TRUCKS IN SPACE
Chapter 11 'Javelin Hunt' or 'The Riddle of Doom'
DISCLAIMER: We wanna thank Mr Takachiho for the use of his Angelic creations and all the other nice folks who are kind enough to allow us to use their creations. Any of our own stuff well anyone is welcome to use them so long as we get credit for them.
"Oro in the Sam Hell are you screaming about, Miss Jordan?" demanded Boss Jefferson Davis Hogg, Esquire from Hazzard County, Georgia circa 21st Century in the USA on Terra. He'd drawn a huge six shooter pistol and he was flanked on either side by Bo and Luke Duke each of whom had drawn bows with arrows nocked!
Bringing up the rear was Sheriff Roscoe P Coltrane and Deputy Enos Strait both with drawn pistols and peeping over their shoulders was Daisy Duke who had somehow acquired a whip. I found out later that General Solo had given it to her. He had two which his cousin Indiana Jones IV had insisted he take.
Johnny, Mr Fitzroy and Natasha came rushing up to see oro was the matter but none of the three had been allowed weapons. That had been part of the deal Spike, Jett and Faye had made with the Master. Of course the time lord wasn't there. Mar was there though and a sleepy looking Suzy Quinn too. These last two were in kimonos over pajamas and nightgown respectively.
Gadzooks! I must have awakened the whole damned TARDIS! Then I noticed it was 0200! Angie came rushing in still trying to belt her kimono and balance a laser sword. I knew she slept with a Panther sleeve derringer strapped to her right forearm- a prezzie from Merrill Stryfe who carried at least fifty as a rule. Miss D and Kome trailed her with Neko Olson. Lastly came the Boss lady and she looked madder 'n a Glyorxian hyena tiger!
"I hope to Kami, Jordan, that you're at death's door 'cause if you ain't I'm gonna put ya there!" she said very quietly. Hoist the storm warnings when Miss O gets quiet we all knew only too well. I quickly explained that I had cracked the code and explained my findings.
"That's all very well, Princess but it still doesn't explain your hollerin' like a banshee." drawled Han Solo and I sheepishly admitted that I had frightened myself when I read the final line of the 'Riddle of Doom' as I had dubbed these runes. Angie had finally checked over my written interpretations and smiled.
"You got it, Edie. I figured it was either referring to me or the Boss but I didn't want to scare anyone since the rest of it is pretty grim tidings indeed. Now as for the rest-
'What be the warning? That time must never have it for it shall lead to chaos brought by the four of the horse. Time shall come with her twice but a sacrifice there must be.- Giles de Montmartre.'
"Perfectly clear to me, my dears. Time means Gallifreyans or time lords and ladies. You are traveling with the Ranee and myself so time is coming with you twice. Four of the Horse is undoubtedly Armageddon which shall be preceded by the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. They will bring Death, War, Famine & Pestilence according to the Book of Revelations in the Christian Bible. It means that your great grand uncle part of whose name you bear yourself did not wish any time lords or ladies to have whatever it is we shall find at the end of this quest. I certainly don't believe he meant the scrolls and writings of the Great Alexandrian Library, do you? I disagree with Miss Jordan about the sacrifice being human or indeed even alien. It is not to be a life form at all. We will know more when we complete that jigsaw puzzle and fit it to the maps. May I suggest that we all go back to our beds? We can discuss these things in full at a decent hour if you so desire. I bid you all good night."
The Master's voice ceased as abruptly as it had started. I knitted my brows in thought then snapped my fingers.
"A warning about oro, Angie? The end of the Universes perhaps? Maybe we should get Mr White and Mr Black to-" I began when Miss O'Halloran smashed her fist onto the table.
