Chapter 2 - High Rise

"Fuck Physics," Lez spat, resisting the urge to snap her pen in half. "Nobody's supposed to have to actually use this shit in real life."

Lez was certain - somewhere in the back of her mind - that she had, in fact, attended an entire semester of Physics classes six or seven years ago. But so far, the evidence wasn't there to prove it.

"Screw it." She had a pretty good rough sketch drawn out. A slight miscalculation here or there couldn't hurt, could it?

At 31 floors up, she knew it very well could. But she was trying not to think about that.

Over the past hour or so, Lez had become very well acquainted with the difficulty of guessing vertical distances. Throw in the fact that the event had happened four days ago, she'd been high on pot and adrenaline at the time, and that now it was 1 in the morning after three mostly sleepless nights and a few drinks, and Lez was becoming less and less confident in her efforts by the minute.

As best as she could figure, Vince had been about 5 or 6 stories down when she'd lost sight of him. Her scraps of physics seemed to work out at any rate, and she guessed that he'd looked about that far down. So now is when I get to try something really stupid.

She pushed her chair out from the table and made her way from her kitchen to the front door of her apartment. She picked up a big plastic bag that sat next to it, loaded down with elastic rigging cords, the kind that you'd use to tie something big and ungainly into a car trunk. They were the closest match to what she wanted that she could find, though the thought of tying and securing enough of them together to reach down 5 or more stories was not a prospect she was looking forward to. Each one was only three or four feet long.

Yup, Shen was right. I'm fucking crazy.

Lez went back into the kitchen, dumping the contents of the bag out all over her kitchen table. She hoped she had enough of the things. She already felt stupid enough spending fifty bucks on a bag of rigging cords; she didn't feel like having to go back and buy more the next day. That, and who knows how long I'm going to be at the station tomorrow... Or if they'll let me leave. She had a funny feeling something might be up.

She pulled out a couple of the cords, tugging on them to test their strength. They seemed strong enough, but she was going to double up on them, just to be sure. Even her lithe 5'2" frame could be a strain on the wire if she were to lose her grip and fall a few stories.

Lez studied them for a minute, trying to figure out what would be the best way to fasten them together. She figured she was just going to have to tie them. She was inwardly kicking herself for having refused to join the Girl Guides years ago at her mother's insistence. Who would have thought I'd be 23, living in NYC, and needing to know how to tie decent knots so I can fling myself out of a 31st story window. She chuckled grimly. "Be prepared."

With a bit of experimenting Lez was able to come up with a knot that seemed reasonably stable. She obviously wasn't able to test it with anything close to the strain that might wind up being put on it, but it seemed to fair pretty well. And it would be doubled up, after all.

For close to the next hour she measured out her "ropes" and knotted the cords together. The little wire hooks that were on the ends of each cord were sticking out all the way down her monstrosity of a rope. She couldn't help but laugh at how ridiculous it looked. She was starting to wonder if, maybe, just maybe, she seriously was going insane. Not that it mattered now, of course. She'd already made up her mind.

Finally finished with making the ropes, Lez did her best to measure them again. Her apartment was cramped and somewhat messy, so she measured by folding it over itself over and over and adding the lengths up. Yet another half-assed guess job, she thought, absently adding up the lengths. I am so dead.

The thought didn't bother her much, really. As long as she didn't think about it too much.

By her measurements the rope should be somewhere around four stories long. Lez winced inwardly. She'd hoped for it to be a little closer to the actual distance before it had to start stretching at all. It wasn't too bad, though - she figured it would be long enough. Now she just had to figure out how to hook it to herself, and how to anchor it.

Aww fuck. Of course, she'd forgotten to figure that into the length. She cursed under her breath. "Dammit. Who'd have thought that throwing yourself out of a building was so damn complicated?"

She got up and surveyed the area of her apartment near the window. It wasn't looking promising - most of the surfaces were pretty smooth and hard. They obviously hadn't thought about a tenant running into this sort of situation. Lez was a bit miffed, though none too surprised. She looked over at her coffee table. It was a pretty big one, wide and heavy with a glass top and shelves underneath for movies and things. It was definitely two or so times as wide as the window, and as long as it was placed right she was sure it wouldn't be able to make it's way through. She could probably fasten the "rope" to one of the sturdy, stylish metal bars that "held up" the glass top. And it wouldn't need too much extra length, either. Perfect.

