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 | Sharks in the water
entry by GreyKat
4/18/2005 10:51 PM
| 041605
Group: GreyKat, JadeNala, ofberenonehand, Grit, Seraph.serif, Evenstar
Outside eyes: Gatsby
Now that I look back on it, this exploration was ill fated from the beginning. Then again hindsight is always twenty-twenty right? Portents of disaster loomed even before we embarked on this adventure, not big looming signs proclaiming “DON’T DO IT”, however. Now, I like the little voice inside my head that tells me things. No, not things like finding the closest bell tower and grabbing your sniper rifle either. It’s that little nagging sense that something just might not work out the way I want it to. I would have thought by now that the little voice in my head would figure out that it really needs that sign with big bold letters. That afternoon was my first hint when I decided to reply to the post about horrible UE experiences. Hours later peeking over the rooftop and looking down at the patrol cars circling like sharks I thought to myself “How ironic”.
The original plan started getting off track almost from the beginning. It was supposed to be a leisurely night of taking city pictures and having a good time. Jade and I were going to meet up with bere and Gatsby and take a few new people out to get to know them and have some fun. I was jonsin’ for some great downtown skyline shots, as well as getting bathed in the neon glow of the rooftop sign.
Jade and I arrived on location early and wandered around getting some exterior shots of the area at sundown. While we were looking for a good parking spot we noticed a Minneapolis patrol car parked over by the new construction at a nearby building. The voice inside my head shifted around uncomfortably but only grumbled a bit at that, however, it wasn’t the first time a patrol car was situated near where I was going exploring.
Not long afterwards bere arrived and Gatsby was detained at a birthday party. The new guys showed up about ten minutes later and we made small talk on the bridge while bere and I finished taking a few pictures. By the time we were all ready to go it was after 10 PM and a quick call to Gatsby confirmed he would join up with us later. I promised him we would save the basement levels until he got there, which also was a thing that headed south right away.
We inconspicuously walked up to the entry point location and as we walked up right away I noticed it was lit up. We kept walking up while bere and I had a quick discussion about how it hasn’t been lit up like that before. We looked around for any other activity and decided to start heading in. We walked into a side area and did a quick check for cameras and foot patrols. It looked clear but my gut and the little voice in my head were screaming so loud that I said out loud that I didn’t like how things looked. Apparently bere and Jade didn’t like it either and the new guys stood around like sheep with wolves staring at them. Indecision is a killer and after a couple of minutes milling around I decided it was get moving to the inside or get the heck out ASAP. I bitch slapped the voice in my head and saw how the group was looking shaky. Standing around half in and half out is a bad thing and I wasn’t going to be a sheep. Telling everyone to get moving and get in, I put my own words into actions and started climbing up towards the entry point and getting into the deep shadows and out of view. Jade of course was right behind me and the new guys with a little urging weren’t far behind. Bringing up the rear was bere and when he got up to the rest of the group I noticed he was looking a bit pale. He quickly said the word explorers dreaded to hear….”Cop”.
My first thoughts were the standard fight or flight check. We were in deep shadow in a place nobody would see us without shining a flashlight at us directly. Based on what bere quickly told me he said a cop pulled into the lot and started spotting the area like he was looking for us. Knowing that our entry point was now not an option of escape I quickly ran through the other options. I knew that there was an escape route out through the tunnels somewhere in the basement. Thinking that the cop was right on our heels I told everyone we were immediately heading down. Getting everyone through to the inside of the building I quickly and silently got everyone moving down the ladders towards the basement. Once we got down into the slightly flooded basement area I quickly located the way into the tunnels and the escape route. By then the panic in me had smoothed out and I knew that the cop wouldn’t come in the building looking for us. I got everyone gathered around in the basement looking down into the watery hole to the tunnels and started talking trying to sound calm. After a bit of talking I was able to get everyone else calmed a bit and to agree that as long as we were here we might as well explore and wait it out awhile. It took more talking to get everyone to agree which probably saved us from getting caught right away trying to get out. They were still skittish so I decided since Gatsby hadn’t met up with us that I would give him a ring and have him check out the outside. Unfortunately, at the level we were at, there was no cell range, so we went up a couple of levels until I could get a signal. He was just leaving the party he was at and on his way back to town. I gave him a run down and he said he would get there and be the eye on the outside for us.
In the upper floors, we started exploring and taking pictures and generally calming down and having some fun. After awhile, we got up to the roof and looked around. Gatsby had arrived and let us know that the patrol car was parked out of view and looked to be waiting for us. An unmarked white van had also pulled up in the alley and parked out of our view. Things weren’t looking too good for us at this point. The new guys soaked in the view from the middle of the roof while bere and I went around setting up and taking pictures.
All the while I was running through our options and figuring out a plan to evade the authorities. I knew we could get out through the tunnel at the expense of getting soaked and probably damaging some things like very expensive camera equipment and cell phones. I wanted to avoid that if at all possible. Call me stingy but I like my phone and camera. The rappel down out of a lower story window wouldn’t work either. For one I didn’t bring climbing rope and I was sure I was probably the only person who could quickly rappel down the side of a building. Getting a group out that way was not an option plus it would leave the rope behind. Not a good idea so I moved on. Gatsby, in the meantime, was keeping in touch and had been spotted three times walking around by the cop and by the guy in the white van. The guy in the van looked to be a museum worker and I decided was probably doing some janitor work, or checking things out on the inside of the museum after being informed of a possible break in. After some more information gathering and pictures I decided on a plan.
