Disclaimer.
Notice I resisted the temptation to do a pun there…
Took all my powers of self control and beating myself with a hammer…
Oh, nevermind!
Anyhoo – this 'ere story is a figment of your imagination. You aren't not reading it. If it doesn't exist, the author can't get sued for purgatory or perjury or polygamy or whateverthehell it is they sue you with when you nick (allegedly) someone's story. The author has no artistic control/licence/talent whatsoever over the genius that is Discworld, the characters therein or any of Mr P's original stories. If she did you honestly think you'd be getting this for free?
This has been a disclaimer from Granny Weatherwax. *STARE* You still here?
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The Luggage was pissed. The new Morpork Terminal 5 was the very definition of organised chaos*. Troll security guards wandered the echoing departure area, nonchalantly swinging giant clubs. The clubs had been issued in case of someone requiring the assistance of the representatives of the 'We Bash Anyfink' Sec. Co on account of them looking at one of the guards in a 'funny way'. It helped to keep everything nice and orderly.
One of the Trolls had made the mistake earlier on of giving the Luggage a quick tap on the lid, just to see if anything would happen. 'We Bash Anyfink' Sec. Co were now down one security guard, a club and a hat. And the Luggage had some extra ballast on board and indigestion that no amount of antacids would cure. Its belligerent nature had neglected to recount the fact that it took at least a week to digest a fair sized troll. The combined result of this oversight, loosing its owner and the general insult of being tapped on the lid had made the Luggage grouchy to say the least. It snapped its lid at any passing ankle that got too close like a bad-tempered Quirm Toy Poodle. The resulting clear space around the sulking Luggage was testament to the quick reactions of any traveller that came within snapping distance.
The Luggage had seen it all before. Thousands of dwarfs, trolls, humans and indeterminates milled around all clutching a ticket and boarding pass, all scanning the specially adapted clacks that signalled arrivals and departures. Leonard of Quirm had taken the basic system and, in his own inimitable style, had created a message board system that could say 'Coach Delayed' in several different colours. The groans and mumbled "Bugger. We're gonna miss the reception" comments showed just how effective the new 'thing that makes announcements to lots of people without someone having to shout at them' machine, as Leonard had called it, was.
The Luggage had all the time in the world. It sidled up to a chairleg and settled down to wait, its booted feet tucked neatly out the way in case anyone made the fatal mistake of stepping on one of its hundreds of toes. Even the Luggage could be tactful. Bloodshed was frowned upon in the polished marble hallway of the pride of Ankh Morpork's city municipal urban planning department. It was a bugger to get the stains out and besides, the Ankh Morpork city municipal urban planning department had thoughtfully provided a quiet room just off the main concourse. Here, disputes over seats, booking arrangements, spilt coffee or comments about someone's choice of travelwear could be sorted out in time-honoured Ankh Morpork tradition – namely a damn good set to.
The Luggage wasn't really sure where it was going. The Luggage was never really sure where it was going. It just travelled. That was its purpose. Departure points or destinations were irrelevant to it – it was the act of being in transit as a piece of Luggage that gave it its purpose in life and its definition. Of actually belonging to someone. Anything else was meaningless. But right now it wasn't in transit. And it didn't belong to anyone. It was stuck in a departure lounge on its own. That went against its nature.
Where the Luggage had come from, how it picked its owners and just why the hell it had such a downright belligerent nature were answers that were all lost in the mists of Time.** It had previously acted as Luggage to a rather scrawny wizard named Rincewind who, despite his best efforts to maintain a modicum of cowardice, kept on managing to save the world at great personal expense. Luckily, the luggage had come free as part of the whole 'Destiny' thing. Eventually, the Luggage had got bored with being used as a raft/guard-luggage/deposit for suspiciously grey underwear and had walked off in disgust.
But that presented it with a problem.
The Luggage had one purpose in life, as previously mentioned. It was Luggage. That's what it did. But luggage isn't luggage unless it's got something in it and someone to belong to. This state of deep psychological conflict was giving the Luggage a lid-ache, adding fuel to the already furnace-like rage that simmered quietly within its confines. It needed an owner. Naturally, it had assumed that parking up in the middle of a coach terminal would be the ideal place to get adopted by a new owner, thus putting it back on an even footing vis a vis the whole 'who/what am I' identity crisis stakes.
What it hadn't accounted for was the fact that (and if you think this through it makes sense) everyone at a coach terminal already has luggage. What would they want with more? Particularly luggage that has a nasty habit of biting the hand that leads it? A small black cloud hovered over the lid of the Luggage and a gentle, Octarine drizzle started to fall on its lid, crackling and sparking as it touched the intense magical charge of the wood.
