Earth, Air, Fire and Custard

by Tom Holt

  Just as he was about to land heavily across the threshold of the Portable Door, he tore his thoughts away from the excruciating pain of talons clenched into his shoulder, and concentrated hard on a date, a time and a place. The goblin hit the deck first, of course, but he hoped very much that he was too preoccupied with Paul resisting arrest to fill his mind with anything that might contradict what Paul was thinking.

  ‘Ouch,’ screamed a goblin voice underneath him, as he landed. ‘Fuck! Look where you’re going, can’t you?’

  ‘Sorry,’ Paul said, as he scrambled to his feet. ‘Did I hurt you?’

  ‘Yes,’ snarled the goblin; but Paul was standing up, hastily shutting the Door and rolling it up. Only then did he turn round.

  Perfect. He was standing in his office; there was the calendar on his desk, and the date was wonderfully, beautifully right. He helped the goblin up.

  ‘What the hell am I doing in here?’ the goblin asked. ‘We aren’t supposed to come out till half-five.’

  Paul shrugged. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘Can’t help you there. I’d get back to the cellars quick if I were you.’

  ‘Too bloody right,’ the goblin muttered, and bolted, leaving Paul finally, blissfully alone.

  Joy, he thought. Absolute bloody joy. He’d taken himself back to his office on the day of Mr Tanner’s mum’s baby’s christening party. He hadn’t yet killed Ricky Wurmtoter, or metamorphosed into Philip Marlow, he hadn’t been killed yet, not even once. Furthermore, he resolved grimly, he wasn’t going to be, not if he could help it. Which he could.

  Just to make absolutely, absolutely sure, he took out his wallet and looked at his bank card. He read the words printed on it, and grinned.

  ‘Sorry, Canada,’ he said aloud. ‘Nothing personal.’

  Paul glanced at his watch, but it had stopped, and he couldn’t find it in his heart to blame it. Anyway, there was a perfectly good clock on his office wall, and it told him the time was 10.35. Perfect.

  Down the corridor, up one lot of stairs, down another, along more stupid passageways, fuck this horrible bloody building for being so big - He stopped just round the corner from Benny Shumway’s office, caught his breath and waited. A second or so passed; then Benny came out, with a file under his arm, and disappeared round a corner. Great. Paul sneaked up to the office door and slipped in.

  There, leaning against the wall, was the sword. If he remembered right, its name was Skofnung, and it was a magical, transdimensional, self-motivated pain in the bum. It was also, unfortunately, essential to his plan -

  (A plan. Whoopee. Here I am, alone against the universe, but I have a plan. So that’s all right, then.)

  He picked it up and, very carefully, drew it out of its scabbard. It looked horribly sharp, and the way the light glinted on the blade was depressingly sinister, like the grin on the face of a goblin. Loathsome bloody thing, he thought. Then he turned to face the door in the wall, the one Benny used when he did the daily run to the Bank. Any moment now—

  Someone was bashing on it, from the other side. Of course, Paul had seen that, and heard it, before. Last time round, it had scared him out of his wits, because he’d naturally assumed that whoever or whatever was out there wasn’t going to be his friend. Actually, he hadn’t been far wide of the mark, at that, because (according to all his relatives and friends) the bloke on the other side of the door had been his worst enemy for the past twenty-three years.

  Instead of slamming back the bolts, he drew them. Then, as soon as there was a lull in the hammering and bashing, he turned the knob and pulled the door open.

  ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘And stop making that bloody racket.’

  A head and body flopped through he door, like an exhausted salmon eventually making it to the top of the waterfall. ‘Thanks,’ said the newcomer, ‘I’d almost given up—’

  The newcomer stopped short. He was staring.

  ‘Yes, all right,’ Paul said impatiently. ‘It’s me. Us. Long story, another time. Now, here’s what we’ve got to do—’

  ‘Fuck!’ the newcomer yelped; and of course, the newcomer was Paul himself. To be precise, the Paul who’d died at Mr Tanner’s mum’s christening party, slaughtered a virtual TV anchorman, and sprinted across the empty plains of the Land of the Dead after Benny Shumway, only to arrive just as the door was bolted. He could remember the despair he’d felt as he’d pounded on the door with his fists until they ached, and nobody had heard him, nobody had rushed to help him. In fact, as he knew better than anybody, some bastard on the other side had shot all the bolts and wedged the door shut with a filing cabinet. His own worst enemy indeed.

