Chapter 13

Krazy Koboi

Opal Koboi giggled like a loon as she crawled through the muck of the tunnel. Loon. She liked that word. Loony, loony, loony. She giggled more. High pitched. Now low pitched. Mix it up, and repeat. Hee hee, this was fun!

Opal's mad giggling had several benefits.

First of all, it let R'hal know where she was, and that she was following the right track. He was no fool, he had made several detour paths. His figuring was, if she tried to go it alone, she'd get lost and he'd be able to find her at some point. He had not, however, thought that she was crazy enough to take the correct paths just because they looked weird. That, in a nutshell, was her plan. Take the most desolate paths, wind up in a desolate location.

That nutshell happened to be her head. Unfortunate, but true.

Second, the giggling kept her busy and she stayed occupied for lengths of time. If it hadn't so enthralled her, she may have given up and R'hal would catch up to her. And dwarves in rages, as he was, tend to crunch things in their molars. Not pleasant.

So, it was a good thing that things stayed the way they were. For the time being.

Root nearly exploded. First the neandathol [A/N: I hope you can figure that word through my minced spelling] Mud Men, now their potentially most dangerous criminal escaped and on the run.

Where was Lady Luck when you needed her? She certainly wasn't up for much these days. He called up Foaly again.

The Howler's Peak officers thought they had the only cameras in the cells. They thought wrong. As the police, Foaly thought the LEP was entitled to their own surveilance gadgets. And he wasn't as polite as them when it came to putting them in bathrooms, though he angled them to face away from the toilets and showers, so they were pretty much showing up the doors and sinks.

"Foaly! Gimme the footage from Howler's Peaker, Cell #1 in the max security unit ON THE DOUBLE!"

"Well if it isn't my favorite beet-complexioned commander."

"No, it isn't. Gimme the tapes."

"Touche, touche. Someone's got a bad case of the gimme's"

"Where are the-" He was, again, cut off by the somewhat unexpected arrival of the required footage.

Foaly really was asking for trouble. "Foaly, this is the film from LAST MONTH!"

Foaly put on a hurt face. "Well, sir, you never specified the date or time- "

"You know what I meant, Foaly. Now, put in the tape. for today, starting in the morning."

"Yessir, Mr. Julius, sir."

"Shuttup and give me-" The video started up on the moniter. Opal was moping on her cot. "Thank you. Now, fast forward about three hours."

The centuar obediently did so. You don't get thank-yous everyday in this business.

"Two more." The film flashed in front of him, and the commander saw something. "Hold it! Wait, wait! Rewind, very slowly." The pixie had been flying all over the room in a fury, then got up and walked sedately to the bathroom. "Give me the bathroom cam starting at that moment."

The bathroom door opened, and Koboi walked in, turned on the water in the sink, and kept turning the handle until it fell off in her hand, and there was a big red button there. She pressed it. A trap door opened underneath her, she crawled through, and soon vanished out of the camera's sight line.

"Foaly, did you see that?"

"Sure did. It would appear she has an accomplice who she bribed into making the escape trapdoor. Very good mechanics. She must've designed them herself when she was still sane."

"What I want to know is, why didn't the Howler's Peak guys catch this?"

"My guess is that her accomplice rigged the tapes for the cameras he knew about, and they were only seeing those. My tapes could not have been rigged. Once again, you should be thanking me."

"You're not fired."

"You're welcome."

"So, what else- hold it, there's something." A dwarf in guard uniform strode into the bathroom. He saw the trapdoor, snarled, and climbed in himself, after replacing the sink handle and, once inside the tunnel, the trap door itself. "Her accomplice."

"You bet."

"Well, who can we put on this job?"

"One detail I forgot to mention. I ran ground scans on the the Peak, and it would appear that the tunneled escape route leads to Fowl Manor. Simplifies things a bit, don't you think?"

"Well, I don't see why Holly can't get on this case, do you?"

"Not a tad. Her clumsiness is done, I think. She certainly seemed pretty agile at the shuttleport, and she hasn't had an orange yet today. And even so, she's the only one with the standing invite, so it wouldn't matter even if she wasn't okay."

"Send her in, then. This case will suit her fine."

"Will do, Julius."

"Good. And since whe have we been on a first name basis? I've warned you about that, Foaly."

"You call me Foaly."

"Well, you're an inferior. Get her in here, now if not-" Holly walked in. "- sooner."

Holly grinned. "You wanted to see me, Commander?"

"Captain. Opal Koboi has escaped from Howler's Peak. You'll have to ask Foaly for the footage of her escape, go to the location she'll be at a certain time, and recapture her. Now, go watch the tapes, gear up, and move out. You've got time. If you've got any questions, ask Foaly. He gives you lip, smack him. Hard. Even if he doesn't, smack him for me."

Holly suppressed a smile. "Yessir. On my way, sir."

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