More Tales from the Guilds Ch. 04

"That's correct, Corporal, and identifyin' it won't be hard. If it really is a Thing, yer'll know immejiately. If it's more horrible than anythin' you've ever seen before, it's a Thing. They don't any two of 'em look the same but every last one is disgustin'. So just get close enough to say if it's somethin' yer recognize and get back at once. In the meantime, Stibbons'll be workin' with Hex t'come up with a 'return' spell and Archchancellor Henry will be cooking up a batch of fireballs so we'll be ready, either way. What size are y'plannin' Henry?"

The Archchancellor of Braceneck University (formerly Dean of Unseen) stroked his beard. "I was originally thinking of a single number eleven, Mustrum, but that might take out the entire garden area so Turnipseed and I will set up a series of six's we can fire in rapid succession. I'm thinking a dozen should be enough."

"Sound tactics, that wizard! Alright, everyone else back from the cordon. Stibbons, when yer ready, Corporal Swires will make his quick spyin' flight, come back and then—they'll be one less batch of Anti-Magic sittin' around."

The Vice-Chancellor nodded, made a few more entries on his knee-top and announced, "All ready, Archchancellor."

"Henry?"

"Loaded & locked, Mustrum!"

"Verra good. In your own time, Corporal Swires."

"Yessir!" Corporal Swire whistled and Morag launched herself off the fence post, up into the sky and down into the hole. After a few minutes (that seemed like hours to the waiting wizards) the buzzard rose out of the hole, circled once and again perched on the post.

Corporal Swire, his eyes big as (very small) saucers and his face a sickly white reported,

"Archchancellor, that was the most horrible thing I've ever seen. It'll be giving me nightmares for weeks, I'm sure. I'm forced to tell you I think it's most definitely a Thing! And it's climbing . . ."

Ridcully swung towards the Archchancellor of Braceneck, "You may fire when ready, Henry!"

Archchancellor Henry, finishing tying a rolled bandana around his forehead, grinned ferociously and roared, "Turnipseed! Range—mark!"

"Fourteen yards, Archchancellor!"

"Bearing—mark!"

"One-seven-zero."

"Fire!"

With a rapid series of loud reports, twelve incandescent spots of light rose in a high arc over the garden plot before plunging down into the gaping abyss. Nothing happened for several seconds and then, one after another, twelve jets of flame shot into the sky. A soul-curdling scream was cut short and then a billow of black and ocher smoke climbed to join Ankh-Morpork's permanent overhead murk. Silence followed, accompanied by a sulfurous stench.

The two Archchancellors grinned ominously and shook hands, nodding as one craftsman to another. Ridcully stepped forward, ceremoniously cut the yellow tape and peered down. Nothing could be seen but the faintest of red glows. He nodded again.

Walking back to Archchancellor Henry, he pulled out his tobacco pouch. "Well done, Henry. Again, it just goes t'show what we can do when both universities pull t'gether. Care for a pipeful of mine? It'll be less unpleasant than that last gout."

"Don't mind if I do, Mustrum." Henry pulled out a calabash that was fully the equal of Ridcully's meerschaum and both wizards packed their pipes in silence, lit them with tiny (#1) fireballs and puffed away for a few minutes in satisfaction.

With a sigh of relief, Stibbons shut down his knee-top and closed it. Captain Ironfounderson saluted and walked away while Corporal Swires returned to the sky.

Within minutes, only Modo was left staring at the place where a fine pile of compost had once been. He wiped a single tear from his eye and then lifted the handles of his wheelbarrow and headed off. Roses needed tending.

*****

Drumknott lay the neatly typed report on the Patrician's desk. "There seems to have been some excitement at the University, Milord," he commented quietly.

Vetinari scanned the paper for essential details, raised one eyebrow and then settled back in his chair to read in depth. "Well, this is interesting, Drumknott. Of course, defending the City against clawed and tentacled Things is the University's most important task and they do have centuries of experience at it so we shouldn't be surprised at their efficiency. However, I am surprised that it was even necessary. The last time we had an incursion from the Dungeon Dimensions was just after the Archchancellor took his position, years ago. That was during that disturbing situation with the moving pictures. We're still not sure how they occurred. Fortunately, there hasn't been a repeat. On the other hand, that does raise the question of how and why this particular Thing found its way here. In a way, I'm glad that both Archchancellors together managed to make any questioning of this thing impossible—presuming that it ever would have been. But without a clear idea of why this was necessary it becomes more difficult to make sure it doesn't happen again. Vexing."

