Chapter Two
Disclaimer: I own nothing. Really. None of this is mine. Except the story line. But all characters, blah, go to the credit of Mr T. Pratchett. Thankyou.
Notes.
Guin: Thankyou! I'm really glad to see someone else with the same opinion. Vimes with white hair? *gasps* As much as I adore Paul Kidby's works…he cannot draw Vimes. He should be a lot younger. I'm glad you like it.
Yoda the Tenth: You mean a lot of my story, or a lot of other stories? ;) Thanks!
Vladivos: I'm hasty to point out a lot of this will make sense when you read the book! The librarian is a character, honest. And he does only say ook and eek. It's not just me being dumb!
SilentStep: Thanks… I'm now very worried, I hope you know. I'll try to maintain a high standard.
BIG thankyou to all reviewers!
*bing*
The shiny doors slid open. Vimes stuck his head around the corner.
"Where on the Disc…"
"Ook."
"You what?" Vimes stared at the librarian angrily. "What do you mean we're not on the disc?"
The librarian shrugged. "Ook."
"Just a feeling?" Vimes felt his temper rise. "Are you trying to tell me you've just 'got a feeling' we're not on the Disc? Where else could we be?!"
"Eek!"
"Right. Fine." He put a hand over his eyes. What to do? Vimes tried vainly to shift into good-'ol-copper mode. First thing: Find the money, and the crime was half solved. No, that wasn't going to work in this case.
Because there was no crime. Yet.
If you discounted someone transporting most of the city Watch…to…well, they weren't…er…it was wrong anyway. He knew that much.
Second thing… who was involved?
This struck a dim light.
"Ok, who's here? Carrot, the Librarian…is that you Reg?" Reg waved his arm, proud to show off he'd sewed it on so quickly. "Detritus…Cheery, that you? Good good. Nobby, Fred, Angua… yes, that's all of us. Me. That's nine."
He took a deep breath.
They were… in a…shop. By the looks of things. There were shelves of…Vimes began to floundered mentally. There were shelves of stuff. He peered up at the sign above him, in shiny gold letters.
"Marks and Spencers. Carrot, what-"
Carrot was striding over to a woman behind a desk. She smiled nervously at him.
"Ca-can I help you?" She was un-used to young men in gleaming armour materialising out of a lift and then wlkaing straight for her. And he had a sword…
"Yes." Carrot put on his I'm-an-officer-of-the-law voice. Vimes groaned. "My name is Carrot Ironfoundersson, I'm the captain at the Ankh-Morpork city Watch-"
"More what?"
Carrot was interrupted mid-flow, and deflated slightly.
"More what what?" He asked, confused.
"That's what I asked you. More pork did you say? This is the clothing department I'm afraid, you'll have to try downstairs."
"No, Morpork."
"Look," she said patiently to the raving lunatic in armour. "If there's none left you'll have to file a complaint. What's your name?" She started rummaging around in the draw on her desk, and brought out a small yellow card.
"Carrot." Carrot muttered. "Ironfoundersson." She gave him a queer look, but continued.
"And what's your complaint, Mr…Mr Carrot?"
"Um. Well." Carrot looked back to Vimes for help, who waved cheerfully and rummaged for a cigar.
"Now see here, where am I?"
The employee had heard about people like this. She'd done the training. Now was the time to put it to use. The trick was to just give them what they wanted to know.
"You're in Marks and Spencers, Mr Carrot." She spoke slowly and deliberately, like you should when talking to a madman.
"Ah. May I speak to Mr Marks, or Mr Spencer please?" Carrot asked, smiling. He decided he'd have to treat her nicely, she was obviously mad.
She stared.
"The- I mean that is to say- they're not available at the moment." She finished. "They're dead."
"Oh. I'm so very sorry. What happened?"
She stared again.
"You are still grieved. Forgive me."
The woman's eyes slid to the emergency fire axe in a glass case on the wall.
"Is this not Ankh-Morpork then?" Carrot continued doggedly.
Most of the Watch were beginning to tire. Cheery's palms were itching to get at the huge golden lettering above her head.
