Harry started to sweat. It was not pouring off him, but he felt his clothing start to shrink, getting moist. A small dollop spilled down the chute formed by his shoulders, picking up speed in the small of his back, and dropped in slightly off center into his ass crack. His face felt warm and he could feel a glossy sheen settle across his cheeks below his eyes. His anxiety and stress were manifesting physically as he tried to survey as much as he could of his surroundings.
His nose and mouth puckered slightly in frustration for not paying enough attention to where he was and how he’d gotten there, and he looked side to side, scanning for anything that would help his bearings. Angie stood between him and the door, not threatening, but almost too docile. His scanning back and forth seemed to bring her delight, although she mistook his growing concern for escape for clumsy ardor. She reached out and put her cool palm on his face, drawing it sensuously across Harry’s chin.
“We can sit down,” Angie cooed, and gestured towards the lush couch that faced the panoramic glass portal that ran the length of the other side of the room, “until you’re ready for…other things.”
While the thought of rutting like teenagers would have been a welcome image, all Harry could do was try and get himself and Ahern out of there. He was getting angry with himself for enjoying his cavorting with Dolph and the three G’s, for getting liquored up, and most of all, inadvertently stumbling into the underwater Las Vegas version of an inter-dimensional nexus. There were no apparent cameras in the room, nor had he seen any outside, but he was sure the place had ample security and beyond Bernard. He couldn’t just walk out with Angie and ask to leave the secret pleasure dome…or could he? Harry saw what he was looking for and turned to Angie.
“I…am going to sit down,” his look of consternation turning to a sly grin as he said it. “What’s behind that tri-fold screen?”
Angie looked in the corner at the divider in the far corner of the room. “Nothing,” she replied.
“Good. That’s what I want you wearing when you come out from behind it.”
“Oooh, now you’re getting into the spirit of things!”
She sauntered over to the screen and disappeared behind it. Her hand snaked out from behind to a wall switch and slowly dimmed the lights in the room. It was nearly dark when a bulb popped on from behind the screen, perfectly silhouetting her perfectly contoured figure.
“Can you see okay?”
The fabric of the screen was giving her shape every opportunity to be cast upon it gloriously for Harry, who wanted to tear through it like a child feverishly unwrapping candy.
“Better than I thought I ever could.”
She purred, “Good.” Angie reached out from the screen again and turned the dial above the dimmer which brought music to the room through recessed speakers in the ceiling. It was more electronic-infused downtempo music like the ambient sounds from in the main room. She turned it up loud and coaxed a “whoo” out above the slinky beat. Angie started to undress and sway from side to side. Her clothes pitched over the top of screen item by item as she made her way out of her clothes. Damn it! This was everything he’d wanted but rather than enjoy the sexy gyrations, he was paying more attention to unscrewing the base of a pedestal ashtray. He hoped it was at least brass, and not some cheap, coated piece of crap meant to add to the ambience. It was fairly solid and heavy, which reassured him. The bottom of the post had been milled with the screw peg so it could attach to the base, and that gave Harry something to try and score the glass with.
He forced the screw hard against the glass towards the upper right corner and it barely scored the surface. He tried again, leaning into the effort, slowly wearing a thin scratch into the window. Harry tried to score another mark to create an “x” as quickly as possible. He looked and saw crumpled, ejected clothing on the floor, and Angie was down to her bra and panties.
“Wow.”
She heard his voice coming from the other side of the room. “Hey...no peeking!” A leg kicked out from the opposite side of the screen and then wrapped around the front. Ahern was loving it, and Harry wished he could have been. Her leg disappeared again and now she turned sideways, undoing the clasp in her bra. It slipped off, her shadow figure growing in the breast but only slightly dropping. Again, perfect. In the lower corner of the opposite side, Harry dug a mark in the glass, and looked back at the screen, where Angie had thrown her bra over the top, dangling there like an escaped POW trapped on a barbed wire fence. She snaked behind the partition with more vigor as the music segued into a harder, faster beat that made her look like a go-go dancer at a swank nightclub.
