The flat seems to be completely empty at the moment. Perhaps the renter is not home?
Hypo carefully opens the door to the hallway, allowing some thin wisps of smoke to creep into the room. Once the door is open about two inches it bumps into something in the hallway. Peering through the crack, Hypo can make out a pair of legs.
It appears that the door is being blocked by a corpse.
Hypo listens for movement in the hallway, and then when clear pushes open the door farther. He pushes hard enough to make a space just large enough to squeeze into the hallway. As he does that he takes a look at the body. He shoves at the door for a moment, and eventually manages to get the body bumped far enough out of the way to get into the hallway. Said hallway is now rapidly filling with lung choking smoke, incidentally.
The body is that of a young woman, perhaps sixteen, dressed in shabby clothes. She seems to have been stabbed. A lot.
"These fuckers are sooooo dead!" thinks Hypo.
Hearing a noise behind him, Hypo looks up to see Sam coming through the window. He is wearing what appears to be a flame-thrower on his back, and an agglomeration of wires, conduits, capacitors, and electronic doodads and thingamabobs around his waist.
"By the pile!" says Hypo, startled. "What in the crusading vagina of Her Excellence is that thing!?" He pauses for a second remembering where he was, "Oh, right, Dimi gave that to you. What does it do?" Hypo hopes that it works better than the condiment applicator that Dimitri brought to the Bastille Day fete. Briefly he wonders if Johnny "Mustard Lungs" McCorkindale has fully recovered.
Sam, fully involved in taking in his surroundings, takes him a moment to realize that Hypo was speaking to him. "What?" he says. "Oh, it puts out fires." Tata points it at the wall and taps the switch that Dmitri told him to. As he does, he says, "I wonder what this thing will do to a person."
"Well, their seem to be a lot of these bastards so you will get a chance to experiment," Hypo says. "Ad nocendum potentes sumus. And that is a fact." Hypo then steps into the hallway, staying in a fighting crouch.
At just that precise moment, around the corner of the hallway (in the direction away from where the smoke is coming from) comes a group of guys in turbans, led by an older man who looks like an evil version of the Ayatollah Khomeini (and if you believe that the ORIGINAL was evil, well, just imagine this guy as worse.) There is a short pause as the Turbanites stare at Hypo and Sam, and Hypo and Sam stare at the Turbanites.
"KIIIIIIIIIIILLLLLLLLL!!!" screams the old guy, and the other Turbanites surge forward!
Marda responded to the oncoming threat by attempting to assess what would currently be the section of floor most damaged by fire so far and putting that space between her and the beturbaned foe.
Hypo is an easy going guy, being raised on the Island has lent him a certain perspective about violence and the uses thereof. He has discovered that being an aggressor or just jumping mindlessly into fights is a sure way to end up dead. As a Garbage Man Hypo sees much proof of this as every day mangled bodies come tumbling over the Brink. So his philosophy is one of peaceful interaction using reason and trade to overcome differences.
Hypo leaps forward, swinging his gladius with energy and ferocity, and screaming "Vae victis!" as he charges the leader. He feints high but goes low, groin low, and go for the femoral. Although the Turbanite Leader attempts to remain behind his companions the speed of Hypo's attack allows him to dodge between the lower level Turbanite's and swing with all his might at the leader, feinting high and going low.
But the Turbanite Leader is not so easily fooled. Unlike his crazed companions, he understands the value of active defense, and does his utmost to get out of the way of the ancient, but still deadly gladius that Hypo is swinging. His movements, combined with the added difficulty Hypo faces in getting past his followers, give him enough of an edge to avoid the initial onslaught.
Hypo's charge gives Sam enough time to line up on the Turbanites with his flamethrower contraption, and start backing towards the open door. Tata opens up with the firefighting machine on the oncoming hoard. Pushing buttons frantically, Sam attempts to get a wide flat burst to hit the fanatics at eye level. He jabs the button on hand-held portion of the doohicky and discovers that whatever its properties against fires may be it does, well, NOTHING to people. Undaunted (well, perhaps a BIT daunted) he backpedals out of the line of sight of the Turbanites and towards the fire escape, drawing his ping-pong ball gun at the same time.
