Scoundrels' Jig (The Chronicles of Eridia)
Page 20
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“I found it!” Brother Wisswick cried, his voice cracking with delight. “I found it!”
The trio had been searching the third floor for over ten minutes, and though the doors up here were unlocked, there hadn’t been much to see until now. Most of the rooms were either empty or filled with junk. The only discovery of note so far had been what appeared to be the Snowman’s bedroom, which contained only a mattress on the floor, a rocking chair upholstered with thick fabric the color of snot, a bare table, and a closet full of white dress shirts and black slacks.
Now they were searching a series of rooms in the west wing. They had split up to hasten the search, with Brother Wisswick checking out the rooms down a short corridor that branched off the main one.
When Brother Tantora and Sister Moshi arrived in response to his cry, they found him standing just inside a large room, his eyes alight with joy and wonder. The room was lined with metal shelves, every one of which was packed with weapons of every imaginable kind: guns, crossbows, bazookas, tomahawks, orcish dueling zwakats, hand grenades, laser pistols, wochobüshkan extender rods, cans of mace, killik throwing bones, and so on and so on.
“Incredible,” muttered Brother Tantora.
Brother Wisswick turned to him and with a high, cracked laugh said, “We can do so much with these things. So very much.”
“The Snowman might have something to say about that,” said Sister Moshi.
Brother Tantora flashed her a disapproving frown. “We will deal with that fool if he interferes. The rightness of our cause will see us through. Do you doubt that?”
Sister Moshi hung her head. “No, Brother. As Xiggon wrote in Peace After All, ‘the ultimate end of all things cannot be doubted by any rational being.’”
Brother Tantora nodded. “Very good.” He turned back to the shelves. “Now come: Let us explore this storehouse of wonders.”
And so they did, eventually winding up at the rear of the room, where a trio of small tables stood in a line, each table bearing a single item upon it like a trophy on display. In front of each item was a small card with the item’s name and some bizarre comments handwritten upon it in an odd, angular script. When the Yellow Pawns saw what those items were, their jaws dropped.
The first item was a silver object the size and shape of a chicken egg. Its surface was smooth and reflective like a mirror and seemed to have been forged from a single piece of metal. The only break in its surface was a hole just large enough to accommodate the toothpick-thin metal rod that lay next to it. The card in front of the object read: “Antimatter Bomb! To unmatter the matter you will plunge the rod into the hole, like a sexy interlude. Then throw. Then duck.”
The second item was shaped like a thick book, but was made of metal and had numerous buttons and switches on its front and sides. Some of the larger buttons had the names of emotions written on them, such as “Love” and “Hate” and “Fear.” The card in front of it read: “Psycho-machine! Fake brain-waves to make enemies cry or spite or cower or happy. Play crazy games with their delicate heads.”
The third item was a metal sphere the size of a basketball. It was not perfectly smooth like the antimatter bomb, but was covered with dozens of squares like tiny hatches, and at its top was a recessed red button behind a clear plastic cover. Its card read: “Omega-Class Flensing Cloud! Use at your own risk!”
“What in the name of the Yellow King is a flensing cloud?” asked Sister Moshi.
“I would imagine it strips the flesh off things in some way,” Brother Tantora said. “I suppose one or all of us will find out eventually.”
“We’re taking it with us?” Brother Wisswick asked in a giddy, excited voice.
“Of course. And the psycho-machine and the antimatter bomb, too. Plus whatever other weapons we can carry.”
“Do you have any particular plans for these weapons?” asked Sister Moshi. “Because, I mean, some of this stuff’s gonna be pretty bulky and heavy and we don’t have any horses or mules or anything.”
Brother Tantora eyed her coldly. “A few minor physical hardships are a small price to pay for the good work we do. Someday it is quite possible we will be called upon, either individually or as a group, to extinguish our own existences in the name of our good work. You would do well to acclimate yourself to that fact.”
Sister Moshi glared up at him. “Now you look here, Brother Tantora,” she said, wagging a finger in his face (she had to stretch a bit to do so), “I know as well as you what we must do, and it’s no big deal. All things end up the same way. I will, too. What I object to is unnecessary toil when one’s energy could be better expended in other directions. All I want to know is, are we supposed to just, like, load ourselves up with heavy weaponry and still expect to be able to compete with two dozen other people to get the gold? Remember, it’s always the lightest and fastest who wins the race. Why don’t we just take the things on the tables right now, and then come back for the other stuff later.”
“But if we wait, the Snowman will move everything,” Brother Wisswick said, almost whining at the thought of all these lovely destructive devices slipping from his grasp. “Now that the location of his hideout has been discovered, he’ll surely decide to relocate.”
Sister Moshi shrugged. “We’ll still have these three things. And we’ll have a huge block of gold. We’ll be able to buy any weapons we want on the black market. Besides, the Snowman might not be in a position to be moving anything at all anymore. I mean, have either of you even wondered where the Snowman is? Why this whole place is unguarded? Why Bastard Jack was just sitting there, tortured only half to death with the door hanging wide open? It’s like the Snowman up and left very suddenly. For all we know, he might not even be alive at this point.”
“That’s quite a leap,” Brother Tantora said.
Sister Moshi shrugged. “I’m not saying that’s what really happened, but bear in mind, there were a lot of people in Moe’s, and as Bastard Jack’s presence proves, we’re not the only ones who decided to travel via the swamp.”
“True.” Brother Tantora tapped his thin, pursed lips with one index finger while he pondered the matter. Finally he motioned at the weapons on the tables. “For now we will take only these three items. Brother Wisswick, you take the psycho-machine. Sister Moshi, take the flensing cloud. I will take the antimatter bomb.” He flashed a grim smile. “Once our current task is done, though, we shall return for the rest of this glorious arsenal, the Snowman be damned.”