Chapter 34
"Bastard's dead!" the huge blond overseer concluded disappointedly after carefully crushing Mbanga's fingers with his heel (no reaction); then he trained his bloodshot eyes on Kumai, standing motionless to the side. "But devil take me," he tossed his whip from one hand to another, "if his buddy won't pay with his whole hide for Ernie right now..." Kumai instinctively blocked the first blow with his elbow, immediately losing a patch of skin. Roaring with pain, he lunged at the blond man, and four others joined the fun. They beat him for a long time, attentively and with a great deal of inventiveness, until it became clear that further action was useless on the insensible Troll. Well, whaddya think -- someone has to pay for the dead overseer, right?
By then the guard chief showed up, yelled: "Enough fun!" and chased them all back to their posts -- he certainly didn't want another deader on his report. See, the deal's like this: if this animal kicks the bucket right here, then he'll have to deal with the master of the works (another asshole!), but if it happens later, in the barracks -- then it's gonna be a `natural loss,' no questions asked. He nodded for the nearest bunch of prisoners who had watched the beating fearfully to come over, and a short time later Kumai was sprawled over the rotten straw in his barrack. Anyone with experience could tell at a glance that this half-corpse covered in tatters of bloody skin was not for this world for much longer. A couple of months prior the Troll managed to cheat death after heavy injury in the Battle of Pelennor, but now his luck seemed to have run out.
...When E:omer's riders broke through the South Army's defenses and panic ensued, Engineer Second Class Kumai was cut off north of the camp, at the siege engine park. Seven more engineers were bottled up with him; being the senior there, he had to assume command. Not being an expert on either strategy or tactics, he saw just one thing clearly: in a few minutes all the abandoned machinery would be captured, so the only thing left was to destroy it. The Troll established order in his company with an iron hand (one of the seven who blurted something like "run for your lives!" remained lying senseless by a bunch of assault ladders) and ascertained that at least they had enough naphtha, the One be praised. In a minute his subordinates rushed all around like ants, pouring it over the catapults and the bases of siege towers, while he hurried to the `gates' -- the break in the ring of wagons surrounding the park -- and ran smack into a forward troop of Rohirrim. The mounted warriors treated the suddenly appearing lonely Mordorian without due respect, and paid for it. Kumai was strong even by Trollish standards (once at a student party he had walked a window ledge with dead-drunk Haladdin slumped in an armchair held in his outstretched arms), so his weapon of choice right then was a large wagon shaft that came to hand. Only one of the four riders managed to back off in time; the rest fell where they met that monstrous spinner.
Even so the Rohirrim were not discouraged much. Six more riders materialized out of the deepening gloom and formed a semi-circle bristling with spears. Kumai first tried to block the way with one of the wagons, turning it by the rear axle, but saw that he would not be in time. Stepping back a little and keeping the enemies in sight, he called over his shoulder:
"Fire it, by damn!"
"We're not done, sir!" someone responded from behind, "the large catapults are still dry!"
"Fire what you can! The Westerners are here already!" he roared, and then addressed the battle-ready Rohirrim in Common: "Hey, who's not a coward? Who'll meet the mountain Troll in honest battle?"
It worked! The rank broke, and a few seconds later a dismounted officer wearing the white plumage of a cornet stood before him: "Are you ready, fair sir?" Kumai grabbed the pole by the middle, made a quick forward lunge -- and found the Rohani less than two yards away; the only thing that saved the Troll was that the light Rohan blade could not cut through the pole which took the brunt of the blow. The engineer hastily backed inside the park, trying to gain precious seconds, but was unable to break away: the cornet was fleet as a ferret, and Kumai's chances with his clumsy weapon were about zero in close quarters. "Fire and run like hell!" he yelled, seeing clearly that he was finished. Indeed, the next moment the world exploded in a white flash of blinding pain and instantly faded into comforting dark. The cornet's blow split his helmet clean apart, so he never saw how the very next second everything around turned into a sea of flames -- his people did manage to finish the job... A few seconds later the Rohirrim, backing away from the heat, saw their reckless officer trudging from the depths of that roaring furnace, bent under the weight of the unconscious Troll. "What the hell, cornet?" "I must know the name of this fair sir! He's a captive of my spear, after all..."
