Carrot climbed to the top of the stairs and stood beside Detritus. "I'll take over from here Sergeant," Carrot hissed in an aside.
Detritus stepped back, looking relieved.
Carrot waved to the crowd. "Stop that this instant," he chided them like they were a gang of rowdy school children and he was the Principal. The crowd dropped back slightly. Watching Carrot in action was a favourite pastime in Ankh Morpork. Strange improbable things happened around Carrot, strange entertaining and often confusing things.
"Now is this any way to behave?" he asked the crowd. The question was only partially rhetorical.
Several people in the front row murmured. "No."
"You there Mr Ballantyne and you there Mr Ironbark. I would have expected better of such upright citizens as your selves." Ironbarks nickname was Ironbar for good reason. The scared and battered bouncer looked abashed under the 2000W glare of Carrots attention.
The crowd was rapt.
"Is this for real?" O'Neill asked Vimes. O'Neill watched the sudden change in the crowd with disbelief.
"Oh yes," Vimes said sardonically.
"It can't last."
"It's worked in this town for years now."
O'Neill shook his head. "He could be king."
"We've already dealt with that."
In front of them Carrot has still berating the crowd. "Now is this the way Ankh Morpork treats guests in this city?" Carrot continued. Under normal circumstances Ankh Morpork was more interested in taking the contents of a visitor's purse and putting it in their own, through one method or another.
While the crowd debated with it self what to say in answer to Carrot's conundrum, Carrot turned to his fellow Watchmen.
"Detritus," Carrot hissed. "Hold them back while I find out what that scream was about." He turned back to the crowd and raised his voice. "Now I'm going in to speak with the assassins and I'm going to find out what's been going on and I want all of you to go home," Carrot called out to the crowd. "And remember each and every one of you, I know where that home is."
Several thousand people tasted the tone of that statement and didn't like the personal flavour.
Carrot slipped past the anxious Assassin's Guild guards that stood behind the watchmen hiding in the shadows around the doorway. Their eyes tracked the crowd, waiting for someone to launch the first projectile, the one that would start the avalanche of disaster.
*
William De Worde wiped at the tomato stain that now covering his shirt and wondered what it was that he had been about to write. The idea was there one minute and now it was gone. He cursed.
*
Lord Downey looked down at the slavering jaws that had just suddenly been clamped around his wrist. There was no sign of blood yet but the message came through that there could be. Blood was an option. A silver knife would be the answer, but that was secreted in a pocket that could only be reached by the hand with the teeth marks in the wrist.
Standing by every window in the room and in every other room on the upper floors of the Guild building was an armed man. Each assassin was pointing a weapon at the crowd below.
"Ah," said Lord Downey.
The mouth around his wrist didn't so much growl, as vibrate his arm so he got the impression of GROWL through his bones.
Before Lord Downey's unfortunate encounter with lassie's evil twin, a great deal of planning had taken place within his office. The conclusion had been reached that a few key people would be the best ones to shoot so that the ensuing panic would dissipate the crowd. Lord Downey had been about to deliver the order when he felt the arrival of something muscular, furry and ferocious - and then came the clamp his wrist. A wet tongue caressed his flesh and he shuddered.
His eyes left the sight of his tortured wrist behind so he could take a closer look at the exquisitely groomed wolfhound teasing the tendons of his wrist with her teeth.
She growled aloud to emphasise the point, but that was just overkill. The point had already been made.
"I have a silver knife," whispered Mansell-Smith.
"Ah but how fast can you deploy it?" Downey observed.
*
The arch chancellor of the unseen university made an imposing figure, with his arm raise and his face glowing with the evangalistic zeal of someone gong about Good Work. Behind him stood a stalwart team of wizards. The Lecturer in Recent Runes wore a similar expression, and held a similar stance. Both had staves raised and words on their lips. Even the Bursar was joining in the incantation. Behind them again, the Librarian was thumbing his way through a book, his fingers were frantic trying to keep up with the way his eyes were reading ahead.
