7
Kim lost her breath suddenly, all of it escaping out of her body on its own as she felt something solid--*really* solid smash into her side. Her body felt like gelatin, crumpling to the ground while something slapped this pistol away, her head slamming against the painted drywall. The swivel chair let out a racket as her body inadvertently toppled it over; her ears catching an erratic clatter of many an object on the floor as she saw the curved knife fly aimlessly towards the bed.
"HUH.!" she breathed quickly, and faintly she heard something tap onto the floor. On the cream tiled floor stood a pair of legs; one of flesh while the other was nothing more metal peg, with some kind of hinge for a knee. Seemingly in slow motion, her eyes trailed up the legs, stomach turning as they ran up those many heinous scars. Her heart beat in her ears as she saw those smug "eyes" of her target gazing coldly upon her-- waiting almost for the prime time to deal the deathblow.
"What's wrong?" he asked, a smug grin played on his wrinkled lips. "Don't like what your hands created?"
"Think of it--!" she coughed. ".As professional courtesy!"
The boy let out an amused grunt. "In that case, let me extend to you the same civility."
--Which seemed to be hidden deep within the violent anger as the twisted, mangled form fell upon her like a corpse. Quickly she kicked up her legs as the marked limbs scrambled wildly, feeling the fingers grazing her throat like a rabid dog. Her shoes kicked upon the boy, dancing flamenco on his chest as it were. The soles flattened evenly upon his mangled abs while she forced all her strength down to her legs.
"EH. YAH!!" she grunted--and the target flew across the small room, the remnants of his limbs jutting helplessly towards her like a rag doll. The scarred mess flipped over backwards, letting out a loud *TING* as his metallic head met the guardrail. where that Nepalese blade sat ready on the wrinkled bedspread.
Uzi disappeared below the mattress--
--Only to pop back out with his hand scrambling for the blade. Her heart beat madly beneath her shirt as he lifted the blade up, chambering it in a severe arc. The piece of cloth around her chest pulsated to the mad beat of the organ even faster as the kid brought the arm down--and that piece of metal became nothing more than a black line as it flew through the air, its length increasing with every millisecond.
She was going to die!
***
Uzi smirked as that wench cowered beneath her slender arms, her eyes clamped shut as he could feel the last centimeter of the blade's grip graze against the tip of his fingers. The blade let out a quick *BOING* as it cut deeply into the drywall, digging a bit into a piece the wench's pink pants.
"Ah." he chuckled. "I'm right on target, as usual. And Vasili called himself crack-shot."
Beneath the makeshift brim of her hands, the auburn opened her green eyes, batting them a little. Her head moved from side to side, from left to right in disbelief, as if there was any doubt to her continued existence. He did put on quite a show though, given her reaction.
"Mr. Drazen!" the nurse said firmly in her native Czech. "What is going on here?"
"I'm sorry, my dear." He replied in the language, limping around the corner of the bed with a *TINK* from his temporary prosthetic at a time, as if nothing had happened at all. The "knee" of the pole let out a squeak as it buckled. Taking a knee, he collected the weapons the wench had crudely spilled onto the floor. "But given comprised attention of my presence, I have to take my leave."
"But. what about your bills?" the woman asked nervously as he swung the slings of his UZI guns over his bare shoulder.
"Put it on my tab." He smirked. He always wanted to say that. Something moved close by, and his eyes caught the auburn stretched out upon the tiled floor, pinned by her pant leg. Her arm reached for the Jericho a mere inch away from her longest finger, a futile attempt for a last ditch effort if he ever saw one.
"Ah-ah-ah!" his voice quickly switched to his accented English as he leaned on the wall for support. He easily concentrated all 145 pounds of his body upon her wrist at the bottom of his peg. From out the wench came a painful sound, like a winding grunt, and her fingers folded gently, lifting upwards at their bases like the legs of dying spider. "That's my gun now."
He easily scooped it up, wedging it underneath his arm alongside his primary pistol. He lifted his ill-fitted leg, and the girl quickly folded into herself on her side, her other hand snatching onto the throbbing wrist. He thought he could see something red trickle from the limb, but he couldn't be sure.
"Did that hurt?" he said in mockery. "Good!"
"D. --Don't think you're getting away with this!" the girl cocked her head back, her emerald eye beaming the pain. "Murderer!"
"Whatever you think, wench." He sighed--and the wench's crown was touching her knees when he brought down his peg upon her head like an axe kick. She let out a loud grunt as he simply stepped over her form, rounding the partition and limping for the door. "Shalom!"
He brushed passed the door quickly, making a slow left as he limped for the next junction, to where the elevators sat for roof access if he remembered right.
"Just hope Shia didn't leave yet!" he grunted.
***
Ron watched helplessly from the bushes as the men in olive drab stumbled out of their Hummer right in front of them. Something stuck him as the last grunt filed out of the transport while the other five headed for hospital door. On the backs of them were printed Hebrew characters, emblazoned in red like the Hebrew he saw painted on the Osprey back in the Senor Senior villa.
"I don't believe this, Rufus!" he said quietly in the brush, leaning casually on a trunk of some kind. "I step out to pee for a minute, and I find these guys pulling up to the curb!"
"Uh." the mole rat said quietly. He trailed down his body onto his cargo pants; the rat poked his head out of the "burrow", the flap of the pocket draping over his hairless head while he pointed. "No parking!"
His lifted his head back onto his shoulders, and he turned slowly so not to attract a whole lot of attention. His indifferent gaze met the post of a sign no more than a few feet away from the car, trailing up the holed surface till they reached a red painted sign. He didn't know a thing about the Czech language, but the color red was universal. or had to be.
"Oh right.!" he nodded sheepishly. "But whether or not they're parked illegally, Kim's not going to like this a bit."
"Uh-huh." The rat nodded. "Hmm--yeah!"
"But how our we going to get out of here with those guys? Their ride's faster than this POS--!" He blinked as he caught sight of the grunt's Hummer parked right in front of the Skoda, its owners letting the big engine purr carelessly on its own with no one tending to the driver's seat. His palm met the top of his brow rather hard.
"Rufus," He smirked, looking down upon his son with a wicked grin on his face, "do you still wonder what it's like to drive a Hummer?"
"Um-hmm--um-hmm!" the mole rat nodded fiercely with anticipation. "Yeah!"
"Boo-yah!" he pumped his fist in the air. "The Ron-Factor strikes again!"
***
"Come on!" Kim grunted as she locked her fingers around the kukri's tiny grip again. "Come on!"
Her muscles bulged from underneath her skin, flexing as she tried to work the curved blade free, regardless of how much her wrist rebelled against her wishes. After a minute of trying, she could feel the blade wiggle a bit more freely through the steel, but it wasn't enough. Her fingers laced together around the tiny grip, easing the blade back and forth, up and down in the little niche of its owner's making. The motions came easier with each period, moving like an over-greased pendulum--
--*Shing! *--
--"Got it!"--
--Until she worked the blade free of the wall. The blade made a passing clatter on the tile as she released it from her grasp, the wrist swinging for mouth blindly and it pressed through her lips. Her tongue swathed over the back gently, tasting a few drops of her blood as the muscle bathed it with her saliva, relieving it of a little pain for a while.
