Chapter 270: WWJD?

Chapter 270: WWJD?

Of course we saw, said Claire. How could we miss that? She wiggled her fingers in front of her face.

It were disgusting, said Flossie, grimacing.

Oh, I said. I thought only I could see it because it looked like the tentacles that appear when I go into one of my trances. I realised my hands were still on fire and put them out. I wish that wouldnt keep happening. Now they know I can do magic.

Premature combustion, said Maurice. You should wear gloves.

My hands didnt hurt but they were a bit red. It was frustrating to have such an incredible power I couldnt harness properly. It was becoming a bit of a feature of my abilities. All the more reason to find a teacher to show me how to do things properly.

Jenny had a concerned look. Thats what it looks like when you cross over? Tentacles exploding out of peoples faces?

More or less. Mostly more. The tentacles dont just come out of faces, they come out of everything.

Ah wouldnt like that, said Flossie.

You should have told us, said Claire, shuddering. So wed be better prepared.

I dont think it would have made a difference. And these tentacles dont seem to have anything to do with the ones I see. Just a weird coincidence. I wasnt sure if it was just that, but we didnt have time to start speculating about it. So, of course, the speculation began.

They looked a bit like illithids, said Maurice, drawing blank looks from the others. You know, mind flayers. Still blank looks.

I doubt theyre connected to characters from D&D, I said. They would have used their psionic abilities if they had them.

Is this some sort of nerd code youre talking in? asked Claire.

Yes, I said.

Maurice was too heavily invested to ease off the throttle now, though. Mind flayers were ripped off from the Cthulu mythos, which is all about the Elder Gods. Didnt Deneel and Dereel mention the old gods? He quickly flicked through his notes.

You think Cthulu is real? I asked, heavily implying such thoughts were madness. More out of habit than anything else. After the shit Id seen, some ancient tentacled monstrosity was nothing special.

I dont know, but its worth bearing in mind, said Maurice, finding the page he was looking for and nodding to himself with satisfaction.

We could help you more if you occasionally told us what the hell you were going on about, said Claire.

Itd just waste time, I said, which was probably a slightly tactless way to put it.

Oh, would it? said Claire. Would it? Too busy, are you?

She was clearly about to flip out, which would waste even more time, and we were stood in the middle of the street with the Squidward Q. Tentacle fanclub probably marshalling their forces somewhere nearby.

We have to be patient with him, said Jenny. Hell get there.

I have been patient. It never gets any better, said Claire.

It will, I promise you, Jenny said in a comforting voice. I had the feeling this wasnt the first time theyd had this conversation.

Whatever it is you guys need to work out, can you do it later? The druids confronting us like that probably means they were serious in wanting us to leave the city. Which means theyll try again.

Flossie was still shaken up by what shed seen. You dont think theyre cannibals, do you?

Dont worry, I said, if they are, Im sure theyll find you delicious. Women, always fishing for compliments.

Technically, said Maurice, if they were cannibals theyd eat each other, not us. Say what you want about nerd culture, it never fails to find a pointless tangent.

Um, said Dudley, shouldnt we move before they decide to, ah, return?

Where should we go? Jenny asked me.

Were here now, we might as well find this Askii guys place. We had come to this part of town because Commander Grayson had told us Askiis home was here, although he wasnt sure if he would be living there, for some reason. He did give us directions, so we knew roughly where to look.

Maurice scratched his chin. If the Shriners keep a watch on druid activities, do you think they know about their squiddish tendencies?

It was a valid question. I had assumed the Shriners kept an eye on the druids because they were a rival religion. Such rivalries are commonplace between competing businesses, sectarian or otherwise. But maybe the Shriners had a more prosaic reason to be wary of the druids. Good old-fashioned fear.

If they knew already, wouldnt they have done something about it? asked Claire.

It did seem unlikely the druids would be allowed to run around freely with their face fingers swaying in the breeze.

I think we should assume they dont know, I said. Which makes it more likely the druids arent going to let us tell anyone their secret. Not that anyones going to believe us.

We could tell Grayson, said Flossie. Hed believe us.

Youre not hitting me with a stick, said Jenny. She was surprisingly calm about it, but obstinate in her refusal to accept non-Western teaching methods.

