M) Chapter 12

12.

'Wachen sie auf! Wachen sie auf! Dumbkopf! Scheisse!
UNTERMENSCHEN!'

'No no no, zat really really will not 'elp'

'Ich w?nsche diesen Idioten aufwachen, damit wir einen diesen Platz
verlassen k?nnen'

'Why zo quick to go back Freddy?'

'Ich hasse diesen Platz. Ich hasse ihn sogar mehr als unten
dort.'

'You know, you really zould be speaking English 'ere'

'Warum?'

'Ze book is in English, it will zust annoy if you speak German.'

'?..Fine, fine! It is hardly like that matters anymore. But why cannot
this ridiculous wretch recover? Looks like he's dying!'

'Zo much for what does not kill us makes us stronger'

'What?'

'Nothing?didn't Kafka zay he waz coming in dis afternoon?'

'Yes, but he has cried off again.'

'What zis time?'

'He says he woke up this morning and found he had been transformed into
a giant cockroach.'

'I've 'eard that before.'

'I want to believe him?'

'There's only so many times Freddy.'

The unconscious mind of Richard Querulous lay sunk in the infinite
depths of a muddy, oppressive bog. He was aware that it was slowly
rising to the surface, and could hear muffled voices above him talking
and arguing about things that really meant little to him for the most
part, wrapped up as he was in his own life and death struggle.
Occasionally the voices would refer to him, almost always disparagingly
however. One of them sounded French, and kept asserting the complete
inconsequentiality of whether Richard regained consciousness or not.
Richard wanted very much to see who they were. Though his eyes were
undoubtedly closed he nevertheless had the impression of a
frighteningly large moustache. Since when did Magnum PI speak
German?

'Do you think he'll ever wake up?'

'I'm told 'e is zupposed to.'

'Didn't think you believed in that kind of thing'

'I don't! But the story is not over yet.'

Richard surfaced. The world did not so much come rushing back to him as
dripping, like thick porridge into a bowl. His whole head felt like
porridge actually, lumpy, gritty porridge prepared especially for a
Victorian workhouse and served from a cement mixer. He groaned, and
with great trepidation opened his eyes and tried to bring his vision
into focus. He could tell it was daytime, and he was lying down, but
pretty much everything else escaped him. He groaned again, wanting to
shake the thick, oppressive feeling from the inside of his head but
scared any sudden movements might make him feel nauseated. He groaned
again.

'Hey Rich, you're awake then.' It was Lance.
Richard closed his eyes again and burbled unsatisfactorily.

'You're ok, we're in hospital, do you remember what happened?'

It took Richard a moment to fight his way through the peat bog that now
constituted his brain, but as soon as he did so the memory of the
previous day's skirmish came back to him in all its frightening detail.
He remembered being trapped in Stack Zero, seeing a grossly rotund
figure closing the door right in front of him when he was mere metres
away from escape. He had ran to it and beat his fists against it,
screaming to be let out, but no-one had come to help. He remembered the
noise of the fire, the crackling of burning paper and bursting spines,
and he remembered the insidious, heavy feeling of death as the smoke
crawled into his lungs and clung there. He remembered the feeling of
running out of air, of him and Lance beating wildly against the door
and then, in desperation looking round for any other exits. They both
knew however there were none, and with the inferno rapidly drawing in
around them, death seemed inevitable. They had clung together, hugging
each and crying without restraint. With each breath they drew their own
doom into their lungs. They began to choke and their eyes clouded over
with heat and smoke. All they could do was sit and wait whilst the fire
and the smoke fought with one another to be the element that claimed
their lives. Feeling the intense heat begin burning their skin even
from a distance, they began to pin their hopes on asphyxiation, having
given up hope of rescue.

'You passed out. Smoke inhalation.' Lance informed his friend.

'Then?how did we..?' Richard croaked.

'Your boss.'

