H2G2 Storytime III: From Prussia with Love. Part XLV
Created | Updated Oct 3, 2006
X darted round a corner, planting a foot into a crack on a paving slab in the wall he jumped up into the air caught the lintle of the door jam made out of grainy stone. Using a hithertoo undemonstrated upper-body strength; in one go, X hoisted himself into the space above the door. He pressed his back hard against the cold wall and held his breath.
Below him the assassin came running to a halt.
"You're here somewhere..."
The hall where X now at perched aove the door was long and dark. At the far end there was an open doorway which appeared as a square window into a grey-foggish world beyond. Something dark flashed infront of that portal with noise like
whumph - of air being impacted - and was gone."Foolish." said Slepp, who had paused just below X, a few paces into the room. The assassin with deliberate pause turned slowly and looked up at X. "to think you could hide from me up there."
X was out of options.
He leapt...
and caught Slepp off guard. The force of the impact drove the assassin off his feet and with X collapsing on top of him he fell backwards over, landing hard on the stone floor of the citadel. X seized the advantage and planted his foot into the assassin's chest, who gave a muted squeak, and X grabbed his arm and hip tossed him over his shoulder and throwing him down hard again.
X was in no mood to fanny about to the marquis of queensbury rules so he threw hard elbows at the assassin's face. Once, twice... Slepp snarled in anger and caught the quick blow on X's third attempt and shove his boot, hard into X's chin, toppling the Agent backwards.
The two crawled to their feet and charged each other. X kicked, Slepp kicked, both right legs blocking the other. They threw punches. They connected with a crack, forcing the two fighters to wave their stinging knuckles.
Sweeping their arms they caught each other's hands. The Agent and the Assassin smiled in respect of this test of strength and heaved. Sore they refused to even acknowledge it, adrenaline rapidly rising.
For a few moments the opponents were locked then X grinned. Slepp's eyes widened as he felt himself starting to give. He sent his knee toward X, but X positioned his leg to evade. Before Slepp could do it first, the Agent swept the hired killer's legs out from under him and together they dropped, exchanging blows along the city floor as they rolled down unstable ground. X was winning and unfortunately for Slepp, they both knew it.
Slepp's arm reached out, feeling something pour through he fingers. With a truimphant scoff, Slepp closed his hand and pelted X with the sand. X fell away hissing, furiously wiping his eyes. Blinking through blurred vision he saw his opponent scrambling to get away, choosing to retreat through choosing to retreat down a small corridor. Spinning his feet X lept up and gave chase - too much in the zone to hear a friendly voice shouting his name...
Slepp's feet echoed as he ran. He could hear his breath hard. Twisting his neck he caught the shadow of his adversary closing in. Too small a corridor for brawling, Slepp reached down behind his back and twirled, arms swiftly arching forward from his pockets.
Skidding to a halt, X clasped his forearms to his head and crouched as he felt a dozen letters flying past, cutting across his arms and sides as the assassin's delivery pinged at odd angles into the corridor behind him.
Slowly the Agent looked up from his crossed arms to see his opponent jogging backwards to survey the result. Seeing X had only been slowed, Slepp sped up as the Agent burst from his ducking position.
Arms pumping, the courier assassins smiled inwardly as he saw the maw of the corridor opening out. There he could turn the odds back to his favour. The light at the end of the tunnel grew and grew...
whumphSlepp froze as a large pendulum, like a giant mallet, swung past his face. Unseen ropes and ancient cogs creaking. Blinking he stepped back as a pebbles tumbled into a black abyss below from where he had stood.
The cave in front of him opened out into a maze of thin stone bridges over a gaping chasm as multiple large pedulums dotted about swung across them.
Looking over his shoulder Slepp saw X gaining distance. Gulping he eyed the pendulum guarding the entrance. When it passed he took a chance and leapt...
"Woah!" yelled X, grabbing the wall for balance as he glimpsed at the complex trap. He looked at Slepp, very slowly, calculating a path over the narrow bridge to reach the other side. The bridge vanished into the gloom which pervaded the chasm - a drop which seemed impossible.
"Okay," X rubbed his hands, psyching himself up as the first pendulum roared past, preparing to move forward. "Three, two, one..."