She removed it from her mouth, her eyes cringing as they ran across the circle than dented her skin. A few pieces of skin were broken, drips of red oozing out them in its own time.
"Ugh.!" she gave the wrist a few rubs with her free hand.
She lifted up her leg naturally, grabbing the limb by the ankle and she swung it out as far as her tendons and ligaments would let her. There was a gash in her pants, about an inch long and a half a centimeter wide at the bottom of the leg where the cuffs flared out.
"Aw man!" she shook her head. "These were brand new Club Banana! Damn Uzi!"
From the floor, she scooped up the blade and clenched it tightly by the grip. Something else caught her by her eyes, laying flat on the tile floor like someone had dropped it on mistake. Her fingers had barely grazed at the blue object as she slid it over to her side. She took it into her hand, her eyes rolling as it was nothing more than an everyday ZIP disk that someone must have dropped--
*Lost-and-found later! * Her mind exclaimed. *Get the target! *
Everything in the tiny room brushed past her as her fingers jerked the disk into her pocket, speeding out the door just to come to a halt as she whipped her head around the hand-railed corridor. Doctors and nurses in the hallway scrambled, stopping for a moment only to take off as their eyes locked with what was in her tight grip.
--Something to her left let out a noisy clang, and she looked to find a small tray of turned on its side, its contents of medical supplies spilled onto the floor. Draping atop of the tray was a woman--probably a nurse--dressed in scrubs, holding her hand on top of her shaking head.
She raced quickly for the woman before she caught a hold of her senses, stuffing the kukri blade carefully between her pants and her belt like a sheath. She took a knee beside the woman as she laid her crowning hand onto the floor.
"Excuse me." She calmed herself enough so that her normal voice spoke through. The woman pushed away from the floor, hitting her back to the wall awkwardly as if someone had grabbed her and thrown her.
"Please--!" the woman cried in accented English. "Do not hurt me!"
"You speak English?" she blinked.
"Yes!" the woman nodded. "Do not hurt me! I did not do anything!"
"I never said you did." She smiled weakly. "But I need your help. Did you see anyone run through here recently?"
"I did!" The woman was on the verge of hysteria. "He was naked and armed! He was running for the. oh--what's the word?"
"Elevator?" she said.
"Yes--elevator!" the woman bobbed her head quickly. "There is a military helicopter on the roof!"
"I know." She nodded. "I saw it outside. But I need you to tell me where this elevator is."
"Down the hall, and to your right!" the woman cried. "Please! Let me go!"
She didn't need to hear anymore as she sprinted off for the junction. As she approached the T-junction, she spun around in mid-stride, running backward the second her shoes touched the ground.
"Thanks!" she called, and she spun back around in time before she got a face full of wall. The elevator nook was closer than what she had expected, no more than a couple of yards ahead of her and closing. Her shoes let out a screech as she came to a halt in front of it, dashing for the open sliding doors, as they were about to close. Spinning quickly on her heels, her fingers stabbed at the button marked PH.
The doors touched each other when they closed. Moving parts above her shifted quickly. and she felt a few pounds heavier as the assent began. Her heavy stomach twisted as she thought about what--no--*who* waited for her at the top of the shaft. Uzi Drazen, a man that death could not lay its bony fingers upon. And if the Grim Reaper couldn't reel him in.
*Then how can I? *
Her guts settled back into their original place as the mechanical humming of the lift ceased. The bell overhead let out a faint ding, and the ferocious winds brushed against her face as the doors slid open, all at the sound of like a giant propeller's buzz. Her arms shielded her face as she stepped out onto the roof; the annoying buzz was deafening while the winds threw her hair in wild directions like she was in the middle of a windstorm.
*Helicopter on the roof.! * Her mind could only whisper in the droning roar.
"The roof!" her arms parted from her face, and her eyes could see the large Apache ready for take off, rotor gaining increasing air speed. At the cockpit, that naked target clawed his way up into a seat, trying to work that pole of a leg in through the closing canopy.
"UZI!" she screamed madly into the raging rotor-wash, taking the grip of the knife into her palm, she unsheathed it with an anger of a Viking berserker.
The kid managed to work his limb into the cockpit, as the canopy was about to synch shut. Through her drying eyes and through the dark glass, she could see that smug look play across his gnarled lips again.
"Ah. Wench Possible!" he shook his head, his indifferent voice blaring over a loudspeaker. "I'm afraid I cannot let you go any further."
"FURTHER THIS--CREEP!" she chucked the knife with all her might, watching it spin in defiance of the copter's whooshing rotors. There was a fleeting *TING* as it stuck proudly out of the chopper's nose, right next to where the canopy met the body. The canopy went ajar; lifting only so much that the kid could work his hand through and grab the knife. Her mouth dropped when the target yanked it off the nose like it was nothing, like Arthur to Excalibur.
"Thanks for the knife!" he grinned as the canopy closed again. She could just barely see the second person in the back fiddle with his helmet, particularly with that. tubular monocle thingy on his face. "But what on earth are you going to do now, Wench? Take on a Longbow with your bare hands? NOW YOU'RE MINE!!"
She bent at the knees, spacing her feet wide apart as if to move quickly. After the target spat his last words, her hair began to drop down onto her back as the copter went airborne a few feet, higher than what she could jump. Her spinning mind went blank as she saw that turret move on its swivel, jerking erratically side to side as if it tried to get a lock on something--
*Like me. *
"Move!"--
The heliport seemed to explode around her--and she couldn't move. Hundreds of cement fountains shot up high into the air, the many chunks mixing with each other as they rained down upon her at the sound of thunderous gunfire. Her arms went for her face as a few thousand pebbles threatened her eyes--
*WA--ZING! *
Something crashed by her foot, something heavy that caused the crumbling heliport to shake to its very foundations. Pebbles smashed harmlessly against her leg and onto her foot, but she managed to somehow force her body to move away. Her cement shoes crumbled as she made a mad dash for the elevator door, her arm taking the lead and her finger stabbing at the call button. Her safety greeted her with doors wide open, and she threw herself inside headfirst.
She flopped onto her back, kicking at the console blindly as her shoe dragged across the buttons. First floor, fourth floor, or heck--any button would do. The door slid closed easily, oblivious that heavy rounds crashed into the building--and welcome relief rushed through her body as she felt her guts push their way into her ribcage.
*Safe. for now. * She breathed.
***
"Shia." Uzi moaned rather loudly, his ears barley catching the thick exasperation over the muffled thrum of the rotors. "Care to explain how that wench found me so easily?"