  But the other Paul, the one he’d just let through the door, wouldn’t have that memory. The way he’d remember it would be bashing on the door and yelling, and the door opening, and seeing himself standing there on the other side, looking all stressy and tense. Also, this sucker had only died - what, three times? Once by his own hand, once by a bolt from Ricky’s crossbow, once stabbed to death by goblins. A mere novice when it came to dying, a mortality virgin.

  ‘You might at least pretend you’re pleased to see me,’ he said. ‘I’ve been to a lot of trouble on your behalf. The least you could do is simulate a little gratitude.’

  ‘Sorry,’ said the other Paul instinctively.

  ‘And shut that bloody door, will you?’

  ‘Oh, yes. Right.’

  Paul leaned past his other self and made sure all the bolts were shot home and all the latches were dropped. ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Time we weren’t here. Benny could be back any moment, and it’d be really, really embarrassing if he sees the two of us.’

  Where to go, that was the question. Awkward. He hesitated for a moment—

  ‘You’ve got the sword,’ said his alter ego.

  ‘What?’

  ‘That sword I got at the christening party. I thought I’d lost it, back in there.’

  ‘You did,’ Paul said. ‘You’re careless as well as feckless, but fortunately I’m here to tidy up after you. Closed-file store,’ he added. ‘Only logical place. Come on.’

  Luckily they made it to the closed-file store without meeting anybody. Paul closed the door, then wedged it shut with the sword. ‘Sit down,’ he said. ‘And don’t interrupt, because this is going to be complicated, and I know you’ve got the attention span of a goldfish. Ready?’

  ‘Um. Yes, I suppose so.’

  So Paul started to explain, and his identical twin listened. Interesting study the other Paul’s face made: first, of course, utter bewilderment; then the gradual dawn of understanding; then a very intense, almost fierce concentration; then the effects of a rather nasty set of implications, starting as a tiny glimmer of doubt and spreading into a pall of gloomy acceptance. Watching himself listening to him, Paul was actually rather impressed: a bit more stoicism, courage even, than he’d have expected from himself under such circumstances. He never knew he had it in him.

  ‘Any questions?’ he concluded. The other Paul shrugged.

  ‘Not really,’ he said; then a pause, then (not really very hopefully): ‘I don’t suppose there’s another way, is there? I mean, another approach we haven’t considered yet. One that doesn’t involve me getting—’

  ‘No,’ Paul replied. ‘Sorry. But look at it this way. One, by rights you shouldn’t be here at all. The goblins killed you, fair and square. Two: all right, it’s not looking good as far as you’re concerned, but look on the bright side, with any luck I’m going to make it; and you’re me and I’m you, so really it’s all as broad as it’s long. Right?’

  ‘I guess.’ The other him didn’t sound totally convinced, but he was trying his best, bless him. ‘And I suppose, if one of us has got to—’

  ‘Quite,’ Paul replied. ‘And the simple fact of the matter is, I’m the real me and you’re just some sort of anomaly, so—’

  ‘No way. I’m the real me and you’re the bloody by-product . . . Sorry.’ The other Paul shook his head. ‘It doesn’t actuall
y matter, does it?’ he said. ‘It’s got to be me, you’re right. Only, isn’t it just fucking typical, it’s always me that loses out. Even against my bloody self.’

  Paul tried to think of something to say; something comforting, something ennobling, something that’d help his tormented alter ego find some degree of inner peace in the face of the horror that lay ahead of him. ‘Oh well,’ he said. ‘Never mind. You ready?’

  ‘As I’ll ever be.’

  ‘You’ll need this, of course.’

  The other Paul took the sword; unwillingly, as if it was something slimy and horrid. ‘Thanks,’ he said.

  ‘Our biggest mistake,’ Paul told him. ‘Well, one of our biggest mistakes, anyhow. Not figuring it out sooner.’

  ‘I wouldn’t know,’ the other Paul replied peevishly. ‘I wasn’t there at the time.’

  ‘Fine.’ Paul frowned. ‘My mistake, then. Only, I should’ve known when Vicky told me she and Ricky had been married. Bloody great big hint, went right over my head like a flock of migrating geese. Still, I got there in the end.’

