Ziff under fire

Part 38 - Immobilfoam

I jumped out of his way as Triple Oh did a hop, skip and a jump, tugging frantically at the control lines but, by the time he passed me, he was skidding along the road on his bum, size fifteen jackboots held up like twin battering rams.

The two men went down like bowling pins. Beryl went down with them and a sudden puff of wind dropped the canopy of the para-glider on top of everybody.

I found a gap in the almost invisible control lines, grabbed a handful and pulled them aside as Triple Oh lurched to his feet. His harness and greatcoat were bunched up under his armpits, the buttons had all been torn off, and the seat of his trousers had been neatly ripped away revealing his tattered underwear.

'Well met Ziff my young friend,' he gasped as he detached the harness . . . 'Methinks I feel a cold breeze on my buttocks. Am I undone?'

'Verily,' I told him, 'the seat of your pants is ripped. Your timing was perfect but the landing was a tad low . . . Anyway, what took you so long?'

''Tis a sorry tale but Theo stole Murga's flying machine . . . he calls it a Stork . . .'

The two men started to get up but were enveloped in the canopy and disorientated. One of them had a pistol.

'Bitte, scheissen Sie nicht!' Triple Oh bellowed.

The man hesitated and Triple Oh quickly unhitched a nozzle from his back pack. I lifted the edge of the canopy and he shot a stream of of the sticky, spaghetti-like purple foam he used to incapacitate bad guys, Immobilfoam. This stuck to everything it touched so, withing seconds, the two men were glued to each other and the canopy by the rapidly hardening foam. Somehow he manage to keep it off Beryl as she wriggled clear of the mess.

She was giggling hysterically. 'You said "Scheissen Sie Nicht!" (shy-sen zee nicht). Instead of Schiessen Sie Nicht (shee-sen zee nicht).'

She gasped for air and then howled with laughter. 'You told him politely . . . "please don't SHIT," . . . instead of, "shoot."

'Those two are scared shit-less anyway,' she laughed. 'Because you . . . you look like the monster from the black lagoon.'

Triple Oh was wearing night vision goggles, clipped to the rim of a too-small helmet, and a toothbrush sized black moustache. His coat was bunched up under his arms. To the Gestapo thugs he must have seemed like something from a nightmare.

Beryl was still giggling as she helped me pull Triple Oh's top coat down over his exposed rear end.

'Shoot,' she gasped. 'This used to be so much easier. I'm getting too old for this.'

'How old be ye, my lady?' Triple Oh asked.

'Older than Yoda . . . I am,' she croaked.'

'Pray, who is this Yoda?' he asked.

'You are too young to know,' Bery said . . . 'How are you going to re-pack the 'chute? It looks a real mess.'

'It is disposable,' Triple Oh replied. ''T'is made from a protein, like spider webs and so biodegradable like the Immobilfoam.'

'Where are thy parents?' he asked me.

'In the farmhouse with Murga, I think.'

One of the Germans said something and Beryl snarled at him.

'I told them if they kept quiet they would stay alive . . . Wait a mo'. I need a pee.'

She unbuttoned her pants and squatted at the side of the road, quite unembarrassed.

'Beryl,' Triple Oh said, 'thinkst thou the kübelwagen could convey us to the farmhouse?'

'I don' know. The front end looks a little bent but the engine's still running. Help me get it out from under the cart.'

Beryl was still buttoning her pants when Triple Oh lifted the farm cart. Beryl and I pushed the kübelwagen backwards. The front end was badly squashed and only one head light was working.

She jumped in and expertly turned it around. 'Get in. The steering is out of alignment but it might get us there before wheels fall off.'

We roared back down the road leaving the two men lying by the side of the farm wagon. The Immobilfoam would disintegrate after a couple of hours.

Beryl stopped the kübelwagen before we got back to the farm, so we wouldn't alert Murga, and walked the rest of the way. Triple Oh gave Beryl a spray can of Immobilfoam, about the size of a small fire extinguisher, and a spray can of the antidote, Dry-up. We left her guarding the front door, to stop anyone from leaving that way, while Triple Oh and I slipped quietly into the kitchen. No one seemed to have noticed my temporary absence. The noise level from the adjacent room had gone up a little and it sounded like much beer had been consumed while I was away.

Triple Oh put a finger to his lips and pushed me under the table. He pulled off his helmet and checked the Immobilfoam nozzle which was connected to a large container in his backpack. He rapped on the inside door.

Conversation in the other room stopped and a few seconds later someone said, 'Wer ist da?' (Who is there?). And then the door opened and a pistol appeared.

Triple Oh fired a jet of Immobilfoam which smothered the gun and then doused the head that appeared next. The man staggered back and fired blindly into the kitchen.

'Schiesse Nicht! (sheeser nicht. Don't shoot),' Murga bellowed. Someone shouted orders and a door slammed and, from the noise, there was a stampede of jackboots toward the front door. This was followed by a series of short bursts from a Schmeisser, presumably Beryl was deterring them from leaving the farmhouse.

It was quiet for a few seconds and then a gang of men charged into the kitchen swinging clubs. Triple Oh squirted Immobilfoam at the first two who promptly glued their hands to their chests as they tried to scrape it off their jackets. The last man managed to grab the nozzle so Triple Oh shrugged off his backpack and used it like a bludgeon but a wildly swinging club hit the side of his head and he dropped to the floor. His assailant stumbled into the first two men and got stuck in the foam as they all fell over.

I reached out from under the table, yanked the Immobilfoam nozzle out of the mess and learned a lot of German curses as I covered the squirming men with the spaghetti-like purple foam. It quickly solidified into a tough rubbery cocoon. I checked the carotid pulse in Triple Oh's neck. He had a good pulse so I dragged the backpack to the farmyard door hoping Beryl could hold off Murga's thugs until Triple Oh woke up.

It was quite dark outside except for a car's headlights which illuminate the farmyard. Someone blew a whistle repeatedly and shouted angrily in German. Then two men rushed toward me from different directions. I couldn't see how I could hold them off with the Immobilfoam but the attack fizzled when Beryl shot out the car headlights. She was using regular ammunition. The flashes from her Schmiesser showed me that she had taken a position behind an old tractor near the kitchen door.

The Gestapo turned on several flashlights and Beryl began firing single shots from her Schmeisser. The flashes illuminated one of the Gestapo crawling up behind her so I shot a stream of foam at his head. I ducked back into the farmhouse as he fired blindly in my direction and bullets ricocheted off the stone walls until he ran out of ammunition. I shot more foam at him and he fell over and stuck to the cobblestones. I walked cautiously toward him and judicially added more foam.

Beryl looked back as she snapped another magazine into her Schmeisser and gave me a finger wave. 'Get down!' she ordered. 'They may decide to shoot back.' She seemed to be winning the battle with the flash lights, only one of them was still working and it was not moving.

'Ziff!' Dunc said in my ear, 'Quick! Behind you. Break left.'