"How the hell should I know, Mr. U?" the hitman's voice crackled through the earpiece. "I've been checking out my hotel's guest list since I've been here, and no one's checked in under the name Kim Possible. Though I did feel sorry for this one guy named Richard Head. I mean--come on! Who'd name their kid that--?"
"Ugh--!" he rolled his eyes. "What does that have to do with anything?"
"Sir!" Shia said. "She could be working for Hershel for all we know."
"Yes, you're probably right." He nodded, and the corners of his lips dropped to a frown as he gazed at what his helicopter had created. Holes as big as softballs pockmarked the roof, shrinking to mere ping-pong balls as the turret trailed veered its fire from the middle of the roof to the elevator doors. He could only see that a couple of bullets had graced them with their presence. But nowhere on the undulated roof did his eye catch the wench's torn body, not even a smear of her crimson. "So the wench thought she had escaped. Pf--guess again!"
"Orders, sir?" Shia asked.
"Move the chopper around the building's perimeter," he said, "and sweep around the circumference of each floor. Engage the target as she appears. The wench must not leave the hospital under any circumstances."
"Does that mean I get to shoot something, Sir?" the friend inquired with a rather jokily demeanor. He rolled his eyes. Shia asked him this every time.
"If you must," he replied indifferently, "you must. Just keep the casualties to a minimum. Has the second team arrived?"
"Yes sir." The friend replied. "They've just parked right in front of the building."
"Good. Have them initiate a full sweep of the premises, floor-to-floor and room-to-room. Now do it!"
"Sir!"
***
Ron timidly lifted his palms from off his ears; the full-blown headache pounding in his ears as if he'd listened to a 21-gun salute up close and personal. He didn't know what the hell was going on. He had sneaked into the Hummer, playing it sneaky as he took a seat behind the wheel. As he familiarized himself with the basic controls, levers and pedals and such, his ears caught the sound of air chopping, just barely over a faint, fleeting whine of machinery.
He had climbed over to the passenger seat gracefully over the primitive console, and the steady chopping seemed to have magically obtained a voice, speaking an unintelligible, garbled tirade that fought for its place over the copter rotors. He poked his head outside the window like a gopher peeking outside its tunnel. The Apache on the white-capped roof had lifted off of the building, hovering seemingly atop the edge as it blurted out its incoherent rant--
--*RATATATATATATATATATATAT*--
--That ceased completely as a huge flume of swirling fire engulfed the tip of the Longbow. His hands capped his ears as the nearby populous ran for dear life screaming bloody murder, his head throbbing with a pain no more annoying that a headache. A lengthy glint of streaming brass fell out of the fireball, alongside dark bits and pieces metal like the remains of a shredded chain, flowing out of the copter like deer droppings till the fireball was thrown to the wind by the rotor-wash.
"Ugh.!" he shook his head like a drunkard. "You okay, little buddy?"
"Oh.!" the pink buddy stumbled around like a smashed frat boy, his paws pressed against his bald crown. "Ouch!"
"Kim's in trouble, Rufus!" he shook his head fiercely, shaking sense back into himself. "I can feel it!"
"Huh--!" the rat rolled its beady eyes. "Duh!"
He blinked as he gazed at the dark, front doors of the hospital as they flung wide open. A huge, white mass of people spilled out of the building, many were like Halloween ghosts in their white coats and white gowns as they floated quickly into the street, dispersing in all directions. Many went for the hospital parking lot while the others ran wherever safety could be found.
In the dispersing whiteout, his eyes caught a glimpse of a simple, pink heart, swaying wildly left and right, as it grew closer to his position. A few feet away from the Hummer, he could see the owner's body; her head capped with puffy auburn hair.
"KIM!" he yelled into the confusion. "Over here!"
The auburn was at the back corner of the vehicle, going for the domestic POS as her shoes stopped moving. The girl spun on heels, that puffy mass of red hair swinging to her backside. He thrust his arm out the window, his hand waving like a treetop in the breeze as the auburn nodded. She ran behind the vehicle, and Ron retook his place at the helm--
--And he was pushed, quite literally--*tossed* back into the passenger's side. He shot the girl a dirty glare as she hopped into the driver's seat, the cabin rocking as she slammed the door. He glanced down at Rufus, his child laid flat upon the primitive console with his head underneath his pudgy arms, shivering pathetically.
"KIM!" he yelled. "You nearly crushed Rufus!"
"Sorry, Ron--!" she jumped at the engine's whirring whine as she turned the key, releasing it when her ears caught the screech. "But I'm driving!"
"Pf--like that's anything new!" he folded his arms in a huff.
Kim took at deep breath after she jerked the shifter into gear, the car jerking a bit the second it was free of the parking brake. Her gaze went blank; her eyes locked onto a corner of the windshield as her hands wringed the wheel like a motorbike's throttle. There was a small *CREAK* before the car lurched forward, and her eyes darted at him quickly, her emerald gaze so grave and serious he felt his heart stop.
"Buckle up." She said calmly, ironically--
--And he barely heard her stomp on the gas over the engine's roar, his head pressed against the seat as the boring sights of the "R" street rolled--no--*smeared* past his window.
"KIM!!" he and his buddy screamed together.
"I said buckle up!" she yelled.
***
Uzi couldn't get it out of his mind as the Apache carefully rounded the corner, swinging the craft parallel to Roentgenova 2 as its gun traced upon the dark windows. His good eye caught the glimpse of a vehicle, a hummer screeching its tires in a soft plume of smoke before it tore down the street. Emblazoned on its side in red were the characters of his outfit.
"Shia." He said curiously, putting a nicked finger to his undulated chin. "Where did you say the second team was again?"
"Uh." the friend droned monotonously, like a character in that perverted American cartoon that went off the air sometime ago. "They should be in the hospital like you ordered, sir."
"Hmm." he picked up the transmitter from the control panel, his gnarled fingers punching in the button as he moved the device closer to his lips. "Bravo team, what's your status?"
He lifted the finger off of the button like he would with the trigger of his pistol, his ears listening intently to the static of his radio. It was a feature he had installed previously, just incase he had problems with the earpieces or the helmets.
He depressed the button again. "Bravo team, what is your status? Bravo team, Respond!"
"Major Uzi!" a voice crackled through the static on his radio. "We're currently on the second floor, initiating a full sweep of the floor before we move on."
"Is there anyone inside your vehicle?" he replied.
"No sir." The voice replied. "Everyone is present and accounted for."
"Then." he depressed the button, and then it clicked as he relinquished his finger from it. A rage swept through him, burning in him as his mind could only come up with only one possibility. "Aw...! DAMN IT!!" His finger stabbed at the button again. "Bravo team! Get out of there!! Procure a vehicle and get your transport back!"
He tossed the transmitter at the console like a child in a raging fit. "Shia! Tail that vehicle, and stop it by any means necessary! I WANT THAT WENCH DEAD!!"
