They came from somewhere else

 John Hoggard

Hurry up you’re late.  The show’s about to start. 

 The lights fade...

 Stop whistling this is supposed to be a serious introduction.

 The curtains roll back and the screen bursts into life.  Dolby Surround Sound blasts from the speakers, you feel like you’re surrounded by trumpets while the drums seem to boom from directly inside your skull.  For those who have missed this acoustical delight switch your imagination to ON.

 The screen is black except for a tiny dot of light in the centre.  Watch it grow.  It becomes elliptical and as it grows still further the ellipse becomes an all too familiar shape.  A mighty, asteroid crated shell, that huge head and enormous paddled legs beating a steady rhythm as it carries its burden through the vastness of space.  If this description has failed to jingle any mental bells then you’re watching the wrong show, but you can stay if you like, newcomers and converts are always welcome.

 As Great A’Tuin fills the screen the music begins to fade away, replaced by the steady roar of air moving at high speed as whatever vessel is producing these images hits the upper atmosphere of the Discworld. 

The image begins to swirl, whatever device this is was designed for space flight and has the aerodynamic capabilities of a house brick.

The rim of the Discworld slides off the edge of the screen.  Neat white writing appears over the images of rapidly approaching land mass.  It reads:-

 Terminal Guidance Failure...

Emergency deceleration Protocol initiated...

Failed....

Calculated survival rate based on current impact velocity...0%

...

...&*^$*(~@%£~#¬@...

 

            It was hot in Ankh-Morpork.  So hot the egg-seller in the market was selling his eggs soft or hard boiled only.

            CMOT Dibbler who had started early in the hope of selling some of his merchandise before people gave up and hid from the Disc’s normally benign sun, discovered that his half-cooked sausages-in-a-bun were now fully cooked sausages-in-a-bun.  The aroma was quite pleasant and he almost ate one.  Only the sudden thought of lost profit and more precisely, the thought of where Big Tuk, his supplier got the aforementioned supplies from[1], stopped him. 

            The Ankh, which never really flowed, but rather slid now had to contend with a baked hard outer crust, slowing its progress out to sea[2] still further.

            A young boy kicked his ball into the Ankh where it sat, hardly moving downstream at all.  This gave the young lad a moment to consider the possibility of risking the firmness of the crust and retrieving his prized possession.  A second before he took his first tentative step the ball spontaneously combusted, in a mixture of chemical compounds that if any first year chemistry student discovered them would grant an instant PhD.

            In a fit of anger the boy threw a rock at the spot where his ball once was.  The rock landed with a thud and sank about an inch into the crust.  A second later it exploded into a thousand tiny fragments.  The boy turned on this heels and ran back into the questionable safety of tinder dry wooden houses with a hundred open fires used for cooking.  Had he stayed five seconds longer he would have been the only person to have seen what happened next.

 A few yards away from the still smouldering carcass of the boy’s ball the crust that was the Ankh suddenly split and was sucked inwards to the accompanying sound of a wellington boot being pulled out of a muddy field.  The ultrasonic shockwave arrived a second or two later, with every dog in Ankh-Morpork baying to the sky as it swept over the twin cities.  Only then did people begin to point at the sky as a fiery shaft of light appeared in the heavens[3].  They watched in horror as it streaked downward towards the heart of the city and vanished behind the buildings lining the streets.  Everyone froze.  Conversations died mid-sentence, muggers paused mid-mugging and victims stopped, just for a moment, being victims.  They waited to be consumed in a fiery blast that would turn them into a shadow on the wall, or the voice of God, in fact any God, telling them to repent.

            No fiery death came and most people’s heads remained devoid of spiritual demands.  With nervous and embarrassed coughs people began to move on.  The noise of a city rushed back to fill the void of silence, washing it away as effortlessly as the morning tide sweeps away the footprints of a midnight stroll on the beach.

            The strange incident claimed only one victim, Harri Kipple, cat burglar, who, blessed with an ability to hear frequencies far above that of normal human hearing had turned mid-leap to find out where that bloody horrible noise was coming from.  He pondered as he fell the nine stories to his death what had possessed him to do such an incredibly stupid thing.  Whether he reached a conclusion before he became a lot shorter and thinner and generally more dead is unknown.

            At the bottom of the Ankh strange electronic thought processes were taking place.  The strange thing about them was that they were taking place at all.  Computers were busy doing the electronic equivalent of patting everything down and making sure that everything was still there.  It took an excruciatingly long nine nanoseconds for the answer to be confirmed as affirmative.  Had the Artificial Intelligence Network been set up to deal with emotion, it would have let out a long, deep sigh of relief.  What it actually did was:

 110010101010011010101010100101010101010101100001010101010

10101010001

11011010001

00101011010

 

Environmental sensor sweep initiated....

....Environment declared uninhabitable for....

...Silicon based life...

...

...Carbon based life...

...

...Decontamination process initiated...

...Detected organic material deemed ... UNSUITABLE[4]...

...Organic cleansing process initiated...

...Mineral conversion process initiated...

...Waiting....

             At the top of one of the many towers of the Unseen University there was a knock on the Archchancellors door.  It was the knock of somebody trying to be firm but polite which is why it sounded neither firm nor polite only irritating.

            “Yes,” bellowed Ridcully.  Ridcully always bellowed, it was his normal tone, except when he was speaking quietly in which case he merely shouted.

            “Archchancellor, there’s been a sign,” said a  voice from the other side of the door.

            Ridcully rolled his eyes heavenwards.  “Don’t be so bloody mystic Groundrunner.  It is you isn’t it?”

            “Yes Archchancellor.”

            “Then stop talking to me through the door and get in here.”  Ridcully didn’t like doors, especially wooden ones, they reminded him of trees.  Up in the Ramtops many an innocent looking tree suddenly developed huge claws and teeth.  Sometimes he’d barely have time to fire off a crossbow bolt.  The similarities jangled a few ancient memories.

            The door opened and the sight of young Groundrunner replaced the memory of a particularly huge bear he had killed when he was just sixteen.  He had the head mounted with the same bemused expression the bear had died with all those years ago.  The thought of its furrowed brow almost made Ridcully smile.

            “So,” began Ridcully as Groundrunner stepped into the Archchancellor’s office, “what’s this about a sign?”

            Groundrunner took a deep breath, this was going to be a long one.  “Well, this is the hottest day Ankh-Morpork has had since records began.  This morning all dogs in the city began howling as if to announce the fiery streak of light which appeared in the skies only a moment later, cutting into the Ankh like a surgeon’s scalpel into flesh.  Then two of the apprentices came back this evening to say the Ankh had started to run clear as it passed through the city.”

            “Firstly Groundrunner, stop reading those damn novels from Pseudopolis, they’re affecting your ability to talk properly.  Secondly, the University has only been keeping temperature records since last Thursday and dogs howl all the time, they don’t need a reason, they even howl when they see me.”

            “That’s because you kick them when they don’t get out of the way.”

            “Don’t interrupt Groundrunner.”

            “Sorry Archchancellor.”

            “The fiery streak of light was probably just a stray lightning bolt, brought on by the strange meteorological weather conditions.  Lastly what the hell were two apprentices doing outside the University walls....What do you mean the Ankh is running clear?”

            “It appears to have some water in it.  Apparently you can hear it gurgling along the riverbank instead of scraping like it normally does.”

            “Show me.  Now!”[5]

 

            Papa Grintus, mid grade beggar of the Beggars Guild carefully dragged himself off the main street and into a darkened alley.  From beneath his body two legs appeared where apparently only stumps had been.  He took the coins from his bowl and very carefully placed them, one-by-one into a heavy pouch.  Out here, so close to the Shades, there were a lot freelance thieves about and they could tell the clink of two gold dollar pieces from the clunk of two half dollar silver pieces at thirty yards.  Papa wasn’t taking any chances. 

            His ears, so sensitive that they could tell whether a potential mugger was carrying his weapon in his left or right hand due to the difference the weight made to the way that they walked, heard a strange little sound and turned Papa’s eyes to the correct direction automatically.

            Zip-zip-zip-zip-rhurr-zip-zip-zip-zip-rhurr.

            Papa’s pupils dilated taking in as much of the available light as possible.

            Zip-zip-zip-zip-rhurr-zip-zip-zip-zip-rhurr.