Kumai came to only three days later in a Rohani hospital tent, lying side by side with the three riders he felled; the steppe warriors made no distinction between the wounded and treated them all equally. Unfortunately, in this case it meant `equally bad:' the engineer's head was in bad shape, but the only medicine he got during that time was a flagon of wine brought by Cornet Jorgen who had captured him. The cornet voiced hope that once the Engineer Second Class was healed he would honor him with another fight, preferably with a weapon more traditional than a pole. Certainly he can be free within the confines of the camp, on his word as an officer... However, a week later the Rohirrim left on the Mordorian campaign, to win the crown of the Reunited Kingdom for Aragorn, and that same day Kumai and all the other wounded were sent to the Mindolluin quarry. Gondor was already a civilized country, unlike the backward Rohan... How he managed to survive those first hellish days, with a busted head and a concussion that kept sending him into pits of unconsciousness, was a total enigma; most likely it was simply Trollish stubbornness, to spite the warders. All the same, Kumai had no illusions regarding his fate. In his time, as required by the tradition of well-off Trollish families, Kumai had followed the entire career path of a worker in his father's mines at Tzagan-Tzab, from miner to surveyor's assistant. He knew enough about mining to understand that no one was concerned with economics here; they were sent to Mindolluin to die, rather than earn the quarry owners some profit. The daily food-to-production-quota ratio for Mordorian prisoners was such as to be bald-faced `killing on an installment plan.' By the third week, when some prisoners were already dead and the others managed to more or less adapt to this murderous cadence (what else could they do?), an Elvish inspection team swooped in. What shame, what barbarity! those folks carried on. Isn't it obvious that these people are capable of a lot more than driving wheel-barrows? There are plenty of experts in all kinds of trades here -- take them and use them properly, damn it! The Gondorian bosses scratched their heads abashedly: "our bad, your eminences!" and instantly conducted a skill survey. As a result, a few dozen lucky ones traded the hell of Mindolluin for work in their chosen fields, leaving the quarry forever. Whatever, the One be their judge... As for himself, Kumai did not think it proper to buy his life by building heavier-than-air aircraft for the enemy (that being his trade): some things are not to be done because they must not be done, period. An escape from Mindolluin was obviously a pipe dream, and he saw no other ways to get out of here. In the meantime, undernourishment was doing its work -- he became more and more apathetic. It is hard to say how long he would have lasted in this mode -- maybe a week, maybe even six months (but almost certainly not a year) -- were it not for Mbanga, the One rest his soul, who managed to slam the door on his way out so spectacularly as to also solve all of Kumai's problems once and for all.
Chapter 35
Close to evening a stranger visited the Mordorians' barrack where the Engineer Second Class was being wracked by a consuming fever. He was wiry and quick in his movements, his swarthy Southerner's face marked by decisiveness -- most likely an officer off an Umbarian privateer who by a quirk of fate wound up at Mindolluin rather than dangling off the yardarm of a royal galley. He stood for a minute over the bloody mess already presided over by hordes of fat flies and grumbled to no one in particular: "Yeah, prob'ly a goner by morning..." Then he disappeared, only to re
-appear a half an hour later and, much to the surprise of Kumai's fellow inmates, begin treating him. Ordering them to hold the patient down, he started rubbing a yellowish ointment smelling sharply of camphor right into the bleeding welts; the pain was enough to jerk Kumai back from wobbly unconsciousness, and had he not been so weakened, his fellows would not have been able to keep him pinned down. Pirate (as the prisoners took to calling him) kept working calmly, and just a few minutes later the wounded man relaxed, melting with copious sweat, and sank into a real sleep like a stone in a pond.
The ointment was truly miraculous: by morning the welts had not only closed but started itching like crazy -- a sure sign of healing. Only a few inflamed, and the Pirate, who showed up before morning call, got to work on those. Kumai, mostly back to life by then, greeted his savior gloomily:
"I don't want to sound ungrateful, but surely you could've found a better use for your wonderful medicine. What use is saving the one who's going to die soon anyway?"
"Well, a man has to do stupid things from time to time, or stop being a man. Turn a bit... yes... Bear this, engineer, it'll be better soon... Oh yes, speaking about doing stupid things. Forgive my curiosity, but why have you stayed to die in this quarry? You could have been sitting pretty in the King's labs in Minas Tirith right now." Kumai grunted: "It's the simple wisdom of prostitutes I've followed all my life: don't hustle while under a client..." and cut himself short when it suddenly occurred to him: how does this guy know about my trade when I've told no one about it and have concealed it during that `skill survey?'
"A commendable stance," nodded Pirate without a shadow of a smile. "The most interesting thing is that in our case it's also the most pragmatically correct one; actually, the only correct one. You see, all those who have hustled back then are already dead, whereas you will soon be free, with a bit of luck."
"Dead? How do you know?"
"I buried them myself, that's how. I'm a gravedigger here, you see." Kumai digested this in silence for some time. The most horrible thing was his first thought: good riddance! And then: my God, whom did I turn into here? He did not understand Pirate's next words right away:
"In other words, you made the right choice, mechanic Kumai. As you can see, the Motherland had not forgotten you and has set up a special operation to save you. I am one of the participants in this operation."
"How?" He was totally dumbfounded. "What Motherland?"
"What, do you have several?"
"You're crazy! Someone really is ready to sacrifice a bunch of people just to get me out of here?"
"We are following orders," Pirate answered drily, "and it is not our business to decide what is more important to Mordor: a spy network that took years to create or a certain Engineer Second Class."
"I'm sorry... By the way, somehow I haven't asked your name yet."
"You did right -- you have no need to know it. Your escape will begin in a few minutes, and no matter what happens, we'll never meet again."
"In a few minutes?! Listen, I'm a lot better now, but hardly enough to... how am I supposed to get past the outer guard?"
"As a corpse, of course. Remember that I serve on the burial detail. Don't worry, you're neither the first nor the last."