"Rodger!" the kid replied. and he felt his gut move strangely within his body, twisting up and down like gymnast as the friend moved the copter properly around. The world outside is angular canopy spun wildly on a broken axis. "And remind me to get some scopolamine hydrobromide."
Shia laughed. "Ha--! Yes sir."
***
"Easy there, T." Yune lifted up his hand as the blonde touched her foot back down on the carpet. While Kim and Ron were away, doing their thing, he decided it was a good idea for the girl to practice and refine her roundhouse kicks. And did she need it, considering how the lamp nearly split in two from an unpracticed strike. "Remember, you're trying to connect with your target, not everything else in the environment."
"Oh--come on now!" her limbs went limp, dropping to her sides while her head dropped back. "I'm doing my best."
"That may be," he shook his head, "but you don't want your toes broken in the process. Believe me, I found that out the hard way!"
"What's wrong now?" her limp head rocked side to side.
"Training in the martial arts isn't easy, T." he shrugged. "*Dojang* training is a lot harder than what I'm trying to teach you."
She lifted her head back up, a kink on her thin eyebrow as she leveled her skull. "Dojang?"
"Hmm--*Dojo* if that helps." He said. "Trust me that an hour in one of those places can seem like an eternity. And the masters in that place aren't as polite as I am, and they'll bitch at you about everything you do wrong."
"So what the hell's wrong with my kick?" her blue eyes rolled in her head.
"Pick up your leg, like you want to strike me." He said. "And extend it out slowly at half speed."
Like an apt pupil she lifted up her leg rather quickly, extending her whole leg out in front of her in a primitive roundhouse kick. Her toes were curled and pressed tightly together, a typical sign of a newcomer to the arts. He strolled over to the shapely limb, a little less than an arm's reach away from her foot.
"Problem one:" he simply took her foot into his grasp, fingers squeezing gently against her soft arch, "your foot needs to be bent at the ankle, like your standing on the ground. And two:" he slid his fingers up to the ball of her foot, taking her toes between his thumb and finger, flexing them up to a natural angle, "keep your toes up. You'd want to strike your opponent with the ball of your foot."
"Hmm--yes, Sensei." She giggled, and his eyes rolled.
"Pf." he shook his head. "You're too girly for combat."
Something tapped onto the side of his knee, rather hardly like someone struck him with a wimpy kick.
"What's that supposed to mean?" the girl glared at him, her hands resting on her round hips by the back of her wrists.
"It means what it means, T." he chuckled--and felt her foot crash lightly into his knee again. "Hey! Patient abuse!"
"Oh--you're going to feel abused when I get done with you!" she smirked.
"Oh--" he waved his hand at her teasingly, "scary woman!"
From somewhere in the room a rather noisy tune played out, fairly reminiscent of something like one of Mozart's works. It had a whiny and shrill character to it, like it had been digitized without a care in the world from its programmer--
"Phone.!" the girl moaned like a pompous master to her servant. He felt his eyes roll again.
"Oh please!" he shook his head as he went for his bag. "Don't move! Don't hassle yourself! Let me, your ever faithful servant, get the accursed phone."
"Now that's more like it." She grinned. "It's so hard to find good help these days, right Jives?"
"But of course, m'lady." The small travel bag continued to bleat that poorly digitized tune as he dug his good hand into the sack. His fingers ran across the many textures of his shirts and pants, feeling the individual fibers brush the tips. He grasped the Nokia when a nail tapped against its plastic shell, pulling it out. He thumbed the blue-lined button.
"Hello?" he said.
"Yune?" that familiar, boyish voice blared into his ears. He really had to turn down the phone's volume sometime.
"Indeed, it is." He nodded. "So what calls for Kim's genius Webmaster to phone me?"
"It's just that, Bin-Mok." The boy said. "Kim would call you herself, except she's occupied at the moment."
"What's wrong?" he asked.
"Yune." he felt his blood ran cold, just at the tone of voice, "Uzi's alive."
His eyes nearly popped out from their sockets. "What??" he blinked. "That can't be!"
"It can be." The boy replied. "The guy's up and kicking. Well. most of him anyway. He's with that Bonnet person right now, giving Kim and Ron a run for their lives as we speak!"
"Well--what am I supposed to do?" he exclaimed. "Sit and pray with my thumbs up my ass!"
The Webmaster let out a revolted groan, exclaiming it over the receiver. "OH--I did NOT need to picture that!"
"Focus, Wade!" he frowned.
"I'm perfectly focused!" the kid replied. "Focused on that nasty mental picture you gave me!"
"Wade.!" he said in a slow, angered drawl. The volume was a crescendo.
"Kim wanted me to tell you to get your stuff together and get ready to leave." The boy replied. "She'll meet you right outside the hotel as soon as she loses the tail."
Faintly, out of the corner of his eye, he saw the blonde switch on the television. Her wavy hair bounced, patting onto the back of the couch as she took a seat. He wasn't sure, but he could have sworn he heard the girl gasp quite audibly over the Webmaster's voice.
"Wait a minute!" he exclaimed. "She's being followed?"
"You bet!" the boy affirmed. "You're going to have to see this one to believe it."
"I don't think I'd want to know." He shook his head.
"Ignorance is bliss, right?" the boy asked.
"In spades!" he nodded.
"Right." The boy said. "I'm going to let you go now. Just hurry up and check out of the hotel. As of now, you guys are officially leaving the Czech Republic."
"How?"
"Don't worry about it." The boy replied. "Hershel's on it. Just get packing!"
"Right!" he thumbed the blue-lined button, feeling that little click beneath his digit before the phone dropped back into the bag. He turned toward the girl, who was preoccupied with the television at the moment. What she was watching, he couldn't be sure, but it looked like a desert- camouflaged attack helicopter was chasing a car down some olden, cobblestone street.
"Tara." He said loudly over the Czech narrative of the TV.
"Yes honey?" she called.
"Are you packed, in the sense that you can leave on the spot?" he asked quickly.
She lifted her slender arm into the air, waving it halfheartedly. "Yeah." She called. "Everything's in there except my pajamas."
"Well get them packed and get your shoes on." The zipper's whine was a staccato, his good fingers jerking the fastener across the length of the bag. He only had one the travel bag to worry about, since he always traveled light. "Were leaving the country today."
"Aw." the blonde moaned girly. "But I wanted to take a boat ride down the Moldau with you."
"Hate to burst you romantic bubble, sweetie," the zipper was silenced as it reached the end of its line, "but we can't stay any longer. But I'll make it up to you when I can."
The blonde rolled onto her belly on the couch, resting her chin atop of her folded arms. Across her lips, she wore an eager, wide smile.
"You mean it?" she grinned.
"I promise it, Tara." He nodded. He couldn't help but return the gesture with a warm smile. "Now get your things packed."
She pushed herself off of the couch. "Yes sir!" she laughed.
