Moving Pictures (Discworld 10)

Victor laid' a hand on his shoulder and made what he hoped would be soothing, beckoning motions. Detritus' face was a fresco of misery.

The suit of armour was still on the slab behind the screen, in front of the tarnished disc.

They stared at it, hopelessly.

Victor tentatively drew his finger through the dust. It left a streak of shiny yellow metal. He looked at Ginger.

'What now?' he mouthed.

She shrugged. It meant - how should I know? I was asleep, before.

The screen above them was bulging very fatly now. How long before the Things came through?

Victor tried shaking the - well, call it a man. A very tall man. In seamless golden armour. Might as well try to shake awake a mountain.

He reached over and tried to free the sword, although it was longer than he was and, even if he could lift it, would be as manoeuvrable as a barge.

It was gripped fast.

The Librarian was trying to read the book by the light of the screen, feverishly thumbing through the pages.

Victor chalked on the side of the slab: 'CAN'T YOU THINK OF ANYTHIN AT AL?'

Ginger took the chalk: 'NO! YOU WOKE ME UP!! I DON'T NO HOW TO DO IT!!! WHATEVR IT IS!!!.'

The fourth exclamation mark only failed to be completed because the chalk snapped. There was a distant 'ping' as part of it hit something.

Victor took the other half out of her hand.

'MAYBE YOU SHOUD HAV A LOOK AT THE BOOK,'

he suggested.

The Librarian nodded and tried to put the book in her hands. She waved him off for a moment, and stood staring into the shadows.

She took the book.

She looked from the ape to the troll to the man.

Then she pulled her arm back and hurled the book away from her.

This time it wasn't a ping. It was a definite, low and very resonant 'booong'. Something could make a noise in the place with no sound.

Victor skidded around the slab.

The big disc was a gong. He tapped it. Bits of corrosion fell off, but the metal shivered under the light blow and gave out another tinny rumble under his touch. Below it, now that his eyes were instinctively seeing it out, was a six-foot metal pole with a padded ball at one end.

He grabbed it and heaved it off its supports. Or tried to, at least. It was rusted solidly in place.

The Librarian positioned himself at the other end, caught Victor's eye, and this time they hauled on it together. Flakes of rust dug into Victor's hands.

It was immovable. The gong hammer and its supports had been turned by time and salt air into one single metallic whole.

Then time seemed to slow and became a series of frozen events in the flickering light, like moving pictures sliding through the box.

Click.

Detritus reached down over Victor's head, grasped the hammer by its middle, and lifted it up, tearing the rusted supports out of the very rock.