How else are we going to get you up to speed quick enough? Trust the Chinese way, its been in use for thousands of years.

Were not Chinese, said Claire, like that made a difference.

Racist, I said.

I, um, I think I saw a curtain move in one of the windows, said Dudley.

We all looked at the house, unable to see anything. But Dudley had much better eyesight than the rest of us, and if he said he saw something, none of us were going to dispute it.

How can we get in? asked Maurice.

The walls were very high, and there werent any obvious footholds. Dudley jumped up to grab some overhanging ivy. It came away in his hands in large clumps.

We could climb the gate, Flossie suggested.

It looked possible, but the spikes at the top werent very encouraging. We all stared at them with undisguised reluctance. Of course, Jackie Chan would have bounced off this wall and that wall and been over in a jiffy. Im telling you, wed all be better off if our parents had used physical violence to teach us martial arts. And also the piano.

Coom on, said Flossie. Itll be easy.

Her time spent running up and down the backs of dragons in flight had instilled a degree of self-belief in her, it seemed. She wasnt the most slender of girls, but she was quite sprightly.

Without waiting for us to agree, she scrambled up the gate like a big-bottomed monkey. She reached the top and waved down at us.

There was a creaking sound, the gate broke free of its moorings on either side, and fell inwards with Flossie still attached.

The gate hit the ground with a thud, sending up a cloud of dirt and dust. The door was open thanks to a new knock down ginger world record.

Dont say a word, said Flossie as she got to her feet red-faced. That had nothing to do with my weight.

Obviously not, I said. They were just rusted. And it doesnt matter what people think about your weight, Flossie. Theres only one person whose opinion matters when it comes to things like that. Him. I pointed at Dudley. As long as he wants to shag you, you arent overweight.

Flossie looked at Dudley who nodded enthusiastically. She grinned and blushed harder.

What kind of advice was that? demanded Claire.

The good, practical kind, I said. Theres no point telling insecure people to believe in themselves. What kind of useless shit is that?

Claire stared at me open-mouthed, unable to find a rebuttal. A technical K.O. is still a win.

We entered the grounds and tried to lift the gate up to prop it back in place, but it was too heavy. Wed have to pretend it was like that when we found it.

The path up to the house was covered in weeds and rogue plants, but there were no other obstructions. The front door was closed and there was no doorbell or knocker that we could find. I tried knocking with my hand but it wasnt very loud on the heavy doors. There was no response.

There was a letterbox halfway down. I bent down and pushed the flap up. Inside, the hallway looked deserted and unlived in, covered with cobwebs.

Hello? I shouted. Mr Askii? Peter sent us. There was still no response. Were Visitors. From Earth. Its an insignificant little blue-green planet far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the western spiral arm of the galaxy.

Maurice crouched down beside me and shouted, Mostly harmless, through the letterbox.

There was a clicking sound. The door opened making me lose my balance and fall into the house. The others retreated behind me.

I got to my feet and walked in, followed by my cautious party. It was dim and dusty. There was a large staircase ahead of me that went up to a landing and then split into two. There was a very tall window over the landing which let in some light, although there seemed to be a tree just outside which was blocking a lot of it.

The door slammed shut behind us and we all jumped and turned to look at it. There was a noise from in front and we jumped again, turning to look that way now.

There was a man standing on the first landing. He was wearing a dressing gown and pyjamas, it looked like. And he had a large sword in one hand.

I suppose they sent you here to kill me, he said in an American accent.

Who? I asked.

You know who. Those blasted druids. Couldnt get past the hex on the gate, so they hired you schmucks to do their dirty work for them.

Ahhh, I said, not really wanting to ask, there was a hex on the gate?

Yes, of course. How else was I supposed to keep them out?

I raised a finger to indicate he wait a moment. I turned and walked through my party, opened the front door and stuck my head out. There were druids streaming in through the wide-open ungated entrance. I closed the door.

The thing about someone like Jackie Chan is that he isnt your conventional fearless hero. He knows a punch can hurt your hand as much as it hurts the other guys face. He also knows you should use your environment to your advantage.

So, I said, is there a back door to this place?