It's never as easy as that

"Andy, I need you over here with the detector," Rick shouted. Then he turned back to shave-head. "Okay, let's go."

"Uh, no. I'll go. You wait here."

"Sorry. The gas leak must be nearby. I've got to make an assessment."

"Listen, buddy. This is my house and you're not allowed inside."

The tech, whose name certainly wasn't Andy, showed up with a big box with flashing lights and an impressive-looking vacuum-shaped nozzle. "Indications are high here. Please, sir, you'll have to step outside. Henry, you'd better suit up. This house could go any second." The detector, or whatever it was, made a shriek, which made both shave-head and Rick jump.

"No time for that," Rick said. "There are additional civilians inside."

"You getting killed with them won't help. Now back off, that's an order."

"I'm going in." Clearly the tech had seen too many old movies. Equally clearly shave-head was buying what the tech was selling.

Rick pushed past shave-head and stepped into the home's entryway... and decided that Black Hat had better not be expecting to get their security deposit back from whomever had rented them this house.

A stack of greasy pizza boxes leaned against one wall. A couple of steel weight plates had been discarded in the middle of the floor. And 8x11 prints of surveillance photos were tacked to the wall... most of them showing attractive females. Even at a quick glance, Rick recognized several shots of Olivia, one of them showing her in a bikini bottom with no top.

"Gas company," he shouted. "Mandatory evacuation. Move it."

"Hey." Shave-head grabbed at him. "You can't go in there."

"This is an emergency," Rick said.

"Listen, asshole. I said you're not going anywhere."

The semi-automatic pointed at Rick's head stopped him when no words would have done so.

"Put down the weapon," the tech said. "Do you have any idea what would happen if you fired that gun with this concentration of natural gas? We would all be blown up."

"Then you'd better back away, hadn't you."

Well, Rick had worried something like this would happen. Which didn't mean he had a plan. "No need to shoot. I'm backing up." He put up his hands like he was in a cop show and stepped carefully toward the door.

A couple more shaveheads appeared in various stages of undress, mostly wearing boxers and wife-beater undershirts but one stripped down to a French-looking ball and cock sack underpant thing. "What the hell is going on here?" cock-sack demanded.

"Gas company," the first shavehead said. "We've got to evacuate."

"But what about the--"

"Shut the fuck up."

"We are going to have to search the house for the site of the leak," Rick said.

"I'm calling HQ," ball-sack said. "Something about this doesn't... hey." He pointed at Rick. "This creep isn't gas department, he's--"

A huge bang followed.