            Finally a tiny, human-like, figure emerged from the shadows and walked into the alley.  Papa watched it approach in amazement.  What a splendid little toy.  There were a lot of dwarf workshops in the area, they came here because it was cheap and none of the neighbours complained about the noise when they were fighting with the trolls, perhaps it was one of their gadgets.

            Zip-zip-zip-zip-rhurr-zip-zip-zip-zip-rhurr.

            He reached down and picked it up.  The legs continued for a moment and then stopped.  Papa was amazed by how heavy it was.  Micro-fusion engines are very heavy, but Papa wasn’t to know that.

            He grinned with delight as the little man’s left arm rose up and pointed at Papa.  A bright red light appeared at the end of the arm.  It was shining onto Papa’s forehead but Papa was unaware of this, he was more concerned with the sudden smell of burning flesh.  He stopped being concerned a moment later when the tiny but incredibly powerful laser beam cut through his skull and frazzled the brain inside.  He toppled forward knowing he was dead, just not knowing why.

            The little man clattered to the floor as it fell from Papa’s hand.  Rhurr-click-zip-click-click-rhurr, it went as it moved itself back into an upright position.

            Zip-zip-zip-zip-rhurr-zip-zip-zip-zip-rhurr, it went as moved off back down the alley.  From the river, not a stone’s throw away, other tiny figures were emerging from the water.

 

            A little distance from the now deceased Papa Grintus, on the other side of the river, was Hide Park.  It was a park, just like any other park, in any other large city, in any universe.  It was a park only because it had more grass than houses and more litter than grass and nobody went there at night, even the muggers had stopped going because the only people left to mug was themselves. 

            The water in the park’s small lake fizzed and steamed.  It often did this, you’d be amazed what some people threw in park ponds, but now it fizzed like the can of soda handed to you by a smug looking friend whose backing away even as you take hold of the ring pull.  It was fizzing around the edges of something.  The type of something that if you slitted your eyes so you could only just see out and then peered out of the corner of your eye you still couldn’t quite see what it was, but you would know it was there, anyway.

            There was a scraping noise from the thing which wasn’t really there and when it stopped there was a splash a little distance from the fizzing water.  Above the surface of the water tiny motes of light appeared, swirling randomly, like an animated 3D dot-to-dot, or a million fireflies on an acid trip.  The lights moved towards the edge of the pond, leaving behind little islands of fizzing water.  When the lights reached the edge they vanished.  A few brown patches appeared on the grass as the water from the pond killed it off.  These brown patches had a definite, foot-shaped, quality about them, which was a worry considering their enormous size.  It almost made you glad you couldn’t see what had made them.

 

            Ridcully and Groundrunner walked through the streets of Ankh-Morpork keeping the Ankh in sight as they did so.  Even though the sun had set almost an hour ago the air and the stonework radiated the heat from the day making it uncomfortably hot, especially for Groundrunner who was almost running to keep up with Ridcully.

            “It doesn’t look any different,” noted Ridcully as they walked.  He sniffed.  “It doesn’t smell any different either,” he noted further.

            “Apparently the change is quite sudden, just down river of Misbegot bridge,” replied a panting Groundrunner.

            “Get out of the way!” bellowed Ridcully as some hapless old man exited a side street directly into the Archchancellor’s path.  “I don’t care what war you fought in,” he shouted as the old man tumbled away shouting at Ridcully, “if you marched as slow as that I’m surprised you kept up with the front-line.”

            As the two figures vanished into the gloom the old man considered his retort then stopped when five million years worth of genetic survival instinct tapped him on the proverbial shoulder and asked him to very slowly turn round.  He did this without seeming to move a single muscle, his feet simply rotating on a turntable of fear.  His eyes locked onto a hundred swarming fireflies flickering to the beat of some unheard tune.  However, if you let your eyes unfocused the fireflies seemed to be constrained within a shape, the shape of a huge....

            It was gone, the old man knew somehow it was headed down the street behind those two infernal wizards.  It was the same direction as the old man’s house.  He looked into the sky and at the stars shimmering in the heat haze.  What a pleasant evening for a walk his instincts thought.  He turned and moved away at the best pace a nonchalant run could produce.

 

            Ridcully and Groundrunner arrived at the point where the Ankh began to flow like, well a proper river should, only to find the most advantageous viewing spot of the street cordoned off.  That is to say,  Corporal Nobbs was stood in the middle of it drawing on a dog end.

            “Evening Gentlemen,” said Nobby as the two wizards approached.  “Can’t come this way,” he said lightly, “due to the fact that this street is now a Crime Scene.”

            “We have important business in this street Constable.”

            “Corporal,” corrected Nobby automatically.

            “We have important business in this street Corporal and I demand to pass,” growled Ridcully.

            “Sorry,” replied Nobby, “only people with the relevant authority may enter the Crime Scene in case they disturb vital evidence.”  He sounded like he was reading the words from a script.  What Nobby wanted to say was, “Captain Carrot says nobody gets past in case they muck up the body and stop us finding any clues,” but Carrot had carefully translated it for him and made him learn it.

            Ridcully considered turning Nobby into a toad, but after a moments thought he concluded somebody had already beaten him to it, with the added twist of leaving the toad still in its original human form.  It wasn’t that Ridcully lacked the power to turn Nobby into something nasty, what he lacked was the imagination to turn Nobby into something worse than what he already was.

            Ridcully rolled up a sleeve of his robes and made a fist.  He held it up to, or more precisely, down to, Nobby’s face.  “If you don’t let me through I’m going pound your face into so much pulp even your own mother wont recognise you[6].”

            Nobby eyed the organic sledge hammer that was Ridcully’s arm and decided that the most relevant authority right at this moment was that fist.  “Right you are then sir.  You’ll find Captain Carrot at the junction of Treacle Mine Road and the dockside,” said Nobby.

            “Thank you Constable.”

            “Corporal,” corrected Nobby.

            Ridcully unload his arm and strode into the gloom of the dockside.  Groundrunner shrugged at Nobby then ran off after Ridcully.   A moment or two later something slipped past Nobby and moved down the street in pursuit of the two wizards.  Before Nobby’s eyes could focus it was gone, perhaps it hadn’t been there at all, just a few sparkles of light.  It was just the shape...

            “Good evening,” said Nobby without turning round.

            GOOD EVENING.

            “You been for the beggar then?”

            YES.

            “A little unusual for you, a lowly beggar.  Something special was he?”

            YES.  HE WAS THE FIRST.

            “Something to do with the big bugger who just ran past me?”

            NOT DIRECTLY, BUT THERE IS A LINK.

            “You off then?”

            IN A MOMENT.

            Nobby got the feeling[7] Death wanted to ask him something.

            HOW MANY TIMES HAVE YOU SEEN ME NOW?

            “I’ve never seen you,” replied Nobby quickly.  “I make a point of never seeing you.”

            HOW MANY TIMES HAVE YOU NEVER SEEN ME?

            “I never see you all the time.  Sometimes I can go weeks without never seeing you.”

            I THOUGHT SO.  ARE YOU PERCHANCE THE EIGHTH SON OF AN EIGHTH SON?

            “Do all the son’s have to have the same mother?”

            I BELIEVE IT HELPS BUT NO, I DO NOT BELIEVE SO.

            “Might be then.  The Nobbs family tree looks more like grass cuttings than a tree.  Anything thing’s possible I s’pose.  Why?”

            There was no reply.  Relief overcame annoyance and Nobby’s heart, which had stopped in case it drew attention to itself, started beating again.

 

            As Ridcully strode through the dockside with Groundrunner trailing behind voices ahead guided his approach.

            “I’m at a loss sir,” came the unmistakable tones of Captain Carrot.  “I have no idea what killed him.”

            “What’s left of his brains dribbling out of the hole in his head may have contributed,” commented a sarcastic female voice.

            Ah, thought Ridcully, no doubt that was Constable Angua, Carrot’s faithful companion, so to speak. 

            Ridcully disliked werewolves intensely, what he found particularly annoying about werewolves was having to explain to the local authorities why you’d just shot a perfectly ordinary looking, if naked, person in the back under the pretence that you could have sworn you’d seen a wolf.

            “It’s a very neat hole and whatever made it must have been very hot because the wound has been cauterised.  There’s no bleeding at all,” continued Carrot, seemingly unaware of Angua’s tone.