A hand clasped his shoulder and he jumped in surprise.
"There's... There's..." breathed Arthur heavily. He looked past his partner and blinked, "a trap."
whumphSlepp raced ahead into the darkness across the narrow stone bridge. The assassin was cogniscent of the fact that a few inches of stone where all that seperated him from a long drop into a void.
Whilst ordinarily a few iches of stone would have been fine, the eerie creaking of the pendulum gantry hidden out of sight overhead disturbed him. He hated the place since they'd arrived. The heavy slap of his feet against the stone reassured him but the oddest sensation continued to overwhelm him; it was as if he could feel the vacuum of nothingness plunging down beath him pressing upward, threatening to consume him. Behind him he heard a hammer cross his path and fly upwards to be consumed by the gloom of the distant chasm walls.
whumphSuddenly he found himself on the other side of the bridge. The path led into a doorway and inside he could see torches were burning.
"Arthur! W-what are you doing here?"
"Ran. Ran ...all the way. Had to stop you."
"Stop? Stop me why? I had that guy."
Arthur caught his breath again. "Who was that?"
"I'm guessing one of the Cult's goons. He hits pretty hard though." X reflected, wiggling his jaw to check it wasn't dislocated.
There was something else. Something glittering.
"The archologist found another way. Come on."
And then Slepp beheld a true wonder. About the tiny room, in small alcoves and a semi-circular rough stone shelf were diamonds, lots and lots of diamonds.
The shelf sheltered and enclosed a haunched figure, pale and seeming to glow, the figure sat crossed legged and haunced on a simple stool, oblivious seemingly, to the tremendous wealth all around him. The diamonds reflected the flickering torchlight bathing the room in a rich yellow light.
Slepp breathed.
Appearing to wake, a snort of surprise, the man, for it was now clear to Slepp that the figure was that of an old man in a tweed suit, looked around for the person who had disturbed his rest.
"Ah!", he exclaimed in clipped aristocratic tones "Mr?"
"Tonnajob."
"Tonnajob, yes...of course. I was wondering when you would show up. Yes do, please come in - that's it."
The old man gestured slowly waving his arm, beckoning Slepp forward. Slepp beheld for a moment the skeletal movement beneath the man's skin. He seemed so brittle.
"You have a choice." the old man spoke, without interest or emphasis, he his head bowed towards Slepp.
"I...er..." Slepp knew the Agent was beind him and this small room was make the fighting dfficult. He looked agitatedly over his shoulder glancing back at the doorway and the bridge. Maybe he could use the old man for cover?
The old man watched Slepp intently.
"The other one will be here soon, I suggest you hurry."
X jogged alongside Arthur. "Did he mention what kind of trap it was."
"Not a sausage"
Together they turned a corner and re-entered the halls of testimony.
"Choice?" said Slepp edging closer to the little figure. He spoke slowly and deliberately to hide his intent. "..what...do I have to choose?"
"The wealth of a nation."
Slepp stopped in his tracks.
"and the wisdom of infinite time." The man said spinning on the stool to face Slepp. His eys were still held tightly shut.
"What do I have to do?"
"Simple. Find The Turqoise Moon. The most brilliant diamond of all. That was my task and it is yours."
"Which one is it?" Slepp cast about looking at the multitude of diamonds sitting on every surface, in every corner, glinting with the light of the flames.
"I cannot help you to choose."
Slepp spun on the spot, his back to the old man.
The old man's raised his head to look at Slepp. His skin was grey and drawn tight across his face and crackled like parchment. Slepp didn't see him open his eyes.
They were black and empty, without pupils, reflecting only the abyss over which Slepp had crossed.
"So choose wisely." He blinked and closed his eyes again and bowed his head.
Slepp went to a corner alcove facing the man on the stool. He paused thoughtfully and with some deliberation selected a gaudy Dimond orb faceted like a disco ball about the size of a small Melon.
"I think this could be the Turqoise moon. I've heard the others talking about it. Looks big enough." he said.
He turned trimphantly to the pale figure and held aloft his prize.
"This is your choice?" the old man said.
"It is."
"Then carry it back across the bridge and look." the old man instructed.
