Claude's Writing is Getting Terrible

The following is actual prose Claude produced during an action scene (thriller genre). Brandon is the bad guy, but from this prose, who could tell?

Brandon's eyes came back to Tim and stayed there and Tim could see him arriving at a number. The number was not in Tim's favor and they both knew it, and the variable that changed it was on the far side of the cabin where Linda had been for the last ninety seconds.

The far window came in with Linda behind it.

Glass and frame and the canvas covering all at once, Linda coming through the opening with her weapon up and her voice filling the room before the sound of breaking glass had finished.

"Sheriff's department. Weapon down. Weapon down now."

Brandon dropped.

Not the weapon. His whole body, straight down, tucking below the line of Tim's draw, and he was through the back door before Tim had covered half the distance to where he'd been standing.

Tim went through the back door after him.

This is terrible. It's not just bad prose, it's nonsensical. What is this business about a number?

I could go back to ChatGPT 1 and at least generate sentences which could be defined as English. What on earth is happening to Claude?