Now, how to rig myself into this thing... Lez figured she would tie the other end in a loop just barely big enough to go around her. She'd get it under her arms and be able to grip the rope that way, while having a bit of security if she slipped. She nodded. This wasn't looking too bad.

She went about getting the doubled-up makeshift bungee rope tied securely to the coffee table, then spent a good five minutes heaving the thing over toward the window. Who knew it'd actually be a good thing for this fucking thing to be so damn heavy... She pushed it up against the wall under the window, only losing maybe three feet of the rope length all told. The coffee table also provided something of a platform for her. Things were starting to come together.

Kneeling down on the coffee table and peering out the window, she started lowering down the rope to see how far it reached. Further and further down, the rope slinked along the side of the building until she came to the end. She squinted at it in the darkness of what was now 3AM. She couldn't tell if it was going down as far as she'd hoped. Plus, I'm going to lose another two feet at the bottom for my "harness". Crap. All told, the length of the rope was only three and a half stories at best. And she was pretty damn sure Vince had been five stories down at the very, very least.

Lez turned around and sat on the coffee table, her back to the window. She didn't know if she should try it with the rope too short or not. She didn't want to push her luck stretching the cord too much, but she also wasn't interested in having to miss her meeting at the station in favour of going out and making herself look like even more of a nut by buying more cords. Oh yeah, Lez, like lowering yourself out of a building is perfectly normal. She shook her head in frustration. No way. I've gotta give this a try. Tonight.

Lez hopped up from the coffee table and got herself "in gear". She'd found an old pair of jeans that she wouldn't mind getting scuffed up if need be. (Though she was hoping that she wouldn't be scuffing them by smashing them into the pavement along with her.) She put on a dark, long sleeve shirt on and rolled the sleeves up almost to her elbows. She dug out an older pair of lace-up black boots that came only to just above her ankles instead of all the way up to her knees - they had a bit of a heel, but she remembered that they had really good traction, and she was sure she was going to need it to get back up. She smoothed her hair back with water and a bit of hair gel, and put some bobby pins in to keep her bangs from toppling forward in front of her eyes.

And last, she got out an old pair of leather fingerless gloves and pulled them on, tightening the ties on the backs. She picked up the rope and gripped a little, feeling it cinch tightly in her hands. Perfect. Lez hopped up and down a few times, trying to limber up, rolling her shoulders, stretching out her hands and fingers. She took a few deep breaths. She was ready.

At least, as ready as she was ever going to get.

Lez picked up the other end of the rope, whispering to herself and trying to psyche herself up a bit as she tied it around her waist. She made sure it was tight, but not too tight - she didn't plan on practically hanging herself off the side of the building by mistake. She tied a knot that would have put a Girl Guide to shame and pulled on it a few times as she clambered up onto the coffee table.

Well... Hate to use a cliché... but here goes nothing.

Taking one last deep, long breath of night air, she turned around and crouched on the coffee table with her back to the window. Without giving herself enough time to think against it she grabbed hold of the rope near the top, clambered back, and let herself slip out of the window.

Immediately she regretted it. She hadn't grabbed the rope high up enough, so she fell a foot or two before the rope came taught and stretched, nearly yanking it out of her grasp completely. Practically biting her tongue off to keep from calling out in fear, she gripped the cord with every ounce of strength she had, coiling her body around it as she bumped soundlessly against the side of the building. And there she was, hanging out of the side of her window, 31 stories above the ground at 3:30 in the morning.

It occurred to her, vaguely, in the back of her mind, that she had no clue what she was going to do once she'd gotten do the point she'd seen Vince disappear, but she decided she'd figure that out once she got there.

Lez let herself hang there for a minute and compose herself. Her arms ached from the sudden jerk of the rope and she could practically feel the influx of adrenaline coursing through her blood. And somewhere along the line she had managed to make the mistake of looking down. She clung to the rope like a fiend and started - not for the first time that night - to seriously question her sanity.

After a few moments she was able to get a grip. She looked up at the windowsill just above her. The rope's first test had gone pretty well; though she'd been scared out of her mind, she hadn't felt as though the rope was going to suddenly give way. She touched the side of the building with her boot and got herself steered around so that she had her feet planted on the vertical surface. Slowly and cautiously she started letting herself down the rope, going one hand over the other and trying not to let too much of the rope out at once.

Luckily the people who lived in the apartment right under Lez had the lights out. She paused when she reached the top of their window, not sure whether she should try to go around it or if she should just dip by quickly and hope they hadn't noticed. She realized that either way the rope would be visible going down in front of the window, so she got a good grip of the rope and edged her way down. She noted with relief that the blinds were drawn anyway. One down...