            “Put it down as suicide for the moment,” said a third voice.

            “Suicide?” queried Angua.

            “Counting money in The Shades is fairly suicidal,” noted the third voice.

            “But he still has his money,” continued Angua.

            “Just goes to prove, you really can’t take it with you,” replied the voice.

            Ah yes, thought Ridcully, now I know who that is...

            “Good Evening Commander Vimes,” greeted Ridcully as he rounded the last corner of the street and walked up to the alley adjoining the dockside.

            “Oh, it’s you Ridcully,” said Vimes without looking up from the body of the beggar.  “And what brings you out on this fine evening?”

            “I’m making a study of a unique natural phenomenon,” replied Ridcully.

            “So you want to know why the river is running clear as well?”

            “Strange events such as this pique a wizard’s curiosity.”

            “Really?  I thought the only thing which piqued a wizard’s curiosity was whether he could get a sixth chicken drumstick onto his dinner plate without dislodging the ten roast potatoes already there.”

            “Those days are long gone Commander Vimes.  I believe in the maxim; sound of body, sound of mind.”

            “Sound of wheezing,” noted Angua as Groundrunner lurched round the corner.

            “Sorry, gasp, gasp, I took, gasp, a wrong turn, gasp, gasp,” said Groundrunner in between shuddering breaths.

            Vimes just shrugged his shoulders and grinned a told-you-so, grin.

            “Why did you run?” asked Ridcully.

            For a moment Groundrunner didn’t answer.  He took a few long, deep breaths then began.  “I suddenly felt like I was being watched and then I got this overpowering urge to run.  It felt like a really good idea at the time,” he added lamely.

            “Wizard’s intuition?” commented Angua.

            Ridcully turned to face Angua and was about to reply but stopped when he saw that she had suddenly developed a very lupine expression without her features apparently changing.  The transformation was so complete Ridcully felt a sudden urge to go for his crossbow.

            A little growl emerged from Angua’s throat.  It could have been mistaken for her clearing her throat, but only by a profoundly deaf corpse.

            “What is it?” asked Carrot.

            “We’re being watched,” replied Angua in a voice which was more human than wolf, but only just.

            “Where?” said Carrot spinning round.  “I can’t see anyone.”

            “Exactly,” she growled.

             “I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” said Groundrunner quietly.

 

            From the river there was a sound of the world’s biggest champagne cork being fired through a bucketful of jelly.  Carrot reacted instantly.

            “Another one.  Everybody down!”

            Both Angua and Vimes dived to the floor.  Ridcully and Groundrunner stared at them in disbelief, then they alternately stared at the floor and sky as they tumbled head-over-heels.  If the Discworld ever developed a rail network, Ridcully would already be in a position to testify what being hit by a speeding locomotive felt like.

           

            Something fiery streaked across the night sky in front of Ridcully and struck the side of one of the wooden warehouses that lined the dockside.  A sound like a hundred Ramtop Pine trees being felled at the same instant pounded against Ridcully’s ears.  Then, a wave of heat passed over him that made the sticky night air feel cool in comparison.  Finally he was showered with fragments of wood and more strangely pieces of hot, bubbling fish.

 

            A roar filled the air.  A roar, verging on a scream.  It chilled Ridcully and the others to the bone.  The weight of Carrot was off him in a moment and Ridcully managed to roll over and see, just for an instant, a shape.  The outline was blurred, shown only by a few swirling lights and sticky globules of ex-fish.  Then it was gone, he could sense rather than see it’s departure.  Ridcully concentrated his vision in the Octarine end of the spectrum and he could still just about make out a blurred shape running back towards the centre of the city.  He watched for as long as he could but when his eyes threatened to disconnect themselves from his optic nerve he stopped.  Normal light swam back in, pallid in comparison the hues given to things by the magical eighth colour of the spectrum.  Even a black cat in a light tight room blazed like a beacon in Octarine light[8].  Very slowly, in case anything important fell off, Ridcully stood up.

 

Death watched the small party rise to its feet and begin to pick bits of steaming fish remains off one another.  He held up two lifetimers.  In his left hand was that of Groundrunner, the other held that of Ridcully.  He stared into the lower bowl of each.  The sand in each had quite definitely ceased to move.  A thousand particles of sand floated between the upper and lower bowls.  Death cast an accusing glance into the night sky then shook each one hopefully.  The sand remained resolutely stationary, unmoved by Death’s efforts.

            BUGGER, said Death.

            He stalked through the group.  Both Ridcully and Groundrunner froze mid-breath, hanging onto it, just in case it was their last.

            Death stopped at Ridcully.  He turned to face the motionless wizard. 

            I’LL BE BACK, said Death before he continued on His way into the night.

            With Death gone Groundrunner felt it safe to faint and promptly did so.  Ridcully let out a sad little whine as the breath in his lungs squeezed its way out of his terrified throat.  Carrot and Vimes looked at Ridcully with bemused expressions.  Only Angua seemed to understand what Ridcully had been through and she shivered as she cast a final glance in the direction Death had gone.        

 

            With the immediate threat of Death, quite literally, gone, some of Ridcully’s wizardly overbearing returned.

            “What the hell was that!” he demanded.

            Vimes prodded a larger piece of smouldering fish with his boot.  “Probably an Ankh Spectrum trout.  Quite a rare breed.”

            “Getting rarer.  Do they often explode?” asked Ridcully, his tone lowering slightly.

            “Not often,” replied Vimes, “although this is the third we’ve seen tonight.  You see the oxygen level in the Ankh is so low, the Spectrum trout has developed an incredibly effective respiratory system to enable it to survive.  In water with a high oxygen content the system very quickly goes critical.  The fish tries to expend all the extra oxygen as quickly as it can.  As you can see the effects are quite terminal, both for the fish and quite often for innocent bystanders.”

            “Hmm, interesting though all that is Commander, and may I say how remarkably well informed you appear to be, I was originally referring, not to the fish, but to the thing that none of us could see.”

            Apart from the gurgle of the river, the squishy sound of various pieces of fish falling from the hole made in the wall of the warehouse and the general background noise of a city with half of its million inhabitants doing the night shift, it had gone very quiet.

            “What thing would this be?” asked Vimes cautiously.

            “I don’t know,” snapped Ridcully, “I couldn’t see it.”

            “Good,” replied Vimes.  “I couldn’t see it either.”

            “Will you two stop it,” interjected Angua.  “It doesn’t matter if you couldn’t see it.  I sensed it and we all heard it didn’t we?”

            In the silence there were several murmured ‘yesses’.

            There was another sound, quiet but growing louder.

            Reep, Reep.

            “Commander,” said Carrot.

            There was no response.         

            Reep, Reep.

            Carrot tried again.  “Commander.”

            Reep, REEP.

            “Huh? Yes what is it Carrot?”

            REEP, REEP!

            “You appearing to reeping, sir.”

            “What?  Oh, damn!” said Vimes reaching inside his jacket and pulling out a small black box.  Pulling open the front he stuck it against the side of his head.  He then spent the next few seconds frantically shouting at the box.

            “Speak up Sybil I can’t hear you.  What?  I can’t hear - I said, I can’t he- Hello?  Hello!  Bugger!”

            He pulled the box away from his ear and slammed the front shut.  There was a squeal of protest from the box.

            “Sorry,” said Vimes sliding open the front.  “Was it your hand?  OK,  I know it’s not your fault and that I shouldn’t take it out on you.  I’m sure once they upgrade your spell things will be much better.”

            Vimes closed the front again, more carefully this time and slipped the box back inside his jacket.

            Vimes scanned the row of quizzically raised eyebrows.

            “Erm, it was Sybil’s idea.  A Mobile Demon.  It’s a crossbreed between those little voice imitating demons you get at side-shows and the telepathic ones fortune tellers use to con you out of half a dollar each year on Hogswatch night, by telling you exactly what you want to hear.  It was supposed to be so I could tell her when I was going to be late, but so far we haven’t managed more than three sentences that don’t involving phrases like, ‘Pardon?’ and ‘You’ll have to speak up.’  Apparently the demonologists blame the amount of residual magic leaking out of the Unseen University and intend to put up repeater octagrams around the city to help the demons focus better on their communication spells.”

