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The Ragged Edge... — Description
"Dammit! C...c'mon!" TK growled, her voice a strained, frustrated near-whine as she pumped her shoulders up and down harder, feeling the edge of the ragged metal slide harmlessly across the surface of the cords for another half-a-dozen heartbeats. She was panting heavily, and the muscles in her calves burned as they strained to hold her up on her toes and help her sawing efforts, which had been going on for several minutes already. But with every downward jerk, she found it harder to push back up again. Little-by-little she sagged back down toward her heels, less-and-less of the high-positioned, rusty "blade" rubbing uselessly against the binding bola cords.

When her feet finally fell flat against the floor again, TK let her head and shoulders sag forward as she paused to catch her breath and regather her strength for another try. Rank discouragement was etched onto young heroine's strained, weary face...but there was deep, deep anger as well. Her claws had done less than nothing to these strands, and so had the last two bits of metallic junk with which she'd tried to saw through them. This slab of fallen metal, she'd had a good feeling about...but it was proving no more effective at helping her win her freedom than its previous bretheren. The cords still hugged her like a remorseless, synthetic octopus. They hadn't slipped, hadn't budged, hadn't loosened, and hadn't cut. If she hadn't known better - and she did, as the feeling would have been abundantly clear to a furred being like herself - TK would have said that the bola strands were glued to her, so firmly and irrevocably did they hold. She fought back the wave of despair which flowed over her like molasses...but it was growing harder to do so with every passing moment...

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On to "One Step Ahead..."