Richard had fallen unconscious under the weight of the smoke fumes, and
Lance, huddled next to him by the door, envied his easy exit
powerfully. The fire was close now and Lance felt certain he was for
burning. Then, suddenly he felt a forceful blow to his back, someone
was trying to open the door! Delirious with joy Lance crawled forwards
to allow the portal to be opened further and dragged Richard with him.
He sat watching, near surrounded by the flames of hell, as the door was
slowly forced open. Dirt and smoke covered him from head to toe and his
best friend lying close to death in his arms when the door was finally
opened wide enough to allow an entrance. Several dark forms in masks
rushed in and evacuated the pair just as the inferno was closing in for
the kill.

'Dr.Quinn?'

'He was working late apparently. He found our redecorating work in the
Cage and followed the stairs down to find smoke creeping out of from
the hole we had made in his wall. We're lucky the fire brigade were so
quick. He says he had no idea the secret chamber was even there.'

'And?Janice?'

'Who?'

'Janice!' Richard shouted hoarsely, regretting it a moment later, 'She
closed the door on us, I swear!'

Lance looked troubled, 'Are you sure it was her?'

'Yes, who else could it have been? Rik Waller?'

'I wouldn't put it past him.'

'So when do we get out of this place, we need to find that bitch.'
Richard sat up in his bed resolutely, but instantly began to feel
devilishly nauseated.

'Hold on there partner, there's more news I'm afraid,' said Lance in
his most soothing, nasal tones.

'For starters, you're not going anywhere until this afternoon at the
earliest, you took in a lot of smoke.' Richard snorted derisively, but
paid for it with a coughing fit. 'Secondly, I'm afraid Dr.Quinn didn't
appreciate what we did to his Cage.'

'What?'

'I'm sorry Rich? you lost your job.' Lance placed his hand on Richard's
shoulder in a gesture of friendship and solidarity, Richard shrugged it
off and muttered 'bastard' under his breath.

'It's not just you though Rich,' Lance continued, 'I'm in trouble too,
my superiors want me to explain what was going on last night, and
frankly I have no idea what to tell them.'

'Tell me about it' Richard rejoindered.

'I am'

'Oh, go on then.'

'Well, I could be in trouble.'

'I'm the one who's dying! Have we forgotten that?'

'No - but - maybe you aren't dying?'

'What?'

'All I am saying is,' Lance paused and put his hands together
diplomatically, 'A lot of stuff has happened, a lot of very strange
stuff.'

'You're so fucking insightful Lance,' Richard turned away in
disgust.

'All I'm saying is, maybe you're not going to die tomorrow, maybe
someone is going to try and kill you.'

Richard began muttering obscenities to himself and periodically
coughing up grim looking phlegm.

'Let me rephrase that. Look Rich, all I mean is you're not going to
drop down dead tomorrow for no reason. Maybe someone is trying to make
you think that but?.Rich? Are you listening?'

'Fuck off Lance'

'Fine' Lance replied, giving up on the conversation, 'I'm going to see
what I can find out about this Janice of yours then,'

'She's not mine' Richard corrected pedantically.
Lance put his friend's bad humour down to the mysterious death
conspiracy that had surrounded him for the past five days, and tried
not to hold a grudge.

Lying alone in his hospital bed, Richard had plenty of time to think
things over. The last few days made no sense to him at all. He felt he
had been little more than a bad actor in an absurd play. He and Lance
had followed some carefully strewn breadcrumbs down some very odd
pathways, and they had almost been killed by their quest. Yet for some
reason they had been saved. For some reason Richard's life, doomed as
it was to an imminent end, had nevertheless been miraculously rescued
from horrible death. The only reason Richard could think of for this
mysterious salvation was that fate wanted to insure that the Reaper
would drop in on Mr. Querulous on the right day. This made him feel
rather indignant, had he been saved only to face death again so soon?
Was his every action already predetermined, or was there anything he
could do change his destiny? He wondered, but predictably, no answer
was forthcoming.

