Reaper Man

by Terry Pratchett

  “You stop that,” said Mrs. Cake. “Everyone knows you got run over by a cart in Treacle Street because you was drunk, One-Man-Bucket.”

  s’not my fault. not my fault. is it my fault my great-grandad moved here? by rights I should have been mauled to death by a mountain lion or a giant mammoth or something. I bin denied my deathright.

  “Mr. Poons here wants to ask you a question, One-Man-Bucket,” said Mrs. Cake.

  she is happy here and waiting for you to join her, said One-Man-Bucket.

  “Who is?” said Windle.

  This seemed to fox One-Man-Bucket. It was a line that generally satisfied without further explanation.

  who would you like? he asked cautiously. can I have that drink now?

  “Not yet, One-Man-Bucket,” said Mrs. Cake.

  well, I need it. it’s bloody crowded in here.

  “What?” said Windle quickly. “With ghosts, you mean?”

  there’s hundreds of ’em, said the voice of One-Man-Bucket.

  Windle was disappointed.

  “Only hundreds?” he said. “That doesn’t sound a lot.”

  “Not many people become ghosts,” said Mrs. Cake. “To be a ghost, you got to have, like, serious unfinished business, or a terrible revenge to take, or a cosmic purpose in which you are just a pawn.”

  or a cruel thirst, said One-Man-Bucket.

  “Will you hark at him,” said Mrs. Cake.

  I wanted to stay in the spirit world, or even wine and beer, hngh. hngh. hngh.

  “So what happens to the life force if things stop living?” said Windle. “Is that what’s causing all this trouble?”

  “You tell the man,” said Mrs. Cake, when One-Man-Bucket seemed reluctant to answer.

  what trouble you talking about?

  “Things unscrewing. Clothes running around by themselves. Everyone feeling more alive. That sort of thing.”

  that? that’s nothing. see, the life force leaks back where it can. you don’t need to worry about that.

  Windle put his hand over the glass.

  “But there’s something I should be worrying about, isn’t there,” he said flatly. “It’s to do with the little glass souvenirs.”

  don’t like to say.

  “Do tell him.”

  It was Ludmilla’s voice—deep but, somehow, attractive. Lupine was watching her intently. Windle smiled. That was one of the advantages about being dead. You spotted things the living ignored.

  One-Man-Bucket sounded shrill and petulant.

  what’s he going to do if I tell him, then? I could get into heap big trouble for that sort of thing.

  “Well, can you tell me if I guess right?” said Windle.

  ye-ess. maybe.

  “You don’t have to say anythin’,” said Mrs. Cake. “Just knock twice for yes and once for no, like in the old days.”

  oh, all right.

  “Go on, Mr. Poons,” said Ludmilla. She had the kind of voice Windle wanted to stroke.

  He cleared his throat.

  “I think,” he began, “that is, I think they’re some sort of eggs. I thought…why breakfast? and then I thought…eggs…”

  Knock.

  “Oh. Well, perhaps it was a rather silly idea…”

  sorry, was it once for yes or twice for yes?

  “Twoice!” snapped the medium.

  KNOCK. KNOCK.

  “Ah,” breathed Windle. “And they hatch into something with wheels on?”

  twice for yes, was it?

  “Roight!”

  KNOCK. KNOCK.

  “I thought so. I thought so! I found one under my floor that tried to hatch where there wasn’t enough room!” crowed Windle. Then he frowned.

  “But hatch into what?”

  Mustrum Ridcully trotted into his study and took his wizard’s staff from its rack over the fireplace. He licked his finger and gingerly touched the top of the staff. There was a small octarine spark and a smell of greasy tin.

  He headed back for the door.

  Then he turned around slowly, because his brain had just had time to analyze the study’s cluttered contents and spot the oddity.

  “What the hell’s that doin’ there?” he said.

  He prodded it with the tip of the staff. It gave a jingling noise and rolled a little way.

  It looked vaguely, but not very much, like the sort of thing the maids trundled around loaded with mops and fresh linen and whatever it was maids pushed around. Ridcully made a mental note to take it up with the housekeeper. Then he forgot about it.

