I wrote a POST a little while back as a response to one of the Mariannewest 5-minute prompts. In it, I got my characters into an impossible situation, one I couldn't think of a way out of, so I wrote another post asking people to make posts coming up with ideas to get them out of it.
As part of that, I threatened that if no-one came up with any ideas before Monday (today) I'd write a gruesome sequel where they all died.
Well, it's Monday, but I had an idea......
Image created by AI in NightCafe Studio
Inspector Chivers took a deep breath. Things didn't look good.
If the teller let go of the switch, the bomb would go off and they'd all die. If he, Smith and Jones tried to make a break for it, they'd set off the motion sensors, the bomb would go off and they'd all die. If they tried to shoot the motion sensors out, they'd have to hit and destroy every one of them simultaneously, or the tamper sensors would kick in, the bomb would go off, and they'd all die.
He couldn't even see the wiring for the bomb, let alone make enough sense of it that he might be able to shoot out a critical wire that would disarm it.
Priorities, priorities....
First one was to calm the teller down. She was clearly close to a complete breakdown, and if she let go of the switch then it was all over. The spring on the thing was strong, and sooner or later her strength would fail anyway, but there was no way Chivers wanted to accelerate the situation.
"Hey, what's your name ? I don't just want to call you 'oi, you !'"
"L.... Laura," the girl replied shakily.
"How long have you worked here ? Is this the first time something like this has happened to you ?"
"Ye... yes sir. I've only been at Floyds Bank for a month, I'm the newest one here. I guess that's why they picked on me."
Chivers studied her. She was young, maybe twenty. Both hands were clamped over the switch like a vice. Tears had made tracks down her makeup, but even with that and the expression of dread and terror on her face he could see she was quite pretty. She looked very smart in her uniform, it hadn't had time to pick up the wear and tear of years of daily use.
Then he had a thought.
"If you knew it would get us all out of this sticky situation, do you feel strong enough to hold the switch with just one hand for, oh, five minutes ?"
"I... yes, I think I could. I hope."
"Good, good. Okay, I know this is a personal question Laura, but are you wearing stockings or tights ?"
She looked confused.
"Stockings.... "
"Excellent. What I want you to do is very carefully hold the switch with one hand, and with the other, take off one stocking. It doesn't matter which. Take your time, and if you need to stop and hold the switch with both hands for a bit, that's fine."
Nodding, Laura changed her grip, holding the switch as tightly as she could with just one hand. Then she kicked off a shoe, hitched her skirt up a little way and started to undo the clips holding her stocking up.
She had to stop a couple of times. She was wobbly and shaking, but the knuckles of the hand on the switch were white with the pressure she was putting on it.
Finally, used her other foot to anchor the bottom of the stocking and pulled it off.
Chivers grinned. For the first time he had a hope his idea might work.
"Nicely done, Laura ! Now what I want you to do it take the stocking and wrap it around the switch. You'll have to kind of drag it under your finger holding the switch down without letting go even slightly. Wrap it round as tightly as you can, as many times as you can."
He watched as she did this. She was moving with purpose now. Very slowly and carefully, but that was a good thing.
Then his heart sank. Even though she was wrapping it as tightly as she could, the way she had to pull it under her finger meant that it wasn't tight enough.
"Okay Laura, it's going to need to be tighter than that."
Her mouth twitched, and he saw despair cross her features. "I can't. Not again. It won't work. I'm not strong enough."
"Don't worry Laura. I've got an idea. It's going to be okay. First of all, I want everyone ready to run for the back door as soon as I give the word."
Laura nodded, and Smith and Jones slung their rifles and got themselves ready to sprint for it.
"Right Laura," Chivers said, sounding as confident as he could, "turn around slowly. There's a pen on the desk. Pick it up and slide it along the side of the switch, inside the stocking. Then twist it to tighten the whole thing up, like one of those rubber band aeroplanes. Keep twisting until you can't twist any more. Tell me when you feel the pressure of the switch under your finger reduce to nothing. Got it ?"
She nodded again and twisted the pen to tighten up the stocking. When it was done, she asked "Now what ? As soon as I let go, it's just going to unwind again. We're still going to die."
Grinning again, Chivers told her "No. Open a drawer on the desk slightly and wedge it in there. Don't let go, though. You want to wedge it in so the pen can't spin and unwind itself. Then, tell me it's done. I'll give the word, you let go and we'll all run for it. Okay ?"
She carefully opened the drawer a little, pushed the switch-pen-stocking assemblage into it, looked at Chivers and nodded.
"Okay, I'll count from three to one. When I get to one, Laura you let go and all of us get to the exit as fast as we can. Three....two...one..."
She let go.
The switch stayed put, but could be seen to be slowly starting to move, trying to release the stored energy of the spring she'd made.
They ran to the door, all four of them, sprinting as fast as they could. Smith and Jones got there first, followed a second later by Laura and Chivers. Behind him, Chivers heard a sharp crack. The pen had broken.
He threw himself forward, pulling Laura to the ground and landing on top of her to shield her body with his. There was a deafening explosion. The bank collapsed, falling in on itself.
But as the dust started to clear, Chivers could see that all of them were still alive and whole.
Through the ringing in his ears, he laughed. "Come on, let's all go find a coffee. We deserve it. You too, Laura, you're the heroine here. I'm buying."
I smiled through this, that was a seemingly simple solution to this nerve wrecking problem. Don't think I could have ever thought of this.😁 smart move🙌🏽 I really enjoyed it all
Thank you! I spe3nt ages thinking it over and came up with nothing. Then I woke up on Monday morning and the solution was just there in my head. It's amazing what the subconscious mind can come up with given a bit of time 😀
!BBH
Yeah sometimes worrying about something leaves one with nothing, but when you just get it off your mind, something clicks and the solution just appears 😁
Welcome to the crew Laura! Hehehe
Yeah... I think I sometimes get a bit too attached to my characters. I should be far more willing to let them die horrible deaths 😁
!BBH
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