Creeping up to the edge of the roof in the deepest shadows bere, Jade and I started watching for patrol cars. Sure enough there was a high amount of activity below us. A patrol car would drive around the block spotting the construction area as well as the lot and alley we came in from about every five minutes. We also knew from Gatsby that the museum guy was still there as well as a patrol car parked out of sight waiting for us. I had decided that our best option was to wait for bar close and by then the cops would be distracted with catching drunks and the museum guy would probably see we weren’t in the museum and take off. Jade, bere and I liked the idea a lot. It would give us the best chance of escape using external distraction to cover our trail. The patrol cars continued circling like sharks below waiting for us.
Continuing to take pictures while also explaining what was going on straight up to the new guys we continued to wait. A new wrench was thrown in the gears about then. It seems that Evenstar had to get out within the next half-hour to play sober cab for someone. Great…that did put a crimp in things. I started running things through my head again. Jade and bere saw me talking to the new guys telling them how things looked and also saw that I was probably scaring the pants off them. Honestly, I care less if someone is scared as long as everyone knew what our chances were. Fear is a good tool sometimes… call me evil if you want. I figured we had about a 50% chance of escape going through the tailrace route and about a 20% if we went at bar close if the patrol car waiting for us didn’t move. If the waiting patrol car moved and the security guy left and the bars closed then we were gold getting out quickly the dry route. Now I was pretty sure that wasn’t going to happen but I hoped it would. I called Gatsby telling him we were going to start heading down to evade and to do another walk about to give us the intel on what things looked like.
Packing up our gear we headed down silently and after some small confusion went to the dry route exit that we had a very slim chance of getting out of. I called Gatsby again to get the scoop outside. The parked patrol car was gone; there were no sharks in the waters that he could see either. He couldn’t get anything on the parked security van so we didn’t know if it was there still or not. It seemed the fates were working for us at least a little bit. Deciding to check it out and see if we could find out about the van bere and I decided to climb down and take a look to see if things were clear. We had everyone else except Jade who was positioned in the deep shadow stay in the building. That way if bere and I were caught they would head out through the tailraces using us as a distraction. I quickly told them that if they had to go out that way to follow the running water to the river and get out quickly.
At that point, bere and I started climbing down silently as we could. Fate can be a fickle thing sometimes though. At first our stealthy way down was going fine, we made it to the catwalk in absolute silence. Then as we went to climb on opposite sides of one of the steel beams I slipped and my foot hit a loose pipe. BONG! I silently cursed myself while hanging on with just my hands and getting a better foothold. Not even two seconds afterwards bere hit the same loose pipe with his foot. BONG! If nobody heard the first one they sure as heck heard that. The noise that created seemed so loud that it could be heard for blocks. I was tol later by Gatsby that he heard it down by the rivers edge.
We got down to the main floor and checked to see if we could peek out and see if the van was gone. The lights that were on before were now off, so we had all the shadow we needed. The fates helped us and then laughed at us, then helped again. This kept repeating itself. I decided to try the side door we came in through and the fates laughed again as I found it was locked tight. We quickly started looking for another means. After checking another door that only locked to the outside for alarms it looked clear. It was also a tad bit closer to the way down to the riverbank where we would be fairly safe.
We signaled to the rest of the group to come on down and soon we were all huddled in the shadows by the escape door. I called Gatsby on the outside one last time, it still looked clear. I told him if he saw anything to give my cell a single ring and then hang up. We got everyone ready to go and were just about ready to bum rush the door and take off running when Jade and bere noticed my phone went off. I stopped everyone and did a quick call to Gatsby. He said a patrol shark had just pulled into the lot and spotted the area then pulled out again. He thought we were going to run right out to our doom! We waited a minute and he said the coast was clear again, but he didn’t know if the patrol car was just parked out of sight. A quick gut check and I decided if we were going to do it we were going to do it now! I told him we were coming out. He said he was looking and was going to videotape our escape. I said ok and hung up.
After a couple of seconds I said “go” and we rushed out the door, as we were piling out the door, I felt my phone ring once then go dead! It was too late; we were already out! Thoughts rushed through my head of a patrol car swooping in and catching us all. We continued to run jumping the fence and taking off. I lagged behind to help Jade who seemed to be struggling with the fence and to check our back route. Glancing down the hill, everyone was dashing across the road and to safety. Jade and I brought up the rear and walked across the road calmly. A convertible car was driving by and a girl rolled down her window and asked if we were coming out of that building. I smiled a little and we walked on not confirming or denying anything.
We met with Gatsby coming out of the shadows as the rest of the group walked down the road. I asked him what the last single ring was for since we had made it out safe. As we continued to walk along casually he told me that right before we ran out a patrol car went speeding by looking to go around the block and come in the lot we came out of. He continued to say that a second patrol car drove into the lot and started spotting and drove on no more than two seconds before we rushed out! He said he had it all on tape too! There was a 5-second window of opportunity to escape and we had hit it perfectly! We caught up with the rest of the group for a short moment and I told them to scatter and bail, so at that point, we parted ways with the new guys. Be cool and nobody gets caught.
Jade, bere, Gatsby, and I headed over to the bridge and talked as if in casual conversation. I filled bere in about the patrol cars and we chatted a little while longer and decided that was enough for the night. I was keyed up and ready to go somewhere else, but by now it was 3 AM and bere and Jade were done for. A mutant tailrace night crawler almost a foot long slithered by as we said our goodbyes and split up and made it safely to the car. I laughed all the way home reliving in my mind the very narrow escape from the sharks. Soon the thick fog on the road home swallowed us up as my laughter faded into the night fog.
[last edit 4/20/2005 6:11 PM by GreyKat - edited 1 times]
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