When Tupac Shakur arrived at the Manhattan recording studios, a sense of unease washed over him. Something seemed amiss. Inside, his friend and sometimes adversary, Christopher Wallace—better known as Biggie Smalls—was with his manager, Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs. Yet, it was the presence of men in army fatigues outside that truly disturbed him.

Despite his misgivings, Tupac was lured by the promise of $7,000 for laying down some verses for an emerging rapper.

He decided to proceed. Unbeknownst to him, stepping through that door would set off a chain of events that would become a pivotal moment in music history. Until now, the full story of that pivotal night has remained untold.

This week, author Jeff Pearlman released a definitive biography on the iconic hip hop figure, tracing the journey of Tupac Shakur in Only God Can Judge Me: The Many Lives of Tupac Shakur. The book explores Tupac’s ascent from the struggles of poverty in the Bronx and Baltimore to his breakthrough in California, alongside the challenges posed by his mother’s addiction and her involvement with the Black Panthers.

Pearlman provides an in-depth look at the fateful November 1994 encounter at Quad Studios, near Times Square, which ignited the fierce East Coast-West Coast feud that ultimately led to the tragic deaths of both Tupac and Biggie, as well as numerous others associated with them.

Tupac would be fatally shot two years later at the age of 25, leaving a Las Vegas concert in September 1996. His murder remains unsolved. Biggie, aka the Notorious B.I.G., would die less than a year later. No one has been convicted in his slaying either.

And while Tupac claimed he was shot five times in that New York City studio in 1994, Pearlman reveals that the rapper mistakenly shot himself – firing a bullet into his own groin, wounding his testicle.

When Tupac Shakur pulled up to the Manhattan recording studios, he was uneasy. Something felt off

His friend and rival Christopher Wallace, known as Biggie Smalls, was inside with his manager Sean ‘ Diddy ‘ Combs, but the men in army fatigues stationed outside unsettled him

‘He shot himself,’ said EMT Ron Johnson, who was called to the scene. ‘There’s no doubt about it. The way he explained it all happening, from the distance he described, there would have been powder burns everywhere. He told me he was shot. He told me how it happened. But the way the bullet wound up in his leg, the way it went through his balls, the angle it took – he was clearly reaching for his piece.’

As with much of the rapper’s life and death, fact has for years been hard to separate from fiction.

What’s known is that Tupac and three friends arrived at the legendary studios around midnight on the instructions of James Rosemond, a music manager and record executive known as ‘Jimmy Henchman’.

Tupac described, in subsequent interviews, feeling uncertain about the atmosphere in the studios, and surprised by the presence of the camo-clad guards. He had no bodyguards at that point, but did carry a Glock pistol in the waistband of his jeans.

On entering the building, Tupac was greeted by a rapper he knew who shouted hello from the balcony, Pearlman writes, and went to get the elevator up to the eighth floor studios.

But before the elevator doors opened, the unsmiling men in tactical clothing pulled out 9mm guns and ordered Tupac and his three friends to the floor.

The three complied, but Tupac instead resisted and reached for his own Glock, shooting himself in the groin in the process.

In the chaos, the robbers shot him twice – once in the hand, and once in the head, with a bullet grazing his skull. They also made off with $40,000 of jewelry.

Entitled Only God Can Judge Me: The Many Lives of Tupac Shakur , the book charts the rap legend’s rise from abject poverty in the Bronx and Baltimore to his big break in California. (Pictured: Tupac with Snoop Dogg)

‘They were snatching my s*** off me while I was laying on the floor,’ he would later say.

Taken to Bellevue hospital, the rapper, according to Pearlman, asked Dr Charles Thorne: ‘Hey, Doc. Is one nut gonna be enough for me? Because I’ve gotta at least be able to have one nut.’

Yet Tupac would later claim he was shot five times and never reveal that he accidentally shot himself.

Johnson, the EMT, told the author there was no doubt. There was no entrance or exit wound in his jeans, and the powder residue was only in his underwear.

Yet the myth has lingered. And the fallout was extremely real.

In April 1995, while in Rikers Island on sexual assault charges, Tupac told a journalist with Vibe magazine that he thought Biggie and Diddy were behind the Quad Studios attack.

‘I got shot five times, you know what I’m saying?’ he said, lying about the facts of the case. ‘People was trying to kill me.’

He said he was taken aback by the reactions of Biggie and Diddy, in the minutes after the shooting.

‘Nobody approached me,’ he told Vibe. ‘I noticed that nobody would look at me.’

No one was ever charged in the shooting, but it pitted West Coast-based supporters of Tupac and Suge Knight, the owner of Tupac’s label Death Row Records, against East Coast musicians Biggie and Diddy.

‘It definitely pivoted to where it was more serious,’ said rapper Spice 1, describing the fallout from the Quad shooting. ‘It wasn’t just competition anymore.’

In February 1995, Biggie appeared to reference the Quad Studios shooting, rapping: ‘Who shot ya? Separate the weak from the obsolete.’

No one was ever charged in the shooting, but it pitted West Coast-based supporters of Tupac and Suge Knight, the owner of Tupac’s label Death Row Records, against East Coast musicians Biggie and Diddy (Pictured in 1996)

In response, Tupac in June 1996 replied with ‘Hit Em Up’, mocking his East Coast rivals.

‘Puffy trying to see me, weak hearts I rip,’ he raps, ridiculing Biggie as a ‘mark-ass b****’ who once slept on his couch.

He continues: ‘Five shots couldn’t drop me; I took it and smiled.’

Three months after releasing the song, Tupac would be shot dead in Vegas.

Less than a year later, in March 1997, Biggie would be killed in a drive-by shooting in Los Angeles.

Tupac, in the interview a year before his murder, said the Quad Studios shooting had changed his outlook. Even though his claims about being shot five times were fake, the impact was very real.

‘Nobody ever came to save me. They just watch what happen to you,’ he said. ‘That’s why Thug Life to me is dead. If it’s real, then let somebody else represent it, because I’m tired of it. I represented it too much. I was Thug Life.’