With surprisingly little trouble considering the circumstances, Lez slid down the side of the building until she found herself at the end of the rope. She looked up, counting the windows to her apartment. Five. She'd managed to get down five stories, meaning the rope had stretched at least 9 feet or so. She wasn't sure how much it would be able to stretch, or how much she should push it, but she was pretty sure that it could take a fair sight more stress than she'd put on it already. She let her feet down and felt herself sink another foot or so, bobbing up and down slightly at the end of the cord. It was a strange feeling, suspended by a rope 26 or so stories above the sidewalk. She almost wanted to look down, but she knew the vertigo would be too much.

Right. Now what? Lez touched the wall with her toe and slowly spun to face away from the building. Her eyes widened with the sight. The buildings towered over her and plummeted below her on all sides. Pinpricks of light from windows speckled the tall, looming shapes in the dark. The muted sounds of the night traffic wafted up all around her. Lez wondered idly whether she should try this more often.

Now, where the hell was he? She glanced up over her shoulder at her window, then back in front of her. She was pretty sure he had been at least a little further down. Daring a bit of vertigo, she glanced downward a bit. She was guessing now that Vince had been closer to seven stories down when he disappeared. Dammit, this rope isn't going to be long enough. It might stretch that far, but it sure as hell isn't going to stay that far down for long.

Dammit. Now she wished she'd brought along something to toss down. Maybe she'd be able to get a better idea of where the spot was from down here. She spent a minute feebly searching about her person as best she could, dangling and bouncing slightly on the end of the rope. Nothing. She cursed under her breath and started swerving herself around to face the building again, ready to clamber up the rope and back into her apartment to get something else to throw into the void.

Right! She gripped the rope in her left hand, reaching up into her hair and sliding out one of the silver bobby pins, smoothing that part of her hair back firmly. She twisted it a little, squinting at it and holding it out at arm's length. It was a little hard to see, but she was pretty sure she'd be able to keep track of it for a floor or two. Twisting herself back around to face away from the building, she gave the bobby pin a kiss and tossed it down, watching it fall.

And fall. And fall. When she lost sight of it, it was definitely further down than Vince had been. Her heart froze in her chest. The fuck? What happened?

For a minute she let herself dangle there. There was no mistaking it, the bobby pin hadn't just disappeared. For the first time since she'd set her mind to all of this nonsense she felt real doubt creep into her mind. Maybe she had imagined him disappear. Fuck, people just don't disappear. And maybe Shen was right. The ball disappearing could have been her mind playing tricks. Fuck fuck fuck. Suddenly dangling from a building was feeling a little too risky for Lez's tastes.

Wait... Lez gripped the rope again, pulling another bobby pin out of her hair. Not bothering to smooth her hair back, she tossed the bobby pin down, flicking her wrist out and sending it a few feet further out from the building than she had before. Lez blinked. She'd lost sight of it. Had it disappeared again? Of all the... She swore under her breath, pulling yet another pin out of her hair. She tossed it down like the last one, trying not to blink as she watched it.

A floor down and a ways out from the wall, it disappeared.

"Yes!" Lez thrust a fist into the air triumphantly and didn't give a damn who'd heard her. Once again encouraged, Lez gripped the rope in both hands and started heaving herself hand over hand up the side of the building, scraping for a good hold with her boots. Her fingers felt like they were going to fall off if she clung to that rope for much longer, and the rope was starting to chafe across her back and under her arms.

It took her a few minutes, but she finally pulled herself up over her windowsill and slinked back into her apartment. She collapsed on the coffee table, trying to catch her breath as she thanked whatever Gods there may be to be on solid ground again. Lez just stayed there for a few minutes, content to avoid throwing herself out of windows for a little while, at least.

So she wasn't just crazy. Things were actually disappearing. Not that it made any more sense, of course.

So what now? She knew there must be -something- there. Or maybe a lack of something. Whichever it was, she was starting to wonder how she was going to find out.

No two ways around it. I'm going to have to give this sucker a try myself. She groaned, shivering a little as a cool wind kicked up and blew in through the open window. It was at least 4 in the morning by now, and she was going to have to be at the station by 10. Maybe I'm gonna just have to wait until after... Run and pick up some more bungee cords afterward... What little she could see of the room while laying there on her face was starting to blur. She closed her eyes, fatigue setting in despite the chill and her aching arms and hands. Waiting until tomorrow was starting to sound better and better.

