Back to Missions?
Tungsten's note: Here is part two of "Just One Letter". I warn everybody, it's a lot grimmer and weirder than part 1, so if you're squeamish about violence or hate seeing agents get creamed, I would recommend you stay away from it.
Thanks to everybody who commented on part 1, and especially to VixenMage, who showed me how to use an LJ cut. Now I won't be cluttering up Friends pages- yay for efficiency!
As the agents emerged into a stunning English landscape, they could hear the commotion already beginning. They dropped their packs and, charge list and weaponry in hand, raced towards the huge frame hanging in midair. Outside, in Grimmauld Place proper, Sakhmet was looming in Sirius's doorway- sand blew around her, along with a hot gritty wind that tasted of camel leavings. Ithalond, He of the Enhanced Senses, grimaced and swiped at his mouth.
�Why didn�t you tell them about me?�
�She's pitching a fit because Sirius didn't tell the Golden Trio about her? About a girl who's supposed to be the personification of a crazy goddess?� Suicide rolled his eyes upward as if appealing to the heavens. �As if Harry doesn't have enough to worry about!�
�Yes, but she is the star of this story, so therefore they all need to worship her.� Ithalond grimaced again. �Dear Eru, what is that smell? And that taste?�
�Sandstorms ain't all they've cracked up to be, Ith.� The Scythian shielded his eyes, watching Sakhmet practically foam at the mouth. �Sand collects in granules with the soil and the animal shit. Opening your mouth in a sandstorm is a lot like getting smacked with a mud pie.�
�Lovely.� Ithalond clutched the notebook, trying to keep the paper from fluttering in the wind, and charged for meteorological abuses.
�Are you embarrassed about me or something?� Sakhmet shouted above the roar of the wind.
Sirius couldn�t breathe. He couldn�t see. He barely heard a few people come up the stairs and the screaming as they saw Sakhmet and her sandstorm. After that he passed out.
�Is that ca-� Ithalond began.
�No.�
�Charge?�
�Yep.�
�Anything else?�
�Bleepsinthe.�
�No.�
Sakhmet snapped out of her daze of fury as someone grabbed her in an attempt to stop her. She looked around blinking. Tears came to her eyes as she saw her father passed out across the room. �What?� she asked hoarsely. She saw the crowd look at her with pure terror in their eyes. �Oh, no.� The sandstorm fell into a pile of sand on the floor. Sakhmet rushed forward to where Sirius was lying.
Suicide massaged his forehead. �And now . . . the TEHGREATHEALINSEENE!!!!� Somehow, the Extra Exclamation Points slotted neatly into place, making Ithalond eye his partner oddly. �Ai, Tommie would crack her upside the head for this kind of disrespect.�
�Falle would do the same.�
Both men glanced at each other. �Are we both referencing obscure military connections?� Ithalond said after a moment.
�'fraid so.� Suicide considered for a moment. �Bleepsinthe?�
�I said no.�
Searching her brain for what the goddess had taught her of healing, she checked for a pulse. His heart was still beating weakly. Closing her eyes, she searched for a problem she could solve. Sand had forced its way into his throat and lungs. She concentrated on it.
Sirius coughed up a small pile of sand. Sakhmet exhaled the breath she had been holding and opened her eyes. Standing up, she stumbled past the small crowd of staring people down the hall to the nearest bathroom where she promptly threw up and passed out.
The world shuddered as, without a line break or any indication, the scene abruptly switched to �the next morning,� in Sakhmet's bedroom. The two agents reeled as their bodies experienced an entire sleepless night in less than three seconds. Both were seasoned campaigners, but suddenly discovering that you haven't slept, eaten, or used the bathroom in more than eight hours can be rather unnerving.
After a prolonged humorous scramble for the best spots behind the bushes, the agents flopped down on the turf and wearily shared out a meal of lembas, jerky, and instant coffee granules eaten from the plastic container. In the time it took them to finish, the chapter came to an end (less than a page long, by Suicide's estimate), and the next one- �Kitchen Conversations�- began. Sakhmet wandered out of the bedroom where their portrait was currently hanging.