  ‘We got there,’ replied his other self, and Paul couldn’t be bothered to point out the inconsistency. ‘Well,’ other-Paul went on, ‘I’d like to say it was a pleasure meeting you, but . . .’

  ‘But lying to yourself is a mug’s game, right.’ Paul stood up. ‘Look, if it’s any consolation, this is all for the best, and I think what you’re doing is actually pretty cool. So—’

  ‘Yes, well. You would, wouldn’t you?’

  No pleasing some people. ‘You coming,’ Paul snapped, ‘or what?’

  ‘What do you think? Of course I’m coming.’ Other-Paul trailed wearily to the door, then paused. ‘One bright side to all of this,’ he said. ‘I can’t wait to see the look on bloody Wurmtoter’s face.’

  Paul grinned. ‘Me too,’ he said. Then he stopped and pulled a face. ‘Idiot,’ he said. ‘Not you,’ he added. ‘Me.’

  ‘Pretty much academic, surely?’

  ‘Oh, be quiet. Sophie,’ he added. ‘We need Sophie, or it’s not going to work. Only—’

  ‘Only there’s two of us,’ his other self said. ‘Which is going to freak her out no end. Still, can’t be helped. Omelettes and eggs.’

  Paul sighed. ‘I guess so. I suppose I’ll just have to explain it all to her later.’

  Other-Paul grinned. ‘Rather you than me, chum. All right, I’ll stay here, you go and fetch her. Okay?’

  He found Sophie, eventually, in the photocopier room; she was running off something like a thousand copies of a big fat document, sorting, collating, stapling. He came in quietly and she didn’t hear him over the whirr and clatter of the machine (which had once, of course, been the younger Mr Wells, but there wasn’t enough space left in his mind for side issues that size). He looked at the back of her head and thought, Only you, you and no other; and then he asked himself, Why, for pity’s sake? What’s so special about her, as against, say, Vicky or Demelza Horrocks or even, within certain firmly defined parameters, Mr Tanner’s mum? Paul thought about that for two, maybe two and a half seconds, and realised that he didn’t know, that there wasn’t an answer; just as there’s never any answer to those simple but incredibly difficult questions you ask when you’re four years old, and the grown-up just looks at you all cross and embarrassed and says, ‘Just because, that’s why.’ (And, of course, that’s the only real, true answer to that kind of question; there are long-winded ways of saying the same thing, involving lengthy digressions and background materials and abstruse and nebulous concepts, but they’re just another way of saying that same old thing.)

  Why? Because. And that’s how you know it’s true love. If you love someone for or because of something, it doesn’t count; it’s admiration, appreciation or the recognition of some resource she’s got that you can exploit to your own advantage. Unless it’s just Because, it can’t be unconditional, instinctive, involuntary. Doesn’t count. No good.

  ‘Sophie,’ he said.

  ‘What?’ She turned round, banged her elbow against the machine’s dust cover, dropped a sheaf of pages, swore, scowled at him. ‘Oh, it’s you. What?’

  ‘Oh, nothing,’ he said. ‘I just wondered if you were busy right now, that’s all.’

  She gave him that oh-for-crying-out-loud look he knew so well. ‘Do I look busy?’

  ‘Yes. Fairly.’

  ‘Fine. No need to ask, then, was there?’

  ‘Sorry. Only I need your help with something. Won’t take a moment.’

  ‘No. Look, I’ve got to do this stupid copying for Mr Suslowicz, then there’s a bloody great pile of filing for Mr bloody Tanner, and then—’

  ‘Really,’ he said, ‘it won’t take ten seconds. And you’re so busy already, one more little thing’s not going to make any odds, is it?’

  ‘Paul.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Oh.’ He took a step back, as though a real door had just been slammed in his face. ‘Please?’

  She sighed. ‘Can’t you get someone else to help you?’

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘Why? What is it you want me to do?’

  ‘It’s—’ There’s never a word around when you need one, is there? ‘It’s complicated. Take longer to explain it than actually do it, if you follow me. Look, it really would be very kind of you if you could just spare me two seconds.’

  ‘Paul.’ It was a sort of combination half-scowl, half-grin. ‘Did anybody ever tell you, you’re really annoying when you’re being pathetic?’

  He nodded. ‘And really pathetic when I’m being annoying, yes. Actually,’ he added, ‘I think it was you.’