Marda peeks around the corner (hey, how did she get up here anyway? Darned kids!) and notices that the fire seems to be burning further down the hallway, not in the immediate area.
The Turbanites, seeing their leader assaulted, turn on Hypo with righteous frenzy. The plucky Garbage Man attempts to defend himself, but his foes are too numerous and his escape routes too few. Daggers plunge downwards, then rise again wet with blood as he receives multiple stab wounds that eventually bring him crashing to the floor, leaking from numerous punctures.
"Unnnnnnnnnnnnh..." he moans.
Sam whips around the corner, pointing the ping pong ball gun in a menacing fashion, and pulls the trigger. There is no sound, no light, no cool big budget special effects. Sam notes that when he pulls the trigger this time there is a severe vibration in the gun that seems to resonate on the same frequency as the tissues in the gun hand. It makes his hand feel as though it has had circulation cut off and is now getting it back - that icky pins and needles feeling.
The Turbanite leader (Sam's target) ducks behind one of his fervid followers just in time to avoid a grisly fate however, as the unfortunate Turbanite being used as cover literally dissolves into a pile of bones and fluid with a rather sickening gurgling sound. Undaunted, several of the Turbanites break off their attack on Hypo to charge towards the former stockboy, screaming their trademark "KIIIIIIIIIILLLLLLL!!!" Two remain behind, plunging their daggers again and again into Hypo's body until it stops twitching, chanting "Die! Die! Die!" with each thrust. The three piling onto Sam manage to land a good solid cut to his right arm, and further force him back away from the door and out of sight of the leader!
Marda, for the moment ignored, stares aghast as the crazed cultists surround Sam, waving their daggers. Sam breaks away from the cultists, grabbing Marda on his way off the ledge, and takes the punishment that is coming to him as the ground rushes up to meet him.
On being swept away in Tata's rapid descent towards the cold, hard,
ground, Marda, contrary to what you would expect from a six year old (namely
screaming loudly), calmly pushes a button on Tata's funny belt.
Marda, far from panicking, simply reaches down and presses one of the buttons on the thingy that Sam is wearing around his waist. The effect is immediate and amazing - the pair stop falling so fast that if Sam were wearing false teeth he would have launched them as a lethal projectile out of his mouth. The force of the deceleration is such that Sam barely maintains his grip on both Marda and the ping pong ball gun.
Then, as suddenly as he was falling DOWN, Sam finds himself falling UP, albeit somewhat more slowly. Matters are further complicated by the fact that whatever this thing is, Sam's center of balance seems to be important in how it lifts, for within seconds Sam finds himself upside down, Marda dangling from one arm and the ping pong ball gun waving from the other, as he rises past the second story and the third!
For her part, Marda suddenly discovers that she is dangling above certain death, hanging onto one of Sam's hands with one of her own while clutching Teddy firmly in the other to prevent him from plunging to his doom.
As Sam is flipping about in the air like a balloon with the air let out, he begins shouting at Marda. "WELL THIS IS ANOTHER FINE MESS THAT YOU'VE GOTTEN ME INTO! I HOPE YOU'RE HAPPY NOW!!!"
Father Figure's statement of displeasure at the ragamuffin desperately grabbing at his arm does emit a huge ear-piercing wail from Hers Truly, which is six-year-old for "I save you from becoming a red splotch on the concrete below and this is how you thank me?" along with the ever popular, "I don't wanna die before I reach puberty." (Although come to think of it, if Tata were to give some thought to the idea of Marda at sixteen, he might just consider the idea...)
Mr Dart puts the ping pong ball gun between his knees (making sure it is pointed in the proper direction) and tries to get control of the contraption with his 'free' arm, attempting to land on the roof of the building instead of falling for three stories.