�Forth!� Ithalond shouted as the agents leapt to their feet. They gathered up their gear and sprinted away from the giant frame that showed them the Sue's bedroom. After a few steps, the pastoral scene of the English countryside faded away, and Suicide and Ithalond found themselves sprinting past a dour-looking arrangement of Black family ancestors. Sirius's great-great grandfather brandished a wand at them, but Suicide kicked over the man's chair as they dashed through, leaving at least two of the ancestors with very undignified bruises.
�They- huff- have weird taste in- agh- paintings,� the Man panted. Ithalond, thanks to cursed Elvish speed, was running easily in long strides beside him, but Suicide was definitely feeling his age. However, the avowed oddity of the Black paintings were enough to distract him from the onset of serious achiness; after the family portrait, they found themselves racing through a painted dramatization of the Black Plague, complete with the Four Horsemen running rampant.
AH, AGENT SUICIDE, a graveyard voice called out. Death pulled at the bridle of his white horse and followed the PPCers for a few strides. ON THE HUNT AGAIN, I PRESUME?
�Mary Sue-� Suicide managed to say. �Got Sirius-�
OF COURSE. PLEASE DON'T LET ME DETAIN YOU. The skeleton scratched at his skull in a truly universal gesture of puzzlement. BUT SPEAKING OF MR. BLACK, WOULD YOU MIND TELLING ME SOMETHING? I BELIEVE HE IS SUPPOSED TO BE DEAD, BUT THE AMBIGUITY IS SUFFICIENT THAT HIS CASE IS UNRESOLVED, AND YOU KNOW HOW I DISLIKE INEFFICIENCY-
�No time!� Ithalond shouted, pulling at his partner's shoulder. The heaps of corpses fell back in the distance, and a few seconds later, the French Revolution loomed up in front of them. A man with vaguely Sirius-like features was standing on the guillotine, struggling with the members of a mob who had wrenched his wand away. Suicide vaguely recalled that a branch of the famous family tree had been abruptly cut off in 1799, but his lungs were too busy protesting (a) a lifetime of hard combat and (b) three years of smoking to notice. Ithalond hauled on his arm again.
�I thought you were a soldier!� He yelled as they ran.
�A HUMAN soldier!�
�Hold on- we are almost there-�
Another pastoral landscape materialized under their pounding feet, and the agents slowed and stopped, feet pushing up turf as they fought for purchase in the dewy grass. Now they seemed to be in a nighttime scene, with a well-appointed farmhouse's windows glowing and several innocuous dogs slumbering in the yard. Ithalond and Suicide stopped and leaned against a lone apple tree, staring out at the huge frame that was their window into the kitchen. Ginny and Ron were talking about (surprise surprise!) the new arrival.
�Harry�s my friend,� replied her brother, apparently known as Ron. �Harry�s someone I know and trust. This Sock net person fits none of those categories.�
Ithalond turned to high-five his partner, but Suicide was too busy wheezing. The Elf shook his head derisively. �Honestly . . . Men.�
�You'd be . . . gasping . . . if you had a bloody . . . punctured lung . . . � Suicide managed to say. He was bent over, hands on his knees, in a pose eerily reminiscent of a shortstop eyeing a runner on first. To Ithalond, who had never played baseball in his life, it merely looked as though his partner had suddenly suffered intestinal failure.
�Punctured lung?� the Elf said interestedly. �When was that?�
�Fourth assault . . . on the third day of . . . Thermopylae . . . godsdamned Persians . . . what kind of a man . . . puts bloody needles . . . on his spearhead, anyway . . . ?�
Ithalond patted his partner distractedly on the shoulder as he watched the scene transpiring in the kitchen. Sakhmet strolled in and sharply corrected Ron's mispronounciation of her name, and then proceeded to announce that �it�s not my fault that I don�t fit said categories.�
�Not your fault? Do you even remember what happened last night? You nearly killed your own dad! Excuse me if that gives me a little bit of a reason to distrust you.�
Sakhmet shrugged. �That�s not even all my fault. The goddess chose the wrong time to manifest my powers.�
Somewhere in the distance, right on the edge of hearing, thunder rumbled ominously. The two PPC agents, thanks to internal compasses that were not always pointed due Sane, seemed to be the only ones who could hear it. Ithalond could feel the hairs on the back of his neck rise. Beside him, Suicide rose from his painful crouch, humming what sounded suspiciously like the Cellblock Tango. A short spear had somehow appeared in his hand.