Kim lost her breath suddenly, all of it escaping out of her body on its own as she felt something solid--*really* solid smash into her side. Her body felt like gelatin, crumpling to the ground while something slapped this pistol away, her head slamming against the painted drywall. The swivel chair let out a racket as her body inadvertently toppled it over; her ears catching an erratic clatter of many an object on the floor as she saw the curved knife fly aimlessly towards the bed.
"HUH.!" she breathed quickly, and faintly she heard something tap onto the floor. On the cream tiled floor stood a pair of legs; one of flesh while the other was nothing more metal peg, with some kind of hinge for a knee. Seemingly in slow motion, her eyes trailed up the legs, stomach turning as they ran up those many heinous scars. Her heart beat in her ears as she saw those smug "eyes" of her target gazing coldly upon her-- waiting almost for the prime time to deal the deathblow.
"What's wrong?" he asked, a smug grin played on his wrinkled lips. "Don't like what your hands created?"
"Think of it--!" she coughed. ".As professional courtesy!"
The boy let out an amused grunt. "In that case, let me extend to you the same civility."
--Which seemed to be hidden deep within the violent anger as the twisted, mangled form fell upon her like a corpse. Quickly she kicked up her legs as the marked limbs scrambled wildly, feeling the fingers grazing her throat like a rabid dog. Her shoes kicked upon the boy, dancing flamenco on his chest as it were. The soles flattened evenly upon his mangled abs while she forced all her strength down to her legs.
"EH. YAH!!" she grunted--and the target flew across the small room, the remnants of his limbs jutting helplessly towards her like a rag doll. The scarred mess flipped over backwards, letting out a loud *TING* as his metallic head met the guardrail. where that Nepalese blade sat ready on the wrinkled bedspread.
Uzi disappeared below the mattress--
--Only to pop back out with his hand scrambling for the blade. Her heart beat madly beneath her shirt as he lifted the blade up, chambering it in a severe arc. The piece of cloth around her chest pulsated to the mad beat of the organ even faster as the kid brought the arm down--and that piece of metal became nothing more than a black line as it flew through the air, its length increasing with every millisecond.
She was going to die!
***
Uzi smirked as that wench cowered beneath her slender arms, her eyes clamped shut as he could feel the last centimeter of the blade's grip graze against the tip of his fingers. The blade let out a quick *BOING* as it cut deeply into the drywall, digging a bit into a piece the wench's pink pants.
"Ah." he chuckled. "I'm right on target, as usual. And Vasili called himself crack-shot."
Beneath the makeshift brim of her hands, the auburn opened her green eyes, batting them a little. Her head moved from side to side, from left to right in disbelief, as if there was any doubt to her continued existence. He did put on quite a show though, given her reaction.
"Mr. Drazen!" the nurse said firmly in her native Czech. "What is going on here?"
"I'm sorry, my dear." He replied in the language, limping around the corner of the bed with a *TINK* from his temporary prosthetic at a time, as if nothing had happened at all. The "knee" of the pole let out a squeak as it buckled. Taking a knee, he collected the weapons the wench had crudely spilled onto the floor. "But given comprised attention of my presence, I have to take my leave."
"But. what about your bills?" the woman asked nervously as he swung the slings of his UZI guns over his bare shoulder.
"Put it on my tab." He smirked. He always wanted to say that. Something moved close by, and his eyes caught the auburn stretched out upon the tiled floor, pinned by her pant leg. Her arm reached for the Jericho a mere inch away from her longest finger, a futile attempt for a last ditch effort if he ever saw one.
"Ah-ah-ah!" his voice quickly switched to his accented English as he leaned on the wall for support. He easily concentrated all 145 pounds of his body upon her wrist at the bottom of his peg. From out the wench came a painful sound, like a winding grunt, and her fingers folded gently, lifting upwards at their bases like the legs of dying spider. "That's my gun now."
He easily scooped it up, wedging it underneath his arm alongside his primary pistol. He lifted his ill-fitted leg, and the girl quickly folded into herself on her side, her other hand snatching onto the throbbing wrist. He thought he could see something red trickle from the limb, but he couldn't be sure.
"Did that hurt?" he said in mockery. "Good!"
"D. --Don't think you're getting away with this!" the girl cocked her head back, her emerald eye beaming the pain. "Murderer!"
"Whatever you think, wench." He sighed--and the wench's crown was touching her knees when he brought down his peg upon her head like an axe kick. She let out a loud grunt as he simply stepped over her form, rounding the partition and limping for the door. "Shalom!"
He brushed passed the door quickly, making a slow left as he limped for the next junction, to where the elevators sat for roof access if he remembered right.
"Just hope Shia didn't leave yet!" he grunted.
***
Ron watched helplessly from the bushes as the men in olive drab stumbled out of their Hummer right in front of them. Something stuck him as the last grunt filed out of the transport while the other five headed for hospital door. On the backs of them were printed Hebrew characters, emblazoned in red like the Hebrew he saw painted on the Osprey back in the Senor Senior villa.
"I don't believe this, Rufus!" he said quietly in the brush, leaning casually on a trunk of some kind. "I step out to pee for a minute, and I find these guys pulling up to the curb!"
"Uh." the mole rat said quietly. He trailed down his body onto his cargo pants; the rat poked his head out of the "burrow", the flap of the pocket draping over his hairless head while he pointed. "No parking!"
His lifted his head back onto his shoulders, and he turned slowly so not to attract a whole lot of attention. His indifferent gaze met the post of a sign no more than a few feet away from the car, trailing up the holed surface till they reached a red painted sign. He didn't know a thing about the Czech language, but the color red was universal. or had to be.
"Oh right.!" he nodded sheepishly. "But whether or not they're parked illegally, Kim's not going to like this a bit."
"Uh-huh." The rat nodded. "Hmm--yeah!"
"But how our we going to get out of here with those guys? Their ride's faster than this POS--!" He blinked as he caught sight of the grunt's Hummer parked right in front of the Skoda, its owners letting the big engine purr carelessly on its own with no one tending to the driver's seat. His palm met the top of his brow rather hard.
"Rufus," He smirked, looking down upon his son with a wicked grin on his face, "do you still wonder what it's like to drive a Hummer?"
"Um-hmm--um-hmm!" the mole rat nodded fiercely with anticipation. "Yeah!"
"Boo-yah!" he pumped his fist in the air. "The Ron-Factor strikes again!"
***
"Come on!" Kim grunted as she locked her fingers around the kukri's tiny grip again. "Come on!"
Her muscles bulged from underneath her skin, flexing as she tried to work the curved blade free, regardless of how much her wrist rebelled against her wishes. After a minute of trying, she could feel the blade wiggle a bit more freely through the steel, but it wasn't enough. Her fingers laced together around the tiny grip, easing the blade back and forth, up and down in the little niche of its owner's making. The motions came easier with each period, moving like an over-greased pendulum--
--*Shing! *--
--"Got it!"--
--Until she worked the blade free of the wall. The blade made a passing clatter on the tile as she released it from her grasp, the wrist swinging for mouth blindly and it pressed through her lips. Her tongue swathed over the back gently, tasting a few drops of her blood as the muscle bathed it with her saliva, relieving it of a little pain for a while.