  “Damn wire wheely things are gettin’ everywhere,” he muttered.

  Upon the word “damn,” something like a large bluebottle with cat-sized dentures flopped out of the air, fluttered madly as it took stock of its surroundings, and then flew after the unheeding Archchancellor.

  The words of wizards have power. And swearwords have power. And with life force practically crystallising out of the air, it had to find outlets wherever it could.

  cities. said One-Man-Bucket. I think they’re city eggs.

  The senior wizards gathered again in the Great Hall. Even the Senior Wrangler was feeling a certain excitement. It was considered bad form to use magic against fellow wizards, and using it against civilians was unsporting. It did you good to have a really righteous zap occasionally.

  The Archchancellor looked them over.

  “Dean, why have you got stripes all over your face?” he inquired.

  “Camouflage, Archchancellor.”

  “Camouflage, eh?”

  “Yo, Archchancellor.”

  “Oh, well. So long as you feel happy in yourself, that’s what matters.”

  They crept out toward the patch of ground that had been Modo’s little territory. At least, most of them crept. The Dean advanced in a series of spinning leaps, occasionally flattening himself against the wall, and saying “Hut! Hut! Hut!” under his breath.

  He was absolutely crestfallen when the other heaps turned out to be still where Modo had built them. The gardener, who had tagged along behind and had twice nearly been flattened by the Dean, fussed around them for a while.

  “They’re just lying low,” said the Dean. “I say we blow up the godsdamn—”

  “They’re not even warm yet,” said Modo. “That one must have been the oldest.”

  “You mean we haven’t got anything to fight?” said the Archchancellor.

  The ground shook underfoot. And then there was a faint jangling noise, from the direction of the cloisters.

  Ridcully frowned.

  “Someone’s pushing those damn wire baskety things around again,” he said. “There was one in my study tonight.”

  “Huh,” said the Senior Wrangler. “There was one in my bedroom. I opened the wardrobe and there it was.”

  “In your wardrobe? What’d you put it in there for?” said Ridcully.

  “I didn’t. I told you. It was probably the students. It’s their kind of humor. One of them put a hairbrush in my bed once.”

  “I fell over one earlier,” said the Archchancellor, “and then when I looked around for it, someone had taken it away.”

  The jingling noise got closer.

  “Right, Mr. So-called Clever Dick Young-fella-me-lad,” said Ridcully, tapping his staff once or twice on his palm in a meaningful way.

  The wizards backed up against the wall.

  The phantom trolley pusher was almost on them.

  Ridcully snarled, and leapt out of hiding.

  “Aha, my fine young—bloody hellfire!”

  “Don’t be pullin’ moi leg,” said Mrs. Cake. “Cities ain’t alive. I know people says they are, but they don’t mean really.”

  Windle Poons turned one of the snowballs around in his hand.

  “It must be laying thousands of them,” he said. “But they wouldn’t all survive, of course. Otherwise we’d be up to here in cities, yes?”

  “You telling us that these little balls hatch out into huge places?” said Ludmilla. />
  not straight away. there’s the mobile stage first.

  “Something with wheels on,” said Windle.

  that’s right. I can see you know already.

  “I think I knew,” said Windle Poons, “but I didn’t understand. And what happens after the mobile stage?”

  don’t know.

  Windle stood up.

  “Then it’s time to find out,” he said.

  He glanced at Ludmilla and Lupine. Ah. Yes. And why not? If you can help somebody as you pass this way, Windle thought, then your living, or whatever, shall not be in vain.

  He let himself fall into a stoop and let a little crackle enter his voice.

  “But I’m rather unsteady on my legs these days,” he quavered. “It would really be a great favor if someone could help me along. Could you see me as far as the University, young lady?”

  “Ludmilla doesn’t go out much these days because her health—” Mrs. Cake began briskly.

  “Is absolutely fine,” said Ludmilla. “Mother, you know it’s been a whole day since full moo—”

  “Ludmilla!”

  “Well, it has.”