"Nai! We are not sending for those two idiots again! Every single time they show up, I get the worst of it! The Master's right. We should just go back to bed. We'll talk about this thing tomorrow or rather much later today. Jordan, if I hear another peep outta you, you'll be on permanent guard mount, got it? (I nodded) G'Night." growled a very surly Grand Marshall and she trotted back up the corridor to her own suite. My suite was four levels up and the Master did not seem to have a lift. I was too bushed to climb four flights of steps so I sacked out on the divan and used my satchel for a pillow. Blankets weren't necessary aboard the TARDIS.
I awakened to the smell of piping hot java at 1030 hours and accepted a cuppa from Rio. She was a knockout in a long dark wig and a gleaming white suit. She was wearing the shortest miniskirt I had ever seen and her polished white boots barely reached her shins.
"Man oh man Edie! You scared the shit outta me last night. You OK now?" she asked and the concern was evident in her voice.
"Yeah I'm fine Rio. I didn't see you last night. Where were ya?" I asked and sipped the scalding brew.
"I started down but Mr Blue said it was OK and to go on back to bed so I did. I gotta trace out the astral star lines on that old thingy of Angie's in case we lose it again. My fingers felt like they had arthur-ritis in 'em when I went to bed." replied Rio with a wink.
"Guess they wanna try and figure out where we go from Deverios huh?" I ventured.
"Your guess is just as good as mine, Edie. Great interpreting yesterday, Hon. Well, back to the grindstone for me. Later." said Rio.
A day or two later Glork made planetfall on Deverios and the away team was readied again. This time the Bebop gang came with us. The Ranee and Mr Fitzroy accompanied us again but the Master told Johnny to remain aboard.
"I thought you time jockeys despised weapons, Natasha." I said as we stood side by side in the moving room awaiting our turn to be fricaseed and transported. She grinned.
"The other time lords and ladies use stasis rifles and hand weapons which only incapacitate someone. They are quite harmless. I got used to carrying real weapons while I was part of Johnny's crew aboard the 'Starcrusher' back in '48 and '49. The Master's powers are so damned extensive that he doesn't even carry his miniaturization gun anymore. That thing was scary and he was forever threatening to use it on me.
"It extracts all the water from the body leaving a small dry doll, quite dead, of course. You see, dear, the human body is seventy per cent water so removing all of it leaves nothing to moisten and lube the body, understand? Hush now, it's our turn next. Just close your eyes and keep repeating to yourself 'There's no place like home' and before you know it, it'll be all over." said Natasha Ranee in a soothing tone of voice. She seemed to be mellowing with age. Kami knew how old she and the Master were but I knew the Master had regenerated some 15 times! Natasha said she'd only regenned four times.
I shut my eyes and pretended I was Dorothy Gale coming back from Oz. When I opened them I almost expected to see the Wicked Witch of the West standing there. Natasha sure was reminding me of the Good Witch of the North all of a sudden.
"Ow! I hurt my ass dammit!" howled Rio who had been ordered to accompany us this time whether she wanted to or not. I glanced over and saw that she had materialized on a pile of loose gravel. When she had taken a step forward, she'd slipped and fallen onto her keester. Ow! indeed.
"I told you not to wear that short skirt, DelCroix. Get up, will ya?" ordered Miss O'Halloran. Since this was not Workoh she had insisted on coming with us and the Master had raised no objection. However, Miss Donovan and a few of the others were ordered to remain aboard and monitor the vidphones because this time we had been issued comm relay devices.
The Master had said that Deverios was a much larger planet well moon anyway and he didn't want us getting lost. My little box began chirping and I answered it.
"Edie here. I read ya. Lima Charlie. OK. Out." I stuck the thing back into my jacket pocket and ran to catch up with the others. Oh yeah Lima Charlie is radio language for Loud & Clear. Since that 'javelin' on the jigsaw piece had pointed NNE that's the way we went. An hour later Angie spotted a tall watchtower in the distance and a quick look see through her power x binoculars showed a symbol that she said had been used by those Knights of hers in the olden days.
