Miss Susan ran towards the Tower of Arts in the center of the campus. The ancient tower was the oldest building of the Unseen University. It had been repaired so many times, it now twisted and bulged, much like a gnarled yew tree.
She got to its entrance and found a pair of rotting oaken doors (and in some places cedar and pine), rusty-iron studs, with wood beams nailed in a crisscross fashion over the two doors. There was a sign:
Building Condemned.
KEEP OUT!
This means you!
(And also the illiterate guy you brought with you –
Nice try.)
Death's granddaughter had inherited many of his powers, such as walking through walls. She entered.
The innards of the Tower of Arts had long since rotted away. All that was left was a crumbling stone staircase, spiraling up the inside of the outer wall.
On the outside, the tower was 800 feet. But on the inside, it was over a mile high. Crows and other macabre birds circled high up in the dusty air near the top of the hollow tower, their caws echoing. In the walls way up there, were arch-shaped holes where windows once looked out over the city. Across the filthy floor, grey mice scampered.
BOOM! CRASH! BLAMMMM!
The Tower shook as more lightning hit it. Reality seemed to jump back and forth. Suddenly, Miss Susan was looking at the Tower has it had been 800 hundred years before. The core of the building was filled with classrooms, and young wizards-to-be clogged the narrow passages as they hurried to make their next classes.
BOOM! CRASH! BLAMMMM!
She was back. The tower once again was just an empty husk.
Quoth circled down from above. "What just happened?"
"Time bolts are hitting the tower," shouted Miss Susan over the storm. "Chronology is becoming fragmented and jumbled. The past becomes present. The future's knocked into the past. Yesterday may have never happened, and tomorrow is no longer just a day away!"
"Seems to me like a bad place to be."
"A really, really bad place," agreed Miss Susan.
"See ya," sang out Raven, and he flapped his wings as he climbed towards one of the window holes.
Ⱦ
Hupba's black jeans and black turtleneck clung to her curves as if they were painted on. She made sure her black calfskin gloves and black ski mask were snuggly in place. Hupba checked the straps on her black doeskin half boots, the coil of black rope affixed to her belt, and her black felt burglary tool kit. All was ready.
She slid open the window to her room, reached over to the nearby rain pipe, took a good hold, and began to climb. As she neared the top, it popped free of the wall and began bending over streetwards. Panic seized her; should he let go and drop? No, any fall from this height would be fatal.
The top of the rain pipe caught the top of the building across the street and stuck. So she crept sloth-like along the bottom of the pipe, and when she reached the other building, she pulled herself up, got her bearings and hurried across its roof.
At the far edge, a trio of steam pipes bridged a gap over to the next building. She leaped up onto them, and with the soles of her boots sizzling, she ran across and jumped down onto the next roof.
It took a running start to catch the sloped edge of the next building, but she did it on the first try. She pulled herself up, and then ran up the shingles and down the far side, where she leaped into darkness.
Down she plunged, two stories. When she hit the next roof, she rolled, and her somersault took her over a skylight, which shattered under her weight. The backflop onto the stone floor knocked the wind out of her. She staggered up onto her feet and into the dusty smell of a long-abandoned storeroom. She felt her way over to the door, forced it open, and stumbled along the pitch-black corridor to the window at the far end. It didn't open easily, but after giving it a sound thrashing, she managed to push it up.
There was no way to climb down, but there was a slow-moving haywagon trotting by, going in the right direction. So Hupba jumped.
The soft hay cradled her landing. She glanced over and spied the pitchfork right next to her. Ulp. The haywagon wound its way through Anhk-Morpork's streets right passed the entrance to the Unseen University. Silent as a cat, she slipped off the back of the wagon and crouched in the darkness.
One either side of the entrance stood a torch-lit guard in a bearskin uniform. She needed to distract them. She felt around the cobblestones until she found a loose one. It was not difficult to pry it free. The stone wasn't large, just big enough to fill the palm of her hand.
She stood up in the darkness and hurled the stone in a high arch passed the guards and into the darkness beyond. She waited for it to hit with a clatter. And waited. And waited. When the stone finally did come down, it hit her in the back of the head.
Ⱦ
The Book was several yards into the Dungeon Dimensions. It had no memory of having gotten here. It looked behind itself and saw a large hole had been chewed through the oak door. The Book had no memory of having chewed it. Through the hole in the door, the Book could see a monstrosity disappearing into the library. It looked like a jungle of giant tentacles combined with a riot of disarrayed feathers.
There was the sound of a shriek. That was the sound a orangutan would make if it were being swallowed alive.
Ⱦ
Hupba swam back to consciousness in a swirling miasma of doggie halitosis. A scruffy white dog was inches from her nose, looking at her with great curiosity. "New around here, are you?"
She scrambled up onto one hip. "What?"
"Er . . . woof, woof," said the dog.
This was miraculous. "Are you a god?"
The dog blinked. "Yes," he lied smoothly. "Yes I am."
"I thought so! I am Hupba, priestess trainee of the goddess Phphsst."
The nub of a tail beat the ground with hopeful expectancy.
"And you are . . ?"
"Oh. Gadpode. God of, er, table scraps, kitchen leavings, tasty garbage, and doggie bags."
Pain throbbed in back of her head. Her hand came away with smears of blood. "What happened here, O Great One."
"It's that place," sneered Gaspode tilting his head at the Unseen University. "Too much magic. It twists spacetime. Throw a rock; it circles around and hits you."
"I have to get in there."
"No can do. Against the rules. No ladies. Y'see, wizards are in heat all the time. Well. I mean, they're in heat when they're not eating, or snoozing, or avoiding students like the plague, or . . . Well theoretically, they're in heat all the time."
"I have to get in there! You're a god! You can help me!"
"It's impossible."
"You're a god! You can outsmart the guards!"
"Outsmart? Hmm. Yes. That should be easy." After a moment's thought, he trotted in a wide arch though the darkness to come suddenly bursting into the light from the other side. Gaspode was frantically barking (as best he could).
"Bark, bark! Come quickly! Woof woof! Timmy's trapped in a burning building! Bow wow!"
"Wazzat?" asked one of the two guards. "What are you trying to tell us, boy?"
Gaspode winced. He tried again. "Bark, bark! Come quickly! Woof woof! Timmy's trapped in a burning building! Bow wow!"
"Hey!" said the second guard. "I think he's trying to tell us that Timmy is trapped in a burning building."
"We gotta tell the Sarge!"
"Bow wow wow! No time! Follow me! Woof! Now!" He started leading the way away. Gaspode took a look back to make sure the two guards were following, and when he spied the dark figure slipping through the entrance, he suddenly accelerated, ran in a wide circle, and shot through the unguarded entrance after her.
"So long, suckers!"
"Hey. Did that dog just talk?"
"Don't be daft, man. Dogs can't talk."