�This Sekhmet must not be pleased at all,� Ithalond said cautiously. There was an answering growl of thunder, and the sound of rising wind.
�Yeah, apparently the goddess figured I was old enough to handle getting new powers. But she was busy with something else when she granted me my new gifts, so she didn�t see what was going on over here.�
�Rookie, charge for making an immortal goddess dumb enough to give powers to this bint.�
�With pleasure.�
�Bleepsinthe yet?�
�NO.�
�Who�s this goddess person?� asked Ron, who now had dirt on his nose.
�The goddess Sakhmet. She�s an Egyptian goddess of war and destruction-�
�We saw that part,� interjected Ron.
Sakhmet glared at him. �And if you stayed long enough you also noticed that she�s a goddess of healing too.�
Ithalond eyed his partner nervously, in case Suicide was going to turn red or start growling again. Instead, he saw that the Greek was barely paying attention; he had hauled out his cell phone, and seemed to be in the middle of another conversation.
�Eris? Sorry to bother you again, pal, but I need an emergency fact-check. Yeah . . . the Mythology database. Cross-reference 'Sekhmet' and 'healing.' Okay . . . let me write this down.� He had pulled out the yellow notepad and was scribbling furiously. �'Death and destruction . . . balsam for her heart . . . priests obliged to perform rituals . . . ' got it. Thanks. Yeah- how're you doing? Hey, great. Say hi to the Imaginary Objects team for me. Even that guy in the closet- whatshisface. The bogeyman. No, the other one- the one that smells like gym socks. No, don't tell him I said that! Look, it's . . . okay. Thanks. 'bye!� He clicked the phone shut and glanced at Ithalond. �It's a no go. Sakhmet is a bringer of destruction and plague, but not a healer. Power over disease and curing it ain't the same thing.�
�What does that bring us up to? Abuse of mythology?�
�Nah. At the rate she's going, I'd say we charge for contravention of nature.�
�Is that allowable?�
�She's messing with a goddess who drank rivers of blood. I say we err on the side of caution.�
�Sound thinking.�
* * *
Over the next week, the house developed another routine. Sakhmet continued her lessons every other day, and when those were done, she worked on the house with everyone else. Mrs. Weasley had forced the children to clean the house, and with Sirius back up on his feet, they were also able to test out new designs on the rooms of the house. Sakhmet estimated that, if they kept up this rate, most of the house would be finished by the time school started. Ron continued to ignore Sakhmet, and Sakhmet continued to glare whenever she was forced to remain in his presence.
Ithalond groaned. �Why? Because he asked a sensible question?�
�Ah, but you forget, Ith.� Suicide was curled up with his back against a tree, idly chewing on a stick of jerky. �She's the heroine. Therefore, anybody who dares to slander her must pay the penalty.�
�But he told the truth- she didattack Sirius!�
�Ah-ah-ah!� Suicide corrected, shaking his index finger reproachfully. �Ith, you've come a long way since we first began, and I'm proud of you. You can quip along with the best of us and assemble a charge list like a professional. But remember: mens non est postulo, eh? The motto of the PPC agent!�
Ithalond's lips moved as he parsed the sentence. �The . . . brain is not . . . required?�
�Eh, close enough.�
In her lessons, Sakhmet progressed quickly through the first year work at a rate that even Snape would compliment. By giving her more and harder work. Sakhmet didn�t mind this. The sooner she got through the first three years of her education, the easier life at Hogwarts would be.
�Case in point.� The Scythian stretched lazily as Ithalond's brain imploded. �You don't have enough of a hard shell yet. Snape giving compliments to anybody even remotely liked by Sirius? Not happening. You're still too sensitive. You have to learn to accept the Wilver Side of the Farce.�
Ithalond shook his head, dislodging murderous thoughts. �But you were the one snarling and twitching and getting drunk earlier, weren't you?�
�It is a most imperfect science, but someday I shall master it.�
�You are full of shit.�
�Ah, you learn quickly, young apprentice!�
Two weeks after the arrival of this large group, Hermione Granger arrived. Mrs. Black tried to scare her off by screaming at her, but when her granddaughter threatened to call up a sandstorm that would rip the painting to shreds, she glared sulkily instead. Sakhmet�s friendship with Hermione was cut rather short when she realized what terrible taste Hermione had in boys. When she realized the new girl had a crush on Ron, she decided to be friendly. But she doubted that she would ever be able to be good friends with a girl who actually wanted to date a guy who almost constantly had dirt on his nose.