            Ridcully, who had almost choked when Vimes had mentioned that the demonologists were involved, shook his head in amazement.  “It’ll never catch on.  Can you imagine if there were hundreds of these things making those horrible little noises with people just stopping in the middle of the street to answer them.  Nobody will do it Commander.  It’ll never happen.”

            Vimes shrugged.  “You’re probably right.  I’ll send Nobby round to see Sybil when we get back to the Watch.  He’s the only one I know who can eat as many biscuits as Sybil puts out and he doesn’t eat them I will,” he said ruefully patting his belly.

            “Does this call for ‘a plan of action’ Commander?” asked Carrot.

            “Indeed,” replied Vimes.  “Let’s get back to Short Street and see if we can’t piece together this jigsaw[9].”

            “What do we do with old Papa?” asked Angua.

            “I’ll get some of the lads to go round to the Beggars Guild and let them know what’s happened.  Mind you it’ll take them a week to beg a funeral and in this heat that’s one grave I don’t want to be stood down wind of.”

            The three City Guards began to move away from the body of the beggar and the remains of the exploding fish.

            “We’ll go back to the University and see if we can’t apply a magical angle to this,” called Ridcully after the disappearing guards.

            “You do that,” shouted back Vimes.  And keep out of our bloody way, he whispered under his breath.

           

            The building occupied by the High Energy Magic Project was, quite literally, in Chaos.

            “What the hell is going on Ponder!” bellowed Ridcully over the noise.  The air was thick with the tinny smell of high concentrations of localised magical output.

            Ponder didn’t answer immediately.  His thin framed weaved around HEX, the University’s first supercomputer, arms moving with a blur of motion as his hands pulled on various switches and levers.  Slowly the noise subsided and a multitude of small objects and creatures stopped swirling round the machine and dropped to the ground.

            Ridcully tried again.

            “What-”

            SMASH. Tinkle.

            “-is going-”

            Squeeeek.

            “-on.”

            “Be with you in less than two to the power four seconds Archchancellor,” replied Stibbons.

            Off to Ridcully’s left a large, horned sheep gave a ‘hic’ and fell over onto it’s side.

            Ponder shook his head sadly.  “Baggage,” he called, “the ram’s gone down again see what you can do.”

            An equally thin, pale and bespectacled wizard emerged from the shadow of HEX and moved over towards the seemingly comatose sheep.

            “I don’t understand it,” said Ponder, his frame sagging under some terrible, invisible weight.  He reached up into HEX and took down a box, disconnecting it from the pipes that fed into it.  He flipped the lid and peered inside.  A big grey rat had three small, white mice trapped in the corner of the box.  Ponder reached in and lifted the rat out.  It promptly bit him, squirmed free and vanished under the machine.

            “A rat.  I knew you couldn’t use a rat.  Completely incompatible with my original mouse drivers.  Baggage what’s up with the ram?”

            “I think its the Wurzells,” replied the junior wizard.

            “Any treatment?” asked Ponder sucking on his bleeding, rat bitten, finger.

            “Don’t know, I’m a wizard not a doctor, but I hear it’s a nasty virus.”

            “Go and fetch the vet.  Tell him if he comes now I’ll cast a spell that will stop his wife wanting to make love to him all the time.”

            “Ponder Stibbons!” snapped Ridcully.

            The young wizard shrugged.  “It’s just Tiberius’ Morphic Attractor.  It’ll wear off in less than twenty hours anyway, but he doesn’t know that.  I imagine he’s getting quite desperate by now.”

            As Baggage dashed off into the night Ridcully tried one final time.  “Ponder, what the hell is going on?” 

            “It’s those idiot Druids on the Sto Plains.  They’ve complete buggered Henge, their stone circle number cruncher.  Bit of a tourist attraction you see, the ‘worlds oldest computer.  People wanted to see it you see, feel the residual power of a million processed numbers trapped in the granite memory.  So some up and coming young programmer suggests that they could charge for people to walk around.  Fine, science and commercialism can work hand-in-hand and memory upgrades are expensive.  You couldn’t imagine how much they’re charging for a sixty-four ton granite memory block these days.”

            Ridcully shook his head slowly.  After this was over he would take Ponder out hunting, show him what the sun looked like and if that didn’t work he’d have to shoot him.

            “Then,” continued Ponder, “they decide that this is really profitable, if only they could get more people in.  So..” Ponder took a deep shuddering breath, he was almost crying, “they moved the stones to make the circle bigger.”

            “This is a bad thing,” guessed Ridcully.

            Ponder lifted his head.  His eyes were glazed and staring into the middle distance.  “Bad,” he repeated, the word given that special syrup-like quality obtained only by the emotionally overwrought.  “It crashed when the sun came up.  They managed to restart it with some clever arrangement of mirrors but when they asked it what one plus one was it took nine hours to come back with the answer five...ish.”

                “So what’s that got to do with this?” Ridcully asked, pointing at both the machine and the mayhem it had apparently caused.

            “They were supposed to check some of the algorithms of a new program I’ve written for Hex.”  He reached up and patted the machine affectionately.

            Forget the hunt, thought Ridcully, straight to the shooting.

            “But the Druids didn’t tell me Henge couldn’t check if the sun would come up tomorrow never mind some very complex mathematical equations.  So I ran the program and...”  He waved vaguely in the direction of the Universe as if the sweeping gesture would explain everything.

            “So what was your program supposed to do?” asked Ridcully dreading the answer.

            “It was supposed to calculate whether the sun would come up tomorrow,” replied Ponder.

            Ridcully mentally shook his head sadly.  It’s too late even to shoot him, he thought.

            “I have it on good authority that it will,” said Ridcully. 

            “Ah, but at what time will it come up?”

            Ridcully felt like he was swimming in treacle, it was only a matter of time before his brain gave up and died a sugary death.

            “You tell me,” he said cautiously.

            “Approximately zero point zero zero zero zero three times the time it takes the Dean to eat a small pork-pie later than it did today.  That’s as close as we can get without Hex’s help.”

            “You mean the sun rises later every day?”

            “Yes and sets later as well.”

            Ridcully didn’t much like numbers but he was pretty quick off the mark when it came to basic principles.  “You mean it’s slowing down?”

            “Yes.”

            “So eventually it’ll stop?”

            “No.  Eventually it will slow down enough that it will fall into the Discworld destroying it utterly.”

            This was not the best news Ridcully had ever heard.  “When,” he asked.

            “About another four million rotations of the Disc.”

            Numbers again.  Ridcully started a quick mentally calculation, forgot to carry a two and gave up.  It was too far away to worry about and he had more pressing matters.  He had to snap Ponder out of this.  “Ponder,” he said gently.

            “Yes,” said Stibbons looking up, just in time to see the fist but too late to do anything about it.

 

            The Watch House was a hive of activity.  Vimes had sent Nobby off to see Sybil and Gutwrencher to see the Beggars before he[10] went off duty.  Several guards were vying for position to speak to Vimes.  This was a bad sign, decided Vimes.  Normally the lads couldn’t wait to get down the pub after the shift.  In fact a lot of them often woke with their faces stuck to a table top just in time to start their shift the following night. 

            Vimes strode through them and went to his office.  He slammed the door shut leaned up against it and waited.  A minute or so later there was a knock.

            Vimes stepped away.  “Come in Carrot,” he said without turning round.

            The door opened and the disturbed hum from outside slipped in behind Carrot.  Even when the door shut again the noise somehow remained.  “So,” said Vimes turning to face his captain, “what the hell is going on?”

            “It’s not looking good Commander,” replied Carrot solemnly.  “It looks like Papa was just the first.”

            Vimes’ heart sank.  This was the exact same expression Nobby had used before he’d left to see Sybil.  Nobby had said it with a rather far away look on his face that usually meant he was constipated but occasionally had proven to mean that Nobby had some inside information.  From the inside of what and from whom Vimes tried not to think about.

            “Go on Carrot, give it to me straight,” said Vimes, knowing in fact that Carrot couldn’t possibly do anything else.

            “We’ve been inundated with reports from all round the city of strange occurrences and mysterious deaths.”

            “Such as?”

            “Constable Scussi thinks he found the body of Wicker Stumple over by Hide Park.”

            “What, the strongman street performer?  The one you arrested for juggling three jugglers?”