"Oook," said the Librarian.
The wizards chanted in unison. Eldritch forces gathered.
Almost as though powered by the wizards spell, the surface of the event horizon began to pulsate in preparation for action of it's own.
"Nooooooooo!" screamed Ponder Stibbons from his position pinned beneath the bookcase.
The event horizon burst forth, like someone had bomb-dived into the pool that it appeared to be. Like a watery cloud, the distended event horizon swirled malignantly into the room and then retreated as suddenly as it had appeared.
Had there been a thaumatological barometer in the room, it would have gone beresk. The pressure within the room built to explosive proportions.
"Oook?" asked the Librarian and then he peered beneath the overturned bookcase, at the place where Ponder Stibbons was pinned.
*
Carrot slipped past the position where Gaspode the wonder dog was wondering what he might get for supper. Progress had been halting.
Ignoring the potential health risks, Carrot patted Gaspode on the head in passing and the he was inside.
"Nice doggy," Gaspode muttered in the manner of Scrooge delivering a 'Bah humbug.'
Gaspode watched Carrot's progress through the hallway until the door swung shut blocking his line of sight. He sighed a doggy sigh and placed his muzzle back on he forepaws.
Carrot slipped up the stairs and made his way to the familiar office at the top of the building.
No one showed any interest in impeding his progress. He burst through the door unannounced.
"Ah, Angua, there you are," said Carrot affably. "We were all wondering where you had gone." He bent down and patted her head. Lord Downey winced with each pat. "And Lord Downey, and Mr Silversmith, that is a big crossbow you're waving there. You should be careful otherwise someone might get hurt."
Downey watched it happen. He was just one man, albeit armed with a sword, but that was still in it's scabbard, and he was standing in a room full of men armed with loaded and cocked crossbows, but the fact of the matter was; the men with the crossbows were the ones who were outnumbered.
"I was just telling him that he shouldn't wave that thing around," Downey agreed.
"Very wise," agreed Carrot. He looked down at Angua. "I think it's safe to release him," he told her. She was slow to react, but eventually did as Carrot suggested. She disappeared at a brisk canter.
Rumour was a wonderful thing and right at the moment Lord Downey recalled the rumour that the king of Ankh Morpork walked the streets in the humble guise of a Watchman.
Lord Downey listened to the clatter of falling cross bows and shook his head, carefully. After all, his wrist remained imprisoned between the teeth of a wolf-hound.
One cross bow exploded into action. The bolt rocketed out of the window and arced over the city. It's motion was bathed in the new moonlight.
*
It was an amazing sight, one to put the fear of god (any and all of the denizens of Dunmanifestin) into just about anybody.
"What, may I ask, is going on here?" demanded the Patrician, Lord Havelock Vetenari of Ankh Morpork. He stepped through the shimmering interface in space time that cloaked the maw of the stargate and looked disdainfully down at the array of wizards that confronted him.
Leonard De Quirm of the discworld and General Hammond of the Stargate command accompanied the Patrician's return to the discworld. De Quirm was appalled at the stated of his study. Leave the place for a quick jaunt around the universe and look what people do.
Hammond was just appalled.
The bolt of thaumalogical proportions that had been building inexorably could be restrained no more. It erupted from the staffs of three wizards.
"Ooook!" bellowed the Librarian.
A flash of octarine fire filled the room.
From behind the curtains a flash of excited salamander light erupted immediately afterward.
Ponder Stibbons gave up the struggle to climb out from beneath the book case and its contents, and began searching frantically for something even more solid to hide under.
*
Angua reappeared in the room full of disarmed assassins. All eyes tracked her progress. She had been sleek as a hound, but she was sleeker as a human. And she was wrapped in a thoroughly inadequate bath towel. Her hands fought an unequal battle. The kept trying to pull it up and down at the same time. With all that movement she only managed to induce a kind of visual distraction that forced the eyes of on-lookers to always be looking at the wrong end of the towel if they were trying to catch sight of the particular part of her anatomy she was struggling to hide.
