Doctor Who_ Prime Time - Mike Tucker [77]
The audience erupted into cheers and applause.
The cramp in Ace’s fingers was unbearable. She gritted her teeth against the pain and shifted her grip. She was halfway around the overhang, all too aware of the dizzying drop below her.
There were enough handholds on the rough concrete, but the wind was biting, the surface wet. The dangling rope whipped around like a mad thing. Her muscles screamed at her for relief.
‘Don’t stop, Ace. Keep it moving or you’re going to lock up.’ Ace couldn’t see Gatti any more, but a constant stream of encouragement was shouted from below.
Steeling herself, Ace pulled herself upwards, boots scrabbling for new purchases. There! The edge was in view now, just a few more inches.
She loosened her grip with her right hand and reached for the lip. It was tantalisingly close, her fingers brushing the edge. Forcing her muscles to the limit she stretched.
Her fingers caught hold just as her feet slipped from the wall.
Ace heard a scream whipped away by the wind, but she wasn’t sure if it had been Gatti or herself. She dangled over nothing, hanging by one arm. Crying out with the pain she scrabbled desperately for a grip with her other hand. The concrete wall was slippery and smooth, the wind was blowing her around like a leaf.
The ground span dizzyingly below her. If she fell the force would wrench Gatti from the wall as well. The rope thrashed and coiled in the wind. The wind. That could be her only hope.
She tried to concentrate, waiting for a gust that would swing her in the right direction. A gust whipped past her again and she reached out...
Her hand brushed across the concrete lip and she caught hold and began to pull herself forward, pushing with her feet on the flat wall.
She collapsed on to the roof sobbing with relief, cradling her hands to her chest, trying to get some life back into them.
‘Ace!’ She could here Gatti’s voice from below. ‘Ace, are you all right?’
Ace clambered to her feet. ‘Hang on!’
She fumbled with the rope around her waist, looking somewhere to anchor it. The flat roof was a jungle of air vent and aerials. A sturdy metal safety rail ran along the edge. Ace tied the rope to it, pulling hard to make sure it was secure.
She crossed back to the edge, taking up some of the slack.
‘OK Gatti. Unhook yourself and I’ll haul you up.’
‘Right.’ The rope jerked as Gatti released herself from the wall ‘Are you ready?’
Ace braced her DMs on the lip of the roof and wound the rope around her palms. ‘Ready!’
The rope snapped taut as Gatti swung herself out and Ace winced as it cut into her palms. She started to ease her way backwards.
Gatti’s arm appeared over the lip, scrabbling desperately for a handhold. Ace tied off the rope and hurried over to her, catching hold of her hand and hauling her up on to the roof.
The two girls lay breathless for a moment. Gatti twisted her head, grinning at Ace. ‘You’re out of condition, girl.’
Ace punched her arm. ‘And you need to lose some weight.’
They got to their feet, the sprawl of the city stretching out as far as they could see all around them. A single wall of glass faced them. Lukos’s office.
Ace crossed to the glass, cupped her hands around her face and peered inside.
‘Anyone home?’ whispered Gatti.
Ace shook her head. ‘We’d have known about it if there was.’
Gatti looked along the expanse of glass. A sun lounger and a couple of chairs stood alongside a pair of huge glass doors.
She pulled at the doors. ‘Locked.’
‘Good.’ Ace lifted one of the patio chairs. ‘I’ve got some pent up aggression that needs to be worked off.’
She spun on the balls of her feet and hurled the chair at the window, Gatti ducked, covering her head as the sheet of glass shattered into a million pieces, the shards scattering over the roof and tumbling into