"Detritus." She hissed. The troll turned his head with a grinding noise to look at her.
"What?"
"Could you lift me up onto your back please?" Cheery whispered. She needn't have bothered, Vimes was frantically searching for a match. Detritus's stony features forced themselves into one of thoughtfulness. Or, close enough.
"Mister Vimes won't be very happy."
"I know. I'll be very quick."
"I dunno…"
"I'll tell Mr Vimes who those kneecaps we found floating in the Ankh belonged to."
"'E already knows."
"Then I'll tell him exactly how they came to be there." Cheery said slyly. Detritus simply nodded.
"I takes your point. You wants to see the view form up dere doesn't you?"
Cheery tried to work this one out. She eventually came to the conclusion that Detritus was showing intelligence. Odd…she'd been thinking it was rather warm. She peered up. Detritus was standing right underneath an air vent.
To those of you who are ignorant of the fact, trolls intelligence varies with the temperature. Which was a pity, Vimes had always thought, as Ankh Morpork was relatively warm most of the time. In winter, Detritus could even be known to win a game of cards, though it was a rare occasion now that they'd had a coal fireplace installed. It had been Nobby's idea, he'd been running low on the winnings at Poker since the cold weather had started.
"Yes, yes, that's right, The view. Now come on…" Detritus moved a hand down and scooped Cheery up easily, then placed her on the back of his head. Cheery rubbed her hands together greedily, drawing a pickaxe from her belt.
Vimes whimpered.
He'd found his cigars, but couldn't find a match anywhere. He found himself wondering if they had pubs in this world.
No, he mustn't think like that. The last thing he wanted was to get drunk in another world. Must concentrate. Don't think of drinking. Drinking. Don't think about drinking. Drinking.
"No Mr Carrot. This is London, Mr Carrot. Are you from abroad?"
"Do I look Klatchian?" Carrot asked, annoyed. He turned to Vimes, who was being shaken gently by the Librarian. Angua stood watching.
"Where's London sir?"
"Never heard of it." Said Vimes, snapping out of a kind of trance and pocketing the cigars.
Vimes looked at Angua, who shook her head. The ape shrugged as well, though he was aware no-one had asked him. He thought this to be very rude, but did not say so.
"It's in England," the woman at the desk whispered faintly. The orang-utan hid behind Angua, aware of his effect on most of the female race. The woman didn't see him.
"Britain?"
Carrot, Angua and Vimes slowly shook their heads.
"Er…Europe?"
"The World?!" She asked angrily.
"Well, you mean the Disc surely?" Angua asked gently.
"I most certainly do not!" The woman was flustered now. A queue of people had formed up behind them, and were muttering angrily.
"Oi! Shut up!" Vimes hollered. Although he didn't see it, Cheery nearly had a heart attack from atop of Detritus's head. So did most of the queue, one man toppled over clutching at his heart.
Vimes turned back to the woman, who was now positively shaking. "What year is this?" He demanded.
"2002!" She squeaked. Vimes raised an eyebrow at the other two, who were equally as confused.
"Er, I said year madam. Is it not the Fruitbat then?"
He noticed the woman's hand edge a little closer to the axe on the wall.
The librarian looked knowingly at the scene.
"Thank you," Carrot began. "You have been very helpful." Then thinking it might put the ladies mind at ease a little, he removed his helmet and bowed slightly.
She was now on the verge of fainting.
Vimes walked away and rejoined the remainder of the Watch, with Angua, Carrot and the Librarian following. For the first time they looked around.
It was no normal shop that was for sure. The clothes all looked strange, the lights were lit, but there were no candles, and some sort of music was playing softly, yet there was no band. There were tall racks of clothes, funny shelves randomly placed containing weird bottles, and by the feel coming through his card-board boots the carpet was dead weird as well.
"Ook!"
"He says he was right then." Carrot murmured.
"Eek!"
"And he'd still like to go to the little orang-utan's room."
"You think that door transported us to another world?" Angua asked, ignoring the librarian who hopped from foot to foot.