A great deal of the summer passed by in this fashion. Until one day when Sakhmet was halfway through her third year work, the famous Harry Potter arrived.
The sound of the howling wind was louder now, edging into the brain without passing through the ears. Suicide grimaced and clambered to his feet, picking up his quiver of javelins and swinging it over one shoulder. Ithalond looked up from his perusal of the Words, surprised. �Is something happening?�
�Next chapter, she meets Harry. I think we'll have enough charges to kill at that point- we grab her while she's worked up.�
The Elf crossed his arms. �That would be your brilliant plan? What about her goddessly powers?�
�I don't know.�
�So we are just going to be killed?� Ithalond said calmly. He slung his rucksack across his back, snitching a packet of lembas out of the left pocket and taking a bite as he did so.
�Yep.�
�Why are we doing this?�
For once, the ironic attitude of the Universe got things exactly right. The scene lurched and froze as the chapter ended, and an Author's Note thundered down on the agents:
Acharne, abused egytology major, alphabet, nonononono, and wtf- Your puny insults don't really make that much of a difference. If this is such a bad story, then why are you wasting your time being petty and complaining about it? It's not going to make a difference, and it just shows that you have no life. DEAL WITH IT!
�Oh, I adore the ones who abuse people that don't shower them with praise,� Ithalond muttered. �Consider the question withdrawn. So- how exactly are we going to die?�
Suicide flourished the Disguise-Outfitting Ryticular Kostume System, currently disguised as a coffee-stained copy of a romance novel, at him. �We need to be something that can hit her hard and fast. I figure we change here, portal to the kitchen when she starts yelling at Harry, and whack her over the head before she can stop us. Of course, we can probably count on having the flesh flayed from our bones by a sandstorm, or contracting leprosy or something.�
�We shall die fighting, in that case.� Ithalond took the D.O.R.K.S. and began to fiddle with it. There was a flash, and the two agents found themselves dressed in heavy padding, with a Ministry of Magic badge on their left shoulders. Hit Wizards. As Ithalond and Suicide stowed their gear, the device fizzled and transformed itself into an empty soda can. The Greek pulled out the heavy golden ankh.
�It's been nice knowing you, Ith,� Suicide said. The partners shook hands.
�Likewise.�
For once, neither of them felt like cracking wise. The world lurched once more as the next chapter, �Another Arrival,� began. The Author announced that Snape was unusually grouchy to Sakhmet- that day he acted like he had during their first lesson- and also that the portrait of Mrs. Black was pitching a fit, but that the UberSue had shut it up by threatening to rip the canvas apart with a sandstorm. Ithalond hurried scribbled 'Blatant abuse of power' on the charge list, and then tucked it into his pocket. Suicide was watching the scene grimly, coordinates already programmed on the Remote Activator and his thumb poised over the activation switch.
Harry appeared and greeted Sakhmet �in a daze,� and was informed that there were problems with owl mail- apparently, the sole reason that Sirius hadn't known his spawn had existed. The world sped up as it suddenly became a few hours later, and Suicide punched the activation switch. The portal fizzled to life. As an Author's Note thundered past them- (A/N: This is the direct quote I warned you about.)- the agents could hear Harry's shouting drifting through the portal. For a moment, the scene's colors seemed to brighten as Canon, so long denied, reentered the room.
