Hey folks. Thanks for the encouragement. =) It is to me what pencils are to the Eater of Pencils, what socks are to the Small Snuffly Devourer of Socks.

........

It is often said* that the very walls have ears**, and that a secret is best left in the heart. Carrot's quiet words did not reach the Commander as he sat wreathed in a scowl and cigar smoke in his office. Someone, however, was listening.

In Dunmanifestin, high home of the gods, white hands rubbed together in glee. "Come look at this!"

Elegance glided greenly over. "Yes?"

He pointed. "See?"

The Lady peered through the clouds. "The red-haired one?"

"Yes! Do you know him?"

She smiled. "Quite well."

"Ah, you always did have a soft spot for the underdog."

"Oh, he's not an underdog, though some of his friends might be. That Commander, for instance. Or the rest of them."

Thin nostrils dilated. "The rest of them? They aren't even the fleas on the underdog. Honestly, sometimes I don't know why you bother."

"I could say the same to you."

"Well, it all has to balance out somewhere, doesn't it? Now, tell me."

"Yes?"

His aristocratic lips pressed into a smirk. "Is he lucky at cards?"

Eyes of purest emerald stared back into his. Say what you would, there were those of whom the Lady was fonder. He was good for the stories, and proper in his place. Yet he often found ways to make them curse her name. "Let us say.he makes his own luck."

The smirk widened like a pregnant pause. It promised mischief, with a double your money back guarantee if it didn't deliver. "Fair enough for me."

He stood up and stretched lazily. "I'm off, then."

"Where are you going?"

He ran a slim finger over the shaft of his bow, lovingly. "Don't you know? I'm one of the few gods who can enter his kingdom, after all. Not even Fate can go there." He laughed, and the sound was golden and make you think of spring, except that when it cut off the edge was razor sharp. "Ah, but they're droll, these humans. And I do so love a good tragedy."

And with that, he spread his wings and flew from sight.

*usually by persons wary of black helicopters

** This was true in the Patrician's Palace, where if you assumed the paper clips had ears you would be half-right. (They also had eyes.)

........

Space-Time is a concept that remains difficult to grasp for most minds. In fact, some of us struggle with just the first half of it. There is a theory* that since all life developed from amoebas, and amoebas are two- dimensional, we're not really meant to be good at this whole depth perception thing. Nevertheless, most folks can deal with the idea that Space is three-dimensional and Time flows forward at the same rate every where in it.

As it so happens, both of these ideas are wrong. Space has more holes than lacy Swiss cheese and more chunky bits than the milk you find buried in the back of the refrigerator. And Time can flow fast, slow, forward, backward, and in circles. But as even gods tend to go cross-eyed when they think too hard about this (granted, a well-placed gnat can have the same effect), patting yourself on the back for having discovered perspective and knowing you were born after your mum is perfectly kosher.

Some very talented minds, the kind that come single-file over the centuries, can handle the idea that Time really is like a river.+ A river that can be diverted, dammed, or bridged. Most of these minds belong to bald heads gently sipping green tea with yak butter, and only focus on events on the Disc when necessary to prevent the reckless destruction-or tasteless construction-of the History of Mankind.++

However, there is one mind for whom the universe is but a rubber sheet, and if he doesn't peek under it, that doesn't mean he doesn't know what's there.

At the moment, this mind was deeply absorbed in pondering a matter of the utmost gravity.

ALBERT?

"Yes, master?"

DOES THIS ROBE MAKE ME LOOK TOO THIN?

Albert sighed. "No master, it's a classic. You can't beat black for that."

LAST NIGHT A TAILOR WAS CLUBBED TO DEATH BY SOMEONE WHOSE ALTERED SUIT CAME UP TO HIS ANKLES. HE TOLD ME THAT BLACK IS SUPPOSED TO MAKE YOU LOOK-

"Begging your pardon, master, but a seven-foot skeleton isn't going to be winning body-building competitions. Now, shouldn't you be reading the runes or harvesting souls or something like that?"

If it were possible for a skull to sniff, Death of Discworld did it. He had a remarkable talent for expression, given that he had no lips or eyebrows, but then again he had had century upon century to refine his technique.

SOMETIMES I FEEL SURE THAT YOU ARE BEING SARCASTIC. TIME, AS YOU KNOW, IS NOT MY CONCERN. I AM ITS CONCERN, IN A RESPECT.

"That's as may be, master, but-

AND YOU KNOW THAT IT IS VITAL THAT I LOOK THE PART. CAN'T HAVE ANYONE LAUGHING IN THE FACE OF DEATH, NOW CAN WE?

"I doubt anyone would."

YOU'D BE SURPRISED. THEY CERTAINLY WERE.

"The robe is fine," Albert said patiently, "It has been for a few centuries and will probably be for another few. People haven't got that much imagination and frankly no one wants you in color, though I hear them on the Counterweight Continent has got you wearing white instead."

It was times like these that being the manservant of Death was trying. It wasn't that Death wasn't good at his job. On the contrary, he was fantastic at being Death. It was being human that he was lousy at. But for some reason, he kept trying. Albert thought he could understand. Having gone through it himself, he knew that life was overrated but terribly habit-forming.

Death stopped. Albert flinched. Until he'd seen the master do this, he'd never realized how much everything else moved. Living things had a breath, a pulse, a heartbeat. Even non-living things were always changing, if slowly-shifting of the tectonic plates, the wearing away of the mountain, the grind of the earth pressing down on itself far below. But when Death stopped, he stopped. A wind would have better sense than to try and blow through him, though no winds blew in this place. But even on the Disc, the breeze left his robes strictly alone.

Very slowly, the skull turned toward the wall, as if it were looking through it and into another room.

SOMETHING IS WRONG.

"What? Here?"

NOT HERE. NOW.

"What do you mean?"

I WILL NEED TO COLLECT SOMEONE SOON.

"What's wrong with that?"

HE'S NOT SUPPOSED TO DIE.

* promulgated by Ponder Stibbons of UU**

** who tended to be the last picked for softball in primary school.

+ Leonard of Quirm in fact had one of these minds, but he was usually too busy drawing to notice.

++ Meaning, when they see fit to meddle.

............

Yes, short, sorry. Bleargh, cannot think of how to start part 3. Worth hanging on that long, guys? What do you think? Any ideas who the God is?