But something didn't feel right about waiting.

Lez winced, pushing herself groggily up on the coffee table. Her muscles were clenching up with pain and overuse. She brought herself to her feet and took in a breath, blinking hard a few times and trying to clear her vision. This couldn't wait. She was going to have to find a way to lengthen that rope tonight.

What in hell am I gonna use? She racked her brain for ideas. She was sure she must be able to scrounge up something-

Then it hit her. She dashed into her hall closet and started rummaging around behind her coats and jackets. She knew that somewhere in the back, tossed in with a hodgepodge of miscellaneous other bits of useless junk was a long, thick, industrial extension cord. It was easily 15 feet long, and doubled up it would give her the extra floor or so of length she needed. Lez was kicking herself for not thinking of this earlier. The whole rope didn't have to have spring, only enough of it to make sure the jerk of coming to the end of the rope didn't yank her arms out of their sockets or snap her spine. Adding this length to the end shouldn't cause a problem. At least, she was pretty sure it wouldn't.

Lez moved back into her living room, pulling the rope back in through the window and shutting it. She plunked herself down right there and started to work untying the loop she'd made at the end of the rope. It took her a few minutes - she'd really done a number on it, and having been stretched after the climb it was synched quite tight. Then she knotted the doubled-up extension cord onto the end. Much better.

She stood up and turned to face the window again, kneeling down on the coffee table and heaving it open. The cool wind assaulted her right off the bat. Dammit. Had to get freezing on me. I'm in no mood to try to clamber down the side of a building wearing a jacket. She could feel her chest tighten as she looked out he window again and realized that she was going to have to put herself through all of that again.

Trying not to think about it too much, Lez tied the end of the extension cord around her midsection, knotting it as fiercely as she had before. Her hands were shaking a little and she was still sore. She hopped up and down a bit like she had before, but for some reason it wasn't limbering or psyching her up like it had before. A pit of doubt was starting to well in her stomach. The more she wound up thinking about it, the more she felt like she was more apt to wretch out the window than climb out of it again.

I'll wait. It'd be best to wait. I've gotta get some rest before I can do this again. In spite of herself, she was managing to con herself out of climbing back out the window. She even started to untie the extension cord from around her. I'll tackle this tomorrow, after I go to the station-

No. She couldn't wait. Something about the thought of going to the station tomorrow was throwing her off. She had a bad feeling about it. Lez shook her head in frustration. That didn't make any sense. If they were going to put me away or whatever, they wouldn't wait for me to trot right into the station. But something was still nagging at her in the back of her mind. When she thought about it, she started to realize that if she didn't get this all over with tonight, she might never get up the gumption to try any of it again.

Having managed to strengthen her resolve at least a little, Lez secured the extension cord around herself again and got up onto the coffee table. She smoothed her hair back, yanking out the last useless bobby pin as she did and tossing it aside. She flexed her fingers and got a grip of the extension cord as she turned around and knelt down. Making sure to grip the rope high enough up this time, she slowly backed out the window and began once again lowering herself down.

Now that she'd gotten out there again, Lez found her doubt disappearing and a warm glimmer of confidence returning to her fluttery stomach. Hand over hand she slinked down the rope, bracing herself against the building. She descended a lot more quickly this time, daring to leap down over each window in a single, confident bound. In spite of herself, she felt pretty damn good.

To her pleasant surprise the extension cord had allowed her to get at least another floor and a half down. Gauging herself against where she had been last time, she knew she must be just about the same level that everything had disappeared. She swerved herself around to look out. Well, here we go. Lez pressed her heels against the side of the building and, with a little effort, stretched her torso out away from the building, reaching as far as she could. She wasn't sure what would happen if she managed to swipe at whatever it was, but at the moment she didn't particularly care.

Lez grunted uncomfortably. The rope was tight around her chest, and though it was stretching, she wasn't able to reach out far enough. She was vaguely glad that she didn't have larger breasts to complicate things even more. Gripping the rope firmly in one hand, she bent her knees and tried to push herself off and reach out, but she couldn't get enough momentum to get any more than a foot away from the wall before she swung back and hit against the wall again, bouncing a little at the end of the rope. Swearing under her breath, she turned around to face the building again, continuing to firmly grasp the rope. She bent her knees and grunted loudly with effort as she pushed herself away from the building, her head tilted back to view the dark city upside down as she stretched out as far as she could with her free arm. She made a bit more headway this time, but she knew she just wasn't making it as far as she knew she had to. She braced herself against the impact as she swung back toward the building, bending her knees to disperse the energy.