The Luggage had gone from pissed to depressed. It let out a low, creaking whimper, feeling deeply sorry for itself and hating all this fancy new luggage that squeaked by on little wheels*** flaunting it's tartan straps and shiny and easily picked locks. The Luggage let itself sink deeper into a dark depression…
A high-pitched yelp from the tannoy echoed through the marble halls, shattering glasses in the over-priced terminal bar and sending dogs, small children and some dwarves into a frenzy. The feedback subsided and a hesitant, nasal voice issued forth…
"A-hem…Gary, is this thing on? What? Oh, bugger! Right then, um. Ladies and gentlemen…" In the background a frantically whispered "Dwarves! Trolls! Don't forget the Undead! For Om's sake, Frank, were you listening to even one single word of that lecture on equal rights?" A pause as the by now rapt audience listened to a rendition of Frank reminding Gary that yes, he had been to the lecture and to shut the hell up when he was trying to do an announcement and finally Frank remembered that the 'speak' button was open…
"Um, anyway. Folks, we have an announcement. Would the owner of a large Octarine box left by the seating on concourse three please reclaim it immediately. If it isn't claimed within the next five minutes we'll have to assume it's a bomb and blow it up."
"You can't say that!"
"Why not?"
"Hear that screaming, Frank? The panic? The stampeding of boots? The general chaos that the word bomb has caused?"
"Bugger…" CLICK!
Stampeding feet thundered past the Luggage as people got as far away from a potentially explosive device as they could. Within seconds the concourse was deserted apart from a very nervous troll wearing a security hat that was five sizes too small for its massive head, and the Luggage. The troll stared at the Luggage, straining to hear if it was ticking or making any bomb-like noises. A sweating coach guard crept up behind the troll and peered from behind its knee. "Is it doing anything?"
"It's just sittin' der, boss. Not doin' anyfink. Hasn't gone bang yet."
"Good. That's, yes, that's good, right?" The coach guard took his own hat off and ran a sweating hand through thinning hair. "Okay. The bomb squad are a couple of minutes away. We just, yep, we just sit tight."
"I could always poke it wiv a stick if you like."
"Why? Why would you do that?"
"Ter see if it go bang."
"Slate, think it through, would you?"
There was a long pause as Slate thought it through. Eventually…
"Oh. Yeah. Right. Mebbe I don't poke it wiv a stick after all."
The guard rolled his eyes. Slate was one of the bright ones…
A stamping of feet indicated the arrival of the Ankh Morpork Bomb Disposal Team**** The coach guard sighed with relief. Whatever that thing was, it wasn't his problem any more. "It's over there. Unattended luggage. Obviously suspicious." The guard pointed at the sulking Luggage and scuttled off to the safety of anywhere else but here right now.
The 'Squad', as they liked to call themselves, were the elite of the elite. Highly trained specialists in stopping stuff going bang, they had trained with the Ankh Morpork standing army***** and the technical bods at the Unseen University and were now standing in the middle of terminal 5, dressed entirely in green fatigues, gas masks and body armour.
The bomb disposal team nodded at each other. Nobody in their right mind would leave anything unattended in Ankh Morpork for more than five seconds. Not if they ever wanted to see it again, they didn't.
"A piece of luggage abandoned in the middle of the terminal could mean only one thing, guv." The muffled voice of one of the crew spoke the words they all dreaded. Another shook his masked head slowly and gave a resigned sigh.
"Yeah. Tourists."
There was a brief pause as the rest of the team looked at the masked man. Eventually one man slowly raised up a hand and smacked the speaker around the back of the head.
"TERRORISTS, you idiot! Not tourists!"
"What did I say?"
"Tourists."
"I didn't, did I?"
"Just for that, you can go up and poke it with the official bomb-poking stick first." The slaphappy captain handed a long stick painted official Bomb Disposal Squad green and pointed at the Luggage. "If it does anything, run away and we'll be right behind you with the charges."
"I'm getting married next week, you know."
"You show me a picture of your fiancée at this point and you know damn well you're gonna die, don't you?"
"Good point. I'll just go…um, yeah. I'll just go poke the thing, shall I?"
"Off ya go, Bernie."
"Bugger." Bernie stepped forward and carefully approached the box. He got within ten feet of it when the box reared up on its legs and slowly and somewhat menacingly turned ninety degrees around. If it had eyes, they'd be staring Bernie straight in the ankle right about now…
"Sarge? It moved!"
"How?"
"How the hell should I know? Bloody thing's looking at me funny!"
"Bernie, bombs in luggage doesn't look at anyone, funny or otherwise!"
"Yeah? You wanna tell it that?" Bernie let out a squeak. "It's got legs! Loads of nasty little scuttlely legs!"
Sarge turned to one of his team. "Get someone from the Unseen University down here. This isn't in any damn manual. This is bleedin' magic, this is!" The man nodded briefly and sprinted away.