�SO YOU HAVEN�T BEEN IN THE MEETINGS, BIG DEAL! YOU�VE STILL BEEN HERE, HAVEN�T YOU? YOU�VE STILL BEEN TOGETHER! ME, I�VE BEEN AT THE DURSLEYS� FOR A MONTH! AND I�VE HANDLED MORE THAN YOU TWO�VE EVER MANAGED AND DUMBLEDORE KNOWS IT�WHO SAVED THE SORCERER�S STONE? WHO GOT RID OF RIDDLE? WHO SAVED BOTH OF YOUR SKINS FROM THE DEMENTORS?�
At that point, Sakhmet felt it was about time to intrude. If she could silence her grandmother, she could probably silence the boy who lived. She pushed the door open, making sure it creaked. Hermione and Ron looked at her, their eyes wide. Harry turned around, still fuming. �I guess Sirius forgot to tell me that.�
�What that I�m under-appreciated?�
�No, that you�re self-centered.�
�THAT'S ENOUGH!�
There was a thunderous crash as two full-grown men landed hard on the floor of the kitchen. Ithalond dived, tackling the Sekhmet-Sue to the floor and slamming her into the boards as hard as he could; Suicide, only a split-second behind him, hurled the ankh at the back of her head. It impacted, and there was a flash of red light and the stench of sizzling hair.
�Sakhmet Black!� Ithalond shouted, pinning the girl's arms behind her and twisting them more than was strictly necessary. �You are hereby charged by the Protectors of the Plot- aaaaaahhh!�
�Ith!� Suicide yelled- but it was too late. A hot wind whipped the Elf off his feet and dashed him into the wall, tendrils of living sand springing out of nowhere and buffeting him like a leaf. The Greek snatched a javelin out of his quiver and hurled it at Sakhmet, but the girl was glowing now, and the weapon burned to ashes in midair before it even touched her. Sakhmet rose to her feet, the wind whipping her hair around her head like a lion's mane, and pointed one finger at Suicide. Her aura of light gathered itself and charged.
Instantly, fire sprang up around him. The boards of the Grimmauld Place floor crackled and bent as tendrils of red and green flames surrounded Suicide, licking at his legs and scorching his clothing. He cursed and tried to fling a second javelin, but Sakhmet gestured; an invisible force ripped the weapons from his grasp and hurled them into the fireplace. A sinkhole of sand sprouted up, and sucked the javelins down into some unknown oblivion. The searing wind swirled in two separate torrents around the PPC agents, bringing with it the smell of brimstone. Ithalond tried to climb to his feet; the wind slapped him back against the wall, banging his head into the boards.
�Who are you?� the Sue demanded, advancing towards Suicide like the wrath of God. Claws made of energy sprouted from her fingertips, and a lion's tail lashed behind her. Her eyes were glowing red. �What makes you think you can touch me and live?�
Ithalond shouted something, but his words were lost in the howling of the wind. Sakhmet rounded on him and slashed at the air, and five long cuts appeared on the Elf's face. He cried out, either in pain or in rage, and tried to leap again. Once more, the sandstorm struck him down. The ankh lay on the floor, useless.
There was a roaring in Suicide's ears as the Elf fell. Argue and fight they may, but you never leave a comrade behind. Ignoring the fire encircling him, ignoring the pain as its heat seared his skin, he gathered his strength and leapt forward, hands clenched. Sakhmet laughed and waved a hand: the Greek was swatted out of the air and crashed into the chimney above the stone fireplace, laying open an inch of skin. Blood dripped down the brickwork, but the fury of the Suestorm kept him there, hanging in midair. Smiling like a cat, Sakhmet strolled over to the prone agent and laughingly slashed again, slicing open the skin of his chest.
�I am Sakhmet,� she hissed. �I am the goddess of war and destruction. You dare to approach me? You dare to lay hands on me? You will die for this unpardonable crime!�
A choking noise made her head whip around. Ithalond, curled against the wall where the storm had laid him out, was climbing to his feet. His teeth were clenched, and his eyes were clamped shut against the whirling sand, but he was standing nonetheless. Sakhmet frowned and flicked her hand again, opening a matching set of slashes on the other side of his face, but the Elf didn't seem to notice. Something- a little ball of paper- was clutched in his hand.
�Sakhmet,� he hissed. �Sakhmet Black. You are . . . charged as a Mary Sue . . . �
�Silence!� the girl shrieked, striding towards him. �Shut your mouth, mortal!�
� . . . by the Protectors of the Plot Continuum . . . � the Elf was forcing every word out, but his voice grew stronger with each one. The hand clutching the ball of paper was white-knuckled. �You have been charged with . . . vagueness . . . kneejerk abruptness in . . . so-called plot . . . �
�SILENCE!� Another slash. The Elf slumped, but another voice had chimed in.