There are three buttons. Pushing button #1 produces no effect whatsoever. By this time the pair have risen like a balloon past the fifth floor of the burning building and into the gorgeous Mediterranean blue sky of Al Amarja. Fortunately, Sam's grip on Marda's hand (and Marda's grip on Sam's) hasn't loosened - yet.
Sam looks on the handle for something that looks like a control valve, trigger,etc... Getting a grip on himself (figuratively) and the little terrorizer (for real), he says "MARDA... TAKE THIS BLASTED THING. I'M SORRY I SAID MEAN THINGS TO YOU... PLEASE GET US DOWN!" Tata smiles that tender little 'come to Tata' smile.
Holding onto Teddy with her teeth, Marda takes her free hand to first scramble up Tata's arm as effectively as possible to reach the belt, and then to use her technical intuition to gain some sort of control over the device, although as far as Sam can tell, it looks a hell of a lot like pushing buttons at random.
Marda, dangling precariously from Sam's belt, pushes a single button. Immediately the duo (trio if you count Teddy) begin to slow in their ascent. After only a couple of seconds they have stopped rising altogether, some eight stories up.
Marda pushes a second button, and without warning the trio is on "an express elevator to heck... GO-ING DOWN!" as they plunge towards the concrete below!
Sam, though trying to remain calm, looses control of his bladder as the ascent abrubtly ends and the descent begins. He tries to stop himself and hopes nobody notices. But with so many other things going on, it seems unlikely.
"You are such a nice girl, huh sweetie? You love your Tata now don't you honey?
Oblivious to the sarcasm dripping through the statement, or for that matter, their imminent doom (sometimes danger causes the most curious reactions) Marda responds, "Of course I love you, Tata!" She then tries pushing that first button which made them stop, and if that fails, that second button which caused the thing to turn off in the first place.
With the push of the first button, the pair come to an abrupt and tooth jarring halt. Once again Sam manages to maintain his grip on Marda, but Marda is not so fortunate, and Teddy plunges downwards, landing on the roof of the burning building below!
Upon losing her grip on Teddy, Marda immediately launches a high-pitched scream which puts the other one she let out when she began falling in the first place to shame. And of course, contravening any form of common sense whatsoever, she immediately goes to work on finding the right button to send the duo back to the roof so that a rescue can be effected.
When Marda pushes the button there is a loud "SNAP" that reminds Sam of the sound that a big ass circuit breaker makes when it blows, and the pair plunge headlong a good fifteen feet onto the roof below!
Sam stumbles to his feet and chucks the contraption, struggling to get out of all the cables, wires, etc. Once he is finished with that, he walks over to find Teddy and return him to the dazed little creature Marda.
Tata will do what he can to patch the little trooper up. "Thanks Marda for saving us," he says as he bends down and kisses her little scrape. Quickly coming to his senses, he stands up again and checks his ping pong ball gun to see if it escaped injury.
As best as she is able in dazed condition, Marda grabs Teddy and holds him as close to her as she possibly can. She also murmurs, "Sorry I broke your neat flying belt, Tata."
Sam smiles at the genius from hell. "Thats OK, Marda... Why dont you have a look at it when you are feeling better?" Tata drags the piece of junk over and begins a scan of the rooftop.
After the first instants of relief and mutual forgiveness and congratulations for surviving a horrible death, Sam and Marda get the nagging feeling that they're forgetting something. Let's see...
Oh, could it be that the tar on the roofing paper has now melted to the consistency of syrup? Could it be the wisps of black smoke curling up around the corners of the roof? Could it be --
"KIIIIIILLLLLLL!!!"
"Yaiiepp!! Owowowow!"
-- the sound of Woofard in agonizing pain coming from below?
Sam walks over the the edge, looking for the fire escape -- "I hope there is one," he mutters to himself -- and what kind of shape it's in. He does his best to step lightly on the melting tar, trying to stay near the edges. Over his shoulder he shouts, "Marda, you think you can fix it?"