  “It’s not safe for a young woman to walk the streets these days,” said Mrs. Cake.

  “But Mr. Poons’ wonderful dog would frighten away the most dangerous criminal,” said Ludmilla.

  On cue, Lupine barked helpfully and begged. Mrs. Cake regarded him critically.

  “He’s certainly a very obedient animal,” she said, reluctantly.

  “That’s settled, then,” said Ludmilla. “I’ll fetch my shawl.”

  Lupine rolled over. Windle nudged him with a foot.

  “Be good,” he said.

  There was a meaningful cough from One-Man-Bucket.

  “All right, all right,” said Mrs. Cake. She took a bundle of matches from the dresser, lit one absent-mindedly with her fingernail, and dropped it into the whiskey glass. It burned with a blue flame, and somewhere in the spirit world the specter of a stiff double lasted just long enough.

  As Windle Poone left the house, he thought he could hear a ghostly voice raised in song.

  The trolley stopped. It swiveled from side to side, as if observing the wizards. Then it did a fast three-point turn and trundled off at high speed.

  “Get it!” bellowed the Archchancellor.

  He aimed his staff and got off a fireball which turned a small area of cobblestones into something yellow and bubbly. The speeding trolley rocked wildly but kept going, with one wheel rattling and squeaking.

  “It’s from the Dungeon Dimensions!” said the Dean. “Cream the basket!”

  The Archchancellor laid a steadying hand on his shoulder. “Don’t be daft. Dungeon Things have a lot more tentacles and things. They don’t look made.”

  They turned at the sound of another trolley. It rattled unconcernedly down a side passage, stopped when it saw or otherwise perceived the wizards, and did a creditable impression of a trolley that had just been left there by someone.

  The Bursar crept up to it.

  “It’s no use you looking like that,” he said. “We know you can move.”

  “We all seed you,” said the Dean.

  The trolley maintained a low profile.

  “It can’t be thinking,” said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. “There’s no room for a brain.”

  “Who says it’s thinking?” said the Archchancellor. “All it does is move. Who needs brains for that? Prawns move.”

  He ran his fingers over the metalwork.

  “Actually, prawns are quite intell—” the Senior Wrangler began.

  “Shut up,” said Ridcully. “Hmm. Is this made, though?”

  “It’s wire,” said the Senior Wrangler. “Wire’s something that you have to make. And there’s wheels. Hardly anything natural’s got wheels.”

  “It’s just that up close, it looks—”

  “—all one thing,” said the Lecturer in Recent Runes, who had knelt down painfully to inspect it the better. “Like one unit. Made all in one lump. Like a machine that’s been grown. But that’s ridiculous.”

  “Maybe. Isn’t there a sort of cuckoo in the Ramtops that builds clocks to nest in?” said the Bursar.

  “Yes, but that’s just courtship ritual,” said the Lecturer in Recent Runes airily. “Besides, they keep lousy time.”

  The trolley leapt for a gap in the wizards and would have made it except that the gap was occupied by the Bursar, who gave a scream and pitched forward into the basket. The trolley didn’t stop but rattled onward, toward the gates.

  The Dean raised his staff. The Archchancellor grabbed it.

  “You might hit the Bursar,” he said.

  “Just one small fireball?”

  “It’s tempting, but no. Come on. After it.”

  “Yo!”

  “If you like.”

  The wizards lumbered in pursuit. Behind them, as yet unnoticed, a whole flock of the Archchancellor’s swearwords fluttered and buzzed. And Windle Poons was leading a small deputation to the Library.

  The Librarian of Unseen University knuckled his way hurriedly across the floor as the door shook to a thunderous knocking.

  “I know you’re in there,” came the voice of Windle Poons. “You must let us in. It’s vitally important.”

  “Oook.”

  “You won’t open the doors?”

  “Oook!”

  “Then you leave me no choice…”

  Ancient blocks of masonry moved aside slowly. Mortar crumbled. Then part of the wall fell in, leaving Windle Poons standing in a Windle Poons-shaped hole. He coughed on the dust.