Harry flipped the ashtray around and held it tightly with both hands like a baseball bat, the conical tray his inverted base to keep it from slipping from his grip. It was hardly exact, but Harry started small, steady taps against the approximate center of the glass. The music was covering his tapping, but he increased his force, making each strike grow louder and making him worry that Angie would pop her head out and see what he was doing. Every hit created a shockwave radiating from the impact out to the edges, each expanding outward in a concentric circle of gaining strength. The blows were pretty solid, but the glass was unimpressed, holding form and shape. Behind the screen, Angie’s naked shape slipped panties off her form. She twirled them on her finger before propping them over the top. Harry was just about out of time.
With his last few moments, he squeezed hard on the post and swung hard against the spot he had been focused on. With the recoil he shifted his weight to his back leg and swung back around again, lifting his left leg up and stepping into his last shot. Harry exerted all his force on the “x” mark, which made the ashtray post vibrate even more in his hands, straining to pry itself loose of his grip. The prior strike he had felt in his arms and shoulders, but this last hit sent a strain through him completely. He stumbled back a few paces, and dropped the ashtray on the sofa.
The clinking sound of his hits finally lifted above the music, and Angie stopped.
“What the hell was that?”
Harry didn’t have the faintest idea of how to answer. He looked over at the window. There had been no visible change.
“I…uh,” he stammered. He was about to be fucked, and not the good way. Angie poked her head out from the screen, confused. Harry pointed innocently at the window. It was too dark for her to see exactly what he was pointing at at the window, but he was closer, close enough to see how lucky he was. Oscillating the thick pane created enough stress for his impact on the scored surface to challenge the tensile strength of the glass. The pressure from the water outside added to the momentary failure, and a micro-fissure traveled through, enough to extend the “x” a foot in both directions. Through the center of it, water beaded and a slight dribble sputtered down onto the floor. It held, but the slow leak pooled below the window.
Harry walked over to the tiny puddle of spillage and dipped his fingers in it. He came to the partition and held them up, and flicked them at Angie’s face.
“There’s a leak and I don’t think we want to be in here if that doesn’t hold.”
Ahern lifted the small lamp up over the screen, between her and Harry to see the water. It was tiny, but he was right. Harry looked down to avoid the glare of the light that was inches from his face, and in doing so, looked at the screen which had become translucent with the light source now positioned. As honest and amazing as she’d looked in silhouette, Ahern’s nude form illuminated was that much better. The adrenal glands and palpitations in his chest had turned off his dick, which certainly would have enjoyed the moment, but his gamble had worked.
He squinted and looked in her eyes. “You have to get dressed and we need to get to safety in case that thing gives out.”
“Go back out there and I’ll let them know there’s a leak. If they can’t fix it, they’ll evac everybody.”
“I’m not going until I know you’re safe,” Harry said. He took her face in his hands and stared deep into her. In the last few hours of playing the blowhard and sleuth, it was the most genuine thing he’d said. “If something happened to you, now, I’d never forgive myself.”
“I’d hoped you would find me, and join us. It was a long shot, to figure this out and come here, but you did it. I…”
Harry stopped her with a kiss.
It hardly had the passion he’d expected, that he’d wanted in the moment they kissed. There was desperation in their contact. Rather than the warmth and intrigue in kissing, Harry felt hopelessness. Was Ahern flipped completely or could she come back? Would she come back? How much was there to find out from her, willingly or otherwise? Angie, for all her raw sexiness, did not exert any of it in her lips. She had not expected the kiss, but it was almost conciliatory, a reward for his perseverance and success for locating her. She was recruiting him, and that purpose, and that of her masters was what was most important.
Angie dressed hastily and headed towards the door as she looked at the crack in the glass. It was a gentle sputter, and there was maybe a cup’s worth of water pooling. “Come on!”