Marda reverts to her usual useful self. "Tata! We have to help Ciine against those Funny Hat Men!" She does take a cursory glance at the belt to see if it can be salvaged, but her instincts tell her that in order to accomplish such a feat, she would need the resources in Dmitri's shop.
"I was thinking the same thing, sweetie," says Sam with extra sarcasm. "I suppose we can either die in the fire or by the hand of the satanists."
The anti-grav belt is indeed in need of extensive repairs using advanced tools. Sam ascertains that the fire escape is as functional as can be expected at this level -- that is, it's rickety, rusty, flimsy, corroded, and ancient, with twisted handrails and missing fasteners here and there. Other than that, it's completely functional until the last level, which, as they discovered earlier, is completely missing.
Inside the building, Woofard howl of pain has suddenly disappeared in a cacophony of screams, threats, and impact sounds. It's hard to be sure, but it sounds as if some of the Turbanites at least may have received as well as given.
Marda looks to the fire escape. "I'll need more time to fix this.
Maybe we can go down a couple of floors and surprise the people who are
hurting Ciine." It is fairly evident that Marda's plan is lacking
in the tactical details department...
Marda does what she is told and wraps the cable around herself making sure to use the extra wire to bind Teddy VERY tightly to her. She is not going to take any more risks of losing the bear if she can help it. "OK, I'm ready," she says once she is done. "Let's go!"
Sam obviously needs to get one of those WAP dohickeys. Or just start carrying the Anarchist's Cookbook's pocket edition, under the jacket from the Michelin Guide to Al Amarja. Meanwhile, his attempts at creating a doomsday weapon are more frustrating than fruitful. The whole roof is giving off noxious vapours as the tar melts, the smoke is getting thicker, the structure is giving cracking, groaning noises everywhere, little tongues of flame are starting to lap the outside edges on one side of the roof, and the sweat is rolling down in Sam's eyes. It appears that the belt can no more be turned into a weapon than it can be repaired for normal use, at least not without the proper tools and a bit more time.
In frustration, Sam turns to Dmitri's other contraption, the one that looks like a flame thrower. He picks it up and starts examining it, thumbing the on/off switch a couple of times (careful to point it away from Marda, even though it seemed to leave the Turbanites unaffected. How does this damn thing work anyway?
As he flicks the switch on and off, he suddenly notices that the little flames on the edge of the roof seem to flicker and jump in an unusual way. He pauses. No flicker. Still looking at the flames, he flicks the switch on again. The flames literally jump up in the air, suspended for a fraction of second, and are sucked into the nozzle of the "flamethrower."
At this moment, a commotion can be heard down in the street, and the strident whistle sounds that were still repeatedly being heard stop at last.
Sam tosses the device to Marda (his typical reaction now when he doesn't understand how to use various doohickeys) and begins attaching her to his utility belt. Once secure he goes over the edge, trying to find the 'safest' way down the fire escape without pulling the whole side of the building off.
Marda examines the device carefully. Considering the demonstrated effects so far, and the fact that Dmitri took the darn thing in order to put out a fire, she comes to the realization that this is a fire-extinguishing device and (most probably redundantly) tells Tata as much. Kids being kids, of course, it is only a matter of time before she gets bored and tries to use it upon a passing window.
Sam secures his gear and his diminutive partner. Marda is strapped or rather wired to his back (with Teddy lashed to her), with a good view over Sam shoulder and enough freedom of movement to point the "fire sucker" around a bit, but would have a hard time untangling herself to jump down if she tried.
Reassured that the little monster isn't just going to escape and run into more danger, Sam starts his wary way down the creaky stairs of the fire exit. The whole contraption is rickety as all hell, so Sam hugs the wall as closely as he can to avoid putting more torque on the metal supports. The ladder/stairs vibrate with his every move, sending jerky ripples along the way. Black, greasy smoke comes billowing out of every window now.
As they make their way past an upper floor's emergency exit, Sam and
Marda hear frantic banging on the other side. The door is made of
metal and is warm to the touch, although not as hot as the ones downstairs.
