Anywhere in the story: “The element of surprise didn’t so much rest upon someone hearing you but registering the significance of your approach.”
(#00129)
“Okay,” said Rael. “They stole my coat. They somehow turned off your powers. We have, perhaps, two hours at most before they set off their doomsday bomb and all we have is the contents of a rather spacious storage closet with nothing useful in it. What, might I ask, is your big plan?”
Shayde, currently alarmingly caucasian, shorter, and red-headed, kept grinning as she piled the trolley with assorted bits and bobs. “Find a box tae hide in an’ occupy the bottom shelf. Trust me. I’m gonna use stealth.”
Stealth.
Well, in a pinch, even a hair-brained plan was better than no plan at all. Rael picked a box and squeezed himself inside. If anything was more alarming than watching Shayde mutter to herself as she assembled a scheme, it was listening to the same muttering with no other sensory input.
The door opened. The trolley rolled out, accompanied by aimless whistling that, though it failed to actually hit a tune, managed to molest quite a few in passing.
The wheels rattled and shook. The entire trolley made a cacophony as it trundled down the heavily guarded hallway.
“No admittance,” said the guard.
“Got deliv'ry order fer t’ main interface controller,” that was Shayde’s voice, but she managed to nail the local low-caste dialect as if she’d lived in the alleys all her life.
“No admittance.”
“What’s yer name, then, sonny Jim?”
Flakk. Sonny Jim. One of the many, many call-signs of impending doom a la Shayde. Rael cringed in anticipation.
“Why?”
“So I can tell me boss that one… Sergeant… Ro-ourke… failed to allow ‘is supremeness t’ get 'is crullers. An ye know 'ow 'e likes 'em fresh.”
The impassable door hissed open. The trolley rattled onwards in a similar fashion through three more.
And, like a miracle, they were in the countdown chamber.
“That was not stealth!” Rael protested as he sabotaged. “That was the opposite of stealth. It was the antithesis of stealth.”
“Na, it was past stealth an’ through to it’s true opposite. White noise.”
Of course. The element of surprise didn’t so much rest upon someone hearing you but registering the significance of your approach. And Shayde did love hiding in plain sight.
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