  “I hate having to do that,” he said. “I can’t help feeling it’s pandering to popular prejudice.”

  The Librarian landed on his shoulders. To the orangutan’s surprise, this made very little difference. A 300-pound orangutan usually had a noticeable effect on a person’s rate of progress, but Windle wore him like a collar.

  “I think we need Ancient History,” he said. “I wonder, could you stop trying to twist my head off?”

  The Librarian looked around wildly. It was a technique that normally never failed.

  Then his nostrils flared.

  The Librarian hadn’t always been an ape. Amagical library is a dangerous place to work, and he’d been turned into an orangutan as a result of a magical explosion. He’d been a quite inoffensive human, although by now so many people had come to terms with his new shape that few people remembered it. But with the change had come the key to a whole bundle of senses and racial memories. And one of the deepest, most fundamental, most borne-in-the-bone of all of them was to do with shapes. It went back to the dawn of sapience. Shapes with muzzles, teeth and four legs were, in the evolving simian mind, definitely filed under Bad News.

  A very large wolf had padded through the hole in the wall, followed by an attractive young woman. The Librarian’s signal input was temporarily fused.

  “Also,” said Windle, “it is just possible that I could knot your arms behind you.”

  “Eeek!”

  “He’s not an ordinary wolf. You’d better believe it.”

  “Oook?”

  Windle lowered his voice. “And she might not technically be a woman,” he added.

  The Librarian looked at Ludmilla. His nostrils flared again. His brow wrinkled.

  “Oook?”.

  “All right, I may have put that rather clumsily. Do let go, there’s a good fellow.”

  The Librarian released his grip very cautiously and sank to the floor, keeping Windle between himself and Lupine.

  Windle brushed mortar fragments off the remains of his robe.

  “We need to find out,” he said, “about the lives of cities. Specifically, I need to know—”

  There was a faint jangling noise.

  A wire basket rolled nonchalantly around the massive stack of the nearest bookcase. It was full of books. It stopped as soon as it realized that it had been seen and contrived to look as though it had never mo
ved at all.

  “The mobile stage,” breathed Windle Poons.

  The wire basket tried to inch backward without appearing to move. Lupine growled.

  “Is that what One-Man-Bucket was talking about?” said Ludmilla. The trolley vanished. The Librarian grunted, and went after it.

  “Oh, yes. Something that would make itself useful,” said Windle, suddenly almost manically cheerful. “That’s how it’d work. First, something that you’d want to keep, and put away somewhere. Thousands wouldn’t get the right conditions, but that wouldn’t matter, because there would be thousands. And then the next stage would be something that would be handy, and get everywhere, and no one would ever think it had got there by itself. But it’s all happening at the wrong time!”

  “But how can a city be alive? It’s only made up of dead parts!” said Ludmilla.

  “So’re people. Take it from me. I know. But you are right. I think. This shouldn’t be happening. It’s all this extra life force. It’s…it’s tipping the balance. It’s turning something that isn’t really real into a reality. And it’s happening too early, and it’s happening too fast…”

  There was a squeal from the Librarian. The trolley erupted from another row of shelves, wheels a blur, heading for the hole in the wall, with the orangutan hanging on grimly with one hand and flapping behind it like a very fat flag.

  The wolf leapt.

  “Lupine!” shouted Windle.

  But from the days when the first cavemen rolled a slice of log down a hill, canines have also had a deep racial urge to chase anything on wheels. Lupine was already snapping at the trolley.

  His jaws met on a wheel. There was a howl, a scream from the Librarian, and ape, wolf and wire basket ended up in a heap against the wall.

  “Oh, the poor thing! Look at him!”

  Ludmilla rushed across the floor and knelt down by the stricken wolf.

  “It went right over his paws, look!”

  “And he’s probably lost a couple of teeth,” said Windle. He helped the Librarian up. There was a red glow in the ape’s eyes. It had tried to steal his books. This was probably the best proof any wizard could require that the trolleys were brainless.

  He reached down and wrenched the wheels off the trolley.

  “Olé,” said Windle.