The rectangle where a pane of safety glass would normally be set has been
boarded up with plywood, and the door is locked or jammed. From the
other side of the door, along with the repeated blows, comes what sounds
like a string of curses, although neither Sam nor Marda can quite make
out the words. The voice is fairly high-pitched, perhaps a woman
or an adolescent boy, and the blows, although furious, don't resonate very
strongly.
The panel is boarded up with plywood, nothing that would be too hard to kick in -- if the fire escape doesn't collapse, that is. On the other side, the frantic cursing and banging continues, the one raising in pitch and the other decreasing in volume.
Sam grabs the most 'secure' place he can find (preferably something bolted into the wall) and bracing one foot on the door itself, uses the other to insert into the window frame. "Marda, you and Teddy get ready to suck those flames."
Marda nods assent and says, "Ready, Tata!"
Marda firmly clasps the "fire-sucker" and braces herself for Tata's attack on the door. Sam leans on the bolted support and swings his leg, bringing it around in a sort of wheel kick. The heel of his old army boot hits the plywood blind squarely, leaving a diagonal crack clear across, but the panel remains in place. The force of the swing and hit rocks the stairs ominously, but despite the vibration, nothing collapses yet.
On the other side of the door, the kick raises a squeal of alarm, but the ineffective banging picks up again after a very brief pause, more frantic than before. The door vibrates, but does not give.
From a broken window situated a few meters off to the right, tendrils of flame and smoke are now reaching out like so many grasping arms. Braced against Sam's shoulder, Marda points the "fire-sucker" at the flames and presses the trigger. The flames leap like so many trained dogs, and are swallowed by the contraption.
Sam and Marda cannot help but notice how hot it is around here... Sam re-adjusts his grip and takes one more kick at the boarded window. "Good girl Marda, keep pointing that thing at the flames, it sure is getting hot around here."
"OK, Tata." Marda dutifully prepares the flame sucker for the imminent collapse of the door. She can't help but add an excited, "WHEEE!"
A bit daunted by the way the stairs are swaying, Sam holds back a bit on his second attempt. The plywood boarding up the opening gives a bit, but not enough. On the other side, the banging redoubles, cracking the plywood a little more. Sam, tired of this ineffectual banging, braces himself against the railing and gives the door a good, solid kick that goes through the panel.
Unfortunately for the poor tenant on the other side, Sam's foot also connects with said tenant. An exclamation of pain and a dull impact sound against the door follow. The stairs sway dangerously. Sam wavers a bit as he tries to get his balance back and extract his foot from the board. Through the now gaping panel, smoke comes rolling in thick curls. Marda points the fire-sucker at the flames that flicker through the haze, and once again the fire is hoovered out of sight and into the gizmo's nozzle. But the place is still hotter than hell. Marda realizes that it's not just the ambient heat that's rising: the tank of the fire-sucker is getting warmer to the touch.
Tata looks over his shoulder and says "Good girl Marda. Keep it up!" Sam Dart uses what leverage he has to extract his size ll military issue combat boot from the busted panel and sheepishly shouts "Uh... Sorry about that!" Sam looks to see if he can place a few more strategic kicks to increase the size of the hole. Afterwards he makes the command decision that he needs to get the "hell out of Dodge" before it's too late.
"Tata!" the ragamuffin reports, "The fire-sucking thingy is getting really hot. I think we need to make it cool down before we use it any more!"
Without answering, Sam kicks at the door again, removing the rest of the plywood fragments where the window fram used to be. He nows has a square opening, about 60 cm on a side (or two feet by two feet). Black smoke is still pouring out of the building, and poking his head through the opening he can see a prone form, slumped inside, face down against the door. The person seems fairly frail, and is dressed in a ragged denim jump suit, a long-sleeved batik shirt, and an Olyroos cap with a ponytail of red hair sticking out.