Two concentric circles joined at the centre by by four short straight strokes. The left circle showed a picture of knights riding on chargers, horses not that old Dodge car. The other one had a picture of a funny looking rotunda temple surmounted by a cross with equal arms. Strange Latin words surrounded both circles and Angie called it one of the ancient Templar seals. Rio asked if they barked and Suzy slugged her. Anyway this big seal had been carved above the entryway of the tower.
These Knights never seemed to put stuff where it would be easy to get to, oh no! This time we had to walk up a very very very long and winding staircase which Angie explained symbolized the pathway of life. Darn it! Did everything have to symbolize something with these guys I wondered aloud and Rio giggled. My feet felt like lead when we finally reached the top of the tower but our search bore fruit!
I saw it first. Halfway up the North wall and over towards the right (East) was another jigsaw piece. We were debating how to get up there and get the thing down when ZANG! Han's whip snapped a second later he deftly caught the artifact in his left hand. He handed it to Angie who wrapped it carefully in a cloth before stowing it away in her backpack.
"Can we all go back home now, Mommy? I'm hungry." said Mr Legato with a grin.
"Let's head back now. (Natasha activated her vidphone) Hey Harvey! We found it. Yeah, it was on the wall of a watchtower. Had Templar seals above the door and all. See ya in a couple of hours. We're gonna have lunch first. Natasha out." said our time lady and off we went to the closest gin mill.
"Why do I have to pick up the tab?" snarled Natasha Ranee angrily. The rest of us all grinned.
"Well in a way we are your guests, ain't we? I mean 'prisoner' is such an ugly word, don't ya reckon?" drawled Han Solo.
Natasha fed the bill into her PDO and tapped in the amount due plus 15% for our hapless server. I mean the poor lady had been run off her jet boots with all of us constantly ordering more food, desserts, booze and smokes. Finally Natasha grinned and said that she'd get reimbursed by the Master anyway and we all laughed.
She did, however, put the kibosh on Rio's request that we use a rental sky car to get back to the TARDIS. I mean maybe he'd spring for lunch but we couldn't expect the Master to shell out a few hundred credits for a ride back home! Rio bit her lip and winced a few times and rubbed her ass every five minutes (We found out later she'd been walking on a sprained ankle) but she kept relatively quiet on the walk back. I still dunno why the Master didn't just have us beamed back aboard and told Milady the same thing.
"You don't think anyone would have noticed our whole party just vanishing into thin air, Edie? Deverios is pretty damned primitive. They didn't even take Universal Express at that bistro where we had lunch. Ah, we're home. I'd better call the Master and get us beamed aboard. Angie! Don't use the portal! You'll get lost. Yo Harvey! Beam us aboard will ya? OK. Stand close together guys. Energize Harvey." said Natasha and back down the rabbit hole we went! Can ya tell that I hate beaming?
Angie wasted no time in fitting the second piece of the jigsaw into place and superimposing the star charts over it. There was another jagged edge with a long bow and arrow held by a cherub angel and pointing due South. Try as we might though we could not discern any moon, asteroid, sun or planet on a direct line until the Master had a scathingly brilliant idea.
"We are assuming our next destination is in this dimension but remember that the old Knights hid this loot ages upon ages ago. Natasha, find those old Pere Reis star maps. Arigatou my dear. Aha! Just as I suspected! Halfway between us and that star cluster there is a tiny asteroid or there was anyway. It may still be there or oro's left of it. That would explain it's absence from our current star charts. Glork! Steer us due South at quarter speed. We don't want to miss it. Oro'd you say? I have no idea oro it is we are seeking so keep a sharp lookout for anything. It will be on a direct line with us so don't deviate from a due Southerly course. Natasha, man the scanners for Glork. Take one of the brats to help you." said the time lord.
"Delcroix! Front and centre dammit. You're with me, girl." snapped the Ranee. Rio tried to get to her feet but the pain was too much for her and she sank back down with a groan and began to cry. Solo and Angie bathed her swollen ankle and then taped it up while Natasha fumed.
"Rio has a sprained ankle, mum. Could I take her place?" I asked.