She removed it from her mouth, her eyes cringing as they ran across the circle than dented her skin. A few pieces of skin were broken, drips of red oozing out them in its own time.
"Ugh.!" she gave the wrist a few rubs with her free hand.
She lifted up her leg naturally, grabbing the limb by the ankle and she swung it out as far as her tendons and ligaments would let her. There was a gash in her pants, about an inch long and a half a centimeter wide at the bottom of the leg where the cuffs flared out.
"Aw man!" she shook her head. "These were brand new Club Banana! Damn Uzi!"
From the floor, she scooped up the blade and clenched it tightly by the grip. Something else caught her by her eyes, laying flat on the tile floor like someone had dropped it on mistake. Her fingers had barely grazed at the blue object as she slid it over to her side. She took it into her hand, her eyes rolling as it was nothing more than an everyday ZIP disk that someone must have dropped--
*Lost-and-found later! * Her mind exclaimed. *Get the target! *
Everything in the tiny room brushed past her as her fingers jerked the disk into her pocket, speeding out the door just to come to a halt as she whipped her head around the hand-railed corridor. Doctors and nurses in the hallway scrambled, stopping for a moment only to take off as their eyes locked with what was in her tight grip.
--Something to her left let out a noisy clang, and she looked to find a small tray of turned on its side, its contents of medical supplies spilled onto the floor. Draping atop of the tray was a woman--probably a nurse--dressed in scrubs, holding her hand on top of her shaking head.
She raced quickly for the woman before she caught a hold of her senses, stuffing the kukri blade carefully between her pants and her belt like a sheath. She took a knee beside the woman as she laid her crowning hand onto the floor.
"Excuse me." She calmed herself enough so that her normal voice spoke through. The woman pushed away from the floor, hitting her back to the wall awkwardly as if someone had grabbed her and thrown her.
"Please--!" the woman cried in accented English. "Do not hurt me!"
"You speak English?" she blinked.
"Yes!" the woman nodded. "Do not hurt me! I did not do anything!"
"I never said you did." She smiled weakly. "But I need your help. Did you see anyone run through here recently?"
"I did!" The woman was on the verge of hysteria. "He was naked and armed! He was running for the. oh--what's the word?"
"Elevator?" she said.
"Yes--elevator!" the woman bobbed her head quickly. "There is a military helicopter on the roof!"
"I know." She nodded. "I saw it outside. But I need you to tell me where this elevator is."
"Down the hall, and to your right!" the woman cried. "Please! Let me go!"
She didn't need to hear anymore as she sprinted off for the junction. As she approached the T-junction, she spun around in mid-stride, running backward the second her shoes touched the ground.
"Thanks!" she called, and she spun back around in time before she got a face full of wall. The elevator nook was closer than what she had expected, no more than a couple of yards ahead of her and closing. Her shoes let out a screech as she came to a halt in front of it, dashing for the open sliding doors, as they were about to close. Spinning quickly on her heels, her fingers stabbed at the button marked PH.
The doors touched each other when they closed. Moving parts above her shifted quickly. and she felt a few pounds heavier as the assent began. Her heavy stomach twisted as she thought about what--no--*who* waited for her at the top of the shaft. Uzi Drazen, a man that death could not lay its bony fingers upon. And if the Grim Reaper couldn't reel him in.
*Then how can I? *
Her guts settled back into their original place as the mechanical humming of the lift ceased. The bell overhead let out a faint ding, and the ferocious winds brushed against her face as the doors slid open, all at the sound of like a giant propeller's buzz. Her arms shielded her face as she stepped out onto the roof; the annoying buzz was deafening while the winds threw her hair in wild directions like she was in the middle of a windstorm.
*Helicopter on the roof.! * Her mind could only whisper in the droning roar.
"The roof!" her arms parted from her face, and her eyes could see the large Apache ready for take off, rotor gaining increasing air speed. At the cockpit, that naked target clawed his way up into a seat, trying to work that pole of a leg in through the closing canopy.
"UZI!" she screamed madly into the raging rotor-wash, taking the grip of the knife into her palm, she unsheathed it with an anger of a Viking berserker.
The kid managed to work his limb into the cockpit, as the canopy was about to synch shut. Through her drying eyes and through the dark glass, she could see that smug look play across his gnarled lips again.
"Ah. Wench Possible!" he shook his head, his indifferent voice blaring over a loudspeaker. "I'm afraid I cannot let you go any further."
"FURTHER THIS--CREEP!" she chucked the knife with all her might, watching it spin in defiance of the copter's whooshing rotors. There was a fleeting *TING* as it stuck proudly out of the chopper's nose, right next to where the canopy met the body. The canopy went ajar; lifting only so much that the kid could work his hand through and grab the knife. Her mouth dropped when the target yanked it off the nose like it was nothing, like Arthur to Excalibur.
"Thanks for the knife!" he grinned as the canopy closed again. She could just barely see the second person in the back fiddle with his helmet, particularly with that. tubular monocle thingy on his face. "But what on earth are you going to do now, Wench? Take on a Longbow with your bare hands? NOW YOU'RE MINE!!"
She bent at the knees, spacing her feet wide apart as if to move quickly. After the target spat his last words, her hair began to drop down onto her back as the copter went airborne a few feet, higher than what she could jump. Her spinning mind went blank as she saw that turret move on its swivel, jerking erratically side to side as if it tried to get a lock on something--
*Like me. *
"Move!"--
The heliport seemed to explode around her--and she couldn't move. Hundreds of cement fountains shot up high into the air, the many chunks mixing with each other as they rained down upon her at the sound of thunderous gunfire. Her arms went for her face as a few thousand pebbles threatened her eyes--
*WA--ZING! *
Something crashed by her foot, something heavy that caused the crumbling heliport to shake to its very foundations. Pebbles smashed harmlessly against her leg and onto her foot, but she managed to somehow force her body to move away. Her cement shoes crumbled as she made a mad dash for the elevator door, her arm taking the lead and her finger stabbing at the call button. Her safety greeted her with doors wide open, and she threw herself inside headfirst.
She flopped onto her back, kicking at the console blindly as her shoe dragged across the buttons. First floor, fourth floor, or heck--any button would do. The door slid closed easily, oblivious that heavy rounds crashed into the building--and welcome relief rushed through her body as she felt her guts push their way into her ribcage.
*Safe. for now. * She breathed.
***
"Shia." Uzi moaned rather loudly, his ears barley catching the thick exasperation over the muffled thrum of the rotors. "Care to explain how that wench found me so easily?"