Sam adjusts his grip to the window frame. Since the door doesnt look like it's going anywhere just yet. "Ok honey, you let the fire-suck thingy rest a bit. The big question is what do we do now?"
Marda's answer shows a characteristic childlike simplicity. "We gotta help that guy in there get out before he gets more hurt!" Again, one couldn't help but note the shocking lack of detail involved.
Sam begins the ardous work of unstrapping the little monster from his back. "Ok, sweetie grab the window and try to pull yourself through. I'll hand you the fire sucky thingy once you are in. Make sure you hold on tight to Teddy. We wouldnt want to loose him again would we?"
He lowers the six-year old through the opening and more or less on top of the slumped form on the other side. Marda manages to push the unconscious tenant out of the way with her foot as she dangles from Tata's hands, then drops onto the floor.
The newly created opening is generating a draft and sucking smoke through, blowing it in a thickening plume straight in Sam's face. Tata is thankful for his recent lack of funds in regard to eating, since it is allowing him to squeeze through the window rather than do an emergency lipo-suction on himself. Still, he grunts and curses as he pushes himself INTO a burning building.
Although it is a bit clumsy, it's not a particularly difficult task except for trying not to crush Marda or the tenant, and for that irritating smoke. Sam ends up inside the building, with the crumpled tenant and the Rumanian terror. The burning building is giving all expected signs of distress: creaking, crackling, sputtering, flames, etc.
With the fire-sucky thingy back in position, Tata hands the 'gun' and cable assembly to the little beast and says, "Okay honey, you hold on to this so I dont loose you and suck that *(&^ smoke out of my eyes when you get a chance." Sam unwillingly uses the strapping material that he used on Marda to tie the victim's wrists together.
Said tenant is apparently a fifteen year old girl, about 1m60 (five feet and three or four inches), thin and light. She has long reddish hair sticking out of her sports cap, as well as, Sam is startled to discover, soft downy fur like a puppy's along the back of her hands and wrists. He takes a better look at her face, and notices that the fur seems to also cover the base and back of her neck. She reminds Sam of the other furry girl he saw in the CPC dungeons. In fact, there is a good deal of similarity: same type of fur but different colour; both are very human-shaped, not simian; but this one looks several years younger, barely adolescent, and doesn't come off as the sexiest creature Sam has ever met. Her fur IS very soft, though. Could be a relative, or a member of the same unknown species?
Dragging prone form by the hands, Mr. Dart and the little terror staart looking for the interior stairwell. The fire escape is situated along the side of the building, and they also came in through a window on the top floor. They can guess the direction of the stair well, down a short corridor.
The girl weighs little, perhaps 40 kg ( 90 lbs). And dragging an unconscious person by the wrists is well known to be the best way to handle all sorts of injuries, so Sam starts in what he believes is the direction of the internal stairs. It's not too hard, since all he has to do is forge ahead towards the thick of the smoke. The stairwell is the best chimney available and is hidden by the haze, but the corridor leads directly to it.
Marda examines the fire-sucky thingy for some sort of venting device to reduce the heat buildup inside the device. Once the thing has significantly cooled down, she resumes sucking up smoke from the hallway. The thing is not burning hot, just warm; say, like a mug of freshly poured, freshly brewed coffee, enough to make it "ouchy" but not to inflict actual damage. It does not seem to cool down or warm up appreciably when not in use (the place IS hotter than hell, after all.) In addition, Marda has not seen it suck in any smoke, only flames. Speaking of which, there's plenty of those around. Marda continues to suck down the flames to carve a path for Sam and the fuzzy object of his rescue.
Sam drags the unconscious girl by her artfully bound wrists, banging her across every doorjamb. Marda clears a path through the flames with the fire-sucker, dragging it along with difficulty. The contraption does in fact get warmer with every use. The closer they get to the stairwell, the more difficult it is to advance. The smoke is so thick it blinds them, and breathing becomes incredibly painful. They double over, coughing and gasping.