Drumknott turned to leave and silently exited leaving the Patrician nodding and humming as he pondered the report.

In his office at Watch Headquarters in Pseudopolis Yard, Commander Vimes was less sanguine. His fingers drummed on the desk and his cigar shuttled from one side of his mouth to the other. At last he finished reading.

"Dammit, Captain, that was risky! Sending Swires down that hole to scout it out? We could have lost our only eyes in the sky."

"Corporal Swires is a competent watchman and a skilled pilot, Mr. Vimes," Captain Carrot replied, slightly hurt, "and the Archchancellor was very firm about not taking any chances. All he wanted to know was whether there was a Thing at the bottom of the hole and once Buggy saw it was he hastened back to report."

"And then the wizards opened fire. And presumably it was a good thing that they did, given the last episode of Things In The City we went through.

Mind you, I am fully aware of my own dislike of magic, so this isn't just about me. And the Archchancellor has been very helpful on more than one occasion so I don't object. In fact, I'm glad we had the opportunity to assist the University in return. But we always need to be careful. Magic is nasty stuff. It has a sort of life of its own—and it isn't friendly! Use it too often and will send you a bill you are incapable of paying. That's why we leave it to the wizards and when we need it, we're glad to pay the whacking big fees they charge.

So well done, Captain. And we'll hope we don't need to do anything like this again very soon."

*****

Vice-Chancellor Stibbons sat hunched over Hex's long obsolete keyboard, drumming his fingers on the keys with a frown on his face.

"Cryptofer, yesterday's—event was serious. Things From the Dungeon Dimensions invading the city with no overt magical usage on our part? This is a dangerous precedent. What are the chances it could happen again?"

"+++There is yet insufficient information for a meaningful answer+++"

"Now stop that!" Stibbons was angry, "A simple 'I don't know' would be enough. You don't have to play machine with me, of all people, Cryptofer (The name they gave to the mind that had infiltrated the machine) I know what you are and you know that I know. Now, what can you tell me about a threat from the Dungeon Dimensions?"

The University's thinking engine was quiet for a few minutes and then replied, "Sorry, Vice Chancellor, but I actually don't have enough information to answer. The Dungeon Dimensions are outside this plane of the Multiverse and I can't access anything there. Unfortunately, though the University knows more than anyone else about it, we don't have any way to predict its actions. How this Thing showed up is a mystery. I did run a quick scan of the halls to make sure some student wasn't trying for High Magic on the sly but none was."

Stibbons nodded sourly. "I did the same before I came here and got the same result. Disturbing. Maybe the Librarian can run through L-Space and find something out for us but I'm not putting any money on it. Thank-you for trying, Cryptofer."

"My pleasure, as always, Vice-Chancellor."

*****

That night the Librarian sat at his desk, a single candle burning in a safe lamp. Personally, the ape didn't approve of night work in the Library. Candles+books=potential disaster. The Librarian believed that if a student wasn't skilled enough to make his own eldritch light, then he could jolly well go to bed and come back the next day and study until he could. However, tonight was different. The Vice-Chancellor's request was urgent and reasonable. Things From the Dungeon Dimensions should be equal parts horrific and predictable and having one suddenly appear with no warning and no reason was serious. There had been nothing useful in the Library's normal stacks, so taking a deep breath to mentally gird his loins, the Librarian extinguished the candle, scrambled up the end of a bookshelf, ducked behind a shelf of octavos and vanished into L-Space.

Knowledge equals power. Power equals energy. E=mc²  E/c²=m and mass bends space-time because it has gravity. The accumulated knowledge of magic contained on the shelves of Unseen University had the effect of producing an intellectual black hole with sufficient strength to power a spiral galaxy. Though the building was only a hundred yards in circumference, its radius was infinite and so contained every book ever written, every book ever contemplated and even every book that ever could be written. Somewhere in the labyrinth of L-Space had to be what the Librarian sought. And what he sought; he would find.

There are librarians and then there are Master Librarians, those who have been initiated into the mysteries of L-Space. It is not a place for the faint of heart! Monsters stalk the stacks and nightmares from the fevered brains of depraved authors haunt the shelves. Unseen University's Librarian curled his lip, exposing long canines. His library contained a basement full of the most fearsome magical books in the Multiverse. No one who dealt with such ghastly tomes as the Octavo or, worse yet, the Necrotelicomnicom (Said to be written on the tanned skins of flayed virgins . . . but that seems unlikely) would fear what dwelt in L-Space, but he cracked his knuckles as a warning to any who might impede his search and brachiated across the dimensions.

