"Okay, it's unlocked!" he shouts, still trying to keep hanging on to the ledge. In case that wasn't obvious.

He tries to open the window, looking for a way to do it despite the lack of obvious handle – maybe if he pries at the edge of the window? Fortunately the ledge allows him to hang there without obstructing the way, so it's not totally impossible.

That upper arm strength is still kinda ridiculous, though.

"What the heck do you expect me to do about it?" she calls.

The window doesn't open easily—

—until Laura pushes it open from the inside, slowly so as not to drop Theo. "Hold on to my hand!"

Wind, wind, very strong wind!

He pulls himself up, again, and tries to grab ahold of her hand.

Stupid. Bloody. Lock.

She manages to pull him in—

—and as soon as she does the wind closes the window again and locks it.

Right. Of course it does.

Well, nothing's horribly pressing right now, so he can just ask her, "How are you?"

Also, he presumably still has his key. If he wants to get out, he can probably just unlock the window and jump, then summon Fly so he doesn't break a leg or something.

"Not great," she says, sitting back on her wheelchair and raising her shirt a bit to reveal the bandages where a small bloodstain's showing through.

Rrright. Of course she's not. "Oh, right."

He stands there awkwardly for a couple of seconds, then unlocks the window to shout to Sadde. Even if the wind starts up again, he'll shout, "I'm okay, and your mum's... mostly fine!"

That might not be the most reassuring thing to say. Sadde also might not be able to hear it if there's wind.

Yup, wind! Inside the apartment, pushing Theo away from the window and drowning out his voice.

Oh, for pity's sake. He turns the key into a staff and tries to capture the Lock by tapping the window and/or the lock.

If this works, he's going to feel a bit stupid, and if this doesn't work he's going to be mostly out of ideas. Maybe he'll try another few card combos and one will actually work.

Nawh.

He makes a noise of frustration. Then he looks about and studies the scene a bit, because really, maybe this whole thing is different on the inside or there's something he can see because he's magic. Who knows.

Not really. It's just Sadde and Laura's apartment.

"What's the plan, then?"

"I was hoping it would be a bit more obvious after I got past the perimeter, and there would be something that I should just hit with this stick or something, but no, stupid magic system has to be stupid." He makes a noise of frustration, then looks at her and realises he's being unhelpful. "Sorry."

"It's alright. What magic do we have at our disposal?"

"Uhm." He checks his bag to see which cards are available, and then says, "This stick that also becomes a weird key, a card that does wind, a card that does flying, one that does jumping, one that does shadows, a card that does small glowing stuff, aaand..." He hesitates a bit, then finishes with, "The Sword."

She doesn't seem to harbour the Sword any ill will. Well, she doesn't react to it either way. "You used the Shadow pretty creatively the other day, it doesn't just do shadows. What other kinds of uses do these cards have?"

"Well, Windy and Shadow sorta did that themselves. They basically seem to do lots of things that fit inside that sort of general idea, or that kind of scope. I tried getting Windy to control sound, but that was a no because I don't have enough control, and Shadow can apparently generate shadows and also use them to move things...?"

"And your key can be used to temporarily displace—"

She's interrupted by a knock on the door. "Mum? Theo?"

"Wh-" he starts, then starts moving doorwards because why is he expressing surprise audibly, that's not helpful. He tries to open the door, and says, "Yeah, we're here."

Door's still locked.

"Are you alright?"

"Fine, dear. We were brainstorming ways to get out of this." She looks at Theo. "Have you tried using the key on this door instead of that window? Why did you even go to the window?"