and the other three hastily moving past them and disappeared.
They cautiously moved towards the street.
Shepherd took a peek and was relieved to see that they are already gone.
"Shouldn't we go after them and ambush them from behind?" Andrea whispered to her.
"No, that's not our job. We are here to secure civilians and minimize casualties. Let's leave the fighting to Team 3 while we're in here." Shepherd shook her head and reiterated their purpose of being here.
As the two teams passed within shouting distance of each other, Shumpert and the three suddenly turned west, toward the water tower rising over the rooftops.
He doesn't know why, but his gut feeling is telling him to go West.
He trusts his gut feeling, it's what kept him alive till now.
Baldwin caught sight of the uninvited guests.
He'd drifted to the edge of the window without a sound, and when he spoke, it was low, even, no urgency in it at all. "We have company."
Daryl and Tom were beside him in an instant, rifles low but ready.
They saw four figures down the street and moving towards their direction while constantly looking around them.
"Do you think they figured out that we're here?" Tom whispered.
"No." Baldwin didn't move. "They wouldn't be moving like that if they did."
"For now, we are to stand by and let them through. Let's not complicate things more when we're this close to completing our objective." Baldwin advised.
"I recognize one of them, that's Shumpert. He's as important as Martinez." Daryl said when he recognized one of the faces.
"I'd still advise you the same, but the decision is in your hands." Baldwin shook his head and let them decide for themselves. After all, he wasn't the one leading this team and had a different objective when he agreed to this deal with Michael.
Daryl's jaw tightened when he heard him, and for a moment something close to frustration flickered behind his eyes. He was expecting a lot from Baldwin since he was a formidable individual when they first met, and the way he talked painted him like that — someone who would not hesitate to jump into a battlefield.
Unfortunately, Daryl failed to realize that this particular Knight is not those Knights mentioned in fairytales, but someone pragmatic.
Baldwin does live up to the Knights Code of Honor, but he's also not stupid to jump into trouble when he can clearly avoid them.
'What's the point of bringing him along if he ain't gonna do nothin'.?'
He kept the thought to himself. Whatever Baldwin's reasons, the mission mattered more to him than his annoyance to Baldwin.
Philip Blake was still worth more dead than four of his foot soldiers were worth dead right now. So he just shut his mouth and watched Shumpert's team move past them, they did not even bother to check the building they are in.
Shumpert's team was cautiously moving through the street, the water tower was just to their right, close enough now that its shadow fell across the street in front of them.
It should have ended there.
Bang!
When a gunshot cracked out from somewhere above them, sharp and sudden, echoing through the surroundings.
Jack.
"Contact!" one of Shumpert's men shouted, already diving for cover as a second shot followed the first, and in the space of a heartbeat, the quiet, careful silence that Daryl and the others had been holding onto shattered instantly.
Shumpert and his men opened fire toward the water tower the second they spotted movement above them, and Daryl's team returned fire just as fast, and chaos immediately descended into this corner of Woodbury as the two sides tried to kill each other.
"So much for standing by," Tom muttered as his Thompson spewed a rain of bullets towards Shumpert.
"Yeah, well." Daryl quickly ducks down as the remaining glass above him shattered, and the bullets struck the ceiling.
Daryl laughed as he reloaded and looked at Tom.
"Plan's changed, man."