"How the hell should I know, Mr. U?" the hitman's voice crackled through the earpiece. "I've been checking out my hotel's guest list since I've been here, and no one's checked in under the name Kim Possible. Though I did feel sorry for this one guy named Richard Head. I mean--come on! Who'd name their kid that--?"
"Ugh--!" he rolled his eyes. "What does that have to do with anything?"
"Sir!" Shia said. "She could be working for Hershel for all we know."
"Yes, you're probably right." He nodded, and the corners of his lips dropped to a frown as he gazed at what his helicopter had created. Holes as big as softballs pockmarked the roof, shrinking to mere ping-pong balls as the turret trailed veered its fire from the middle of the roof to the elevator doors. He could only see that a couple of bullets had graced them with their presence. But nowhere on the undulated roof did his eye catch the wench's torn body, not even a smear of her crimson. "So the wench thought she had escaped. Pf--guess again!"
"Orders, sir?" Shia asked.
"Move the chopper around the building's perimeter," he said, "and sweep around the circumference of each floor. Engage the target as she appears. The wench must not leave the hospital under any circumstances."
"Does that mean I get to shoot something, Sir?" the friend inquired with a rather jokily demeanor. He rolled his eyes. Shia asked him this every time.
"If you must," he replied indifferently, "you must. Just keep the casualties to a minimum. Has the second team arrived?"
"Yes sir." The friend replied. "They've just parked right in front of the building."
"Good. Have them initiate a full sweep of the premises, floor-to-floor and room-to-room. Now do it!"
"Sir!"
***
Ron timidly lifted his palms from off his ears; the full-blown headache pounding in his ears as if he'd listened to a 21-gun salute up close and personal. He didn't know what the hell was going on. He had sneaked into the Hummer, playing it sneaky as he took a seat behind the wheel. As he familiarized himself with the basic controls, levers and pedals and such, his ears caught the sound of air chopping, just barely over a faint, fleeting whine of machinery.
He had climbed over to the passenger seat gracefully over the primitive console, and the steady chopping seemed to have magically obtained a voice, speaking an unintelligible, garbled tirade that fought for its place over the copter rotors. He poked his head outside the window like a gopher peeking outside its tunnel. The Apache on the white-capped roof had lifted off of the building, hovering seemingly atop the edge as it blurted out its incoherent rant--
--*RATATATATATATATATATATAT*--
--That ceased completely as a huge flume of swirling fire engulfed the tip of the Longbow. His hands capped his ears as the nearby populous ran for dear life screaming bloody murder, his head throbbing with a pain no more annoying that a headache. A lengthy glint of streaming brass fell out of the fireball, alongside dark bits and pieces metal like the remains of a shredded chain, flowing out of the copter like deer droppings till the fireball was thrown to the wind by the rotor-wash.
"Ugh.!" he shook his head like a drunkard. "You okay, little buddy?"
"Oh.!" the pink buddy stumbled around like a smashed frat boy, his paws pressed against his bald crown. "Ouch!"
"Kim's in trouble, Rufus!" he shook his head fiercely, shaking sense back into himself. "I can feel it!"
"Huh--!" the rat rolled its beady eyes. "Duh!"
He blinked as he gazed at the dark, front doors of the hospital as they flung wide open. A huge, white mass of people spilled out of the building, many were like Halloween ghosts in their white coats and white gowns as they floated quickly into the street, dispersing in all directions. Many went for the hospital parking lot while the others ran wherever safety could be found.
In the dispersing whiteout, his eyes caught a glimpse of a simple, pink heart, swaying wildly left and right, as it grew closer to his position. A few feet away from the Hummer, he could see the owner's body; her head capped with puffy auburn hair.
"KIM!" he yelled into the confusion. "Over here!"
The auburn was at the back corner of the vehicle, going for the domestic POS as her shoes stopped moving. The girl spun on heels, that puffy mass of red hair swinging to her backside. He thrust his arm out the window, his hand waving like a treetop in the breeze as the auburn nodded. She ran behind the vehicle, and Ron retook his place at the helm--
--And he was pushed, quite literally--*tossed* back into the passenger's side. He shot the girl a dirty glare as she hopped into the driver's seat, the cabin rocking as she slammed the door. He glanced down at Rufus, his child laid flat upon the primitive console with his head underneath his pudgy arms, shivering pathetically.
"KIM!" he yelled. "You nearly crushed Rufus!"
"Sorry, Ron--!" she jumped at the engine's whirring whine as she turned the key, releasing it when her ears caught the screech. "But I'm driving!"
"Pf--like that's anything new!" he folded his arms in a huff.
Kim took at deep breath after she jerked the shifter into gear, the car jerking a bit the second it was free of the parking brake. Her gaze went blank; her eyes locked onto a corner of the windshield as her hands wringed the wheel like a motorbike's throttle. There was a small *CREAK* before the car lurched forward, and her eyes darted at him quickly, her emerald gaze so grave and serious he felt his heart stop.
"Buckle up." She said calmly, ironically--
--And he barely heard her stomp on the gas over the engine's roar, his head pressed against the seat as the boring sights of the "R" street rolled--no--*smeared* past his window.
"KIM!!" he and his buddy screamed together.
"I said buckle up!" she yelled.
***
Uzi couldn't get it out of his mind as the Apache carefully rounded the corner, swinging the craft parallel to Roentgenova 2 as its gun traced upon the dark windows. His good eye caught the glimpse of a vehicle, a hummer screeching its tires in a soft plume of smoke before it tore down the street. Emblazoned on its side in red were the characters of his outfit.
"Shia." He said curiously, putting a nicked finger to his undulated chin. "Where did you say the second team was again?"
"Uh." the friend droned monotonously, like a character in that perverted American cartoon that went off the air sometime ago. "They should be in the hospital like you ordered, sir."
"Hmm." he picked up the transmitter from the control panel, his gnarled fingers punching in the button as he moved the device closer to his lips. "Bravo team, what's your status?"
He lifted the finger off of the button like he would with the trigger of his pistol, his ears listening intently to the static of his radio. It was a feature he had installed previously, just incase he had problems with the earpieces or the helmets.
He depressed the button again. "Bravo team, what is your status? Bravo team, Respond!"
"Major Uzi!" a voice crackled through the static on his radio. "We're currently on the second floor, initiating a full sweep of the floor before we move on."
"Is there anyone inside your vehicle?" he replied.
"No sir." The voice replied. "Everyone is present and accounted for."
"Then." he depressed the button, and then it clicked as he relinquished his finger from it. A rage swept through him, burning in him as his mind could only come up with only one possibility. "Aw...! DAMN IT!!" His finger stabbed at the button again. "Bravo team! Get out of there!! Procure a vehicle and get your transport back!"
He tossed the transmitter at the console like a child in a raging fit. "Shia! Tail that vehicle, and stop it by any means necessary! I WANT THAT WENCH DEAD!!"