"I don't care which brat you use! Just get up there dammit!" howled the Master.
"Fine. You're with me, Jordan. C'mon girl." growled the time lady and I jogged behind her. Rio and Angie filled me in later on oro had happened while I was on assignment. I was surprised that the TARDIS's scanners were almost the same as ours were on the Lovely Angels.
If you've never seen a scanner well it's like a vidTV screen with lots of dots and stuff on it. I had to watch directly in front of our ship's pathway for any dot or blip and immediately tell the big doggie or Natasha. I was given a small transceiver like an ancient Terran walkie talkie to use and informed that I'd be spelled at 1700 (5 PM) for dinner.
Then back to work until my shift ended at midnight when Natasha would take over. There was a repper beside me in case I got hungry or cold. The Ranee wished me good luck and then told me oro would happen to me if I somehow missed the piece of Terra Firma we were after. I never knew time ladies had such foul mouths!
Meanwhile everyone else was speculating on oro was waiting for us on this strange world the Master had identified on the ancient charts as being called Nyacinith.
"Wish it was the Philosopher's Stone, Al." grumbled Edward Elric.
"Now brother, don't get discouraged. Someday we'll find it or how to make one without human sacrifices." replied Alphonse trying to cheer up his elder brother. Angie had decided it would be another piece of the jigsaw and she felt sure there were four pieces to it. We already had two so we were halfway there she'd told everyone.
A fortnight passed and we'd all been taking turns at the scanners. During Suzy Quinn's watch we finally struck paydirt. Somehow she'd found the PA system's vidmike and she was hollering loud enough to raise Alucard from his grave! Her sighting of the tiny atoll asteroid came just minutes before my shift was to begin. Talk about a lucky break huh?
'Nyacinith' was no more than a quarter of a kilometre across by half a kilometre the other way. Easy peezey you say? Wrong-o! Did I neglect to mention it was heavily forested and looked more like Terra's Amazon Jungle? And of course we'd not a clue of where to search. Mr Solo likened it to a treasure hunt on Terran Canada's Oak Island. Most of us felt that old Han was going a bit senile anyway. It turned out there really is or rather was an Oak Island on Terra but no loot was ever found. In AD 2200 an errant meteor strike wiped it out along with half of Newfoundland and New Brunswick!
The Boss lady wanted to burn down the forest because, she reasoned, the Knights must have used an old temple to hide the next clue. Miss D said we should scan the jungle for caves or caverns. Han and Blue suggested looking for somebody's skull. Blue explained that was how a treasure hunt began in an ancient Terran story by Mr Poe called 'The Gold Bug'. Rio refused point blank to go traipsying through the jungle. I suggested dividing into four teams and attack the forest from each of the four cardinal points. Angie was laughing so hard I thought she'd split her sides open.
"Have any of you guys looked at the aerial vidpix that Glork took for us? I deduced that to use such a tiny asteroid my ancestours must have assumed we'd think of only one place. Since they were at the centre of most things the only place they'd hide anything would be at the very centre of the forest and there is usually a clearing in the centre of a woods I've found. If you check out the vidpix you'll see that I am correct in my assumptions.
Sure enough there it was! A tiny opening in the middle of the trees and oro appeared to be a stone slab, probably an altar set in the very centre of the clearing. How exactly we were going to get a heavy piece of crap like that aboard this tub was beyond me and I said so.
"Unless I miss my guess, Edie, that altar stone is carved with mystic runes or contains a piece of the jigsaw. In either case all we'll need is my trusty cell vidphone. I'm sure the Master has vidphoto equipment aboard so I can enlarge the vidpix and then we can decipher the runes. (Then she frowned) Where can we land this thing? Looks like all trees down there save for the clearing and it's only a few metres across." said Angie and I nodded my agreement.
