Hilda - Lycadea

by Paul Kater

with Maurizio on how they would travel and the way they could best keep their course. In that, the captain proved to be quite an asset. He was used to finding his way in the strangest of places. An ordinary planet would present hardly a problem, he said.

  Once all details were clear and the food packages were stashed away in many pockets, Hilda walked over to the door.

  "Hey witch, what are you going to do?" William asked. As he expected, she just kept going.

  "Hi boys," she said to the guards, after opening the door. "We're going to take a nap, so can you make sure we're not disturbed for a while?"

  "We are not here to disturb you, but to guard you, honoured witch," the spokes guard spoke.

  "Very good. Have a nice - uhm - guard." Hilda closed the door again. She came back to the other escapees in waiting. "I think I handled that quite well. Now, can you take that wall out quietly?"

  27. Through the wall, in the air

  "I think that will be possible," Rebel said. "William, can you put up a soundproofing bubble or so? I am not sure if I can make it all silent when I remove the wall."

  William thought for a short while. He had never done something like that before, but - then his face lit up. "I think I have something better!"

  "Better? How can something be better than a soundproofing bubble?" Rebel wondered, looking at Hilda and Kerna, who both shrugged.

  They watched William head over to the oatmeal machine again, and making it spit out dozens of bowls filled with the blob. When he was satisfied he poured the contents of every bowl on the floor near the door, making sure the layer of it was equally distributed everywhere.

  "Okay kids, now watch," he grinned as he came walking back to the group, his wand in hand. He pointed the wand, pronounced a spell, slowly and clearly, and then he waited. The layer of oatmealish blob started to move. Upwards mainly, where it expanded to the ceiling of the oddly shaped room. It also thickened, so the layer was about five feet thick. He had created a massive layer of Styrofoatmeal.

  "I think that should work," the wizard nodded as his wand disappeared. "And it will help in giving us a head start as well, if they try to break through that."

  "William, my wizard, you really paid attention," said Hilda, hoisting Grimalkin over her shoulders, and then fumbling in her pockets. "I'm ready. Let's go."

  Rebel nodded. She stared at the unfortunate wall. A few moments later, it simply fell away from them. A noise told them it had hit solid ground.

  "I'll go have a look first," said Maurizio, taking the lead in their escape. He stepped through the hole and looked around. "Everything is okay here. Just a little jump from here to the ground." He jumped.

  Rebel went after him. "Once I am outside I can help you if you can't jump," she told the others and leapt to the ground. Kerna with Obsi in her arms jumped also. Hilda followed, and William was the last one to leave the pyramid.

  "Good job," Hilda complimented Rebel, and Maurizio as well. "Now let's get to the flying thing and get away from here."

  They walked around the pyramid. Inside things were still quiet, nobody seemed to have noticed the wall breach yet. And then they found the flying rig. At least, that what remained of it.

  "Holy Bejeebus," William growled, "looks like Davdruw isn't so stupid after all."

  "We can put it back together," Rebel suggested.

  "I'm afraid that will take too long," the wizard said as he scratched his head.

  "I can buy us some time," the woman in leather said. "Just hold on."

  "On to" - the scenery changed - "what?"

  Rebel had employed one of her mysterious powers to transport the group and the remains of the rig to a place they had seen while flying the rig for the first time. "We're behind one of the more remote pyramids. So, let's get to work."

  The work came down to the magic man and the powers of the woman. It helped that they had built this thing once before, so the putting together was done quite quickly. As they all mounted the thing, a somewhat familiar sound reached them.

  "They've noticed we left," Hilda said as she recognised the sound of shuttle-pyramids launching.

  "Let's go then," said William. "Rebel, can you help with keeping us in the air? Then I can focus on evasive actions and keeping everyone on board."

  Hilda felt bad.

  -=-=-

  The rig lifted into the air. William kept them low. They had spotted a few shuttles already and these were high up, so he figured that staying close to the ground would give them an advantage. Unfortunately, the state of the equipment in the shuttles proved to be superior to the stuff inside the pyramids: no matter how high or low the rig flew, the shuttles picked them up and soon they had am escort of four flying around them.

  "You will follow us back to the pyramid," a voice from a loudspeaker informed them.