“I’ll be right behind you…I’ve got to find my friends. We came here together. I don’t want them left behind.”
“If they can’t stop this, they get everyone out of here. You’ll all be safe. They may even bring you to some of the other facilities if there’s still a little fun left in you. And you’ll all get brought back to Montana when you’re finished.”
“I’m right behind you.”
She opened the door and went down the hall back towards the main grand chamber. Almost good enough, Harry thought. He picked up the ashtray again and took a few more good whacks at the crack. It didn’t expand the shatter mark, but the crack went deep through, and the stream of water increased. The place had to flood or he wasn’t going to be able to slip away as they herded everybody out of there. He looked at his cell phone, and it had no signal – no way to call Lester and warn him about what he’d found. And no way to let anybody know where he was.
In the main room, Harry easily spotted Dolph. He had almost a half dozen Asian girls swarming him as he stood over a Craps table. “Shane, my boy! Look! I found geishas!”
Harry smiled supportively. “Looks like you found more than that,” he quipped, noting the large sum of money he’d amassed in front of him.”
“He smiled back, “They’re my good luck charms.”
“Can I ask you a question?”
“What’s on your mind? Don’t tell me you’re already out of dough – they’ll lend ya, but it’s bloody murder.”
“No…no, I’m good. I heard that there’s other places like this. Other locations.”
Dolph turned to his throng of followers. “Ladies, I think Shane wants himself an annual pass!” He laughed, and the swarm of girls giggled like schoolgirls. Harry nodded and affirmed it.
“You can go wherever you want, but I prefer coming to Montana. More out of the way, less crowded,” he said. “And these girls,” he added gesturing with his arms out, “you can’t beat ‘em!” The flock giggled again.
“Yeah, I just have business around the country and I’d hate to have to make a special trip out here, you know?”
“Sure. Until they got this place going recently, I was splitting my time between the one in Michigan and Kentucky. Don’t go to the one in Arizona. All those damn kids out and around Lake Havasu.”
“Wait, there’s one in Kentucky?”
“Yeah, know where Lake Cumberland is?”
His nose and mouth puckered slightly in frustration for not paying enough attention to where he was and how he’d gotten there, and he looked side to side, scanning for anything that would help his bearings. Angie stood between him and the door, not threatening, but almost too docile. His scanning back and forth seemed to bring her delight, although she mistook his growing concern for escape for clumsy ardor. She reached out and put her cool palm on his face, drawing it sensuously across Harry’s chin.
“We can sit down,” Angie cooed, and gestured towards the lush couch that faced the panoramic glass portal that ran the length of the other side of the room, “until you’re ready for…other things.”
While the thought of rutting like teenagers would have been a welcome image, all Harry could do was try and get himself and Ahern out of there. He was getting angry with himself for enjoying his cavorting with Dolph and the three G’s, for getting liquored up, and most of all, inadvertently stumbling into the underwater Las Vegas version of an inter-dimensional nexus. There were no apparent cameras in the room, nor had he seen any outside, but he was sure the place had ample security and beyond Bernard. He couldn’t just walk out with Angie and ask to leave the secret pleasure dome…or could he? Harry saw what he was looking for and turned to Angie.
“I…am going to sit down,” his look of consternation turning to a sly grin as he said it. “What’s behind that tri-fold screen?”
Angie looked in the corner at the divider in the far corner of the room. “Nothing,” she replied.
“Good. That’s what I want you wearing when you come out from behind it.”
“Oooh, now you’re getting into the spirit of things!”
She sauntered over to the screen and disappeared behind it. Her hand snaked out from behind to a wall switch and slowly dimmed the lights in the room. It was nearly dark when a bulb popped on from behind the screen, perfectly silhouetting her perfectly contoured figure.
“Can you see okay?”
The fabric of the screen was giving her shape every opportunity to be cast upon it gloriously for Harry, who wanted to tear through it like a child feverishly unwrapping candy.