"Look where?" slepp asked.
"Just look."
A sneer of disgust for the old man wrinkled Slepp's lips. At no point at all did it ever cross the assassin's mind that anythign was at all amiss.
"Be seein'you." he sniggered.
The old man appeared to shrink as he wrapped his arms about himself and reumed his awkward huanched pose on the stool, like a dehrydated gargoyle.
Slepp left the wobbly yellow light of the room and trapsed back across the bridge at a fast pace.
The diamond looked transparent in the ambient dark. It was so light and so clear in his arms he wasn't even sure he was holding it at all.
"Look?" he said to himself. "look where, for what?"
The old man sat haunched the stool hugging himself, shed a tear which trundled down the lines of wrinkles around his face.
A whisper escaped his throat like a stale wind and the man smiled and coughed a snarlled smirk.
"look....out." he snikkered.
Sleep realised his error a fraction of a second too late. The diamond vanished from his grip, he felt the rush of air towards him, he raised up his hands to sheild himself but the pendulum was huge. It struck with a hammer blow that sent his body arcing far out into the darkness surrounding the bridge. He flailed momentarily, a look of sheer surpise locked onto his face, as the bridge, and his life, raced away from him.
whumph"arugh!" he manged before dropping out of sight, the echo of his death knell ringing in his ears.
Arthur and X paused around Hall 43 when they heard a brief scream echoing down the hall.
"Good Wilhelm."1 commented X. "Pitch and ambience just right, he's got the range certaintly."
"What? Arthur looked quizically at him.
"I think our assassin friend found that trap you were talking about."
The pair jogged on.
The halls of testimony flew past them. Had they been conversant in ancient hieroglyphs Arthur and X would have realised they were running down a corridor covered with warnings such as "Very dangerous traps guarding enormous treasure. Beware!" "Wealth and riches this way - avoid my curs'ed hammer if you can!" "He of quick feet and nibmle mind can outwit my pendulums. and so on and so on.
"I wonder," X reflected, "What was on the other side of the bridge?"
It all came back into focus.
Slepp opened his eyes. He was back in the room with the diamonds, he was sitting on the stool. He could see the doorway, maybe he could have another go? He tried to stand up but found that he couldn't. He was pinned to the stool by an invisible force. He looked at the alcove where he had taken the dimond - his diamond was still siting there as if it had never left.
"You're thinking it was one of the others aren't you" Said the shade of Lord Carnarvon sympathetically, striding about his littlre alcove like he hadn't moved in over a century.
"I thought like that for a while. After a decade or two I realised I'd been duped so let me save you the bother."
"...er... Slepp gawwped.
"It's a trap. Really nasty one too. You see, there is no right answer. The diamond isn't here. The safest choice, indeed the only choice, is not to choose. Course I couldn't tell you that..and you won't be able to tell your replacement.
"Replacement?" Sleep gulped.
"After almost a century I have at last earnt my rest. Unlike you, I made it past the pendulums, all the way back to Cairo in fact. But Rameses's curses have a way of...following you. It was inevitable really. Bad luck old chum."
"Replacement?" Slepp urged again.
"Hmm yes, they come and go: treasure seekers, adventurers, thieves. You know the sort I'm sure. The Desert calls them all - oh but she is a fickle misstress. It's big this place you see, huge. Every few years someone might uncover a new entrance, which the desert has chosen to reveal. People keep on disocvering and re-discovering bits of the City now and again. The really intrepid ones make it this far and they too will learn not to cross a Pharaoh with a knack for black magic."
"You mean I'm stuck here?" Sleep said horrified.
"Congratulations." Carnarvon smiled. "You have the wealth of a nation", Carnarvon gesture to the diamonds on every shelf, crevice, floor table and alcove, "and the wisdom of....infinite time. Be seein' you" and winked.
With a cold cackle Lord Carnarvon dissolved into a white mist and evaporated.
Slepp sat there unable to comprend his fate, he stared at the diamonds which shone back at him his own reflection.
Slepp's eyes were black and empty, without pupils, reflecting only the abyss over which he had crossed.
whumph1What is a Wilhelm Scream you are no doubt asking...
1What is a Wilhelm Scream you are no doubt asking...