            “He didn’t have a street entertainers license.”

            “Nobody had ever been brave enough to ask if he’d got one, just in case he said ‘No an’ wha’ ya gonna do abo’ it.’”

            “Well if it is him he won’t be saying much to anybody anymore.  This being on account of the part of the body normally used for identification no longer being connected to, or indeed in the immediate vicinity of the rest of him.”

            “His head is missing?”

            “Yes.”

            “What, neatly and surgically removed I suppose?”

            “Actually Constable Scussi was very articulate in his description using adjectives such as torn and ripped quite frequently.”

            “Hmm, do the rest of the reports get worse or better than this one Carrot?”

            “The rest are about the same,” replied Carrot.

            “Tell me all about them Carrot,” said Vimes in a resigned tone.

 

            The room was filled with paper, every flat surface and a few that weren’t was covered with ink scrawled sheets.  Ridcully eyed them suspiciously.  This wasn’t maths, maths had numbers in it.  This was magic, a magic that Mustrum Ridcully didn’t understand and by default didn’t like.  It was the type of magic that told you how fast things were going even if they were going so fast you couldn’t measure that speed with anything.  It was a type of magic that told you how far away a thing was even if you couldn’t see it or it was so close you had to measure the distance with bits of other things you could see.

            Ponder had spoken to every wizard in the university who had seen the streak of light in the sky that morning.  He’d asked about barking dogs and angles of incidence and map co-ordinates and every answer he got produced another sheet of incomprehensible squiggles but each sheet became more concise a mathematical arrow saying ‘the answer’s this way’.

            Finally Ponder stopped.

            He stared down at the final sheet of paper.  A drop of red appeared on the sheet obscuring part of the drawing of the university.  Absently he reached up and wiped his nose wincing as he did so.

            “Sorry about the nose,” said Ridcully, “it was purely reactionary.  When you tried to hit me back I just....” he ended with a shrug and stared down at the map of the city.  It wasn’t any normal map, although no map of Ankh-Morpork could be truly ordinary.  It was covered in little symbols representing where all the wizards had been during the day.  Arrows criss-crossed the city showing approximate line of sights and although they didn’t all meet in the same place it was more than just a little coincidental that they all[11] crossed in the region where they’d found the beggar’s body and where the river now ran clear.

            “Are you sure about the rest of it?” asked Ridcully.

            “Quite sure Archchancellor.”

            “But we have enough problems coping with what happens here, on the Disc.  We can’t have other people just dropping in, adding to it.  They haven’t even asked if they can stay.”

            “If they’re doing to the river what I think they’re doing,” replied Ponder, “we might have to ask them if we can stay.”

            “Meaning?”

            “Their presence is changing the natural morphic field of the city.  At first the changes will be quite subtle but eventually the magical sub-thaumatic structure of the Disc’ will be destroyed.”

            A deep chasm opened up before Ridcully.  “No more magic?”

            “Quite.”

            “I’m going to tell Vimes.  This is definitely his area.  It’s trespass at the very least.  No doubt Captain Carrot will be able to recall some legal precedent and arrest them all.”

            “I hope you’re right Archchancellor.”

            “Of course I’m right,” replied Ridcully, slapping Stibbons on the back, whose nose began to bleed again under the impact.

            Ridcully diplomatically ignored this and called for Groundrunner.  The young wizard appeared moments later.

            “Yes Archchancellor?”

            “We’re going to the Watch House.”

            “Yes Archchancellor.”

 

The room was filled with paper, every flat surface and a few that weren’t was covered with ink scrawled sheets.  Vimes studied the map they’d constructed from every report they had and from those that were still coming in.  They’d interviewed every guard in the Watch House and then dragged a few back from the pub.  Vimes was not happy about the conclusion he would inevitably have to draw.

            “So,” he said pressing a finger onto the map, “this was where we found Wicker.”

            “Yes,” replied Carrot.

            “And this was?” asked Vimes moving his finger across the map to another red cross.

            “Another dismembered body.  A much shorter Shortie Hungell, now ex-guild leader of the fledging street fighter and pugilists guild.”

            “How did you know it was Shortie?”

            “He’s got his name tattooed on left hand.  He always wanted his name to be the last thing his opponents saw.  We haven’t found his head or his right arm yet.”

            “And this was what was left of an unidentified member of the assassins guild,” said Vimes moving his finger to another cross.

            Carrot nodded.

            “All the times are correct?”

            “As accurate as possible Sir.  These are times of discovery rather than times of death.”

            “Then it’s heading this way?”

            “That would be the only logical conclusion to draw Commander,” replied Carrot solemnly.

            Vimes stared at the map.  Lots of little green circles stared back.  They spread across the city like an ink stain in water with the body of the beggar being at the approximate centre.

            “This is the last reported sighting of little green men?” asked Vimes pointing to a circle on Wixons alley.

            Carrot nodded.

            Vimes moved his finger across the map to the far side of the river to Grunefair.  “And this is where Constable Wattle saw several flashes of red light and found several dead dogs a few minutes later.”

            “Yes,” replied Carrot.

            “And finally,” said Vimes tracing a green line between the small circles up into Heroes Street, “this is where we found a crater containing a few pieces of green metal, a pair of smoking boots and two pieces of smouldering dwarf bread.”

            “You can’t imagine how hot you have to get dwarf bread before it begins to burn,” noted Carrot.

            Vimes stepped back and viewed the map as a whole.  The large green circles spread out like the ripples on a pond.

            I wonder who gets here first, thought Vimes.

            The door burst open and Vimes’ heart missed a beat until he realised it was Ridcully stood in the doorway.

            “Commander Vimes we’ve been invaded,” bellowed the senior wizard.

            “By little green men from somewhere other than here.  Yes I know.”

            Ridcully’s mouth opened and shut again without any noise being produced.  Vimes watched as he composed himself and prepared to try again.  He didn’t get the chance.

            The Watch House rocked to the sound of an explosion and from one of the upper floors there was the sound of breaking glass, a frantic struggle and, rather ominously, a short lived scream.

            Right on cue, thought Vimes, hating to be right.

            “Angua!” shouted Carrot bursting though the door and up the Watch House stairs.

            Vimes stood in the doorway and reached out a hand.  “Let me help you up Archchancellor,” he said, trying not to smile.

 

            By the time they had reached the remains of Carrot’s room there was no sign of Angua or Carrot.  Vimes quickly scanned the room.  The floor and walls were free of blood and there appeared to be no bodily parts, other than those still attached to the people in the room. 

            Through the broken window the sun started its climb over the edge of the disk and into the fleeing night sky.  Vimes stared into the street.  As light poured along the thoroughfare Vimes could see in the fading gloom shadowy figures moving towards the Watch House at high speed.  Behind those was a larger figure, still trapped in the darkness Vimes could only see it because it was glowing a dull red.

            The morning light rushed on, sweeping the figures ahead of it like flotsam on the incoming tide.  There was the sound of raised voices now.  It was muffled but there was a definite, unmistakable panic quality to the sound.

            At last all the figures were overtaken by the light of the rising sun.  Half a dozen of the cities finest were running ahead of a lumbering Detritus.  There was something very wrong with the troll.  Vimes couldn’t see him properly, he seemed to be shimmering around the edges.

            By the Gods, thought Vimes, it’s a heat haze.  He’s glowing red hot.

            It only took another second to find out why.

            Behind the troll there was a flash of red light and for the first time Vimes noticed the tiny little figures moving at considerable speed behind the fleeing Watchmen.

            Detritus is shielding the rest of the men, helping them get away, thought Vimes.

            Downstairs the doors to the Watch House had been flung open and the men from the street poured in.  They slammed shut and the sound of the entranceway furniture being dragged in front of it could be heard.  That would leave Detritus trapped outside.

            “Come on,” snapped Vimes.  “That’s one of my men out there.”

            The two wizards followed the Commander of the Watch downstairs.  By the time they’d reached the ground floor Vimes was already snapping out orders.

            “Breakout the ceremonial armour,” commanded Vimes.

            “But it’s paper thin,” complained one of the men.

            “Yes it’s paper thin and shiny, real shiny.”

            “I don’t understand,” replied the same man.

            “I don’t need you to understand I just need you to do it!”