Even with all that fuss the towel provided just marginally more covering than she would have managed with her hands and forearms alone, and required a good deal more work on her part. She looked around for something more substantial to wear and found nothing immediately obvious.
"Carrot," she said in exasperation. "Can we get out of here now?"
"Certainly," he said. "I suspect our business here with Lord Downey is complete."
Lord Downey was unsure whether to shake his head or nod it. He compromised with a dazed circular orbit instead.
"Thank you," Angua said with heavy irony.
She was very aware of the attention she was getting from the assassins, all of whom were the younger sons of wealthy families and consequently were all used to getting their own way, often with the servant girls. Angua didn't want to be forced into a position where she had to get nasty to keep them at bay.
Carrot and Angua galloped down the stairs. They reached the entry hall. Carrot set off in the direction of the front door. Last time either of them had checked, there was a huge angry mob was on the other side of that door.
Werewolves knew about mobs, often it was the last thing they ever knew. "Hey," Angua called.
Carrot skidded to a halt. He looked a question at her.
"I'm not going out there dressed like this," she explained.
"Oh, of course," Carrot said and searched frantically around for something else for her to wear.
"I'll meet you at the watch house," she said. "I'll slip out the back way."
"Well," he said dubiously. "If that's alright."
"I promise not to hurt anyone."
Out of sight of any human eyes she discarded the towel because it was too restricting in her flight.
A giant wolfhound slipped out the back door.
Gaspode was gnawing on a bone that he had found beside a pile of trash. It was only by watching to see which pile moved that Angua was able to tell Gaspode form the garbage. His head came up for a moment. He watched while Angua ran down the alleyway. His expression was the doggy version of the kind that sold thousands of movie tickets to teenaged girls.
Once again out of sight of any prying human eyes Angua resumed her human form. Naked rather than nude, she padded to a halt not far from where her clothes had been. There was no sign of them.
There was no sign of Samantha Carter either.
She stood with her hands on her hips and looked around. "Damn," cursed Angua.
*
Sacharissa and Otto crouched behind the curtains and watched the fun with wizards and stray newcomers.
The iconograph had blazed forth with the light of a dozen excited salamanders.
Inside the dark confines of the iconograp box, the imps furiously painted the images that they saw onto the plates, each of them frantically splashing acid like there was no tomorrow. There was one for red, one for blue and one for yellow.
Otto hid behind the curtain and he was bathed in the light of a dozen salamanders. He screamed, but remained integrated this time. No one heard his scream amid the noise and confusion that reined in Leonard De Quirm's study.
"Well done Otto," Sacharissa said.
"Thank you," he said, "but it does hurt so."
A wooden crossbow bolt burst through the window that had been hidden by the curtains and it landed squarely in Otto's chest.
"Ooooohh…" He hissed and then he burst into a fluttering of fine ash and wafted to the floor.
"Oh –ing hell," Sacharissa remarked. "Not again!"
*
Mustrum Ridcully and the Lecturer in recent Runes peered up at the colossal hole that had suddenly appeared in the roof. It was where the blast that had destroyed much of Leonard De Quirms study had vented.
"You put me off my aim," Ridcully accused the Librarian.
"Oook," the Librarian chided.
"Yes I can see that now. Of course I couldn't before. That might have been dangerous, man. You should speak first before doing something like that."
"Oook."
"Well there is that too of course."
"Oook," agreed the Librarian.
"Bursar," Ridcully called. There was no answer. "Where is the man? You can never trust him to be where you expect him to be."
A pile of books and soot moved ponderously. Ponder Stibbons crawled from beneath them. He coughed once or twice then he turned toward the sound of a pitiful moan that issued from somewhere beside him.
He crouched back down and helped the partially comatose form of the University Bursar to clamber from beneath a pile of masonry.