Not one to give up easily, Lez tried two or three more times, getting a pendulum-like momentum going as she pushed out, swung back, and pushed out again. But having to press against the wall each time was dispersing too much of the energy, and she just wasn't able to put enough force into it. It was becoming painfully obvious to her that she was going to have to up the ante a bit.

Lez started to make her way back up the side of the building, getting maybe another story up before she clambered onto a windowsill. The blinds were pulled, so she wasn't too worried about using it as a bit of a base for a minute. She looked back over her shoulder, getting an idea of where the spot was. If she was going to get out as far as she figured she was going to have to, she 'd have to jump out a decent bit. She wasn't sure if she was going to be able to manage from this height, but she figured it'd be best to try it going up incrementally rather than risk her neck on a bungee jump from hell. Purgatory's enough for now.

Gripping the rope so tightly her knuckles practically went white, Lez checked up and down to see where the rest of it was. She nudged it so that the excess was off to the side of her rather than right below her. She didn't feel like getting caught up in the rope mid-fall. Her breath was coming more quickly now, and her lungs were feeling hoarse from the cold night air. For a minute she just stood there, whispering encouragements under her breath. You'll be okay, the rope is good, hasn't given out on you yet. You may be crazy, but you know what you're doing. You're doing this for Vince.

For Vince.

Without another thought, Lez bent her knees and pushed herself back off of the windowsill.

Lez's stomach leapt into her throat as for a full terrifying second she plummeted, free falling, watching the rope rapidly coil taught above her. Everything around her was in a blur of motion and adrenaline.

All at once the rope came taught and Lez found her descent slowly come under some sense of control, though she was falling no less quickly. The rope vibrated violently as the majority of it started to stretch, and before she knew what was happening she had dipped a full story below the rope's previous length. Her eyes widened as she felt herself come to the apex of the fall and, spider-man style, she was being hurled nearly head on and on an incline toward the wall of the building.

Reacting mostly on instinct, Lez leaned back and pulled her legs up, bending them slightly as she braced herself against the impact. The building swallowed up her vision and she closed her eyes in spite of herself just before she hit. She yelped in surprise as the impact reverberated through her entire body and she bounced back out from the building, bobbing up and down wildly on the end of the rope. She kept her eyes squeezed shut, once again coiled around the end of the rope for dear life. Her arms scraped against the side of the building harshly, but she didn't dare open them to look.

She just let herself dangle there for a full five minutes, cursing and swearing in a whisper as tears of fear streamed down her cheeks. Lez let out a squealed sob and started frantically kicking the side of the building, her body convulsing as she cried. This is too much. This is too fucking much. She could hear the blood coursing through her veins and throbbing in her head and chest. She just flung herself about hysterically for a few minutes before going limp, sniffing and hiccuping convulsively. She almost let go of the rope and let herself dangle there, but the fear of being so high up was still settled somewhere in the back of her brain, so she held on tight, her body coiled into a frightened ball. Her hands ached. Her legs were shaking. She didn't know if she could summon the strength to climb back up to her apartment, let alone try again.

Why didn't it work? Furious now, she pulled her eyes open, leaning her head down to wipe her eyes on the sleeves of her shirt. Tilting her head up, Lez tried to slow her breathing a little as she counted up the stories to the one she'd jumped from. She cursed under her breath. She hadn't pushed herself out far enough when she'd jumped. She could see now that she'd probably have to climb up another story, at least, before she'd make it for sure. I'll fucking show you.

Uttering enough dirty words to make a sailor blush, Lez shimmied up the side of the building, running almost completely on adrenaline. Before she'd even realized it, she'd climbed up a full four stories. Without so much as giving herself a moment to think once she'd slid onto the desired windowsill, she grunted with wild effort and hurled herself back into the air.

Once again she found herself weightless, though now she was gaining speed at a sickening rate as she plummeted the four stories. She had just begun, in the back of her mind, to wonder if she'd missed her mark again when her vision blurred. Before she could even question what had just happened her vision blanked, and suddenly all around her was a completely different world.

The sky was darker. The buildings were higher. Lights shone all around, and from the sky. A foul, sterile scent was carried on the air she plummeted through. Below her she heard the sounds of people, but alien sounds, and far too many for this time of night. She looked up, and up, and the buildings looked like they went on forever-

The rope had gone taught, and was stretching down - coming to the apex - she was shaken out of her thoughts -

SLAM.

Her vision went black.