            There was something about Vimes’ tone that made the man snap to attention and suppress any questions the rest of the group had.  They dashed off in various directions and returned only moments later half wearing, half dragging their shiny, paper thin ceremonial armour.

            Vimes had remember one of the last reports that had come in that night.  Constable Tukery had reported that he’d been shot at by one of the little green men but he’d been standing behind a pane of glass waiting to be fitted in one of the large windows at the Patricians Palace.  Tukery was quite certain the light from the little man had bounced off the glass and set fire to a tree in the grounds of the palace.  Perhaps it was a special kind of light.  The type of light you made as a kid with a lens and burned holes in pieces of paper but even that type of light was reflected if you put a mirror in the way.  It was a million-to-one chance and Vimes knew it, but million-to-one chances were all they had left.

            “I don’t think swords are going to be any good,” said Vimes to the men as the buckled up their armour.  “So break out the snow shovels and use your imagination.”

 

            Outside, Detritus was not having a good time.  Trolls being a mainly silicon and calcium based life form with a few heavy and precious metals thrown in for good measure operate best at temperatures much lower than their human counterparts.  The specially designed, heat dissipating, helmet Detritus wore had improved, not his intelligence, but, his speed of thought substantially. 

            Now, Detritus was so hot the heatsinks on his helmet had started to droop and the series of ones and zeroes that made up the troll’s thoughts were being created and moved around his silicon brain at an alarmingly slow rate.  However slow this process was it had but a single purpose; make sure, no matter what, that ones and zeroes CONTINUED to be produced.

            Detritus turned around to meet the little green men and lifted one enormous foot as high as it would go.  The little man underneath raised it’s arm and fired.  In the few moments before it was crushed into the Discworld’s first Frisbee it transmitted a series of warnings to it’s mother craft. 

 

            The mother craft wasn’t listening, on the bed of the Ankh it was having enough problems of its own.

           

            ‘World domination was not going well.  Initially, the vast quantity of minerals found within the sludge known as the Ankh had lead to a massive surge of processing, far beyond the craft’s normal limits of operation.  It had replicated large sections of itself, quickly becoming a fully operational assault craft.  The never-ending supply of minerals were converted and used to produce hundreds of infantry attack drones which were dispatched immediately.  Their programming was minimal:-

 

1100101010100101001101001010101010101110101100110010101[12]     

 

            Now the abundance of minerals was becoming a hindrance not a help.  Automatic conversion equipment was finding that some compounds in the Ankh were unconvertible and highly unstable.  The assault craft was losing control over bits of its internal workings that it hadn’t been programmed to lose control of.  Failsafes were failing and rarely on safe.

            The craft transmitted a message home not knowing that the transmitter array had been dissolved only a few million clock cycles after impact with the river.  Had it known, it could have opened its greatly inferior RF transmitter dish and used that.  However, the equipment used for checking transmission was now several miles down stream still disintegrating in an organic compound known to pavement walking Ankh-Morporkians as ‘Hey where’d my shoe go?  Bloody Swamp Dragons!’

            When there was no response the ship found itself with only one choice.  It began to disconnect all the safety systems on its fusion reactor.  In a little while anybody in Ankh-Morpork not wearing factor two million sunscreen was going to have a very bad day.              

 

            Groundrunner shrugged his shoulders in an effort to make the armour fit more comfortably.  It crumpled embarrassingly.  This was not a good idea.  Dying was a terrible idea admittedly but being squeezed into dwarf ceremonial armour, complete with full face battle helm, first, somehow made the situation worse. 

            He’d tried to protest, explain that if wizards were supposed to wear armour then why had Lord Gygax outlawed it three hundred years earlier[13]?  He’d tried to say all of this but a withering glance form Ridcully had turned it into “Ah, em, ah...but..”

            The Watchmen, snow shovels in hand, dragged the furniture clear of the doorway and flung open the door.  They poured out together, not wanting to be first but not wanting to be last either, believing that right in the middle, surrounded by everyone else, was the safest place to be.  They raced into the street and started beating the crap out of the little green men from somewhere else. 

 

            Carrot raced across the roof tops of the city.  Faster than a speeding cart horse, he leapt low walls and chimneys in a single bound.  It took a long time for the morning sunlight to overtake him and only when it had did he finally stop.  He clung to the outstretched wing of a rooftop gargoyle.

            “It’s broken-right-ear-looking-out-over-the-palace isn’t it?”

            “Yeg,” replied the gargoyle.

            “You didn’t happen to see a big, erm, thing, carrying Constable Angua?”

            “Yeg, ig eng Ugorg.”

            “Hubwards?”

            “Yeg.”

            “Thank you.”

            “Or elcong,” replied the gargoyle, but Carrot was already gone.

 

            Groundrunner stood in the middle of a fire fight and lived.  It happens all the time, it’s what separates the hero from the people who appear in the credits as corpse #1.   He was in the eye of the storm and this eye was moving with the battle.  He followed it subconsciously, his subconscious desperate that he should continue to do so.  

            Groundrunner felt the ground shake as Detritus stamped down on another little man.  From beneath the foot of the troll there was a flash of light and the little man became a smoking and charred crater in the road.  The troll did not look well.  He had a glazed quality about his surface.  Carrot had once proved Detritus had a glass chin by knocking the troll out but if this didn’t end soon Detritus would soon have a glass everything.

            The eye of the storm began to move towards the edge of the fight and soon Groundrunner found himself a whole street away as the battle surged towards the river.  The young wizard dropped his snow shovel and began to run as fast as fear could make his unexercised body go.  He got almost two streets before running away didn’t seem like such a good idea anymore.

            He turned a fatal corner and found himself staring death in the face.  Actually he was staring a large, green suited, thing, that wore a helmet with lots of tubes sticking out of it, in what he guessed was its face.  Death was stood behind it pointing at a lifetimer.

            HURRY UP.  I WANT TO GET BACK TO YOUR ARCHCHANCELLOR.  HE’S ALREADY LATE.  YOU AND HE SHOULD HAVE MET ME AT THE DOCKSIDE LAST NIGHT. 

            Groundrunner looked down at his chest.  There were three bright red lights shining on it.  Groundrunner panicked and vanished.  The small apple tree in it’s ornamental stone basket that took his place may or may not have noticed it’s change of location before it became a five foot high stick of charcoal. 

 

            The spell for translocation is not a difficult spell to learn.  They teach it to apprentice wizards in the first semester of their second year.  By the next semester the class usually has a few empty spaces because it isn’t until the second semester that the apprentice wizards learn what to do before you cast the spell.  It’s seen by the senior wizards as a way of filtering out the impetuous and keeping the class sizes small.

            Never, ever panic is the first rule of Translocation....

 

            The Universe is full of space.  It’s mainly space, with just enough solid stuff to give it some definition.  Even solid objects are full of space.  The space between the atoms is enormous when compared to the size of the atoms themselves and this is the problem.  The Translocation spell knows the Universe is full of space and if you don’t tell it precisely where you want to go it’s likely to put your atoms anywhere.  Possibly in the space between the atoms of the object more commonly know as a brick wall, or worse, for both concerned, the guy you sit next to in Invisible Writings.  First semester, Second Year has, in the past, been a very messy part of the year.

 

            Death stared at the creature that was, in turn, staring at the smouldering apple tree.  He held up Groundrunner’s lifetimer and glanced into the bowls.  The sand within was on the move again.  He tucked the timer away inside his robes and a moment later pulled out another.

            This lifetimer was strange indeed.  It was still shaped like a lifetimer but it was almost flat.  It’s metallic surface had lots of strange symbols and characters etched onto it.  In the centre, on a background of black, were a series of red, glowing characters and as Death watched the one on the far left disappeared.

            YOU’RE NOT GOING TO LIKE THIS, said Death to the creature, BUT IT LOOKS LIKE YOUR VISA IS ABOUT TO EXPIRE.

            Death’s words unheard, the creature pressed something on it’s wrist and disappeared.  Death watched the creature bound down the street towards the river.

            YOU CAN RUN, BUT YOU’RE STILL MINE, said Death before stalking down the street after the creature.

 

            When the disorientation produced by the Translocation wore off Groundrunner’s world was completely black.  He was about to scream when he realised his eyes were screwed shut.  They opened reluctantly, afraid of what they might see, or possibly, what they might not.

