Jerry, see if you can reach the ceiling of the car.”
Jerry extended his hand experimentally. “Sure. Now what?”
“See if you can find the service hatch.”
Jerry prodded at the ceiling as the car continued its jerky climb. Finally
one of the ceiling sections flipped back to reveal an opening perhaps two
feet square.
“Okay,” Wiz said, “we climb up on top of the car.”
“Is that safe?” Jerry asked dubiously.
“Safer than meeting a reception committee. Now hoist Danny up, will you?”
With Jerry’s help Danny easily wriggled through the hatch. June followed
lithely with a slight assist from Danny. Wiz followed June with an easy
leap and a quick chin up. That left Wiz, Danny and June on top of the
elevator and Jerry in the car.
Since Jerry weighed nearly as much as Wiz and Danny put together this
presented a problem. Since Jerry was not exactly light on his feet, it
presented a serious problem. The first attempt to hoist Jerry through the
opening nearly pulled Wiz and Danny back into the car. Finally, Wiz
dropped back into the car to push from below while Danny heaved from
above. With much tugging and shoving, they were able to get Jerry onto the
roof of the car.
Then the elevator ground to a stop and the doors started to open.
Wiz leaped for the hatch and wriggled through just as the doors ground
open. Before they could close the panel two goblin guards strode into the
elevator with drawn laser pistols. As the four humans held their breath
the guards looked around suspiciously, their weapons tracking their head
movements.
One snorted like a bull and drew in a deep breath, as if testing the air.
His companion grunted something to him and he exhaled with a grunt. They
looked around again, but they did not look up.
Finally the pair backed out of the car and the doors closed. After a
moment, the elevator creaked and jerked and started upward again.
Wiz let out a deep breath and nearly collapsed with relief.
“It’s the helmets,” Jerry said after a moment.
“What?”
“The helmets. They’re so ornate the guards have trouble looking up.” He
shook his head. “Bad design. Like a lot of this place.”
“Personally I think it’s great design,” Wiz said sharply. “It just saved
our bacon.”
“Aw, we could have taken them easy,” Danny said. “A few lightning bolts
and, hey-” He made a gun with his finger and mimed shooting at the door.
There was a flash of blue spark from his fingertip and a large scorch mark
appeared on the wall of the shaft.
Danny looked down at his finger in surprise. “I didn’t know it was
loaded.”
“Well, holster it. And remember we’re just a little bit outnumbered here.
We don’t start throwing fireballs until we absolutely have to.”
“Get ready then,” Jerry said, looking up at the indicator over the door.
“We may have to. We’re almost there.”
Quickly the three magicians arranged themselves to have the best field of
fire when the door opened. All three of them muttered preparation spells
so they could come out shooting if they had to. Then they waited.
The elevator creaked and swayed, jerked twice more and then expired with a
sigh. The doors started to open, slammed closed, and then slid all the way
open with a despairing groan-leaving them looking at a blank stone wall.
Wiz looked down through the hatch and out the open door. At the bottom of
the door there was a narrow slit of corridor visible, perhaps eighteen
inches wide. The elevator had gone almost completely past their intended
floor.
“Shit!” Wiz muttered and all of them quickly dropped through the hatch
into the car.
Jerry reached out and punched the elevator button. The car lurched and
groaned again, but did not move.
“Reminds me of the elevator at a Star Trek convention in Denver,” he said.
“We’ll have to squeeze out through that space then,” Wiz said.
Jerry eyed the slit. “I don’t know if I’ve got that much octopus blood in
me,” he said dubiously.
“Maybe there are working controls outside,” Wiz said as he knelt to slip