�Double undefined geography!� Suicide choked out, still pinned to the chimney. His eyes were open and wide in frantic madness. �Blatant use of teenspeak!�
�Disrespecting geography,� Ithalond groaned. He raised his head again. �Abuse . . . abuse of meteorology . . . making Sirius weak . . . �
Sakhmet's eyes were wide. �Quiet! I order you to be silent!� She shouted, turning to stare at first one agent, then the other. One of Suicide's pinioned arms made a very rude gesture, and she struck him with a stinging burst of sand, but her confusion made it weaker than it should have been. �AND ABOVE ALL!� the Greek shouted through the wind, �BLATANT DISRESPECT OF THE GODDESS SEKHMET!�
�That's not the name!� the Sue shrieked. �It's Sakhmet!�
�Sekhmet!� Ithalond burst out. �Sekhmet!�
�Sakhmet!�
�Sekhmet!� the two agents roared. Around them, Grimmauld Place trembled on its foundations. The canon characters all dived for cover, shaken out of their trances by the rumbling and shaking. Suicide and Ithalond ignored this. �SEKHMET!� each screamed at the top of his lungs. �SEKHMET!�
And in that instant, several things happened.
The glow that enveloped Sakhmet, the red and green glow, suddenly began to change. It seemed to tremble and fade at the edges, suddenly laced with a brightness that it had not possessed before, and its center began to grow lighter. Sakhmet slashed at the Elf, the nearest object of her wrath, but the lion's claws that had surrounded her hands flared and died away. The winds stopped as suddenly as if a switch had been thrown, and the forces binding the agents to the walls disappeared. Ithalond fell forward onto the floor; Suicide, less fortunate, fell from seven feet above it and collapsed in a bleeding heap on the sandy boards.
Sakhmet screamed in fury and tried to lash out again, but the aura surrounding her curled around and sank into her. Another shriek, this one of pain, tore from the Sue's throat as pure light inundated every inch of her body- not the flashy glow of Magic!!!, but the hot, brilliant glow of the Nile sun at noon. Her skin crisped, her hair turned to ash, and her body crumbled into burning embers as the power fried her from the inside out. With a brief, shattering scream, she collapsed in a pile of ashes, and the light was free again.
Drifting over the scene, it dived towards the floor in a glowing cloud and struck. Power and heat flowed together, forming a figure- a tall, elegant woman, bare-chested except for a beaded collar, with the body of a goddess and the head of a lion. The mirthless fanged face turned left and right, surveying the scene: the agents crumpled on the floor, and the canon characters half-stunned by the force of the blast, crouched behind the overturned kitchen table.
The lioness shot a glance towards the group at the table, and instantly a peaceful blankness slid over the canons' faces. She bent down and picked up the golden ankh, now sadly twisted and mutilated from the force of Sakhmet's attacks, and turned it over silently in one hand. Then she looked back and forth between the unconscious agents, and what might have been a smile slid across the maw of the lion.
Healing is not my business, a silent voice said. The room flickered, and a tall man in a white linen kilt appeared, bowing to the lioness. He knelt next to Ithalond, and ran a hand over the Elf's wounds; at his touch, the slashes and abrasions healed instantly, and the blood faded away as if it had never been there. The lioness nodded to her son, and he stepped towards the unmoving Suicide, wiping away his wounds as well. An observer might have seen a bemused look on his face as he saw the dozens of scars on the Greek's form.
Well done, Imhotep. The lioness smiled on the god of healing, who bowed again and vanished as silently as he had come. Shaking her head slightly, she turned and again surveyed the scene. And well done, warriors. Go with the blessings of Sekhmet on your heads.
The world wavered, and Sekhmet faded away. A moment later, the prone figures of the PPC agents followed her, and every vestige of the destruction wrought by the Sue vanished like a bad dream. The blank-faced canons flickered as they were moved back to where they ought to be, and a moment later, resumed their conversation as if it had never been interrupted. And this time, there would be no thirteen-year-old adding her own comments.