  "Is that so?"

  Everyone looked in surprise at the man in the red coat. Maurizio was adjusting his eye patch and said: "William, Rebel, pretend to follow them and when I say something, don't think or ask, but do it."

  "What are you up to?" Hilda wanted to know, hating that she was entirely out of control and unable to do anything constructive. This was supposed to be her job, she was not made to sit and wait for others to get her out of problems.

  "Old school tactics," the captain explained in a non-explanatory way.

  "Better watch out, William," the witch warned her wizard.

  "You will follow us back to the pyramid," the voice from the loudspeaker sounded more urgent this time.

  "Okay, we're turning," William yelled, hoping that the people would hear him.

  Apparently they did. As the rig slowed down and started a slow and wide turn, the shuttles around them followed their movements. The wizard was not going to make this easy on them.

  They were on the way back, their destination already in view, when Maurizio whispered something to Rebel, who nodded. Then he asked William how fast the rig could go.

  "Crikey, I don't know. We've been out on it a few times and never in a hurry. Also remember we have no seatbelts."

  "No what?" Hilda wondered.

  "Don't worry, I'll keep us in our seats," Rebel casually remarked. "Just hold on."

  "Again? To what?"

  Maurizio tapped William on the shoulder. "Once things changed, give it all you've got. Just go forward."

  The wizard nodded, wondering what would change.

  "Rebel... now would be good."

  Things changed. The rig was back at the position where it had been intercepted by the shuttles. William did not take time to recover from the sudden change: he pushed all the magic he had into the rig and pushed it forward as fast as he could.

  Hilda's "crappedy crap" was lost in the wind as she felt how something pressed her down in her seat. Grimalkin complained loudly about this treatment, but the speed of the rig was phenomenal. The witch was not certain if William alone was doing this or if Rebel helped a hand, but she was impressed by what suddenly was happening around her.

  "Do you think we are going in the right direction?" William yelled back to whoever could hear him.

  "No, we are going in the wrong direction, and we keep going there!" Maurizio shouted back in the rush of the wind. "No good leading these idiots to where we're going!"

  "Any guess if hiding in the clouds here is safe?" William wanted to know.

  Maurizio advised against that, as nobody knew what was inside them, so they sped on.

  Kerna sat in her chair, almost squeezing life out of Obsi and keeping her eyes closed. She did not want to know what was going on.

  Hilda was more curious: she watched the ground speed by and at a certain moment the strange concrete-like material that made up the surface was no more than crumbles. They had not seen anything resembling a house or pyramid in quite a while. She turned a bit and noticed that nothing was following them anymore. In the distance a few of the shuttles still hovered, but for some reason they held their position.

  "Maybe we can slow down a bit and
look at what's happening," Hilda yelled at Maurizio. She had to repeat her words before he understood and she breathed more easily as the rig indeed slowed down, after some shouting of the captain to William and Rebel.

  Kerna noticed the change in speed and pressure, and peeked from behind her eyelids. Relief flowed over her as she noticed that the rig was hardly moving anymore.

  "I'm going to put us on the ground," William announced. Little later they had landed.

  "Okay, everyone, check yourselves. Everything still where it belongs?" Maurizio said, cheerful as if a speed run on an improvised flying rig was the most normal thing of the day. "And that was some mean flying, you two," he complimented William and Rebel. Rebel got a kiss for that too, something William gladly missed out on.

  Obsidian and Grimalkin were pleased to have regained their freedom and started their own investigation of the meagre surroundings.

  "Nice flying, William," Hilda said. Her quick peck on the cheek was very welcome with him. Then she rummaged in one of her pockets.

  Phweeeeeeep!!

  "That is what these people in their flying pyramids get from me. Nothing more," she said with a smug look as she put the whistle away. "So... where are we?"

  The witch pulled the tablet from somewhere and switched it on. With the wood removed, it responded nice and fast. "So, we had a map. Now, let's see..." She examined the map for a while. Then she looked at Kerna. "Can you make sense of this?"

  Kerna took the tablet and together with the witch she studied the map on the screen. "I think we are here."

  "No. We have to be here. That is where the pyramid stuff is."

  "No.