After that crash, there was silence in the chamber for the space of a breath or two, as everyone stared at the jammed doors in wonder and fear.
3. Petrifaction, Radiation
Mentor Ull had a look of deep annoyance darkening his features. His eyes looked more like those of a rattlesnake than ever. “Erratic behavior! Headstrong, awkward! Why must these primitive creatures perform such irksome frolics?” The gems on his coat blazed with sudden, startling brightness, and every person in the chamber, from Menelaus on the dais to the north side to Bashan the Giant before the jammed doors at the south, suddenly froze in mid-motion, mid-gesture, able to breathe and to move involuntary muscles, but not able even to blink.
The Blue Men all sighed a little sigh, and the dog things, uttering only a yelp or two of scorn and relief, stood and relaxed and shouldered their weapons.
Naar said in Intertextual, “Most bothersome! Why must we trifle with these relicts from ages before mental unity was accomplished? Can we not at least begin to kill off all of those whom we have confirmed cannot be the one we seek?”
But Illiance said in Iatric, “Actually, only those who have eaten our food are affected…,” and he was in the act of turning toward Scipio, who was merely pretending to be paralyzed, when Scipio at that moment happened to blink.
Illiance said to him in Iatric, “Sir? Do you speak this language? What is the meaning of your pantomime?”
Scipio smiled apologetically, and shrugged sheepishly, and kicked Illiance headlong off the dais.
Two dog things fired without orders: one musket misfired, powder not igniting, and the other missed, so its musketball struck the throne behind Scipio and burned like white fire.
Scipio leaped and swung his square-pointed black blade at Illiance, who had landed on hands and knees. Illiance threw his hand before his face, and all the gems on his coat lit up.
As the blade swept down, it resisted and wobbled, in the same way two magnets of the same pole will resist if pressed together; both the logic crystal of the blade and the logic crystals of the coat whined, and then a flash of light and a snap of electric power flashed between them.
The blade was shattered in three pieces, but the gems on the coat of Illiance cracked or went dark. Both men were equally surprised, but both were not equally slow to recover: Scipio stepped on the little man, and snatched up both of the white ceramic pistols from where they stuck out from his coat pockets.
Scipio flipped up the sights with his thumbs and, holding a weapon in either hand, pointed at Mentor Ull, shouting out a command in a language Ull did not recognize.
Yndech said in Intertextual, “Let us irradiate the false Judge of Ages with our pistols, and mourn the departure of Mentor Ull. The exchange will be economical.”
But Ydmoy said, “Uncouth! You reason like a Locust. Perhaps the false Judge can be deflected via negotiation to a nonviolent admixture of motives and results. Perhaps if the false Judge were willing to compromise, he would merely shoot Ull in some extremity and maim him.”
Yndelf said, thoughtfully, “I have noted an interesting anomaly to which some attention should be paid. Was not Relict Melechemoshemyazanagual Onmyoji de Concepcion subjected to nerve paralysis with the others? While we turned our gaze to the fascinating assault on Preceptor Illiance, the Warlock seems to have hidden himself.”
Ull spoke in Iatric, ignoring the guns pointed at his head, “Negotiations are in order. I will first release the Giant Bashan, in order that he may translate our words. I no longer trust the accuracy of the Chimera Anubis.”
Ull now turned and called to the far side of the chamber. “Relict Bashan! First, command the false Judge to disarm himself. Next, order the Warlock of Williamsburg to reveal himself from hiding. Third, to each man, in his own tongue, translate these words: ‘It is required that the identity of the Judge of Ages be revealed. It has been deduced that he is posing among you in disguise. Each group is enjoined to look at those among you, and to identify whose behavior is eccentric or untypical for your order of being.’”
With another flicker of gems, motion returned to the limbs of Bashan, who stretched, and then laughed such laughter as Giants use.
Bashan turned, and raised the huge staff on which he leaned, taller than a weaver’s beam, and threw it like a spear. It passed halfway down the chamber and struck and pierced the gold containment sphere of the atomic pile. In the distance, a bell began to ring shrilly.
And with that, Bashan said mockingly in Iatric, “Little grasshopper, did you not wonder why I paused to make mention of an ability to speak all the languages here, even though the only languages I had opportunity to overhear in the medical house were yours?”
All throughout the chamber, the men and women of various ages began to groan and stir.
Scipio, who did not speak Iatric, said, “Okay! Someone who talks English or Spanish has to tell me whether the Moon-man here released the paralysis because I said so, or whether something else is going on.”
Menelaus, who had been frozen inside his cloak, now straightened and stretched and said, “Something else. The radioactivity in the chamber is drowning out the radio signals the Blues are sending to mites in our nerve clusters to paralyze us. So we can move.”
“Radioactivity interferes with radio?” Scipio asked, blinking.
“Hence the name. I see you have the same level of scientific education as a Witch.”
“Is the radioactivity going to kill us? Or mutate us into spider creatures?”
“Or less than a Witch. The Chimerae should be okay, because they are bioengineered for high-roentgen environments. The rest of us—depends on how long we are exposed. We have enough working coffins to do some cellular correction to prevent cancers and other misgrowths. It is what they were designed for. But for now…”
“For now, I shoot this guy in the head?” Because Scipio was still standing (one foot on the back of Preceptor Illiance, who was looking remarkably unflustered) with the pistols pointed at the skull of Mentor Ull, who was looking remarkably dyspeptic.
Ull said to Menelaus in Iatric, “Tell this unnamed Relict of long-ago that his antique railgun pistol is of no advantage. My embellishments”—his gems lit up as he spoke—“organize the circumambient magnetic flux to my advantage.”
And an invisible force yanked the metal dowel running down the length of each translucent barrel straight up into the air, taking the pistols with it. Scipio held on to the grips and found himself dangling in midair; he let go as the pistols were flung upward. Both pistols hung in midair twenty feet or so above the floor, and then Mentor Ull flung them both all the way down the length of the great hall and up atop the balcony, where they rang with a noise like dropped China crockery.
Scipio, shaken but unhurt, landed on his feet not far from where Menelaus stood. Illiance, freed of Scipio’s weight, was helped to his feet by two or three dog things with drooping ears, who licked his face and fussed over him, passing snarling glances of hate toward Scipio.