* * *
�Mmm . . . more apple sauce, please . . . �
�Agent Suicide? Are you all right?�
� . . . pass the salt . . . �
�If he is dreaming about food, then he is well.�
�I don't understand it- you were both asleep when I came in, but you woke up very quickly. He's been asleep for three hours!�
The Greek in question licked his lips and rolled over sleepily, lost in the visions of pork dancing in his head. Ithalond shrugged and nudged him with his foot, but Suicide refused to stir beyond clutching the pillow a little more tightly. �He does not seem to want to wake up,� Ithalond observed critically.
�Then I suppose we'll just have to eat all this food by ourselves,� Mithiriel commented. �I tried out that recipe for lamb stew that I got from Agent Lacrimose, and I think it turned out quite well. A pity I made too much, but I suppose the minis will be happy to eat it.�
�Stew?�
>zip<
When Ithalond opened his eyes a second later, Suicide (still clad in the ragged remains of his uniform) was already seated at the card table in the middle of the response center. �Come on!� he shouted impatiently, tapping his fork against the surface of the table. �Are you guys going to sit there all day? There's people starving in Klatch, you know!�
There may be people starving in Klatch. However, they weren't going to get any help from two Elves and a Scythian, who proceeded to attack the meal that Mithiriel had made. After the first five minutes, when the two agents had finally stopped for breath, conversation was frothy and light; Mithiriel chatted about her plans to form a playgroup for underappreciated minis, and Suicide and Ithalond fought a fork-duel over the last baked potato.
They were halfway through the meal when there was a loud knock at the door of the response center. Mithiriel stood up to answer it (the baked potato situation had reached critical levels, and was now being resolved by rock-paper-scissors, best five out of nine). When she opened the door, she found a large wooden crate lying in the hallway; it had air holes punched in its side, and several peculiar symbols- plants and eyes, mostly- stamped on its side in black ink. An ominous breathing was coming from within.
�Help me with this, Ithalond,� she called out, and her husband promptly answered the call. The two Elves heaved the crate into the response center, where Suicide waited with a crowbar and bated breath. When it had been gotten in and the door closed, the Greek stuck the end of the crowbar under the lid and heaved, levering it off and tossing the wood away. Then, carefully, he leaned over and peered into the crate.
There was a moment of silence. �Well,� Suicide said at last, �It wasn't a dream, I guess.� And he reached down and lifted a strange creature out of the crate.
It was about three feet tall, standing on its hind legs, and had the snout of a crocodile. A fluffy lion's mane, tied into pigtails with blue bows, flowed around its shoulders, and its front legs were adorned with the fur and claws of the King of the Jungle. Its hindquarters were that of a hippopotamus. Grinning innocently, it flopped onto the foor on its gray behind and blinked up at them with wide eyes.
�What the . . . � Ithalond began. There was a note pinned to the creature's pink collar, and Suicide plucked it off.
�'To the warriors: here is a friend for you to play with. She has a name which I think you will find familiar, but she is very friendly and will not cause you trouble. She has a great deal of heart.' Damn,� Suicide observed, staring down at the mini. �I guess that's what you get when you missspell an Egyptian goddess's name. A mini-Ammet . . . good grief.�
Mithiriel shook her head firmly. �Well, we can't keep it here; this place is overrun with small things as it is.�
�Send her to that friend of yours,� Ithalond suggested. �Eris? Perhaps she shall appreciate this little one, since we could not get her the hair of the Sue.�
On the floor, Sakhmet yawned widely, exposing long rows of cutely serrated teeth. The stumpy hippopotamus tail, which also had a bow tied around it, thumped the floor as she pawed at her face. Nobody had ever seen soul-devouring evil look so adorable before.
�Sounds like a plan,� Suicide responded. �Between Thiranduil, Narnia No-Longerfled, and that damned microwave, this place is bloody well overrun. I don't think we need another tiny engine of destruction tearing up my laundry in the middle of the night.�
�Your laundry?� Ithalond snorted. �It would have to be a far braver creature than an Ammet to face that danger!�
�Hey, that was uncalled for!�
�Why? I still have not forgotten that you kicked me earlier. Consider it fair payback.�
�I had to! You were trying to throttle me!�
�Extenuating circumstances.�
�Exte- no fair, you stole my line!�
�Poor Man. Here is a pen; write to somebody who should care.�
�Says the guy who faints at the sight of a meat pie.�
�NEVER BRING THAT UP AGAIN!�
. . . and so, in RC #2771a, all was as it should be.