That collision was no accident. After a riot officer pulled Tommy from me, two officers ahead suddenly turned toward me and pushed me backwards with their round shields. As another officer pulled me backwards, a fourth shoved me hard on my chest. I crashed into a billboard, saved by my skateboard helmet.

Read: The anger of Hong Kong’s youth

I pushed up my mask. By this time, it should have been clear to the officers that I was a woman, weighing less than 120 pounds, and possibly the oldest person they’d tackled all week. My helmet bore a sticker with the word press in English and my Overseas Press Club credentials hung from my neck. My daft response to their commands should have indicated I did not understand Cantonese, but the police didn’t stop their abuse. One officer hit the top of my head and my hand, screaming all the while. When another pointed the baton inches from face, I spat, “You put that thing down.” The words would have sounded tougher had there not been a tremble in my voice.

I eventually sat on the ground holding the hand of a young woman in her early 20s with long hair highlighted the shade of tea. She had lost her eyeglasses in the fracas, and the events were a scary blur for her. Before us, several young people lay prone, including a young woman in shorts who held her head as if it hurt. I could not see Tommy; I was frightened that he had been arrested and demanded that they bring him to me. I was also scared that if I let go of the girl, they would arrest her. The two officers in front of me refused my request to leave. “This is a riot!” one screamed at me.

A carousel of officers came over to stare. None seemed to want to cuff me, but none knew what to do with me, either. I was an inconvenient consequence, yet a possible lawbreaker. An officer finally examined my credentials and seemed puzzled when I said “America.” Suddenly it dawned on his partner that the girl and I were not together. “She’s an arrested person!” he exploded, and he roughly separated her hand from mine. A pack of police shoved me backwards until someone in a scrum of waiting journalists pulled me to safety, far from the people headed to jail.

Read: Hong Kong’s protests have cemented its identity

Local journalists face these pressures on a more regular basis. Consider William Pang, a volunteer offering tech support for Local Press, a feisty digital news outlet, when democracy protests swelled over the summer. The site’s editors needed everyone working the story, so out Pang went, again and again, to film. He was live-streaming video from outside a police station late on October 1, China’s National Day and the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, when young protesters shattered the windows of a nearby rail station. Soon after, the familiar boom of an exploding tear-gas canister sounded, the calling card of the Hong Kong police. The crowd began to run.