Sam grabs Marda and both of them lay flat on their stomachs. Hopefully, if there is any fresh air to be had, it will be there. The air is marginally more breathable near the floor, and Sam's poor carbon monoxide-drenched brain vaguely remembers something from highschool fire drills about "staying low". Yep, that might have been why they said that; but at the time, like 93% of all highschoolers, Sam had been mostly concerned with turning the fire drills into opportunities for escape from classes for the rest of the day. He looks at the stair well: it's a pillar of smoke.
Tata pulls the unconscious furry girl back towards the outside fire escape as best he can, staying low, and Marda tugs on the fire-sucking equipment, occasionally using it to suck more flames. The self-made mad bomber looks around for that most precious of objects, a fire extinguisher, or better yet, a fire hose. The smoke cloud over his head makes it difficult to distinguish anything at all, but there is also a reason for using red as code colour for fire equipment, besides the obvious fact that flames are often red. A splash of that colour is still visible on a wall along the corridor. Sam drags himself towards it, hoping it's not just a communist poster.
Taking a deep breath of less polluted air near the floor, he pokes his head up and squints at the red object, his eyes watering. Yes! Yes! It's a fire hose, an old model, safely tucked behind it's glass door with indications in several languages to "break in case of fire". Tata smashes the glass (in his weakened condtion, it takes him two tries) and fumbles at the hose. The thing is stiff, unwieldy, dusty, and smells vaguely moldy. Sam has to drop down to the floor to breath, hugging the nozzle to his chest. Now what?
Marda, more mechanically inclined, and familiar with the antiquated model since it's similar to that used in Rumanian orphanages and schools, guesses the object's functioning immediately. Without waiting, she scampers over Sam's back to release a valve in the niche where the hose was stored. The noise from the fire (and the fact that their ears are ringing and their thinking addled from carbon monoxide poisoning) makes it hard to communicate, but she indicates with gestures that the lever on the nozzle has to be pulled back too.
Sam pulls on the brass lever, with at first seems stuck in place with the grime of ages, but finally yields. Nothing happens. Sam and Marda look at one another with consternation, and just as he's about to throw the thing down, Sam feels a slight tremor in the hose. The next instant, water spurts through, accompanied with the impact of all this pressure suddenly hitting the nozzle. Sam, with great luck, manages to hold on to the nozzle as it tries to whip back and forth, and a jet of water gushes forth, spraying wildly left and right as he struggles to control the hose.
This, at least, has the fortunate effect to get everything and everyone thoroughly wet (well, it's good in a fire, anyway) and, incidentally, of waking the unconscious girl who rolls to a sitting position in alarm and confusion.
Sam removes the restraints from the woman's arms and profusely apologizes. "How was I to know you were sticking your head right where my boot was going?" Tata then moves to the edge and begins to tie Marda and Teddy into his harness once more.
Stunned, the girl looks at him with big round eyes (a perfectly translucent turquoise in colour) and an expression of pure outrage.
The demolitions expert has one last crack to make before going back over the edge with this Romanian dervish on his back. He looks atthe startled girl and says "Maybe you can use this hose as some sort of rope. Sorry I can't stay longer and chit chat but I'm outta here."
Sam abandons the heavy hose (about 20 pounds a foot) as too difficult to use as Rapunzel's hair. He grunts and winces as he makes his exit -- he has felt in better shape after football practice and slam dancing. Some of the knife wounds have started bleeding again under the exertion, and Marda doesn't feel too good either.
As he struggles through the opening, he helped along by the sudden slam of a jet of water at 70 psi (the system is poorly maintained and water pressure is a bit low) hitting him square in the ass. He goes tumbling on the landing of the fire escape on the other side of the door. The jet of water drenches him and his companion thoroughly (again), raining in a beautiful arc above their heads through the opening. The fire escape rocks dangerously but does not collapse.