He began to think as well about how he had spent his life, and found
that for a young man of twenty-two there was already a European regret
mountain festering inside him. Facing the prospect of death in
something over twenty-four hours, the most burning regret of Richard
Querulous' life was that he had not had nearly enough sex. Though he
realised this must make him a tremendously shallow person, and he was
deeply upset that he could not come up with anything more significant,
he could not yet shake this carnal remorsefulness from his mind. He
watched several attractive nurses pass him by as the day wore on, and
moaned softly at the thought of each of them in his arms, knowing full
well that his fantasies would remain such. He regretted not having
enough sex, and he regretted not having enough fun, not drinking
enough, not ever smoking a cigarette or taking drugs. Fuck, he
exclaimed to himself quietly, if I'd known I was going to die at
twenty-three I would have smoked like a fucking chimney. Then he began
to think how after, twenty three years of feigning an ambition to be a
writer, he could not think of a better simile for heavy smoking than
'like a fucking chimney.' He swore again, and buried his face into his
pillow in a bitter sulk.

Some time later in the afternoon Lance arrived back at the hospital
looking tired and downhearted. Richard was asleep again, but when he
woke Lance relayed his news with a quiet voice that evinced nothing but
resignation.

'They can't find her.'

'What? Who?'

'Janice. She's not in work, she's not at her home. Her neighbours
haven't seen her since yesterday, and they say they never fail to
notice her in the mornings. She's disappeared.'

'Probably knows what I'd do if I?' Richard croaked weakly, before
trailing off into a light coughing fit.

'I think I'm probably going to lose my job.'

'I'm?sorry Lance.'

'They want to speak to me tomorrow afternoon but it's just a
formality. They'll suspend me first, then when Dr.Quinn presses
charges, I don't think they'll want to have much to do with me.'

'Dr.Quinn's pressing charges?' Richard inquired, surprised.

'Yes, not that that'll bother you,' Lance replied, coldly.

'So that's it then? I'm a goner in your eyes? All because some stupid
book says so?'

Lance looked away despondently.

'Where is the book anyway?' Richard wondered out loud.

'I think it got burned.'

Richard visibly perked up. 'The New Eschatologist? Got burned? Does
that mean I'm free?'

'I wouldn't know.'

Thinking about the book made Richard recall the full strangeness of
Stack Zero. Had they really seen so many volumes of that strange death
chronicle? Was Richard part of that now, just another morbid chapter in
a grim black book? Had he really held The Bible, Part Three in his
hands? He found it difficult to disentangle what had really happened
from the dreams and delusions of the previous day's trials.

'Did we really see all those books in Stack Zero? All those New
Eschatologists?'

'Yes,' Lance replied firmly. 'But it doesn't matter now. We have no
idea what they are really or why they were there. Now we'll never find
out. The publishers have vanished, the only repository we know of of
the books themselves is now a charnel-house. I feel like someone
is
just playing with us.'

'Lance' Richard interrupted with an oddly excited tinge in his
voice.

'Yes?'

'Let's stop playing along then. If I'm going to die I'm going to
die'

'Insightful,' Lance moaned.

'What I mean is, let's?..face the music and dance!'

'You hate dancing, you say it makes you look gay.'

'Fine fine, I know what I said, but Lance, if I'm going to die
tomorrow then can't you give me some kind of send off? Let's go out
tonight, let me make up for all my stupid wasted years! Please!' The
pair locked eye contact, and Lance understood Richard's words as the
last request of a doomed man. 'If the universe is set on treating us
in
absurd way, let's respond in kind!'

'Okay,' Lance replied after a few moments deep thought, 'I have to go
and make a phone-call then'

'Who to?' Richard inquired, trying to shake off the nagging doubts he
was now having about his idea.

'If we're having a last night Richard we'd best do it properly. I'm
getting him in on this Rich, I'm phoning Thom Holliday.'

Richard gasped.