"Rodger!" the kid replied. and he felt his gut move strangely within his body, twisting up and down like gymnast as the friend moved the copter properly around. The world outside is angular canopy spun wildly on a broken axis. "And remind me to get some scopolamine hydrobromide."
Shia laughed. "Ha--! Yes sir."
***
"Easy there, T." Yune lifted up his hand as the blonde touched her foot back down on the carpet. While Kim and Ron were away, doing their thing, he decided it was a good idea for the girl to practice and refine her roundhouse kicks. And did she need it, considering how the lamp nearly split in two from an unpracticed strike. "Remember, you're trying to connect with your target, not everything else in the environment."
"Oh--come on now!" her limbs went limp, dropping to her sides while her head dropped back. "I'm doing my best."
"That may be," he shook his head, "but you don't want your toes broken in the process. Believe me, I found that out the hard way!"
"What's wrong now?" her limp head rocked side to side.
"Training in the martial arts isn't easy, T." he shrugged. "*Dojang* training is a lot harder than what I'm trying to teach you."
She lifted her head back up, a kink on her thin eyebrow as she leveled her skull. "Dojang?"
"Hmm--*Dojo* if that helps." He said. "Trust me that an hour in one of those places can seem like an eternity. And the masters in that place aren't as polite as I am, and they'll bitch at you about everything you do wrong."
"So what the hell's wrong with my kick?" her blue eyes rolled in her head.
"Pick up your leg, like you want to strike me." He said. "And extend it out slowly at half speed."
Like an apt pupil she lifted up her leg rather quickly, extending her whole leg out in front of her in a primitive roundhouse kick. Her toes were curled and pressed tightly together, a typical sign of a newcomer to the arts. He strolled over to the shapely limb, a little less than an arm's reach away from her foot.
"Problem one:" he simply took her foot into his grasp, fingers squeezing gently against her soft arch, "your foot needs to be bent at the ankle, like your standing on the ground. And two:" he slid his fingers up to the ball of her foot, taking her toes between his thumb and finger, flexing them up to a natural angle, "keep your toes up. You'd want to strike your opponent with the ball of your foot."
"Hmm--yes, Sensei." She giggled, and his eyes rolled.
"Pf." he shook his head. "You're too girly for combat."
Something tapped onto the side of his knee, rather hardly like someone struck him with a wimpy kick.
"What's that supposed to mean?" the girl glared at him, her hands resting on her round hips by the back of her wrists.
"It means what it means, T." he chuckled--and felt her foot crash lightly into his knee again. "Hey! Patient abuse!"
"Oh--you're going to feel abused when I get done with you!" she smirked.
"Oh--" he waved his hand at her teasingly, "scary woman!"
From somewhere in the room a rather noisy tune played out, fairly reminiscent of something like one of Mozart's works. It had a whiny and shrill character to it, like it had been digitized without a care in the world from its programmer--
"Phone.!" the girl moaned like a pompous master to her servant. He felt his eyes roll again.
"Oh please!" he shook his head as he went for his bag. "Don't move! Don't hassle yourself! Let me, your ever faithful servant, get the accursed phone."
"Now that's more like it." She grinned. "It's so hard to find good help these days, right Jives?"
"But of course, m'lady." The small travel bag continued to bleat that poorly digitized tune as he dug his good hand into the sack. His fingers ran across the many textures of his shirts and pants, feeling the individual fibers brush the tips. He grasped the Nokia when a nail tapped against its plastic shell, pulling it out. He thumbed the blue-lined button.
"Hello?" he said.
"Yune?" that familiar, boyish voice blared into his ears. He really had to turn down the phone's volume sometime.
"Indeed, it is." He nodded. "So what calls for Kim's genius Webmaster to phone me?"
"It's just that, Bin-Mok." The boy said. "Kim would call you herself, except she's occupied at the moment."
"What's wrong?" he asked.
"Yune." he felt his blood ran cold, just at the tone of voice, "Uzi's alive."
His eyes nearly popped out from their sockets. "What??" he blinked. "That can't be!"
"It can be." The boy replied. "The guy's up and kicking. Well. most of him anyway. He's with that Bonnet person right now, giving Kim and Ron a run for their lives as we speak!"
"Well--what am I supposed to do?" he exclaimed. "Sit and pray with my thumbs up my ass!"
The Webmaster let out a revolted groan, exclaiming it over the receiver. "OH--I did NOT need to picture that!"
"Focus, Wade!" he frowned.
"I'm perfectly focused!" the kid replied. "Focused on that nasty mental picture you gave me!"
"Wade.!" he said in a slow, angered drawl. The volume was a crescendo.
"Kim wanted me to tell you to get your stuff together and get ready to leave." The boy replied. "She'll meet you right outside the hotel as soon as she loses the tail."
Faintly, out of the corner of his eye, he saw the blonde switch on the television. Her wavy hair bounced, patting onto the back of the couch as she took a seat. He wasn't sure, but he could have sworn he heard the girl gasp quite audibly over the Webmaster's voice.
"Wait a minute!" he exclaimed. "She's being followed?"
"You bet!" the boy affirmed. "You're going to have to see this one to believe it."
"I don't think I'd want to know." He shook his head.
"Ignorance is bliss, right?" the boy asked.
"In spades!" he nodded.
"Right." The boy said. "I'm going to let you go now. Just hurry up and check out of the hotel. As of now, you guys are officially leaving the Czech Republic."
"How?"
"Don't worry about it." The boy replied. "Hershel's on it. Just get packing!"
"Right!" he thumbed the blue-lined button, feeling that little click beneath his digit before the phone dropped back into the bag. He turned toward the girl, who was preoccupied with the television at the moment. What she was watching, he couldn't be sure, but it looked like a desert- camouflaged attack helicopter was chasing a car down some olden, cobblestone street.
"Tara." He said loudly over the Czech narrative of the TV.
"Yes honey?" she called.
"Are you packed, in the sense that you can leave on the spot?" he asked quickly.
She lifted her slender arm into the air, waving it halfheartedly. "Yeah." She called. "Everything's in there except my pajamas."
"Well get them packed and get your shoes on." The zipper's whine was a staccato, his good fingers jerking the fastener across the length of the bag. He only had one the travel bag to worry about, since he always traveled light. "Were leaving the country today."
"Aw." the blonde moaned girly. "But I wanted to take a boat ride down the Moldau with you."
"Hate to burst you romantic bubble, sweetie," the zipper was silenced as it reached the end of its line, "but we can't stay any longer. But I'll make it up to you when I can."
The blonde rolled onto her belly on the couch, resting her chin atop of her folded arms. Across her lips, she wore an eager, wide smile.
"You mean it?" she grinned.
"I promise it, Tara." He nodded. He couldn't help but return the gesture with a warm smile. "Now get your things packed."
She pushed herself off of the couch. "Yes sir!" she laughed.