The jet of water stops as suddenly as it began, and Sam picks himself up to make a rapid descent. The metal stairs are now nicely slippery. Sam holds on to the ramp and starts making his way down -- only to be bowled over a gain by the impact of a light but energetic body hitting from behind. Unbalanced by Marda's weight, Tata nearly slips down the stairs and all the way to the ground several stories later, but catches himself in extremis. A human (?) projectile goes shooting past him, taking the steps three at a time, vaults over the rail to jump down to the next flight (rocking the stairs again), and disappears from Sam and Marda's sight.
Sam holds on to the rail, panting and not wanting to move. "Nice lady," he retorts over his shoulder to Marda. "Should have asked for her phone number... ya think?" After a long pause, Tata tries to recover his breath and proceeds cautiously down the fire escape. He takes his time as he knows he is beyond his own physical abilities at this point.
Marda stares at the lady running out for a moment and then remembers her original intentions. "Tata! We've still gotta save Ciine before he gets hurt. It's hot in there!" She then slumps over a little bit from the bodily damage resulting from all the excitement she's been through today.
The two have to jump the last level of the missing staircase.
Sam first lowers the imp to the ground using the remnants of wiring, then
cautiously lowers himself, dangling from the upper edge, and lets go.
Ah, how easy that would have been was he less perforated and asphyxiated...
But they both reach the ground without further harm.
Seeing Marda and Sam, he stops and literally quivers with rage, balling his hands into fists and waving them in the air. His eyes bulge and his face contorts into a hideous grimace of hatred. He screams something in a foreign language, then whips out a small, rather plain looking handgun and fires it.
Instead of a *BANG* there is a *vvvvvvVVVVVVORP* and a raging column of violet light emerges. It misses both Sam and Marda, instead striking the tenement that they just escaped from, causing a chunk of it about 10' square to simply vaporize. The man screams again in apparent frustration.
Marda yelps and jumps about three feet to the west. Looking for the best way "out", her eyes frantically dart in all directions until finally reaching the obvious solution - the very hole which the Berber of Fate has just supplied them. She cuts in through the hole, attempting (probably vainly) to drag Tata behind her.
With childlike efficiency and a cornering ability which surpasses the finest German automobiles, Marda darts for the hole, only to be driven back at the brink of safety as flames shoot out of the opening! The room within the tenement is completely involved, offering the girl a grim choice between death in the flames or facing her grim assailant's weapon. Tata, for his part, seems completely stunned by the suddenness of the attack.
Marda seems less than enthusiastic about being flash-fried, so she heads back with no little resignation towards the man with the gun bent on their annihilation. Not being the reincarnated form of any famous generals as far as she knew, she checks out her options anyway. The best bet seems to be to use the gun to destroy enough of an object to cause the rest of it to crash around the man's head. Checking out a few promising angles and doing some quick trigonometric equations in her head, she finds a suitable mailbox underneath a suitable ledge with a suitable flowerpot and scrambles on top of it, bracing herself for the next shot.
It is times like these that she almost misses home.
Almost.
Tata seems to have forgotten about the screaming Romainian, Wuffwuff and everyone else. Sam is an enlightened figure, he knows how a smoke ham feels and is experiencing a tendancy to just stand there and wait until the process is over. The flash of light, however, reminds him that he has a survival instinct. Bolting up straight as a rod, he draws upon his 1,2,3,4 step-by-step military training and draws his weapon. Trying not to think about the absurdity of the ping pong ball Whammo gun in his hands, he attempts to remove the attacker.
Sam's military training takes over #1 line up sights (ot in this case mouth of ping pong ball gun) with target, #2 let out breath, #3 squeeze trigger, #4....
.... well, there IS no #4. The ping pong ball gun does whatever
it is that ping pong ball guns modified by Dimitri Vatsavos do at the same
moment that the guy with no hair takes another pot shot at Marda.
The result, as far as Sam and Marda are concerned, is a violent flash of
rainbow colors, a sound like they have just stuck their head inside a cathedral
bell as it was ringing, a brief stab of pain as their limbs are contorted,
then merciful blackness.
To Be Continued...