"We'll beam down. Harvey, I'll take the Templar kid, Edie, Suzy Q and Solo down. Any more and we'll be standing on each other's shoulders. OK you four, let's go. Glork? Five to beam down. Gimme five minutes to get to the transporters." said Natasha and we reluctantly followed her to the Neverland room. Six minutes later we touched down. Angie and Suzy landed on the stone altar while the Ranee touched down lightly on the ground and Mr Solo landed in a crouch beside her his outstretched arms easily catching me like a fireman does when someone jumps from a burning building.
Angie soon ascertained that the 'runes' were actually a drawing of the third jigsaw puzzle piece and she began snapping vidpix like mad from every conceivable angle.
"You get unlimited vidtext with that thing too?" chortled the Ranee and Angie nodded abstractedly.
"Yeah, I get unlimited solar minutes as well. I'm with 'Shimougouan Infinity'- just twenty credits a month. Ya gotta have a sponsor to sign up. I was lucky that the Brig sponsored me and Suzy. That's enough I think. Edie, better get a rubbing of it just in case. Anything underneath it Suzy? Nothing huh? (Angie whipped out a hand lens like Mr Holmes might do OK a magnifying glass) Hello, that's strange. There are no javelins, arrows, spears or anything to indicate the next direction and the one side is definitely unfinished. There must be a fourth piece but which way do we go to find the darn thing I wonder?" mused Angie.
"Ow! Who the jigoku left this damned thing in the middle of a forest? Hey Angie! Oro the oni is this bloody thing?" yelled Suzy and we all trooped over to look at her find. It was strange looking. A round stone polished like the drill floor back at the Academy. In the centre of it was oro Suzy had stumbled into and skinned her knee. A metre and a half tall rusty hunk of metal with a jagged top. Guess part of it wore out huh? Han, Legato and Angie all realized oro the thing was at the same time.
"A sundial!" they chorused. The Ranee was frowning again.
"The sun's out but it's nowhere near your precious sundial you'll notice." she said and we had to admit that she was quite correct. Then I had a brainstorm.
"Maybe it's a moondial?" I suggested. Everyone laughed at that suggestion except Angie.
"Maybe Edie's right. If this had been intended to catch the sun's rays why wasn't it positioned differently and why weren't these trees cut back farther? (She pointed towards this system's sun) See? A sundial should be on the opposite side of the table. (We looked and didn't see another sundial where she was pointing. Now she indicated the section of sky above the dial empty save for a few scudding clouds which promised some wet stuff by morning) That's where the moon will appear at sunset. (She checked her wrist chromo) Natasha, how about we wait here for sunset and see oro happens? I brought a repper so we can have lunch and dinner here. How about it, time lady?" asked the tallish redhead.
"Why the Hell not? I didn't get much sleep last night. Make us some lunch, Vicontessa. Solo. Bluesummers. See oro kinds of fruit and veggies this dump has to offer. Edie. Suzy. Rep up some chairs and a cloth for the altar stone. Then rep up some dishes and silverware and set the table. Wake me when lunch is ready. Quinn has first watch. I suggest that the rest of you get some sleep after lunch." said the Ranee.
Lunch was delicious. I had next watch so I sacked out after lunch. I spelled Suzy and she had lunch. I had dinner when Blue relieved me at 1700 hours. At sunset we'd see oro we would see. Afterwards Blue would take the watch followed by Solo and finally the graveyard shift would be handled by Natasha.
Of course at sunset the moon shot its shimmering silver rays down the shaft of the moondial and illuminated the big White Tiger meaning our final piece of this complex puzzle lay to the West. It was such a nice night that we begged Mama Ranee to let us camp out here. She was still tired and readily agreed. While the rest of us repped up sleeping stuff Angie got out slide rule and sextant. She was still hard at it when morning came and with it an icy cold rainstorm! I tapped her arm but all she did was point at a distant speck on her charts. The redhead seemed to be in shock! Then I saw why!
END of Chapter 11. Chapter 12 'There & Back Again' or 'Finishing the Puzzle' coming real soon to a website near you.