            Groundrunner screamed.  The huge side of ham hung a few inches from his face did not immediately react.  Eventually it swung slightly in the eddies of future possible existence.  Groundrunner’s teeth were chattering in the cold cutting his vocalisation into a short tattoo of aa-aa-aa-aa-aa-aa-rr-rr-rr-gg-gg-gg-hh-hh-hh’s which echoed around the vastness of the warehouse.

            This must be the Pork Futures warehouse, thought the young wizard.  Perhaps without a definite location the magic was drawn here, to another place of magic.  Wow, the odds must be thousands to one against.

            “Hel-lo.  Who’s there?” called a cold, female and slightly canine sounding voice.

            Groundrunner had heard that voice before.  Last night on the dockside.

            “Constable Angua?”

            “Ye-es.”

            Now the echoes of his scream had died away Groundrunner could pinpoint the location of the voice.  He moved towards the centre of the warehouse and looked up.  Hanging upside from one of the meat hooks was a upside down Constable Angua.

            A million-to-one chance, thought Groundrunner, me still being alive and finding Constable Angua.  That’s got to be a million-to-one.

            Above him the chain started to rattle.  “Aren’t you a little tall to be a dwarf Watchman?”

            “Huh, what? Oh, the uniform,” said the wizard, lifting off the battle helm.  “My name’s Klue Groundrunner and I’m here to rescue you.”

            The line was delivered beautifully spoilt only by the fact that when the window broke and the huge shape jumped through it Groundrunner started screaming again.

 

            Carrot was following a very tenuous path with a skill that would have made Angua proud.  Carrot lacked the highly sensitive nose that his companion’s special ability leant her but stone talked to Carrot in a way only another dwarf could understand.  All right so Carrot wasn’t genetically a dwarf, but he thought like a dwarf and in a world where what you thought was just as real as what you are, then Carrot was a dwarfish as, well, the next dwarf.

            The creature had indeed gone hubwards.  However, on the farside of the University it had doubled back and followed the river back towards the rim.  Carrot was pretty sure that it wouldn’t leave the city but as the trail lead towards the flood gates at the far edge of the city he wasn’t quite as convinced.

            Then, on top of the Carpet Shop a scuff mark on the roof indicated that the creature had turned sharply and was now heading widdershins.  Carrot sat on top of the Pork Futures warehouse trying to discern where the creature had gone next.  When he’d heard the scream he had scrambled to the edge of the building found a window he could reach without plunging to his death and without a moments hesitation had dived through the opening.  As he dropped towards the warehouse floor the screaming started again.

 

            Vimes swung at the little tinman in front of him hitting it squarely in the chest.  It flipped end over end before it slammed against the wall of a house.  It’s head came off and it began to spew fire like an Agetean Empire Candle on Hogwatch Night.

            “That’s eight,” he shouted at Ridcully.

            “I’ve surpassed that,” replied Ridcully, “ten is now my score.”

            We’re winning, thought Vimes suddenly.  We’re actually winning.

            It was true.  Although victory would not be without a price.  Vimes would have to write several short, cold notes which would all begin, Dear Mr & Mrs X, I regret to inform you that....  But at least there would be people to write notes too.  That’s what was really important.  The sun would come up tomorrow and there would still be people there to see it come up.

 

            On the bed of the Ankh the water was fizzing.  No Chemistry involved this time, just good old fashioned Physics.  At two hundred and twelve degrees Fahrenheit water boils, even on the Discworld.  They might not know who Fahrenheit was, but boiling water is, by any name or measure, just that.  On the bed of the Ankh, things were getting very, very hot.  In a few minutes the little spaceship’s fusion plant would go critical and Ankh-Morpork is going to be lit up like a Hogwatch tree, just before it’s vaporised.

            Tomorrow the sun would come up, not over the city of Ankh-Morpork, but, over a newly created, perfectly circular, lake.  Vimes and his Watchmen didn’t know this of course, so they fought bravely on.

 

            Carrot, Angua and Groundrunner didn’t know it either.  Knowing the world as they knew it was going to end in a few short minutes didn’t really detract from the problem that for them it would end in a few short seconds...  

 

            “It’s back,” growled Angua.

            “Where?” asked Carrot.

            “Right there,” replied Angua, pointing across to an empty space on the far side of the warehouse.

            Klue concentrated on the space.  “She’s right, it’s here.”  He concentrated harder.  “Oh boy.”

            “What’s wrong now?” asked Carrot.

            Death waved at Klue.  REMEMBER ME?

            “I think we could be in a spot of bother here,” replied the young wizard to Carrot.

 

            The creature stopped.  It was mildly perturbed by the seemingly large number of lifeforms it had met (and killed) that could see it.  Now the female humanoid it had captured earlier was clearly indicating it’s presence to the other two humanoids, one of which also seemed to be aware that it was here.

            The creature was already uncomfortable enough, having convinced itself it was being followed by something it couldn’t see.  It gave up and dropped it’s invisibility cloak.

 

            The members of the City Watch and the wizard watched it appear before them.  It was enormous.  A huge thing, covered in a shiny green suit with lights and other protrusions sticking out of it.  It’s head was a featureless mask of dark green and grey, but they knew it was looking at them.

            “When you decided to rescue me didn’t your plan include some way of us getting out of here?” asked Angua angrily.

 

            The creature flipped up the console on it’s wrist and began to reactivate it’s weaponry.  Nobody else knew what it was doing but Carrot, Angua and Groundrunner all got the feeling that it had something to do with them dying a horrible death.

            “If anybody’s got any ideas,” hissed Angua, “I suggest now is a good time to try them out.”

            “I have one,” replied Groundrunner, “but it’s dangerous.”

            “Between certain and imminent death and dangerous, I opt for dangerous every time.  Now hurry up!” snapped Angua.

            Groundrunner tore off the armour he’d been wearing and rummaged around inside his robes until his hand touched a familiar metal box.  He pulled it out and flipped the lid.

            The box made a few little clicking noises.

            “Yes I know it’s cold,” whispered Groundrunner, “but this is really important, so please...”

            Carrot peered over the wizard’s shoulder.  “It’s like Commander Vimes’”

            “Are you there Ponder?  Please respond.  No it’s not like Commander Vimes’.  This is a much more advanced piece of equipment.  Ponder, please respond!”

            “Yes what is it?” replied the little demon in the box, sounding remarkably like Ponder Stibbons.

            “Ponder it’s Groundrunner.  I need Hex to cast an automatic translocation spell on me and the two people stood next to me.”

            “Hex isn’t really up to it at the moment.  You might be wrongly translocated.  There could be bits of you all over.”

            “Ponder if you don’t do it now there are going to be bits of me all over anyway.  Please, I’ll explain it all if we make it!”

            “OK, give me five seconds to get the program loaded up.”

           

            The creature had stopped making adjustments on it’s wrist.  It’s beam cutter hadn’t powered up properly but in a few seconds it would be more than enough to finish the job.

            It waited for the sights to power up.

            Three dull red lights appeared on Groundrunner’s chest.

            “Ponder, now would be a really good time.”

            “Hex can’t get a proper lock on your signal.  There’s too much magical interference.”

            “Just do it!”

            “It’s a million-to-one shot.”

            “DO IT!!!”

 

            There was a swirl of bright light around the three figures as the magic of the translocation spell fought against the almost overwhelming background magic inside the warehouse.  Finally the raw power generated by Hex forced the completion of the spell and the three vanished from the warehouse.

 

            The creature stopped firing.  This was not supposed to happen.  Yes, they were supposed to disappear but there was supposed to be bits of smoking and charred flesh left behind.  Now all there was a ball of light and even that was shrinking.

            The creature approached the glowing sphere.  It was almost gone now.  Very small but incredibly bright.  The creature reached out with a gloved claw and touched the light.

            The warehouse filled with an incredible flash of blue-white light and the walls shook to the sound of a thousand thunderclaps going off in a tin bucket.

            OH, YOU DIDN’T WANT TO DO THAT, said Death as he stalked up to the hole which had appeared in the side of the warehouse wall.

            Outside on the pavement the crumpled body of the alien lay in a heap.  Its helmet had been smashed off and the broken pipes connected to it made strange hissing and gurgling noises.  Around a blackened glove, blue magical light still crackled and sparked.

            YOU CAN COME OUT NOW, said Death.