“Better than I thought I ever could.”
She purred, “Good.” Angie reached out from the screen again and turned the dial above the dimmer which brought music to the room through recessed speakers in the ceiling. It was more electronic-infused downtempo music like the ambient sounds from in the main room. She turned it up loud and coaxed a “whoo” out above the slinky beat. Angie started to undress and sway from side to side. Her clothes pitched over the top of screen item by item as she made her way out of her clothes. Damn it! This was everything he’d wanted but rather than enjoy the sexy gyrations, he was paying more attention to unscrewing the base of a pedestal ashtray. He hoped it was at least brass, and not some cheap, coated piece of crap meant to add to the ambience. It was fairly solid and heavy, which reassured him. The bottom of the post had been milled with the screw peg so it could attach to the base, and that gave Harry something to try and score the glass with.
He forced the screw hard against the glass towards the upper right corner and it barely scored the surface. He tried again, leaning into the effort, slowly wearing a thin scratch into the window. Harry tried to score another mark to create an “x” as quickly as possible. He looked and saw crumpled, ejected clothing on the floor, and Angie was down to her bra and panties.
“Wow.”
She heard his voice coming from the other side of the room. “Hey...no peeking!” A leg kicked out from the opposite side of the screen and then wrapped around the front. Ahern was loving it, and Harry wished he could have been. Her leg disappeared again and now she turned sideways, undoing the clasp in her bra. It slipped off, her shadow figure growing in the breast but only slightly dropping. Again, perfect. In the lower corner of the opposite side, Harry dug a mark in the glass, and looked back at the screen, where Angie had thrown her bra over the top, dangling there like an escaped POW trapped on a barbed wire fence. She snaked behind the partition with more vigor as the music segued into a harder, faster beat that made her look like a go-go dancer at a swank nightclub.
Harry flipped the ashtray around and held it tightly with both hands like a baseball bat, the conical tray his inverted base to keep it from slipping from his grip. It was hardly exact, but Harry started small, steady taps against the approximate center of the glass. The music was covering his tapping, but he increased his force, making each strike grow louder and making him worry that Angie would pop her head out and see what he was doing. Every hit created a shockwave radiating from the impact out to the edges, each expanding outward in a concentric circle of gaining strength. The blows were pretty solid, but the glass was unimpressed, holding form and shape. Behind the screen, Angie’s naked shape slipped panties off her form. She twirled them on her finger before propping them over the top. Harry was just about out of time.
With his last few moments, he squeezed hard on the post and swung hard against the spot he had been focused on. With the recoil he shifted his weight to his back leg and swung back around again, lifting his left leg up and stepping into his last shot. Harry exerted all his force on the “x” mark, which made the ashtray post vibrate even more in his hands, straining to pry itself loose of his grip. The prior strike he had felt in his arms and shoulders, but this last hit sent a strain through him completely. He stumbled back a few paces, and dropped the ashtray on the sofa.
The clinking sound of his hits finally lifted above the music, and Angie stopped.
“What the hell was that?”
Harry didn’t have the faintest idea of how to answer. He looked over at the window. There had been no visible change.
“I…uh,” he stammered. He was about to be fucked, and not the good way. Angie poked her head out from the screen, confused. Harry pointed innocently at the window. It was too dark for her to see exactly what he was pointing at at the window, but he was closer, close enough to see how lucky he was. Oscillating the thick pane created enough stress for his impact on the scored surface to challenge the tensile strength of the glass. The pressure from the water outside added to the momentary failure, and a micro-fissure traveled through, enough to extend the “x” a foot in both directions. Through the center of it, water beaded and a slight dribble sputtered down onto the floor. It held, but the slow leak pooled below the window.
Harry walked over to the tiny puddle of spillage and dipped his fingers in it. He came to the partition and held them up, and flicked them at Angie’s face.
“There’s a leak and I don’t think we want to be in here if that doesn’t hold.”