"What?" Reg looked excited. "Another world? Wow. That's great. We're liked intrepid explorers!" He waved his hands enthusiastically in the air.
The others didn't share the zombies enthusiasm. There were nervous glances exchanged. Partly because none of them wanted to tell Reg his left hand had ripped off and struck the man Vimes had given a heart attack on the head. The man lay still.
Carrot looked thoughtful.
"It certainly seems like it doesn't it? Everything is out of place. And we're no longer on the Disc. We're on The Europe."
"Ook!" The librarian finished dramatically.
"The World then." Carrot corrected himself.
Vimes considered it. Certainly all evidence was pointing that way, but surely not… he'd just accept it for now. Ok, he was on another world. Right. This couldn't be any worse than going back in time.
"Right. We're going to find somewhere to stay, while I figure out what to do." That would do for now. It seemed to satisfy the others, though they still looked worried. Reg had noticed his hands departure and wandered over to retrieve it.
"You killed our grandfather!" said a little girl tearfully.
"Oh I'm awfully sorry…" Reg looked at the man closely. "Though you never know, he could become a zombie, eh? Wouldn't that be great?" He went to chuck the little girl under the chin, but a handbag swooped down from the mother and sent his right hand, which had been holding the left hand as well, flew off.
"Oh for goodness sake." Reg put his…er…stumps, on his hips.
"Do you know how long it takes to sew them back on properly?" his words were meaningless. The mother and daughter had both fainted.
The librarian wandered over and picked up Reg's hands, which were lying on the floor.
"Thanks. Couldn't try sewing one of them back on for me could you?"
"Ook."
For one horrific moment Reg thought he was going to eat them, but only raised them to eye level and peered and them.
"The needle and threads in my pocket." The librarian sewed it on quickly.
"Wait a moment…" Carrot frowned. "Where's Cheery?"
If trolls could sweat, Detritus would've done.
"No idea. I don't know nuffin."
Vimes gave him a look.
"She's on me head, Mister Vimes."
It was then they noticed a slight 'tink, tink' noise. The librarians eyes started to water.
"Cheery!" Vimes called out. The noise stopped.
"What on the Di-"
"Europe, sir." Carrot corrected.
"What on The Europe are you doing?"
There was a slight pause.
"I'm…er…mining, sir."
"Really."
"Yes, sir."
"Get down Littlebottom."
Detritus reached up and grabbed a struggling Cheery from the top of his head. She hadn't been visible before, but now they could see she was carrying a big shiny 'M'. Vimes chose to ignore this.
Angua sniffed the air.
"It does smell strange, sir. Sort of clean."
She walked in the general direction everyone was walking. Vimes didn't want to admit he had no idea what to do. The others were aware of that.
"You know, people are giving us funny looks."
"Can't think why sir." Angua replied. But they were. People had stopped walking, were staring. Some ladies stared at the librarian, who curled his upper lip back in a grin and waved shyly.
They ran away screaming.
Funnily enough, no-one stared at Detritus. They simply took him to be a statue. Even stranger, no-one noticed he was moving. Possibly more strange than that was that they didn't noticed he carried a very large crossbow, and why M&S would have a statue of a large troll with a crossbow was beyond anybody's guess, but they acknowledged it.
"We'll have to ask then won't we?" Carrot said cheerfully. He turned to a man who had stopped to gape.
"Why're you staring sir?" He asked politely.
The mans jaw, if possible, dropped a few more inches before he closed it.
"You-you're…clothes. And…the…mo-"
Carrot clapped his hand over the mans mouth.
"Don't say it. I wouldn't say it. He's an ape." The librarian gave the man a dark look. If there was one thing that truly (and quite literally) drove him crazy (apart from someone mistreating a book obviously) it was someone calling him a monkey. The Watch had seen what happened to the poor ignorant souls who had done so, and had almost completely eradicated the word form their vocabulary to be safe.
Angua looked around. True, they were very out of place. Vimes looked quite lost, he was staring at his sandles. This was probably due to lack of cigars. The man Carrot had addressed scuttled away backwards into the crowd.
