h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Yo, Kuma! Better leave them ears. From listening to her radio it seems like we could use them to buy mari-raes freedom back...

Can you make out what direction that message came from, Kes?

Sounded like straight down to me...

*wonders, in passing, how kuma managed to eat the droids without realising most of what he ate was metal...*

Linus is about right .... the monitor says we're right on mari's location, but signal strength is too low for that. Means she's several layers of metal away from us .... down ... or up! I'll use a hand-held scanner to find her out there. Who's coming?

*Opems the hatch and looks around an empty metal corridor with hatches on all surfaces.*

Never underestimate the strength of the bears teeth, Linus. I even heard he is able to bite a and drink it in more than one gulp...

Okay, Kes, let's see what we can find

I'm with you guys... now which hatch shall we try first?

shazz

*Waves the scanner around, with indeterminate results. Shrugs. Points to hatch immediately above them.*

you want us to climb up...

I hope Kuma is going to fit in these tunnels...

He can stay and mind the farm if he doesn't fit .... Come on!
*Starts opening the hatch*

*semi-poisenous gas billows out of the hatch and more or less sedates the BFG's, who wander around in a daze, seeing all sorts of shapes and colours before their eyes*

*No Ears shoves mari into the Ladies loo and stands with his back to her, leaving the door open. He growls something about taking no chances. As soon as his back is turned, she leans backward for leverage and karate kicks him against the back of his knees. He goes down with a crash. Her hands are cuffed behind her so she uses her foot to break his neck. She stands looking down at the body wondering where the key to the cuffs might be. She tries the communicator again...*

Where the heck are you people?

*Through the purple haze, Kes sees the radio flashing. He presses the send button a few times, but can't manage anything more ...*

*wanders around in the giant dome of the derelict gasometer, humming to himself, temporarily insane and with glazed eyes *

Maaaaaaaaaaan, this is the best Pink Floyd concert I've ever attended

*Fortunately for Wowbagger this is a natural state of mind for him (brought about through the normal weirdness of his life ) and he races off to the radio.*

Mari-rae... we're on our way. Though by the look of some of these guys we might be taking a rather long route.

Your signal's bouncing everywhere so, while we know your xy position, your z position tells us your somewhere between the planet's core and that nice purplish looking moon that we saw overhead a while back.

Do you think you might be able to give us a hand locating you?

Hello mum... having the best trip of my li...
Oops!

*Shakes head and tries to clear fuzzy cobwebs and pretty purple spiders from her mind*

Mari-rae must be somewhere close... I can hear tinkling waterfalls...


shazz

*Shakes head vigorously; brushes several miniature orange and green striped rabbits off his shoulder. Stands up - and suddenly feels better*

Hey - it's a gas attack. The gas is dense - it dispersed downwards - stand up - the air's clearer!

*Checks scanner*

I still reckon mari's overhead somewhere. Let's go look - but pass out the gas masks this time!

*Rushes back and grabs armfuls of gas masks... and her wits*

Ok people... we MUST get our act together and rescue Mari-rae...

*Dons mask and follows Kes up through the hatch*

shazz

Who the hell is Don?

shazz

*After they've been climbing upwards for a couple of minutes, the signal on the scanner starts to fade*

We've gone past her. Back down to the next side hatch, and try that.
*Pauses until Shazz starts to climb back down*

Damn!
All this climbing up and down is quite tiring... especially when your head is still full of strange ideas!

*Starts to climb back down again*

shazz

OK - the signal from mari's radio seems to be strongest next to this hatch. Here goes

*Opens hatch in the side of the shaft, looks through, then jumps through*

Hey! What's the Deimosian word for "Ladies" ?