Ahern lifted the small lamp up over the screen, between her and Harry to see the water. It was tiny, but he was right. Harry looked down to avoid the glare of the light that was inches from his face, and in doing so, looked at the screen which had become translucent with the light source now positioned. As honest and amazing as she’d looked in silhouette, Ahern’s nude form illuminated was that much better. The adrenal glands and palpitations in his chest had turned off his dick, which certainly would have enjoyed the moment, but his gamble had worked.
He squinted and looked in her eyes. “You have to get dressed and we need to get to safety in case that thing gives out.”
“Go back out there and I’ll let them know there’s a leak. If they can’t fix it, they’ll evac everybody.”
“I’m not going until I know you’re safe,” Harry said. He took her face in his hands and stared deep into her. In the last few hours of playing the blowhard and sleuth, it was the most genuine thing he’d said. “If something happened to you, now, I’d never forgive myself.”
“I’d hoped you would find me, and join us. It was a long shot, to figure this out and come here, but you did it. I…”
Harry stopped her with a kiss.
It hardly had the passion he’d expected, that he’d wanted in the moment they kissed. There was desperation in their contact. Rather than the warmth and intrigue in kissing, Harry felt hopelessness. Was Ahern flipped completely or could she come back? Would she come back? How much was there to find out from her, willingly or otherwise? Angie, for all her raw sexiness, did not exert any of it in her lips. She had not expected the kiss, but it was almost conciliatory, a reward for his perseverance and success for locating her. She was recruiting him, and that purpose, and that of her masters was what was most important.
Angie dressed hastily and headed towards the door as she looked at the crack in the glass. It was a gentle sputter, and there was maybe a cup’s worth of water pooling. “Come on!”
“I’ll be right behind you…I’ve got to find my friends. We came here together. I don’t want them left behind.”
“If they can’t stop this, they get everyone out of here. You’ll all be safe. They may even bring you to some of the other facilities if there’s still a little fun left in you. And you’ll all get brought back to Montana when you’re finished.”
“I’m right behind you.”
She opened the door and went down the hall back towards the main grand chamber. Almost good enough, Harry thought. He picked up the ashtray again and took a few more good whacks at the crack. It didn’t expand the shatter mark, but the crack went deep through, and the stream of water increased. The place had to flood or he wasn’t going to be able to slip away as they herded everybody out of there. He looked at his cell phone, and it had no signal – no way to call Lester and warn him about what he’d found. And no way to let anybody know where he was.
In the main room, Harry easily spotted Dolph. He had almost a half dozen Asian girls swarming him as he stood over a Craps table. “Shane, my boy! Look! I found geishas!”
Harry smiled supportively. “Looks like you found more than that,” he quipped, noting the large sum of money he’d amassed in front of him.”
“He smiled back, “They’re my good luck charms.”
“Can I ask you a question?”
“What’s on your mind? Don’t tell me you’re already out of dough – they’ll lend ya, but it’s bloody murder.”
“No…no, I’m good. I heard that there’s other places like this. Other locations.”
Dolph turned to his throng of followers. “Ladies, I think Shane wants himself an annual pass!” He laughed, and the swarm of girls giggled like schoolgirls. Harry nodded and affirmed it.
“You can go wherever you want, but I prefer coming to Montana. More out of the way, less crowded,” he said. “And these girls,” he added gesturing with his arms out, “you can’t beat ‘em!” The flock giggled again.
“Yeah, I just have business around the country and I’d hate to have to make a special trip out here, you know?”
“Sure. Until they got this place going recently, I was splitting my time between the one in Michigan and Kentucky. Don’t go to the one in Arizona. All those damn kids out and around Lake Havasu.”
“Wait, there’s one in Kentucky?”
“Yeah, know where Lake Cumberland is?”
---
Pam used her key to get into Dave’s apartment like so many times before, but this was the first time she’d opened that door thinking it would be her last. He wasn’t there as she’d expected, but he’d be back soon enough. She made sure he would be.