Two minutes later^ a rather rotund wizard arrived, red faced and sweating profusely at having to break into anything other than a leisurely stroll. He barrelled up to Sarge, robes billowing out behind him. "You haven't tried to blow it up or anything, have you?"
"Nope. Bernie was gonna poke it with a stick but he says it's looking at him funny."
"Good. Because you'd just annoy it if you tried anything."
"So?"
"So what?"
"Well, it's obviously some kind of magical thingy"
"That's the official description we're using now, is it? Some kind of magical thingy?"
"And it's obviously in a foul mood, pal. It ate Bernie's official pokey stick."
"Bloody lucky it didn't eat Bernie."
"Not for want of trying. So what do you do?"
"Me?"
"Look, buddy. My boys and me? We blow stuff up. The old fashioned way. Ya know. Bang sticks and all. This?" He pointed at the Luggage. "This, old son, is clearly of magical origins. You're our go-to guy for this kinda thing."
"So?"
So? So go to it, pal!"
"Not me, mate. I'm Runes and Oggam. Haven't got the slightest idea about Octarine furniture, mobile or not."
"Listen, buddy…"
"Look, I'm telling you! I don't know anything about this kind of magical ordnance! The best man for the job is…um, well, actually he's currently an orang utang at the moment but still," The wizard beamed brightly at the increasingly irate bomb squad Sarge. "He's your guy."
"The Librarian?"
"If there's anyone who knows about Octarine, it's him, my friend, believe me." The wizard pulled out one of the latest designs in mobile clacks. After setting it up in a clear line of sight of a repeater tower, the wizard sent a quick 'claxt', as it was known in the more 'with it' sectors of society.
Five minutes later, a large, male orang utang^^ knuckled its way silently through the terminal. It sidled up gently behind the wizard and tugged on his robes.
"Ook?"
"Oh, hello, Librarian. Didn't see you there."
The Librarian pointed at the Luggage. "Ook?"
"Yes. That's the blighter. Apparently been lurking around here for an hour or so."
"Ook. Ook, ook?"
"Yes, but it ate his stick."
"Eek!"
"Exactly. So. Um, I was wondering…"
"Ook. Ook, ook, ook, eek!"
"Really? That's all it wants?"
"Ook."
"Well, how about you?"
"Ook?"
"Absolutely old chap! Think about it! It's the perfect solution! I mean, you could keep all your bits and bobs for the library stuff you do…"
"Ook."
"And bananas, exactly. It has a whole range of uses!" The wizard beamed and turned back to the Sarge. "Apparently, according to the Librarian here, all it needs is an owner. Something about having to belong to someone to give it its identity or some such headology nonsense." He beamed brightly. "Don't worry, the Librarian has volunteered to look after it. Rather than you chaps getting all unnecessary with pokey sticks and bang sticks and any other form of stick-like device. What?"
"What?"
"Exactly! So that's settled then." The wizard and the Librarian barged their way through the bomb disposal team and marched towards the Luggage.
"What just happened there?"
"Dunno but that monkey's bathtowel's slippin'…"
"Good lord!" The entire team looked away…
The Luggage did a little jig of excitement as it saw the Librarian lolloping gently towards it. The Librarian sat down next to the Luggage and examined it gently with one soft, brown finger. The Librarian sniffed at the box on legs and turned his huge brown eyes towards the wizard.
"Ook."
"Yes, I think it likes you too." The wizard sighed with relief. "Well. Looks like it's got a new owner then. We can all sleep peacefully in our beds again without the worry of a rampant, pissed off piece of Octarine Luggage aimlessly wandering the land."
"Ook."
"Probably not, no. But it might be fun to try!"
The Luggage nuzzled into the soft embrace of the Librarian's long arm. It had a new owner. It had an identity again.
It was…The Luggage…
The End
*Organised Chaos: Pron. 1. Ankh Morpork Coach Depot. Particularly on a Thursday afternoon, for some strange reason. 2. The studio of Leonard of Quirm. 3. Pointless dictionary definition to fill space between Organised Beating and Organised Death (see Guild of Assassins entry under "What are you doing in my room at three in the morning with that hammer?").
** There isn't, in truth, any form of meteorological formation that could be considered to be the actual Mists of Time. But if there was, it'd be full to the gills of stuff that gets lost every day.
***Yet another invention by Leonard of Quirm. The 'bag that you can put stuff in but don't have to carry on account of the wheels', as the rather large advertising banner had promoted it as.
****Also known as the 'Suicide Squad', for blatantly obvious reasons.
*****Except on Wednesdays when it was the Ankh Morpork Lying Down army.
^Seriously. Otherwise this is gonna go on for ever…
^^Who had thoughtfully remembered to put his bathtowel around his waist before going out in public.