  ‘Mphm. Sounds like the sort of thing I’d say.’ She frowned.

  ‘All right, but you’ve got to promise you’ll do the Mortensens for me, tomorrow morning. All right?’

  ‘Sure.’ No problem at all promising that. ‘All right, so that’s settled, is it?’

  ‘What do you want, a signed contract?’

  They didn’t say anything to each other on the way to the closed-file store. When they got there, he lunged past her, pulled open the door and darted in, saying, ‘This way,’ or something equally pointless. As he’d devoutly hoped, there he was, the other him, waiting.

  ‘Paul? Look, what’s—?’ She stopped just inside the door, for once completely speechless. The two Pauls smiled feebly at her, and Paul said, ‘Hi. It’s us.’

  A moment of deep silence; then, ‘Paul, what the fuck—?’

  ‘Long story. Very long story. Think Robert Jordan and multiply by three. Meanwhile, it’s very important that you see this. Here, look.’

  The other Paul drew the sword out of its scabbard, knelt down and laid it carefully on the ground. She looked at it and said, ‘Paul, what the hell’s that got to do with—?’

  And stopped.

  ‘Oh,’ she said.

  Other-Paul stood up and got out of the way quickly as Sophie crouched down and looked at the sword. Her hair, falling forward from behind her ear, brushed the gleaming brown-with-silver-swirls blade. She looked up.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ she said. ‘It’s like I know this. Like—’ She pulled a face, angry and frightened and confused. ‘Like it’s, I don’t know, family or something. Paul, what the hell’s going on?’

  He knelt down beside her. ‘I don’t really know,’ he said. ‘Not all of it. But apparently this is some kind of magic sword, and the way it works is, it’s in two parts. There’s the actual sharp metal thing, and then there’s a human that sort of goes with it. Its other half. And—’ He stopped, taking on board a small but vital moment of understanding that had eluded him till now. ‘The thing is,’ he went on, ‘neither of them works without the other. No, that’s not it. Neither of them is right without the other. What I mean is, you can’t use the sword unless you’ve got the girl too. And—’ He looked away for a moment. ‘And vice versa,’ he added. ‘And I’ve actually had this stupid thing for months now, it was under the s
ofa, Ricky gave it to me, but I hadn’t actually figured out the rest of it. You see, all this time I’d got the idea that the other half of this sword was - well, someone else. But now I’ve finally got it straight in my mind, that part of it anyway. It was you, all along, and I was too stupid to realise.’

  Pause. ‘Me?’

  Paul dipped his head slowly. ‘That’s right. You’re this thing’s other half. So . . .’

  ‘Vice versa?’

  He nodded again. ‘I think it sort of explains a lot of stuff. About, you know, us. Only it wasn’t us, it was stupid bloody magic, getting in the way and screwing us around, as usual. And—’

  ‘So who’s he, then?’

  The other Paul might have muttered ‘The cat’s mother’ under his breath, or not; he wasn’t helping matters, and Paul ignored him. ‘That’s a different story - well, part of the same story but way, way off at right angles. The thing is, unless I fight a duel to the death with Ricky Wurmtoter - not here, somewhere else, which reminds me, we need a goblin called Colin - unless we have this stupid duel, the whole of history for the last thousand-odd years is going to get really screwed up, and it’s all Van Spee’s fault but I’m the only one who can sort it out. Actually, it’s a real bugger. That’s why I need you to help me.’

  Sophie scowled at him. ‘You said it’d only take two seconds.’

  ‘I exaggerated. But I will still do the Mortensens for you.’

  ‘After you’ve saved the world, you mean?’

  Paul nodded. ‘Sure,’ he said. ‘Assuming there’s a world left tomorrow, no problem.’

  She thought for a moment or so. ‘I’d still like to know exactly what you meant by vice versa.’

  ‘Look—’

  ‘And anyway,’ she went on, ‘you and me breaking up, it wasn’t about magic. Well, not all, anyway. Partly it was because you’re shallow and emotionally retarded and completely self-centred and inconsiderate and—’ She stopped.

  ‘Yes? Go on.’

  ‘Actually.’ A deep, thoughtful frown on Sophie’s face. ‘Yes, you’re all that stuff, but that wasn’t it. I mean, that’s the kind of thing you have endless rows and tears and yelling over, but it’s not why we split up. I don’t know why we split up, do you?’