Thud! (Discworld 34)

Vimes bustled the astonished man away before Mr Boggis was killed on the spot by the God of Over-Acting, and almost walked into the one Special who could be guaranteed not to talk too much.

"And here, Mr Pessimal, here we have the University Librarian," he said. "Good man in a melee, eh?"

"But that- that"s not a man! That"s an orangutan, Pongo pongo, native of BhangBhangduc and nearby islands!"

"Ook!" said the Librarian, patting A. E. Pessimal on the head and handing him a banana skin.

"Well done, A. E.!" said Vimes. "Not many people get that right!"

And so Vimes dragged the inspector back through the crowd of damp, armoured men, introducing him right and left. Then he pushed him into a corner and, to faint stunned protestations, dragged the mail shirt over his head.

"You stick close behind me, Mr Pessimal," he said, as the man tried to move. "It could get a bit sticky later on. The trolls are up in the plaza and the dwarfs are down in the square, and both of "em are drinking up enough courage to have a good scrap. That"s why we"ll

be lining up in the Cham, right between "em, the thin brown streak, haha. The dwarfs favour battle-axes, the trolls go in for clubs. Our weapon of first resort will be our truncheons, and our weapon of last resort is our feet. That is to say, we"ll run like hell."

"But, but, you have swords!" A. E. Pessimal managed.

"We have swords, acting-constable. Yes, that is a fact, but poking holes in citizens is Watch brutality, and we don"t want any of that now, do we? Let"s get going; I wouldn"t like you to miss anything."

He harried the man again, out into the street and the stream of watchmen heading for the Cham. Apart from them, the street was empty. Ankh-Morpork people had an instinct for staying indoors when there were too many battle-axes and spiky clubs out there.

The Cham was simply a very, very wide road, once intended for ceremonial parades, a hangover from the days when the city had much to be ceremonious about. Drizzle filled it now and did not do much more than wet the pavements and reflect the light of the flares along the barricades.

Barricades ... well, that"s what they were called on the Watch inventory. Ha! Lengths of wood painted in black and yellow stripes and mounted on trestles were not barricades, not to anyone who"d been behind a real one, which was built of rubbish and furniture and barrels and fear and bowel-knotting defiance. No, these simple things were the physical symbol of an idea. It was a line in the sand. It said: thus far, and no further. It said: this is where the law is. Step over this line and you"ve gone beyond the law. Step over this line, with your massive axes and huge morningstars and heavy, heavy spiky clubs, and we few, we happy few, who stand here with our wooden truncheons, we"ll ... we"ll ...

... well, you just better not step over the line, okay?

The yellow and black edges of the Law had been set about twelve feet apart, giving plenty of room for two lines of watchmen standing back to back, facing outwards.

Vimes dragged Mr Pessimal into the centre of the Cham, between the lines, and let him go.

"Any questions?" he said, as latecomers jostled past them to take up their positions.

The little man stared towards the distant plaza, where the trolls had lit a big fire, and then turned to look the other way, at the square, where the dwarfs had lit several fires. There was the sound of distant singing.

"Oh, yes, we"ll get the singing first. At this point it"s all about getting the blood pounding, you see," Vimes added helpfully. "Songs about heroes, great victories, killing your enemies and drinking out of their warm skulls, that sort of thing."

"And then, er, they"ll attack us?" said A. E. Pessimal.

"Well, not as such," Vimes conceded. "They"ll try to attack the other bunch, and we"re in the way."

"They won"t go around us, perhaps?" said A. E. Pessimal hopefully.

"I doubt it. They won"t be in the mood for narrow alleys. They"ll be thinking in straight lines. Charge and yell, they"ll say, that"s the way."

"Ah, there"s the university over there!" said A. E. Pessimal, as if noticing the huge bulk of Unseen University for the very first time. "Surely the wizards could-"

-magic their weapons out of their hands, possibly leaving them with all their fingers? Magic them into the cells? Turn them all into ferrets? And what then, Mr Pessimal?" Vimes lit a cigar, cupping the match in his hand so that the flame made his face glow briefly. "Shall we follow where magic leads us? Wave a wand, eh, to find out who"s guilty, and what of? Magic men good? The innocent would have nothing to fear, d"you think? I wouldn"t bet tuppence, Mr Pessimal. Magic"s a little bit alive, a little bit tricky. Just when you think you"ve got it by the throat it bites you in the arse. No magic in my Watch, Mr Pessimal. We use good old-fashioned policing."

"But there are lots of them, commander."

"About a thousand altogether, I reckon," said Vimes placidly. "Plus

who knows how many more out there who"ll whale in if we let it get out of hand. This is just the hotheads and the gangs right now."

"B-but can"t you just, er, leave them to it?

"No, Mr Pessimal, because that"d be what we in the Watch call "complete and utter bloody chaos" and it will not stop, and it will get bigger very quickly. We have to finish it right now, so-"