You see, before Pam headed over to Dave’s, she called the F.B.I. branch office in Seattle, and they’d never heard of any agent Hardy or Cohen. The office in Washington D.C. was interested in hearing about this when she claimed they’d kidnapped David Bullock after the demolition of the SCANTV studios, but the F.B.I. had a slightly different perspective after conversing with her.
[The following transcript was recorded Saturday 20:46, log file 12/06-1983; shift 6 – agent Karly Sharper, examiner. Transcription from recording by IT specialist L2 Lynne Mequon]
SHARPER: Ma’am, thank you for your patience. I have reviewed the statement you made to our Seattle office but we do not see that your information lends itself to verification of an abduction or kidnapping.
RESPONDANT, identified as BRODY, PAMELA: What do you mean, verification?
SHARPER: We do not have any reason to believe that Mr. Bullock is unwillingly with any party at this time, given your statement and our information.
BRODY: Your information? What information is that? All you’ve got is my information!
SHARPER: At this time, we do not suspect any criminal activity has occurred relating to Mr. Bullock.
BRODY: But you don’t have any agents Cohen or Hardy! You have people impersonating federal agents! That’s a crime. You can’t do that!
SHARPER: Again, ma’am, we do not show any agency operatives in that branch with those names. Are you certain that’s what they were?
BRODY: Yes, I’m certain. They had a badge and everything.
SHARPER: Did you record a badge number or an ID PIN?
BRODY: No, but…
SHARPER: We appreciate your report, however, since we can not corroborate your information, there is not much more I can do?
BRODY: But I told you, they came to our studio…
SHARPER: The SCANTV facility that was damaged in the storm last night?
BRODY: Yes…
SHARPER: I have copy of the report from the attending EMTs and the statement you gave the police at the hospital. There’s no mention of two gentlemen claiming to be F.B.I. agents there.
BRODY: But they…
SHARPER: And the log at the hospital has both you and Mr. Bullock signed in, and later released.
BRODY: Yes, and we were both there with them. They were there!
SHARPER: Released on your own recognizance.
BRODY: What about the incident at the Denny’s? That’s when they took him – there’s got to be a police report about a disturbance there.
SHARPER: As I told you, there was no report of any disturbance at that location. The records at the hospital indicate you were ‘severely traumatized’ by the events of the evening. Is that correct?
BRODY: Yeah, but…look, I know what I saw. Okay?
SHARPER: We are unable to help you any further regarding this matter. If you have any additional information that substantiates these two gentlemen who you claim are impersonating our agents, please contact your local branch office…
BRODY: This is my friend, and he’s missing now after these two showed up, and I’m worried about him.
SHARPER: As you claim, if he’s on his way back to his family in Somerset, please check with them to see if he’s arrived, or if they have been in contact with him. The F.B.I. can not instigate an investigation until you take the matter up with your civic authorities and they determine the individual truly is a threat to himself or others or is a vulnerable adult. Would you like the contact number for your local police department?
BRODY: No, I don’t, and it they were pretending to be federal agents.
SHARPER: I’m sorry. Is there anything further I can assist you with?
BRODY: You need to find them.
SHARPER: I’m sorry. Is there anything further I can assist you with?
[call ends]
Pam texted a message to Dave. It read:
checkd with fbi-no agents cohen/hardy. BANANA! contact me i can get help. safe here at home. come back.
One way or another she’d get to him, and unsuspecting, he’d come back. It had been a whole day without a reply from him, but Pam was confident Dave read her message. He’d try to get away, possibly even without telling her he did, because he might think she was being monitored by associates of “Cohen” and “Hardy”. BANANA was a code they’d used when they go fence hopping and trespass government buildings to sift trash to find documents that escaped shredding that had dubious content – the kind that made for excellent topics for “The Word”. “Why don’t you make like a banana and split,” he said platitudinally when they’d first met, and somehow the corny nature of it worked.