Samantha Carter burst through the door and confronted a scene from Armageddon. Each hand was filled to overflowing with gun, and ammo was hanging off her in every direction. "Oh my god!" she screamed. "I'm too late."
The place looked like the marines had been in and partied.
*
Angua stood in the alley, with her hands on her hips and glared around, trying to find a clue to where her clothes might have gone. In that pose and that lack of outfit she looked like the reincarnation of some sort of ancient Amazonian warrior. As far as she was concerned now, she was neither naked nor nude, she was just angry as hell.
"Buggerit," muttered Foul Old Ron. He saw naked young women walking about in Ankh Morpork's alleyways all the time. Not often in the flesh, so to speak, but he was not really in a position to make the distinction. His mind had passed that point a long time ago.
"Couldn't have said it better myself," Angua said in disgust. She turned on her heel and faced whomever it was that had just passed such a succinct judgement on her circumstances, determined to find out what had gone on.
Foul Old Ron clutched her breastplate in one hand and her skirt in the other, effectively making them totally unsuitable to be worn by a person ever again.
"Millennium hand and shrimp," he said. Even his alcohol-abused brain sensed that he was in some sort of danger. He took one involuntary step backward. That felt so good that he took a couple more.
Pawning the outfit should garner him enough money to buy at least one boot and a bottle of cheap wine, provided he stayed alive long enough to spend it.
Angua toyed with the idea of tearing his throat out, but it wasn't worth the days she would have to spend in a sick bed afterward.
She turned dismissively on her heel again. The sound of flexing meat filled the alleyway. A wolfhound marched out into the street.
Foul Old Ron shuffled with exaggerated purpose in the opposite direction. He burst out from the other end of the alley and continued his haphazard motion for hours before exhaustion got the better of him. Gaspode his thinking brain dog had to seriously hustle to keep up.
*
She had worked out what had actually gone on eventually.
"How are we supposed to get home now?" Samantha Carter demanded. She waved a gonne at the wizards. Ridcully refused to be cowered.
"Another of the dungeon dimension denizens?" the Lecturer in Recent Runes asked Ridcully. He took his lead from the Arch Chancellor and stood his ground. He had no idea what that thing was that the fetching young woman was waving at him, but she seemed pretty confident of the outcome of their confrontation and he had no intention of testing the justification behind her confidence just yet.
"I expect so," Ridcully said confidently. "I say young lady, would you mind lifting your shirt?"
"Yes please do," said the Lecturer in recent Runes completely missing the point of the request.
Samantha's response was purely non-verbal.
"Dr Carter," said General Hammond. "I think things are much less severe than they look"
"Oh," she said. "Then that blast wasn't aimed at the stargate?"
"Ah," General Hammond said and turned around to survey the damage. "I see. Yes I understand your concern. Would you mind having a look for me?"
*
Carrot and Detritus stood on the step outside the Assassin's guild. 'No," Carrot called. "I have no intention of allowing you people to take the law into your own hands. Now I'm sure we can all be reasonable people. Why don't you all go home and let the Watch look after watch business." He spotted a figure sitting a little way apart from the main mob. He was batting at a red stain on his shirt. "I'm sure you'll all be able to read about it in tomorrow's Times."
For most people that sort of statement would have been palpably ridiculous, and would have been sufficient grounds for only the faintest hesitation before mob rule, ruled.
Not when Carrot Ironfounderson uttered something so trite.
The crowd murmured and looked embarrassed. A few of them clasped their hands behind the their backs, eyes downcast and stirred the dirt with their toes.
O'Neill watched in amazement. It was going to work, he realised. The extremities of the crowd were already dissolving like a sugar cube in hot water as people realised that the show was over and hanging around might actually have consequences.
Something happened on Detritus' hand.
"Daniel Jackson," Teal'c asked in the short silence that had settled over the SG-1 team. His voice carried a clearly puzzled note. "Where am I? And what is going on?"
"I have no idea," Daniel answered absently. "It has all been way to complicated for me."