"So all those who were..."
"Alas, that job was for real. That was Elvish work, there was nothing we could do... Anyway: you will now drink from this bottle and `die,' to all appearances, for about twelve hours; after what happened to you yesterday, no one will be the wiser. The rest is technical details that do not concern you."
"What do you mean, don't concern me?"
"Very simple. I advise you to supplement your wonderful `don't hustle when under the client' principle with another one: `the less you know, the better you sleep.' Whatever you need to know you will know when it's time. Drink, Kumai, time is of the essence." The liquid in the bottle worked in seconds; the last thing he saw was Pirate's swarthy face with a myriad of tiny scars around the lips.
...Kumai never found out what happened later to his `corpse' (six beats per minute pulse, no visible reactions). Nor was there any reason for him to learn how he rode the corpse cart under a pile of dead bodies, or how he lay in the nearby abandoned quarry under a layer of gravel, awaiting transport. He came to in total darkness; everything's in order -- if Pirate was right about the twelve hours, it should be night now. Where am I? A stable, to judge by the smell... The moment he moved, an unfamiliar voice with a hard-to-place accent spoke:
"Congratulations on your safe arrival, Engineer Second Class! You can relax -- the road ahead is long, but the biggest danger is past."
"Thank you, ah..."
"Superintendant. Just Superintendant."
"Thank you, Superintendant. That man, back in the quarry..."
"He's all right. You don't need to know more."
"Can I send him my regards?"
"I doubt it. But I'll report your request."
"Permission to ask a question?"
"Permission granted."
"Am I expected to create new weaponry?"
"Certainly."
"But my specialty is completely different!"
"Do you intend to teach your superiors, Engineer Second Class?"
"No, sir." He hesitated. "I'm just not sure..."
"But the HQ is sure." The Superintendant's voice thawed a little. "After all, you won't be working alone. There's a whole group there. Jageddin is the boss."
"The Jageddin?!"
"The very same."
"Not bad..."
Say what you want -- but there is a certain charm in not having to think about much and just doing what you're told...
"So, you just lie there and get better. Were it not for this stupid incident with the overseers, you could've gotten started right now, but as it is, we'll have to wait."
"You know, I'm well enough to go home, to Mordor, as it is." The invisible man chuckled: "Why do you think you're going to Mordor?"
"What do you mean?"
"It's very simple, really. You're a wanted man, or at least we're anticipating such an eventuality; as you've seen, the Elves are very thorough. Whereas you must work, rather than hide -- two very different tasks."
"All right; where, then?"
"Think. What's the best place to stash stolen goods? In a policeman's attic. What's the darkest spot? Right under the lamp. Get it?"
"You mean to say..." Kumai said slowly; he felt cold in his gut, because all the pieces of the wonderful puzzle that was his miraculous escape began to fit into a very different picture: a clever ruse. "You mean to say that I'm staying here, in Gondor?"
"No. To be honest, it would be tempting to hide you in Gondor, nor would it be too difficult in any other time. We were working on this option, but had to abandon it. The thing is, right now the King and the Queen are jockeying for position in Minas Tirith; both have their own secret services which spy on each other, so it would be real easy to attract their attention purely by accident. So, unfortunately, no local option for us. But the world is not limited to Gondor and Mordor... By the way, were it the Reunited Kingdom trying to use you, they would most likely have sent you to Mordor: between them, the army and the counter-intelligence service of the victorious nation could have set up an `ivory tower' for you bar none. Do you agree?"
Silence fell for a couple of seconds.
"Damn! Is it so obvious on my face?"
"Without a doubt -- although I can't see your face in this dark. In other words, let the experts worry about such things and do the job you know how to do, all right?"
"Please accept my apologies, Superintendant."
"Don't worry about it. As long as we're on the subject: the people you'll be working with at that `university' got there in a variety of ways; many are your good friends. You can discuss anything your heart desires with them -- student parties, news of the Resistance, philosophy -- anything but the story of how you got there. Loose talk on the subject can cost a lot of people their lives -- both my
colleagues, like our mutual friend in Mindolluin, and your colleagues still in the hands of the enemy. I say this with utmost seriousness and responsibility. Do you understand, Engineer Second Class?"
"Yes, Superintendant."
"Very good. Get well soon and move on."
***
"Congratulations, Mongoose." Cheetah straightened up in his armchair and looked over the Secret Guard lieutenant standing there at attention. "I have examined your report on Operation Mockingbird. Six men rescued -- great job. The Service thanks you."
"His Majesty's servant, sir!"
"At ease, Lieutenant. Sit down, this is no parade ground. So the retreat from Mindolluin happened under the emergency option?"
"Yes, sir. The last man I've watched -- engineer Kumai, number thirty-six on our list -- got into a stupid mess the day before the planned escape. The local warders turned him into chopped liver, and I had to fix him up real fast; to be honest, first I thought that there was no hope. I did save and extract him, but this completely exposed me: the snitches reported the healing, and... In other words, your boys from the backup team showed up just in time."
The Last Ringbearer Page 20