"I think," Angua said slowly, "That if we're going to assume that we're on another world we'd better blend in." Vimes looked up from his close inspection of his feet.
"We'll need alien clothes, sir." She explained. Vimes nodded. Reg Shoe was positively gleaming with excitement.
"We'll be like spies!"
"Ook."
"I don't know what we're going to do about you… do you think orang-utans are normal here?" Carrot asked the others.
Nobby and Fred had been having a quiet game of 'rock-paper-scissors' at the back of the group. They looked up and pretended to look thoughtful, while Nobby's rock smashed viciously into Fred's scissors out of sight from the others. Fred's eyes watered, but maintained the thoughtful, if now a little pained expression.
"They're not normal back home," Vimes said heavily. The 'home' felt weird. "And I don't see any."
"Well there're plenty of clothes lying around. We just need to…do some shopping." Angua smiled grimly. This was not going to be easy. If this place was anything at all like Ankh Morpork, then she knew how to handle it. But it wasn't going to be fun.
"Ook."
"He says the first one we're going to need to sort out is you, Detritus."
"Goody goody." The troll muttered.
"Oook."
"He says he's pretty sure that there are no trolls here."
"How sure?"
Carrot turned to the librarian.
"Ook."
"He says 99% sure. They think he's a statue."
Vimes looked up at the towering figure.
"I can see why. What do you suggest?" Vimes asked the librarian, who frowned.
"Ook?"
"No!" Carrot said quickly.
"What did he say?" Cheery asked curiously.
"He asked if we could dismantle him."
"Ook?"
"If it's anything to do with disguising him as a walking rockery, tell him no." Vimes said shortly.
"No he says we could just cloak him, and put a hat on, and pretend he's really tall."
Vimes wasn't in the mood for thinking.
"That'll have to do…"
"Snip snip Fred! I win!" A shout came from the back.
The group turned round. Fred grudgingly handed over a coin to Nobby, who's fingers were still waving around in either a pair of scissors, or flashing the V-sign. Carrot gave a meaningful cough, and both of them snapped to attention.
Angua took Detritus's hand.
"Come on, Detritus. This isn't going to be fun."
The troll lumbered off after her, and the rest of the Watch followed. Soon they disappeared into the unknown abyss that is a super-large store. Those that wander in, are often never seen again.
It was at that very moment in which Slives ran around the corner, followed closely by two other huge hulks of police officers. He gave a shout of frustration when the group wasn't there. He motioned for the officers to stay where they were, and approached the lady at the till.
"Excuse me madam, but did you happen to see a monkey here?"
"No." She snapped at him.
Slives held in check his temper. He didn't get this far in life to lose it all now by assaulting a woman at a till.
"Did you happen to see…anyone…unusual?"
She frowned at him angrily. She was quite shaken, Slives noticed.
"Yes, I did!" She sobbed. "Two funny men in armour, one woman as well. Behind them was a statue and stuff…"
Slives eyes gleamed.
"Yes, that's them. Where'd they go?" He asked eagerly.
"I don't know! They went off into the shop."
"How big is this Marks and Spencers, madam?" Slives said, through gritted teeth.
"Why should I tell you?" She pouted.
"Because I am head of security." He stated calmly. In the whole of Britain he added mentally.
"Ah. Well, in that case… it's very big." She examined a freshly varnished nail. Slives wrinkled his nose at the smell. "Five floors."
"Five floors?"
"Biggest one in Britain." She frowned at him. "That all?"
But Slives had already stormed back to the two men. He thrust a piece of paper under their noses. He'd gotten an officer to do a sketch of the group in the lift. It was very accurate.
"These," He snarled. "I want you to find. They're in this shop somewhere. Bring them all to me!"
The biggest one grinned evilly. "Dead?"
Slives gave a grin that outmatched any evil the officer could possibly show.
"No. Alive!"
Weeeeeeeeeee. Wasn't that fun. Please Rate and Review, I need it. If I don't get reviews I don't update. I need encouraging! Don't we all?