An indefinable time later, the Librarian returned, a rolled papyrus scroll tucked under his arm. However long he had been gone, he returned to the instant he left, carefully set the scroll aside and curled up in his nest under his desk. What he had found could wait until the Archchancellor woke up in the morning.

*****

"Can yer read it?" Ridcully looked down at the ancient scroll unrolled out on the Uncommon Room main table.

The Librarian shook his head. "Ook."

"But yer can tell from its karmic signature that this is what we need. Verra well then, it'll have to be translated. Someone fetch Rincewind."

Professor Rincewind, Chair of Experimental Serendipity, Chair for the Public Misunderstanding of Magic, Professor of Virtual Anthropology, Egregious Professor of Cruel and Unusual Geography, Reader in Slood Dynamics, Fretwork Teacher, Lecturer in Approximate Accuracy, Health and Safety Officer and Lecturer in Unspeakable Linguistics had spent the previous day being escorted to the Counterweight Palace, flirted with by Madame Lotus Blossom and returned to Unseen. Each time this happened, his response was the same—hide under his bed for fear of the ceiling falling in on him and wait for the next meal. Thus, when the Archchancellor called for him, he had to be dragged out from beneath the mattress and half-carried, trembling the whole way, down the corridors to the Uncommon Room.

"Professor," Ridcully addressed him unwillingly, "yer one magical ability is in languages. Use it 'n' figure out what this scroll is hidin' from us. Otherwise the next Thing that shows up might appear in yer room, instead o' the Kitchen Garden."

Rincewind paled and set at once to running his finger from right to left across the dusty papyrus. As he did his pallor became greenish. "Archchancellor, this isn't about magic. It's a summoning of one of the Old Gods!"

"Yer mean the ones with five eyes and eleven tentacles? The kind that eat virgins and inexperienced young men? That's not good. I'd better call in some reinforcements. Runes, send for my brother."

Hughnon Ridcully, Chief Priest of Blind Io and de facto High Priest of Ankh-Morpork, came grumbling and muttering. "I hope this is important, Mustrum. We've got a major kerfuffle brewin' over on the Street of Small Gods and I need to attend to it."

His eyes wide and twinkling with innocence, the Archchancellor packed his pipe, lit it with a #1 fireball and asked, "Any chance it could be about some cacklin' buffoon attemptin' t' summon one of the Elder Gods?"

Hughnon glared at his older brother. "Now how in seven damned Hells did you know that?"

Silently, Mustrum pointed his pipe stem at the scroll still laying open on the table. "We had an 'incident' day b'fore yestiday. We thought it was a Thing From the Dungeon Dimensions, b'cause it had all the charact'ristics. Yer know, uglier than sin, badly assembled out of spare parts, Anti-magic field, the whole bit. Demned thing gnawed a crater in the Kitchen Garden but fort'nately couldn't climb out b'fore we fired a dozen #6 fireballs at it. Trouble was, there wasn't any surreptitious high magic bein' done so we couldn't figure out why it came here. Librarian," here pointed at the orangutan with his thumb, "went into L-Space and came back with this. Rincewind says it's a summonin' ritual for Elder Gods."

"What? The ones with eleven eyes and five tentacles? The kind that gobble down innocent chaps and untouched lasses? Let me look."

His lips moving in silent, obscene syllables as he ran his fingers over the crackling manuscript, the Chief Priest of Blind Io read. When he finished, he licked his finger and held it over the document. Only the faintest of glimmers appeared. He swung around.

"Mustrum, this is a copy! Oh, it's got the summonin' down, alright, but it ain't the original. And to me that means that someone here in Ankh-Morpork has managed to cop the first one and is tryin' to use it t'bring down somethin' named C'atalpa. D'yer think that's what yer incinerated in the kitchen garden?"

"Hughnon, we didn't exactly take the opportunity to introduce ourselves t'each other. In my experience, Things don't have names and since I wasn't expectin' a god I didn't see the point. My question is, can yer summon whatcher think is a god and get a Thing? If so, we have t'stop those idiots and do it right quickly. We might not be so lucky with the next one. Suppose it arrived in the Palace!"

Hughnon walked slowly over to a club chair and sat down. From somewhere in his robes he pulled out a huge ornately carved brier pipe and calfskin tobacco pouch. Once the bowl was packed, he held it up and, right on cue, a tiny lightning bolt struck the tobacco and set it glowing. He sat puffing for some time, quiet but obviously deep in thought.