Pam dozed off around midnight, still sitting up in the chair by Dave’s desk. Sometime in the night, she heard a rustling outside the door, and it woke her up. Across the room, she saw what looked like two pairs of feet blocking the hallway light under the crack of the door. There was something being said out there, but it was very soft. Pam got up slowly in the dark apartment. She had not left any lights on so that if Dave were to return he wouldn’t have any idea somebody was there, waiting. Carefully, she picked up the claw hammer she’d left on the countertop and made her way over to the door.
Through the peephole she saw two of the ghoul crew from the Denny’s. It was the pale man and the sole girl. A shiver ran through her. They were arguing at a low volume what to do. She kept gesturing at the door while he threw his arms up repeatedly. Finally, he submitted and reached into his trenchcoat to pull out a small sleeve that flipped open revealing several small tools. He kneeled below the peephole and started fiddling with the lock, trying to flip the tumblers. The woman stood there annoyed, staring at the door, almost as though she could see Pam on the other side. Pam carefully lifted the door chain and silently attached it to the door and stepped back.
It took a minute or so, but she heard the lock disengage. The handle turned and the door started to open. It made a soft thunk as the chain caught, and the pale man mumbled “shit”. He reached up and started to feel for the chain, and then produced a slender, curved tool which he used to jiggle it out from behind the door. He had just lifted it off the slider when Pam threw herself against the door, slamming it closed and taking the top of his fingers off. He screamed in pain and shock and fell backwards, hitting the hallway wall and clutched his severed fingers. The woman had jumped back in surprise as Pam pulled the door open and swung the claw hammer, just barely missing her and hitting the wall next to the door. Pam yanked it out and took a shot at the bleeding intruder. He tried to defend himself with his stump-fingered hand and only succeeded in slowing the strike that hit is wounded hand and his collarbone.
The shrieking continued and he pleased for help. “Morgana!”
Pam was knocked over by a fierce kick at her midsection that sent her stumbling a feet yards down the hall before rolling over. Morgana grabbed her fallen comrade by the back of his coat and dragged him down the hallway towards the stairwell they’d entered from. Pam, still winded from the giant boot that Morgana laid on her, made one last feeble attempt to hit them and hurled the hammer down the hall. To her own comical amusement, it bounced once and then took a decent hop, where it landed on the lower part of the man’s leg, causing him to yelp again.
Doors had opened after the noise settled down, and neighbors looked out, guarded. Pam had made her way back inside, and grabbed the fingertips with a Ziploc bag. She threw that and the hammer into a plastic bag and left Dave’s apartment.
She whined in a squeaky voice. “Would you like the contact number for your local police department?”
---
A blue light flickered in the large room, but it was not an effect for the benefit of the clientele. Bernard’s voice came over the loudspeaker.
“I’m sorry my friends, but we must ask you take stock of what you have and head back to our antechamber. We have discovered a small issue within a ventilation diffuser that we must shut down so that it does not affect other units in the complex. In order to maintain the proper environment, we will be addressing this issue immediately so that you can continue your time with us. Until we get this quickly fixed, please let our staff accompany you to the antechamber or back to your accommodations. Merci.”
Call it what you will, but it worked, Harry thought. He looked around for Angie, cutting across the traffic of people moving out of the hall. He brushed past Gary, who was dressed in an Indian squaw’s costume and had what appeared to be several oily stalks of corn in a basket. He called out Shane’s name, but Harry ignored him, trying to find Angie. The room was emptying out, and he’d not seen her. He turned back towards the exit, but rather than seeing revelers leaving, all he was faced with was quite possibly the largest buttoned down shirt ever made. He looked nearly straight up to find there was a collar and large head at the end, eyes staring down at him. The giant stood there like a wall with clothing.
“Mr. Turquoise,” said Bernard with the saucy contempt of his French lineage, “do you not want to join your friends in the antechamber?”
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