            The shade of the alien stood up out of its broken body and looked down at it and then across to Death.

            “I’LL BE BACK,” it said in tones not unlike Death’s own.

            Death looked at the figure.  Perhaps it was the white fur, the large protruding front teeth or the very long pointy ears but the alien seemed to have lost all of it’s menace outside it’s suit.  DON’T COUNT ON IT. 

            “...out of here?” asked the creature in a voice similar to that of Angua.

            Death nodded and pointed to the sky.  THIRD STAR ON THE LEFT AND STRAIGHT ON ‘TIL MORNING.

            The creature blinked it’s huge black eyes and vanished in a swirling pattern of light and a strangely pleasant sounding musical note.

              Death stood a moment or two in deep contemplation.  Nothing surprised him, because he knew that in Time he would see everything, but there were just some things...

            GIANT, INVISIBLE RABBITS INDEED.

            From deep within his robes there was a disturbance, a gentle but annoying vibration.  He reached inside his robes and pulled out the source of the annoyance.  He could still feel the vibration in his hand as he glanced at the surface of the small black box.  OH COME ON, THIS HAS TO BE A MISTAKE. 

            There was no response.  Of the few entities that even Death occasionally had to answer too, a mistake was not an option and a job was a job no matter how strange the client.  VERY WELL, said Death in response to the silence, BUT DO YOU THINK WE COULD GET BACK TO THE MORE TRADITIONAL METHODS OF DELIVERING A MESSAGE FROM UPON HIGH?  I’M NOT QUITE READY, I THINK, TO BE PAGED...

 

            Groundrunner was falling, he flapped his arms and screamed.

            “What are you doing?” asked a familiar voice.

            Groundrunner stopped screaming, stopped flapping his arms and opened his eyes.  He looked down. Ah...

            He swung embarrassingly a few inches off the ground his robes caught on one of the many levers that protruded from the side of Hex.  He twisted round and kicked the computer.  “You did that on purpose!” he snapped.

            From inside the machine something turned and clicked.  TeeHeeHee went the sound.

            “Here let me help you,” said Carrot wrapping a huge arm around the young wizard, lifting him from the hook.

            “Thank you,” said Klue once his feet were back on solid ground.  He looked around in a panic.  “Where’s Angua?”

            “I’m here,” said a voice from behind a side screen.

            “Are you all right?” asked the young wizard.

            “I’m fine.”

            Ponder took the young wizard to one side.  “The spell wasn’t quite complete.  For some reason Angua’s clothing didn’t quite make.”

            Klue looked in deep suspicion over Ponder’s shoulder at Hex.  From deep with the machine a wheel turned, a spring sprung.  Ooooaaaahhheesss, went the computer.

 

            Vimes sat on the edge of the road with his back pressed up against a wall.  He was breathing heavily.  He lifted a dirty hand to his face, wiping away sweat, grease and blood.  His blood.  He looked across at Ridcully who was sat down beside him.  The wizard’s beard was singed and his robes still smouldered in several blackened places.  Vimes was shattered but Ridcully looked fine, hardly even out of breath.  Wizards had gone up in his estimation, they were now definitely above vampires.

            “Sorry about that,” said Ridcully, tapping his own temple in reference to the gash on Vimes’ head.

            Vimes shrugged.  “Couldn’t be helped.  Friendly fire, fog of war and all that.  Besides if you hadn’t hit me I wouldn’t have fallen over and I would have been very dead.”

            “I could have shouted.”

            “And I would have ignored you and that little tin man would have shot me in the head.”

            “Just doing my bit for law and order,” replied Ridcully taking out a packet of dog-eared cigarettes from a pocket deep within his robes.  He took one out and handed it to Vimes who took it and pushed it into his mouth without thinking.  It lit itself a moment later as did the one Ridcully put into his mouth.  The wizard gave Vimes a little shrug.  “Perk of the job,” he said.

            “I promised Sybil I’d give up,” said Vimes drawing a deep lung full of smouldering tobacco.

            “Hey it’s not the end of the ‘world,” replied Ridcully.

 

            Well not for another four seconds anyway...

 

            Within the maelstrom there was a region of calm.  It radiated from Death.  It had patted Physics on the head and given Chaos an ice-cream.  Time slowed, becoming a ten year old metro on the M25[14] of reality.  Death picked something out from beneath the fingernails he didn’t have and waited patiently.

                        Atoms pulled themselves together, merged becoming part of an ever denser, more unstable element.  Death slowed time down even further and watched the process at a level that would have made the operator of an electron microscope green with envy.

            He moved in closer, stunned by the energy in the system, the power of the Discworld’s sun in a volume no bigger than his own skull.  FASCINATING, QUITE FASCINATING.

            It was such a shame...

 

            The scythe brushed through the critical atomic core.  The densely packed atoms shattered, spilling out in an instant all the secrets of the Universe.  Subatomic particles surprised by their sudden exposure to existence vanished out of embarrassment. 

            Gone.  

            It was over so quickly even Death couldn’t slow the process enough to watch it happen.

 

            On the surface the Ankh heaved and then settled.  Thick brown waves rolled up the banks on either side of the river where their muddy deposits began to dry in the heat of the early morning sun.

            Already the normal deep brown colour of the Ankh was returning to the waters down stream of Misbegot Bridge.  It slowed as it thickened and its natural, pungent aroma drifted back across the city on the slightest of breezes.

            Within minutes the clear waters were gone, nothing more than a memory for the millions and millions who had survived the Discworld’s first invasion of alien lifeforms.

            Death waited for the last of the remains of the spacecraft to be absorbed by contents of the river.  There were no small flashing devices left half buried in the bed of the river for this craft.  This had been a sequel free invasion, there would be no more surprises for the residents of Ankh-Morpork.  Well not from invading aliens at least.  Satisfied that his task was complete Death too slipped away.

   

            The Librarian had been for a walk.  He’d actually been drinking in the Mended Drum but since he had to walk between the Drum and the University this journey, in his mind, counted as a walk. 

            He sat down on the warm flagstones of Sator Square and unhitched the large bunch of bananas he’d been carrying over one shoulder.  He lay the bunch carefully down beside him and then snapped off one of the bananas from it.  He peeled it nimbly and as his large mammalian lips carefully took the fruit into his mouth he watched the ‘world go by.

            The Square was busy.  People wandered, seemingly randomly, all about him.  Carpenters, builders, stonemasons and labourers criss-crossed his path.  The rebuild of those areas affected by the creatures from somewhere else was almost complete and soon the city would be back to normal.  As normal as Ankh-Morpork could ever get, that is.

            The Librarian basked in the heat of the sun.  He had never been to a rain forest but he knew, in his magically altered genes, that sticky hot was a the perfect temperature to be at.  Relaxed and content he slurped and chomped on his banana, at peace with the ‘world.

            Almost everybody in this part of the city recognised the Librarian.  If a conversation ever started,  Big, hairy and orange sack of potatoes with arms and legs..., it invariably ended, ...that’ll be the Librarian.  This afforded the Librarian a certain amount of respect and therefore space.  As the rest of the population of the city nudged and bumped one another on their way to where ever they were going the Librarian sat undisturbed in his own little space right in the middle of Sator Square.

            Through the crowd the Librarian saw him coming.  Dressed in the latest fashions from Klatch, a busy, determined walk, heedless of everything around him including the Librarian, his whole attention was given over to talking loudly and importantly to a little black box held in his hand and cupped against his ear.  Only at the very last instant did his brain register the orang-utan sat in his path and only then did he stop.

            While still talking loudly to his hand the young man glared down at the Librarian.  The Librarian looked up at the arrogant young man’s face then down at the ground at several precious bananas squashed underfoot.  The librarian leapt up and stuffed the remains of his first banana, complete with skin into the mouth of the man.  Stunned and silenced the young man staggered back and vanished into the crowd.

            Calmer now the Librarian sat back down, looked sadly at the squashed fruit and pulled a fresh one from the bunch.  He peeled it carefully, revelling in the experience.  He took his first bite...

           

            For this orang-utan the future’s bright, the future’s banana... 

 

              

 

 

 

 

(c) John Hoggard 1998

 

Discworld and all associated names remain the copyright of Terry Pratchett.  The author recognises that copyright and understands that the rights to any profits remain solely with Terry Pratchett and his associates.