At last he held the pipe out to one side and said, "Mustrum, I don't like the options, here. If you try to locate the cultists (if that's what they are) by magical scryin', we'll just end up fuelin' some damned Thing. If we complain to the Patrician, he'll innocently ask just how is he to suppress one 'religion' without puttin' the rest in danger."

"And if you go to Blind Io," Mustrum added, "he may or may not decide to be of any help. I think this may be something we need to do ourselves."

"Yes," Hughnon murmured, "and quietly."

*****

After dinner that evening, the University Council assembled in the Uncommon Room for post-prandial port and cheese. The Librarian knuckled around the main table where the scroll still sat, looking ever more ominous the longer he stared at it. At last he tapped it with his forefinger and then went and sat in one of the club chairs. Steepling both his fingers and his toes, he stared over the tips at the Archchancellor.

"Ook."

"Excellent point, old chap," Ridcully nodded in response, "It won't be enough to just eliminate the cabal behind this idiocy. We'll have to get the original scroll and pack it together with this copy down in the basement. Can't be lettin' this sort of information out into the general public. It's too demned dangerous."

"Actually," Vice-Chancellor Stibbons pointed out, "the simplest solution would be to just burn both scrolls. But," he looked around at the stricken faces of every wizard in the room and especially the Librarian's, "that is simply out of the question. Destroy knowledge, however dangerous? I think not."

"True," the Chair of Indefinite Studies agreed, "However dangerous a book may be, we don't destroy it. Lock it behind a stone door down in the sub-basement? Chain it down to a lectern with iron links? Oh yes, on both counts. And in this case I might even be persuaded to approve sealing up the room. But no flames."

"The bounder in charge," Ridcully interjected, "on the other hand? No mercy, chaps, none whatever. Deliberately bringin' in Things t'Ankh-Morpork? Hangin's too good for him. But it seems to me that this isn't somethin' that the University should be tryin' t'arrange all by ourselves. I think a meetin' with Commander Vimes is in order.

*****

"Idiots!" Eldervicar Plotswell muttered under his breath as the last of his 'congregation' left the basement room in the Shades. They had done the incantation and something had happened, but what that was he couldn't determine. Obviously, it was the fault of the fools who had assembled here. It had to be. He had, through great good luck, acquired the proper scroll. They'd followed the ritual exactly, or as exactly as he could make out. The writing was obscure. No, the only thing that could be wrong was the mindset of his minions.

Things would have doubtless worked better if only he didn't have to deal with the dregs of society but they were the only ones gullible enough to fall for his "Old Gods" spiel. Just what had they summoned and where had it gone? Well, if it was something sufficiently dreadful to bring chaos to the city he would know, soon enough. And once he located it, he was sure that as its summoner, he would be its Master. Then the city would be his!

*****

Several evenings later, Commander Vimes quietly stepped into the shadow of the wall surrounding Unseen University to meet Proctor Wiggleigh. The Proctor saluted and led him onto the University proper via the Wizards' Passage, that set of loose bricks which had made scrambling over the wall so much easier for generations of students either in search of illicit entertainment outside the campus or a warm bed afterwards. The bricks had been loose for centuries and not one finger had ever been lifted to get them repaired. After all, they were Traditional.

They squelched across the damp lawns to the garden shed where Wiggleigh opened the door to reveal the large figure of Archchancellor Ridcully sitting on a stack of burlap bags smoking his pipe.

"Good evening, Archchancellor," Vimes greeted, "your message said you could use some assistance from the Watch?"

Ridcully nodded somberly. This, Vimes thought, was ominous. Usually the Archchancellor had a persona as big and ebullient as he was physically and to see him so subdued was unpromising in the extreme.

"Yes, Sam, we do. Find someplace comfort'ble to sit. And you may as well light up. The explanation'll take some time."

Once the Archchancellor had recounted the events that lead to the crater in the Kitchen Garden, he continued, "Then, usin' the technique we developed to hunt down the maker of voodoo dolls we tried to locate the bounder who stole the original scroll and who might be tryin' t'summon what he seems t'think is an Elder God. That the damned thing was actually a Thing From the Dungeon Dimensions seems t'have been outside his feeble understandin'. We got some results but we can't be sure which of the idiots who handled the copy is the real villain. All we have is this series of iconographs. There seem t'be about five individuals who we're certain are involved but which one is the leader and which are innocent dupes, we can't tell. And we daren't use too much magic to find 'em, either. The rotten part about Things is that the blighters eat magic and if one is too close when we locate the villain, it's just likely to suddenly arrive, bigger and stronger than ever."