"Me neither," O'Neill said. "Just shut up and maybe it'll keep happening."
"Oh."
O'Neill stared across the crowd for a moment. "Umm," he said after a delay that dragged out to become a few seconds. "Teal'c, where have you been?"
"Been?"
"You know, after you got shot by the Gou'ld?"
"All I remember is an overwhelming urge to eat flies."
"OK," O'Neill said. "I think I'll deal with that later."
*
A few last flakes of plaster dropped from the ceiling. One of them landed softly on the top of General Hammond's cap.
"These men have blown up the stargate," shouted Samantha Carter.
"Would if that were true," muttered Lord Vetenary. He looked at the wizards, then at the hole in the study roof, then at the fractal scattering of plaster, that no longer rendered the ceiling, and the paper that had been neatly arranged on the desk lay everywhere. So much change in so little time… "Don't let me keep you, Arch Chancellor."
"Um yes we have things that need to be attended to," Ridcully agreed. He wasn't sure what had happened but, whatever it was, it was not a good idea to hang around and ask for explanations.
"I say," said Ponder. "Perhaps an explanation might be mgbble mgbble." With Ridcully's hand clamped around his mouth he trailed off after the others.
The wizards swept from the room with a lame attempt at dignity. Under the circumstances that was impossible, carrying several kilograms of atomised plaster on their robes, they managed little better than the appearance of a rout.
They brushed past Sacharissa and the pile of ash that had been Otto as though they weren't there.
Sacharissa picked at the scab on the back of her head and placed a drop of her blood in the pile of ash. Otto reappeared, bounced a few times to savour being un-dead yet again.
"Oook," said the Librarian.
"Why thank you," Sacharissa said. She blushed. Otto groaned at the sight. Not again…
*
It was only an hour or two later that the SG-1 team gathered in the debriefing room of the SGC and scattered themselves around the conference table.
A computerised display of the stargate map filled the wall at one end of the room.
"We have an agreement from Lord Vetenary," General Hammond began, "to keep his end of the stargate sealed. I, for one, trust the man completely in this regard. I don't think it will be in any one's best interest if we keep that transport route open. Do we all agree on that?"
O'Neill nodded.
"Yes sir," chorused Samantha Carter and Daniel Jackson.
"I still don't know what happened," commented Teal'c.
"I'm not sure any of us could tell you," O'Neill said.
"I'm not sure I believe it myself," Jackson said.
*
Lord Vetenary placed the copy of the Ankh Morpork Times back on the desk and looked out through the window of his office to the city outside.
A poor quality image showing the destruction in Leonard De Quirm's study filled almost a quarter of the front page of the paper. The headline read 'Boffin's Base Blasted'.
The outline of the stargate was not clearly visible in the iconograph image, it had been obscured by the octarine flash of the wizards' staves, reflecting back at the iconograph off all the falling dust.
The stargate had proved indestructible, even deflecting the combined might of the three wizards in concert. That sort of power was not for the discworld. Not now, and probably not ever, unless human nature changed.
Somehow Lord Vetenary could not see that happening in the foreseeable future.
A side bar on the newspaper carried the story of the riot that had threatened to erupt outside the Assassin's Guild. There was no suggestion that the two events were related.
Lord Vetenary glanced over toward the Assassin's Guild building. There it stood, none the worse for last night's activities.
Life went on. He went back to his desk and prepared to meet the leading citizens of Uberwald. They were due to arrive in a few hours and there was so much to do.
*
Death plucked the remains of the Energiser Bunny from off the ground and looked closely at the batteries in its back. He plucked them out and watched while they faded into wherever it was that the life of an Energiser Bunny went when the body finally passed away.
"THESE THINGS SEEM TO GET INTO AS MANY PLACES AS WE DO," he commented to Binky. "YOU DON"T SUPPOSE WE CAUSED THEM DO YOU?"
"SQEEK," said the death of rats.
"YOU"RE PROBABLY RIGHT," death said and then they rode off.